“Sitting in complete silence for five minutes.”
“Five minutes? I’ll die. There will be nothing left but ashes and regret.”
“Learning one—just one—fact about veterinary medicine.” Her lips twitch. “And retaining it for more than ten minutes.”
“This is cruel and unusual punishment. I’m reporting you to Drayke.”
“Drayke will take my side.” She folds the paper primly. “He’s been trying to make you read for three centuries.”
“How do you know that?”
“Selene told me.” She grins. “We share intelligence now. Brotherhood secrets aren’t safe.”
The dragon stirs with delight.Clever. Mate is clever, funny, and ours.
“Counter-proposal.” I shift to face her fully. She doesn’t lean away—if anything, she angles toward me, close enough that I can smell the herbs she’s been working with. “We alternate. One item from my list, one from yours. First person to refuse loses.”
“Loses what?”
“Pride. Dignity. The right to make fun of the other person for the next century.”
“Century.” She considers this. “That’s a long time to hold bragging rights.”
“Dragons have excellent memories for gloating.”
She laughs again—easy, natural, nothing like the careful control she wore those first weeks. “Fine. Deal.” She offers her hand. “But I’m going to win.”
“You haven’t even seen the haunted lake yet.”
“And you haven’t experienced five minutes of silence.” She clasps my hand, her grip firm and warm. “May the best list win.”
I hold on longer than necessary. She notices. Squeezes once before letting go, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth.
“So.” She slides off the table, tucking her list into her pocket. “Cliff diving first? Or do you need time to practice your silence?”
“Cliff diving. Definitely cliff diving.”
“Lead the way, then.” She gestures toward the door. “Let’s see these hidden depths of yours.”
The hidden waterfallis an hour’s flight north.
I’ve been coming here for decades—a secret place where the river plunges over a cliff into a pool so deep, it might as well be bottomless. The water is cold and clean and perfect for drowning your thoughts in.
Aisling is nervous during takeoff, fingers digging into the ridges of my neck. But somewhere over the first mountain range, her grip loosens. Her body relaxes against my scales. And when I dip low to skim a glittering lake, she actually whoops.
“Do that again!”
I do it again. And again. By the time we reach the waterfall, she’s laughing and leaning forward to peer at the world below, all traces of tension gone.
We land on a ledge overlooking the falls. The roar of water fills the air, mist rising from the churning pool in rainbows.Aisling approaches the edge, looks down at the hundreds of feet of nothing, and lets out a low whistle.
“That’s a long way down.”
“Scared?”
She shoots me a look over her shoulder. “Terrified.” But she’s grinning. “Let’s do it anyway.”
Something warm expands in my chest. “I’ll shift the second we’re airborne. Catch you before we hit the water.”
