I want to hold on to my anger. My hurt.
But looking at him now—exhausted, guilty, trying so hard to explain the inexplicable—I can’t.
“This doesn’t upset you?” he asks quietly. “Knowing what I am?”
“K.” I meet his eyes. Time to just spit it out… the unbelievable truth of my own crazy world. “I work for dragons. My boss is a dragon. Half my friends are dragons or witches or phoenixes or other things that shouldn’t exist but do. Your world? I’ve been living in it for months.”
His expression shifts. “You… knew? About my kind?”
“Not that you specifically were one. But dragons in general? Yeah. I’ve known since—” I stop. “Since my friend hooked up with one.” God, that sounds almost as impossible as my life has become. “And I met everyone at the Aurora Collective.”
“Aurora Collective.”
“Long story. But the short version is: I accidentally exposed the existence of dragons to the internet, almost started asupernatural war, and now I work damage control for the good guys.” I pause. “Well. The better guys. It’s complicated.”
K just stares at me.
“What?” I ask.
“You have been carrying this knowledge. This entire time. Protecting it even from me.”
“Yeah.” I shrug.
“Why?”
“Because I promised I would. Because exposing dragons to the world—” I shake my head. “It’s not my secret to tell.”
“But you would have told me. If I asked.”
“If you knew to ask. If you remembered what you were.” I reach out, touch his hand where it rests on the blanket. “I couldn’t just drop ‘hey, by the way, dragons are real and I work for them’ on someone with amnesia, K. That’s not… That wouldn’t have been fair. You were confused enough.”
His fingers curl around mine. Warm. Solid. Real.
“You protected me,” he says quietly. “From knowledge you thought would harm me.”
“Or confuse you. Or… I don’t know. I just knew you weren’t ready to hear it.”
“And now?”
“Now you figured it out on your own. By turning into a giant fire-breathing lizard to save my ass from mercenaries.” I squeeze his hand. “So yeah. Cat’s out of the bag. Or dragon’s out of the… cave?”
He almost smiles.
Then his expression sobers. “There is more. About what happened. Before.”
My stomach drops. “Lyria.”
“Yes.” He doesn’t look away. Doesn’t make excuses. “I do not know who she is, Mara. I swear this to you. I have pieces—rainand ash, grief like a wound that will not heal. But no face. No name beyond what I spoke.”
“You loved her.”
“I…” He struggles. “I believe I did. Once. Before I lost my memory. Before I woke in these mountains knowing nothing.”
“And you still do.”
“I do not know.” His voice is raw. “I feel… obligation. Duty. The shape of what love was, perhaps. But not—” He stops. “Not what I feel when I look at you.”
My breath catches.
