Page 57 of The Frost Witch (The Covenants of Velora #1)

The wind kicked up as we climbed down the mountain, the crags giving way to hills until we saw the southern road emerge.

Once, it had been a bustling trade route that circled the human lands before curving around the edge of the mountains to the coast. Now it was mostly overgrown.

Only the ancient stone wall that ran along one side made it easy to discern, and only then because it was only as tall as my waist. Any taller and it would have tumbled down to the ground a century ago.

When I’d journeyed out from the coven lands, we’d always been instructed to avoid such thoroughfares. If we came across humans, we were to take what we needed and leave no survivors.

Humans had no power or magic, nor could they enhance our own. There was no benefit in keeping them alive.

We followed the road south, the mountains lurking to the east.

When the tavern finally emerged from behind a hill, my feet stilled.

“It is busy,” I breathed, my brain struggling to make sense of what my eyes saw.

A half dozen horses were hitched to the post outside, a few of their owners smoking by the door. The structure itself was impressive. Three stories tall, built of stone, with several windows already lit and burning in the falling twilight. It started to snow as I stood there gaping.

“There are so few places like this left that the humans who are still here cling to them,” Garrick said, his voice heavy. He must have seen every sort of place Velora had in the time he’d spent collecting bounties and acting as a mercenary. If he was willing to enter, then it must be safe enough.

For humans.

“Maybe you should hide.” I had no notion how I would hide a shimmering lavender dragon the size of a large dog. But the prospect of revealing her to so many people—even a dozen—suddenly seemed ill-advised.

“Maybe you should spend another night sleeping on the ground.”

We both growled simultaneously, earning a look of wry amusement from Garrick.

“Isanara is refusing to hide,” I said.

“Shocking.”

I rolled my eyes. I knew better than to waste my time arguing with a teenager, human or dragon. Isanara did tuck herself in close to my feet, weaving between my legs as we walked. The long cloak partially covered her, and Garrick’s scowl did the rest. No one disturbed us as we entered the tavern.

Another half dozen patrons littered the inside, along with a burly proprietor who held court over the bartop that ran the entire length of the southern wall.

“Wait here. I’ll go see about lodging.”

I had no coin to offer him. I’d shoved all of it into Kyrelle’s hands before the Mercy Gate. But he was Garrick the Red. Surely two decades of fulfilling bounties had left him flush enough to afford a couple of warm beds for the night.

He returned a few minutes later, the half-moon scar at the corner of his eye crinkling suspiciously.

I planted one hand on my hip. “Let me guess—there was only one room available?”

“I have only been in Velora for twenty years, and even I know that there are not enough people within a hundred miles who could afford and fill all of those rooms,” he said. But he held my gaze, and it was anything but soft.

My teeth clenched together as my throat slid, heat rising from low in my stomach. What was it about his eyes that held me so completely? I’d never felt this pull before, not to man nor woman. Not in family, friendship, coven, or lover. Garrick the Red was in a category all his own.

“So I can finally expect some privacy.” The words sounded as false as they felt. I hadn’t had privacy in three hundred and seventy-seven years, not since my resurrection. Or ever, maybe. I’d been the youngest of three sisters.

And despite the bath I desperately needed, the prospect of privacy from him now seemed foreign. I imagined that the Lifebind on the inside of my wrist tingled, a living thing rather than a damning brand. I hated it, I reminded myself. I was supposed to hate him.

Garrick reached into the space between us. Reached for me. I let him. I leaned into it, into him, unable to separate my body and mind from the primal urges that controlled me. If he wanted to touch me, then I wanted?—

He opened his hand, revealing a single key. “There could be a thousand rooms available and we would still be sharing. My place is at your side, Koryn. Or have you already forgotten?”

Any remaining ice inside of me melted instantly, my core turning to a mess of molten desire.

I tipped my head back, hungry for every detail of his face.

The silken silver strands around his jaw begged for my touch.

His eyes burned into mine, intense with a silent demand that my body yearned to answer.

His mouth… Dark God spare me. No man should have a mouth that decadent.

“And where will I be sleeping?”

I jerked backward, miraculously finding my footing even with Isanara twining between my legs.

“You can sleep in the stables,” I huffed.

Garrick’s eyes flicked down, clocking Isanara, then back up to me as he realized what had happened.

Or maybe he didn’t, because he stepped away and continued as if nothing had happened. As if I hadn’t been willing to let him lay me down right there on the ground.

“I saw a vein of coal in the mountainside as we were climbing down. I will go fill our bags.”

Isanara snapped her jaws in approval, her tail swishing in a motion I’d come to associate with satisfaction. In contrast to the sharp way she whipped it from side to side when agitated.

Garrick shifted his pack to one shoulder and then reached for mine.

I shrugged it loose, suddenly desperate for the moment alone that seconds before had seemed incomprehensible.

But Garrick was faster. He was always faster.

His fingers closed over mine on the strap, still taut with the weight of the pack on my shoulder.

Power surged inside of me, frost and ice crystallizing in my veins. But as his warmth seeped into me, the rough callouses on his fingers brushing my knuckles, the power did not overwhelm me. It danced. It curled and flurried and moved with… joy.

I jerked away, dropping the pack. Garrick caught it easily.

“Which room?” My voice came out low and rough, but I could do nothing.

Garrick spared me that intense gaze as he dropped the key into my hand. “Top floor.”

“Which room?” I repeated.

“There’s only one.”

I might be a mess, but Garrick was completely nonplussed. As usual. He turned away and left the warmth of the tavern for the billowing storm without a farewell.

“You could go with him.”

For a second, I did not realize it was Isanara that had spoken, not the traitorous voice of my own subconscious.

“So could you.” And then I might actually have a few minutes alone.

She blinked up at me, her golden-green eyes wide. Expressive. Staring up at me like I’d lost my mind. “Someone must stay and protect you.”

“Right. Because I am so fucking incompetent that even a baby dragon is more trustworthy than me.”

“I am not a baby,” she hissed. But she did not correct my other assertion.

“Let’s go. Maybe he’ll be gone long enough I can at least have a bath. Possibly even a warm one. Do dragons bathe?”

She huffed in disgruntled approbation. “I feed on the very power of the earth. I am not bound by such mundane mortal tasks. Do you truly know so little about dragons?”

I sighed as we reached the stairs. I did not dare correct her about my mortality. “I guess so.”