My breath comes in shallow bursts, dizzying me. The sheer possessiveness in those words is at once alarming and arousing. “That sounds impractical,” I manage.
“It is, considering Atlanta is waiting in my suite for us,” he says, dropping his hand, eyes shuttering ever so slightly.
I flick my hair back and move past him. “Then we best not keep her waiting,” I say as I glance at him over my shoulder. His gaze darkens and he stalks after me all the way into his private suite.
Atlanta straightens from her seat at the central table, her mouth opening. “Kaisa, your hair. You look…you look incredible.” Her gaze flits over to Ozias for a second before landing back on me.
I incline my head. “With so much changing, I felt the need to change with it.” Meeting her at the table, I lean my hands against it, scanning the cluttered workspace beforegiving her my attention. “I suppose we ought to talk about what happened this morning.”
She tucks her mass of curls behind her shoulders and clears her throat. “You were able to stay a dragon after sunrise. That’s an astonishing level of progress in such a short time.” She sounds hopeful, yet tentative. The same feeling buds in me as she casts her gaze to Ozias, almost as if waiting for him to divulge something. Telling Ninon about mind walking to Zhoric suddenly has me wanting to tell everyone—to hold me accountable, to hold me here.
Ozias leans back against the table between us, his wide hand landing overtop mine. I startle and when I glance at him, I’m rewarded with a winsome smile, casual and confident. “I think it means you’re getting closer to tapping into your elahi.”
My brows inch together. Is Ozias still trying to get me to keep my secret from Atlanta?
Her eyes flit between the two of us, then busies her hands with the parchments, separating them into tidy piles. “That’s one possibility.”
Ozias lifts my hand and turns it in his, his thumb gliding up and down my wrist. “With a sure way to find out.”
“More training?” My efforts with Ozias and Atlanta haven’t yet produced results I’m content with.
Ozias’s smile is rampant.
“I see my torment pleases you.”
He shrugs, raising my hand to ghost his lips across the back of it. “More so I like seeing how far I can push you.”
Atlanta pushes away from the table. “I’ll finish preparing the missives for the farmhands and fisherman to plant out in the Sere.”
“I’ll take them tomorrow,” Ozias says without looking away from me.
Atlanta pauses on her way out. “Why the rush?”
He lowers my hand down to my side and slides his hands into his pockets. “The sooner the Nevobans know to expect something, the better. I have a feeling it won’t be too long before Kaisa finally reveals this hidden elahi of hers.”
“You truly think we’re that close?” Her eyes dart tome, assessing.
“We’re coming to the end. I know it.”
Atlanta opens her mouth, then bites her lower lip, keeping whatever it is she was about to say inside. She nods, then leaves the room, Ozias and I watching her until she’s well out of sight, until the sound of her steps are long gone.
I can’t stop looking at the doorway, wondering what she was going to say.
“Come with me tomorrow,” Ozias says, drawing my attention.
“What?” I ask, my mind running to catch up to his meaning.
“To disseminate the missives. Come with me.”
My mouth opens in understanding. “Out there? Beyond the Realm?” The last time I was over the Realm’s border springs to mind; being forced to the ground, Dyeus’s forces closing in on us.
“Do you trust me?” he asks.
Tilting my head, I give him a long, lingering perusal. The sharp ends of my hair graze my shoulders, reminding me of change. Reminding me I have a choice. Reminding me that I have power.
“Yes,” I say. Even though I’m afraid. Even though things can go horribly, tragically wrong. It doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
