“About anything difficult, not yet,” Zan says. “I want to put some more space between us and the cottage before we start yelling.”
“I promise I can be mad without yelling.”
“I promise I know that, but I think you should feel free to yell if you want to.”
I blink at that.
Have I ever just... yelled?
Even when using my magic, have I ever been allowed to scream?
No.
Not when my unfettered rage would have made my captors wary of me, made them constrain me more, out of fear they wouldn’t be able to control me otherwise.
I have made myself smaller, too.
I peek up at Zan.
I wonder if part of why he understands me is that he has never been allowed to rail, too.
A dragon’s roar, after all, will draw dangerous attention.
As quickly as we’re moving—between Zan’s super speed even in this form and my anger fueling me—we whisk through the trees almost at a run, a hike that otherwise might have taken an hour streaming by in a whirl.
And then there is the lake.
Out of the trees, the vision unfolds before me.
A lake so serene I can see the reflection of the surrounding trees in it. Sunlight glinting, making the world look soft. Gentle birdsong in the air.
And then me, an intrusion into this world.
This is where Zan thinks I should scream? Let out my emotions on this idyllic landscape?
“Hey,” he says.
I look at him.
“Still think I need a bath?” Zan asks.
I blink.
Then he flashes a grin at me—adare—that makes me catch my breath.
And he dashes away from me toward the lake and then takes a running dive right in.
I am mesmerized as his head pops up from under the water, as he shakes his head to dispel the water from his eyes, and beckons me, a smirk on his face.
Howcan any single person be this beautiful?
My chest is full of so many feelings—ones I probably have the training to name, but—
What am I supposed to do?Notjoin him?
In something like a daze, I follow him toward the lake.
And then I gradually pick up the pace, until I, too, am running—
