“Is she all right?” I ask roughly.
“She’s lonely and miserable.”
My heart both expands and breaks. “She has you. She has Fyrestar and Embersol. She has Sybil and Stuart.”
“She needs you. She just won’t admit it.”
Tears sting my eyes and spill over. “Does she know you’re here?”
He chirps a sound I can’t decipher. It sounds maybe like a yes, but that she didn’t like it.
“What does this mean?” I ask. He unfolds his talon and gives me back the scale I offered. Misery tears me in half. “She didn’t want it?”
“She said you shouldn’t waste your starborn magic on useless healing for no reason.”
No reason? She’s the only reason I do anything anymore. I keep ruling so her kingdom is safe from mine dissolving. I fight werebeast fanatics so they won’t even look in her direction, especially now that weres are trickling into Bloodwold to live, work, and raise families. I continue to send gold to Rita and Gerard so she’ll have a magnificent mansion and a huge fortune one day if she wants it. I rip scales from my chest and give them to her because it’s the only way I can think of to prove how much I love her.
I stare at the scale in my hand, remembering the one Rannigan took from me so long ago. The piece of me is cold and dark compared to Rimblaze’s glowing feathers in my peripheral vision.
An idea flits across my mind and sinks into my stomach, clenching my insides in a sudden, tight fist. I meet Rimblaze’s eyes, my heart suddenly pounding like a hammer against my ribs. “I think I know how to do it.”
Rimblaze’s eyes look just like mine. He cocks his head. “Do what?”
“Give her back the sunlight. The daytime. Her life. With the help of you, Fyrestar, and Embersol, I think Idallia can behold the sun again. She’ll be able to walk out in the day. She can fly in the light.”
Whatever Rimblaze tells Idallia about our conversation convinces her to meet me this time. I feel like two opposing generals on a battlefield instead of a man who loves this woman so much that my life doesn’t feel worth living without her in it. I remember her complaints about Rita and Gerard—how they saw only each other. I believe love can expand with family, but I understand the owners of Glarraden House better now. All I see is Idallia. Everything else could fall into ruin, and I’m not sure I’d care.
She lifts her chin, her eyes hard but glistening with tears. I did that to her. Hard and unhappy. The legacy from the best week of my life.
My chest folds in like a book closing on a chapter I wasn’t finished with. It wasn’t just a week, either. Our physical intimacy lasted a week, but friendship, teamwork, and admiration began from the very start. As for the yearning, I don’t remember when it started. Only that it became everything and pushed me to make choices I never should have.
We stand on the rocky plateau of the first peak of the Silver Moon Range. An autumn chill laces the night air with the scents of turning leaves, cold granite, and woodsmoke from the hamlet to the east. Everything reminds me of autumn two years ago, when all this started in earnest. The mountain has a foot in Torridaig, a foot in Bloodwold, and views to the southeast over Fanghaven. At the juncture of two kingdoms and nearly three, Idallia chose it as neutral ground, but nothing between us is neutral.
Her birds flank her. They look at me with kindness. Maybe pity. She lays a hand on Fyrestar. He stays by her side, but the younger two both come forward to greet me, Embersol with an affectionate head bump against my thigh that makes me smile softly, sadly. I stroke their warm, glowing feathers.
“Embersol’s grown so much,” I say hoarsely, my voice grating like it hasn’t been used in a decade. “She’s twice the size she was when I last saw her.”
“Blackrock Keep has a lot of rats,” Idallia says flatly. “She likes them.”
“Pest control?” If that’s humor, I fail miserably. Idallia doesn’t soften.
“The fields around the keep are terrible for hunting. The city rats are fat, at least.”
Do they miss the mountains of central Torridaig? The pines and cliffs and cold, blue lakes? The gusting winds and secret, emerald meadows tucked between soaring, snow-capped peaks? “Are you all well otherwise?” I ask.
She ignores that, saying sharply, “You have something to tell me?”
I swallow the hot ache in my throat. “I’m sorry.”
By the light of her warbirds, I see her shoulders stiffen. “I know. It doesn’t change what happened. Or what you did.”
“I know it doesn’t.” Would getting on my knees help? I don’t think so. Idallia responds to strength, but my strength feels gone. “I didn’t want to lose you. I was scared you’d leave, and everything would change.”
She huffs a sound so dry it sucks the damp sheen right from her eyes. “That’s where you made the mistake, Bale. If you’d told me, I would’ve stayed.”
My name on her lips is both everything I want to hear and a dagger to my ears. “I always meant to tell you everything a long time ago. I taught you to protect yourself and a people. I trained you to lead.” I shake my head, hardly understanding myself and my choices. It was all instinct. “But every year that went by, every Council meeting, I’d think…next year. I’ll tell her next year. We’ll all be together just a little longer. A team. A family.” My voice cracks, and she inhales with a shudder, her eyes gleaming. “And then…” I swallow. “I didn’t really understand it yet, but I needed you in my life. To talk to. To train with. To protect.” I wave a self-deprecating hand at myself. “Dragon shifter, you know…We gather and keep and safeguard. It’s against our nature to give anything up.”
“I’m not a thing, Bale. I’m a person.”
