“You could have fooled me,” I mutter. “First thing you did when Roane tried to bind you was to unleash a serpent on him.”
“It was the worst monster I could think of.”
“You threatened me with a dragon.”
“I thought it was a dragon. I couldn’t find a good description.”
The opening of the door is edged with silver light, so I wander half-blindly toward it. A white oval gleams on the floor, next to the bundle of my dress, and I realize it’s the griffin egg.
Standing at the door, I gaze outside. Below the small hill sprawls the city, along with the glowing river, the mountains and the lights flickering on the cavern roof and the walls of this miniature world.
It’s strange and beautiful. Haunting and fascinating.
Like Roane.
The thought is so remarkable, I have to shy away from it.
I rub my eyes. Is this a weird dream? A beautiful nightmare? Lowering my hands, I draw a breath, and then I pinch my arm, hard.
Ow.
It feels real. It’s not a dream. I’m well and truly stuck here, every decision I make entrenching me further in this fantastical world and its inhabitants.
Gods, I don’t know what I’m doing. Why I decided Olm is my responsibility, why I refused to hand the book over to Roane to do with it as he pleases, why…
Why I’m so attracted to Roane, my thoughts losing all sense of propriety and logic when I’m around him.
“Aline?” Roane’s voice breaks me out of my trance. “Watch out.”
I take a small step back inside as he appears. “What’s that?”
He’s dragging with him what looks like… a small tree. A tangle of branches. He enters and pulls the thing after him, blocking the entrance. He brushes dust off his hands. “There.”
“Is this going to stop griffins and other assorted monsters from entering?”
“To a point. And you’ve got me to protect you, too.”
I open my mouth to tease him, but I remember the way he fought the hydra and just shake my head.
That fight had been… riveting. The way his tall body had moved, so perfectly controlled, honed to such perfection, every strike precise and hard, every move exact and smooth.
It had been sexy.
And now that we’re not anymore caught up in a dangerous struggle, when I can actually consider how that felt like, watching him, knowing he was defending me, protecting me… My body stirs.
What bad timing. What a terrible idea.
“And now?” I whisper. “What do we do now?”
“You need to rest,” Roane says, walking around the cabin, again with that faint glow about him. “I’ll keep watch.”
“What about you? You need to sleep.”
“Don’t worry about me. I can go for long stretches without sleep. I’m used to living on high alert,” he says quietly. “I won’t be able to relax, so I might as well watch over you.”
“Watch over you.”My heart melts. That particular organ doesn’t know that it’s misreading the signs, just like my body doesn’t realize he’s not what it needs.
He’s not whatIneed. What I could have. What would make me happy.
