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Chapter Thirty-One

W e settle into a routine. Mornings we go to Beanevolence, surrounded by my friends, and sometimes come home to more blurry #Alvalin photos on the news or social feeds.

Invasive as it is, at least we’ll never have the problem of never having any photos together.

Jeeze. In the afternoon, we work on the farm, surrounded by Dav’s beloved hoard.

In the evening, we play cards with the field hands, where Dav loses a small fortune in dimes (on purpose, I sometimes think), or the kids teach us the latest board game, or we tuck up in the hideous orange lounge, surrounded by one another.

He tells me stories about people whose famous names have become streets and parks: Jarvis, Brock, Pierpoint, and the other heroes of the wars he’s fought in.

I tell him stories about chem labs, and getting tipsy at tastings, and hijinks at the minigolf course on Lundy’s Lane, which now stands on the place he’d once made camp and given orders.

For good or bad, it gives me a lot of time to think.

While Janet teaches Dav how to handle the car, I look out the window and think about territory, and colonies, and wars.

When I pop back to my apartment for spare clothes and to pick up the mail, I think about property taxes, and how a small part of my rent had been landing in Dav's pocket, and I'd had no idea.

While we sit in the front window of the café, and I pour over a freshly-printed version of my thesis and the freshest academic publications so I can update it, I think about sustainability, and a dragon's life span, and what it means to modernize so much that you slide into the past.

When I meet up with Dikimbe and Mauli at the bar, I think about how everyone can see my pin, and how my behavior will forever be the yardstick by which Dav is measured.

When Stu laughs about some weird telephoto shot of me, I think about privacy, and the performative nature of social media, and what it means to be owned by the public.

When I walk past the pharmacy and catch a glimpse of Pedra, I think about food allergies, and taboos.

When we get silly videos or photos of sunsets over the lakes from Onatah, I think about how beautiful the cities on her territory are, like something out of a solarpunk futurist's wet dream.

I think about how her architects build up, not out, preserving the land and serving the people, all at once.

I think about how much urban planners here could learn from her; how much I, personally, could learn.

Mostly I think about how dragons are so firmly interwoven into the fabric of human lives, and none of us understand how much .

Never thanked you for driving me to Dav's, I text Onatah in the middle of the night.

You did, Onatah texts back, which means, like me, she's probably having a bout of insomnia. But I take your text in the spirit of searching for an opener. What's up?

Glancing quickly at Dav, asleep beside me, I roll out of bed and pad down the hall to the hideous orange lounge, where my screen light won't disturb him. ? 4 U.

Ask.

Why r drgns so separate? Have feelin Dav wld rather not live behind walls. He LIKES humans.

He really does.

I sink lower, glancing over my shoulder to make sure Dav hasn't come looking. Even though it's only texting, it feels like I'm cheating on Dav a little. But I want dirt on him that only a friend can shovel.

Dav hates walls , I agree.

First, you gotta know that Dav's young, okay?

?! He's 263!

Young. Which means he's enthusiastic about humans. Hatchlings love you guys.

Like kids like puppies?

No

Well, at least Onatah isn't into the pet analogy. Thank god.

So…?

We do best when we have a person. We're creatures of the air, and fire, and water. We’re all over the place until we find a human to be our ground.

So less like a love match, and more like a compulsion?

Dav called it his 'stupid draconic instincts' and I'm wondering how much they had to do with us falling for each other.

I asked Dav once why he liked me, and he'd given me the pretty line about caring, but it might also have been just because I was available to be the target of this instinct.

I'm okay with that. Humans have stupid instincts that want them to hook up at the biological level, too. Doesn't mean the relationship that grows out of it isn't as real.

Do you have a person of your own? Can I meet them?

No.

No, you don't have one, or no, I can't meet them?

Dav’s British.

Nice dodge. ???

They all have sticks up their asses. They live in impenetrable mansions, separate and utterly unknown to the humans in their territory. Get me?

Something… something is so close to clicking…

0 I C, I text.

But I don't.

I wake to Dav draping the sofa-blanket over me. "You can sleep longer. You were up late."

"Couldn't shut off my brain," I confess, scrubbing my eyes. "Lots to think about."

"You have been quiet, lately." Dav runs the backs of his fingers down my prickly cheek.

"Lots to think about," I repeat and sit up.

"There's no plans today."

"Kinda is, if you want this to be our ‘later’."

He sits on the coffee table so we can meet eye to eye.

"I'm not letting you off the hook," I say softly. "But if you're uncomfortable, maybe you could write it down?" Dr. Chen had suggested this method, to help me lay out my feelings to Stu in a way he couldn't interrupt or derail.

"No, no," Dav says. "I’ve stalled long enough. I want to tell you, but… I’m struggling to find the words. I wish I could…"

"What?"

"It's selfish." He nudges forward, down onto his knees, and mashing his face against my chest. Hiding. "I wish I could ask you to promise to not be afraid. But that's not fair."

"I'm not afraid of you. Your scales, the fire, none of it scares me."

"No, not…" he says softly. "It's…other things."

I pet his hair back from his temples. It’s still damp.

He hasn't done his flippy-flappy morning hair-drying routine.

It's ballet and porn, all at once. God, his hands.

The way they carry, and lift, and touch.

Styling hair. Petting goats. Sifting coffee beans.

Pulling espresso. Even when he's accidentally lightly stabbing me, I love them. I lift one of his hands to my mouth.

"Colin." He breathes my name softly, like a benediction.

"I fucking love your hands," I tell him, because he deserves to hear it.

"You may not want me to touch you again, after I explain."

Moments like this one, where we were both still sleep-muzzy and warm, it feels like I might overflow, like there's no way I'll ever find room for all of this…

all of this . But maybe I'll expand, somehow, to hold it all under my skin, close to my heart.

I'm Dav’s ground, and his gravity, and his center.

And he's my air, and my laughter, and my heat.

"So explain, and maybe let me decide for myself?"

But he's not meeting my eyes. I know how sometimes it's easier to say big things when you don't have to watch people's faces as you do, so I don’t mind. He shudders, inhales, takes the offering for what it is. "I don't want to lose… Our lives are so… our home is…"

"'Our' home," I repeat, and I meant for it to sound sarcastic, but instead, wrung out on overthinking and sleeplessness, surrounded by the smoky-amber scent of happy dragon, it comes out more awestruck and quiet.

"Of course, 'our', Colin. Everything mine is yours now, too."

I nip his ear. "So, this is a marriage."

"You are determined to apply human terms to everything that we are, Mine Own," he says, but it's not unkind.

"Just trying to understand."

"Has Onatah been a good instructor?"

"What?"

"She is my best friend," Dav says, looking up at me. After a beat, he adds: "After you. She was worried you were tying yourself into knots. Of course she texted me."

"Gossipy lizards. Does she have a Favorite?"

"Yes."

"I asked if I could meet them and she said no." I offer up the most theatrical pout I can manage.

"One day," Dav promises. "Perhaps we can… host an event. To celebrate your taking my token."

"Babe, we call those weddings."

"Ha ha ha," Dav says.

Strangely, forever with a dragon doesn't sound as terrifyingly permanent this morning as it did a few days ago.

"But, uh, before we start auditioning bands and sampling cake, maybe we could do something smaller?"

"What are you thinking?"

"I'd like to have some people over. Just my posse-Dike, Mau, Hadi, maybe Min-soo? All people you already know."

Dav makes that thoughtful prrrowt noise. "I suppose… perhaps, an evening thing? Out among the grapes?"

"Not in the house?" I watch him carefully. He did say it was uncouth to let humans that aren’t his into his nesting grounds, but if we’re going to be even in this, if we’re going to be equal, I want my friends to be able to visit.

Of course, he knows I'm gauging his reaction, so his face goes blank.

"Okay, not in the house," I concede.

He lets out a breath. "I am sorry," he starts.

"Whatever makes you comfortable," I interrupt, and it's true.

"It must seem wretchedly unfair—"

"No, actually. I get it. Small steps. Between the two of us, who has the therapist?"

Dav winces. "The more I hear of Dr. Chen, the more I wonder if I should make an appointment."

"Would you?" I ask, trying not to sound too enthusiastic.

I mean.

I love him.

But my dragon needs someone to talk to, STAT.

"Perhaps a draconic therapist," he concedes. "I'll have Sarah look into it."

"That's all I ask."

Dav squeezes me close. "You ask a great deal more than that."

"Like an informal get together among the grapes," I tease.

Dav squirms, which does interesting things where he’s pressed against my thighs.

"Why so insistent?"

"I want to show you off. Rebekah is dying to meet you."

"The ex with the excellent sartorial taste?"

I kiss that beautiful multisyllabic word out of his mouth, leaving a dimpled smile behind.

"Don't be jelly, babe."

"I'm not… jelly."

"Good."

"And perhaps she can give our shopper advice," Dav says. "Your taste is wretchedly hard to pin down."

"Ah!" I laugh. "Can't name what doesn't exist."

"Your taste?"

"Bingo."

"What about inviting your family?" Dav ventures coyly.

"Friends first. The horror of the Levesques, second."

"Horror?"

"On my part," I clarify. "Mum'll bring baby photos, and Stu will tell you it was not his fault the dock came unmoored, and he is full of shit so don't you believe him for one second, and Gem's gonna eat you alive."

"Sounds delightful," Dav says, with a dopey, dreamy look on his face.

He's asked tons about my family, but I've never heard a thing about his, except passing mentions of distant cousins, or far-off ancestors.

"So, uh, hey," I say, trying for casual and sounding the exact opposite. "What about, um, your family?"

Dav goes still again. "They're in Wales."

"I don't mind long flights."

"I don't know if…" he trails off, cornered. "Father has had to take on so much, recently. Perhaps nearer to the holidays, when they'll have the extra staff in. We'd be less of an imposition."

"It wasn't a demand," I say gently. I take his hand and kiss the tips of his fingers. "I'm in no rush."

"And mother is…"

"Passed?" I ask, heart seizing for him, that he can't say it. That I know how he feels.

"Brooding. I'm to have a sibling."

"Oh! When?"

"Anytime in the next decade," Dav says, casual-as-you-please, and fuck me.

He could be a big brother, like, tomorrow, or… or when I'm in my mid-thirties.

"Well," I say shakily. "Um. Yay? And that's normal, then? One, uh… baby?"

"Egg," Dav confirms.

"One egg at a time?"

"Generally. I am an only child. For now."

"Looking forward to it?"

"I believe so." He cups my ass playfully. "Though I ought to ask Stuart and Gemma for advice on being an older sibling."

"Please. Don't."

"So, it's not in good taste to unmoor a dock—"

"It wasn't me!" I protest.

We laugh and tussle, and it’s not until we’re downstairs, partaking of the workers’ breakfast that I realize how neatly he had talked his way out of answering the "done it again" question.

Damn, he’s good.