She trailed off, but the implication was clear enough to make my heart rate quicken.
"Not the one you what?" I asked.
She met my gaze directly, challenge in her eyes. "You know what."
I did know, or at least I hoped I did. But part of me needed to hear it said explicitly, needed the confirmation that I hadn't imagined the connection between us.
"I need you to tell me."
She sighed. "I don't want misunderstandings between us, Alar. Things are different now that we are both at the academy. It's no longer as hopeless as we both thought it was before and during the pilgrimage. We can allow this thing between us to grow. We can give each other another chance."
"I would like that." The tight knot in my chest began to unravel. "I admit that I've been hasty in jumping to conclusions, but it was hard to interpret the scene differently from where I stood. You barely spared me a glance before climbing his dragon, but I understand now that you were overwhelmed."
A small smile played at the corner of her mouth. "An apology from the mighty Alar? I should mark this day on my calendar."
"I didn't actually apologize," I pointed out.
"It was implied." She rose to her feet and took a step closer to me. "So, are we friends again? Or...whatever we were?"
The question was an opening, an invitation to define what lay between us. I hesitated, knowing the wise course would be to maintain distance and focus on my mission, but looking at her now, so close that I could count the faint freckles across her nose, I knew that reason was not going to prevail because it was a poor substitute for what my heart wanted.
"I'd like to find out," I said, standing up and offering my hand to her.
She took it, and a bolt of electricity arced between us.
"Did you feel that?" Kailin asked.
"Every damn time."
I wanted to pull her into my arms and kiss her until she forgot not only Commander Ravel but also her own name, but I didn't want to jump into anything yet. I needed more time to process and decide if I could or should take our relationship any further than this.
If I cared to be honest with myself, it had been convenient to be angry. It had made things easier. The decision had been taken away from me, and all I had to do was brood and feel sorry for myself.
Now the ball was back in my corner, and I needed to take responsibility for it.
We stood there for a moment, the air between us charged with possibility. I started to raise my hand to cup her cheek when another knock sounded at the door.
"Alar? You in there?" Morek's voice sounded through the wood. "Jarren is kicking us out of the lounge, saying that curfewstarts in half an hour. Codric asked me to tell you that if you want to shower, you'd better do it quickly."
I had a feeling that the warning wasn't about my shower, which Codric would have assumed I had already taken, but about Kailin needing to leave.
She stepped back, the moment broken. "I'll see you tomorrow, then."
I nodded, reluctant to see her leave. "Breakfast date?"
She smiled. "You got it."
50
KAILIN
"Before truth's reveal, the seed of honesty must bloom into a deeper trust."
—Shaman Saphir Fatewever
When I closed the door behind me, the corridor outside Alar's room was empty, which was fortunate since the smile plastered across my face could have been misconstrued.
I tried to get rid of that stupid grin by focusing on the strange combination of electric lights and olive torches in the corridor stretching out before me. It was actually a clever solution to thefrequent power outages plaguing Elucia. The erratic behavior of the electromagnetic currents caused interruptions, ranging in duration from minutes to days. Everyone kept oil lamps on hand, but torches seemed more fitting for a structure that had been originally built before the First Extinction War. The Shedun had destroyed everything they could, but they couldn't destroy the mountain itself, and when Elucians returned to their ancestral land, the Dragon Force Citadel and the aviary had been reconstructed.
