A small, tentative smile lit her face. “I do not understand, but I am grateful you feel that way.”
If only he could take her into his arms! But this was not the place, and he did not want to risk ruining the moment by saying the wrong thing, so he simply said, “I do.” And stood beside her in silence as Georgiana finished her song and resumed her conference with the dragons.
A few words drifted past, too soft to hear. Finally the large dragon rose, stretching its wings before folding them again, and then approachedElizabeth. Georgiana remained with the other dragons, leaning against the flank of the green one, watching Darcy.
The dragon spoke only to Elizabeth, not even looking at him. “Companion Elizabeth, we have heard this child’s answers to our questions. I will present them to the Nest so we may determine whether to permit you to take final vows.”
Elizabeth bit her lip. “It is not enough, what she had told you?”
The dragon brought his forelegs together. “She has a kind and generous soul, and I trust she would not voluntarily help the Wicked King. But he could still influence her, and your husband is an unknown quantity.”
She bowed her head. “I understand.” Her voice quavered.
Darcy could not bear it. Suddenly decisive, he took a step forward. “I would make a request, if I may, Honored Juniper.” Was that the right form of address, the one Elizabeth had used earlier?
The dragon blinked slowly, studying him. “What is your request?”
“I would like to prove my trustworthiness by being read.”
Another blink of the enormous eyes. What was he thinking, this creature many times his size, far older and more powerful than he? “Has anyone coerced you to do this?”
For some reason, that amused him. “My wife attempted to persuade me, but without success. Your kindness to my sister has changed my mind.”
Blink. “You understand this would be a deeper reading than merely the sharing of thoughts, and that I may see things you do not wish me to?”
Darcy swallowed hard, but he had come this far. “I do, and I ask only that you keep private those findings which do not relate to my wife’s fitness to be a dragon companion.”
“That which need not be revealed shall never be disclosed. Come, then. Place your hands on my talons and look into my eyes.”
His heart pounding, Darcy followed his instructions, moving so close that the faint aroma of burning metal tickled his nostrils. Juniper’s talons were large enough to fill his palms, smooth on top and ridged underneath, and thick with magic. The immense inhuman face loomed over him. Didflames ever come from between those sharp teeth? The dragon’s eyes were large, gold-rimmed amber, and hypnotic.
Was the mist rising again? The world was losing focus around him.
You are doing well, said a gentle voice in his head.It would be possible for me to move silently through your thoughts, but I will make myself known, so you will know what I have sensed and what is untouched.
And he could feel it, a presence drifting through his thoughts. Bringing the events of the last few weeks to the forefront. Then back to his first meetings with Elizabeth and his decision to marry her. The choice to undertake his mission.
The presence flinched away from his memory of interviewing the wounded soldiers and sailors, leaving those unexamined. Instead it went to his mother, her reappearance and Georgiana’s despair. Back to when his mother had been lost, and all the pain of the boy who believed his mother dead, an embarrassment to the Darcy of today.
The dragon comforted him.It speaks well of you. A child should feel such a loss.
Oddly enough, it helped. A small part of his bitterness toward his mother leached away.
Your mother has allowed herself to be enslaved to duty, putting it ahead of all else. There should be a balance in life. Laughter, hope, and love.
All he could think of was Elizabeth.
Yes, she can teach you to laugh more.There was a feeling of warm satisfaction.
Back to the idea of Cerridwen, then, and a sense of amusement as the dragon perceived his early hostility towards what he had believed to be a kestrel familiar.We all dislike what we do not understand. Do you not find it so?
Fortunately, while Darcy was still mentally blushing over how childish his behavior appeared in hindsight, the presence moved onto his knowledge of Faerie – sparse as it was. And his hearty dislike of it for the pain it had caused his mother and Georgiana. But the presence also understood a thought he always avoided like a poisonous snake – his deep fear of whatmight have happened to his true-born sister, the one he had never met, who had been traded as an infant for the Georgiana he knew.
There is nothing you can do, but the Faerie court does not mistreat their mortal children. They are like beloved pets to them. It is unlikely she is suffering.
But unlikely was not good enough.
No, it is not.Then the presence drew back, tugging at something in him, and suddenly he found himself in the dragon’s mind, surrounded by a cathedral of well-organized thoughts, tinted by a strange light like the last moments of a sunset.
