Amos’ mouth lifted in a half smile. “I am.” He tapped his chest. “She is. I can feel it.”
“I can see your excitement,” Marcus commented. “Don’t think I’ve ever seen you this happy about anything.”
Amos looked out over the sprawling land. “Never had anything to be this happy about.” Taking a deep breath, he cleared his throat. “I’m going to ask her to stay.”
The only sound was their horses’ hooves against the hard ground. Marcus chuckled. “I think we’d all like that. I don’t know if Nathaniel and Franny will come back. They seem to like it there in the Human Kingdom.”
Amos made a face. “Really? Clover hates the cold.”
“Clover was born to be outside.” Marcus smiled, lost in thought. “It was hell trying to get her inside to eat when she was little. My wife was always chasing after her, hollering for her to come inside.”
“Clover told me how your wife died.” The story haunted Amos, and he knew it haunted the man beside him too.
Marcus used to be a general in the battalion, and while on an assignment in the North Oasis, a highborn who’d been visiting Dragon Village had come looking for him to deliver a message from the king, not knowing he had left. When Clover’s mother answered the door and told the man her husband was gone, he’d asked to come in.
Being alone with only Clover in the house, she’d told him she didn’t feel comfortable with a man in her home without her husband. The man had entered anyway. What followed was nothing short of brutal and horrific.
Clover’s mother had had the wherewithal to tell Clover to go upstairs and stay quiet when she realized an unknown man was at the door.
Clover witnessed everything.
“Did you kill the man responsible? Clover never told me his name.”
Marcus shook his head. “Couldn’t. It was Merrick Hammond.” He wouldn’t look at Amos. Merrick was the king’s closest friend and ally. Highest on the council after the king.
Amos felt sick. “We’ll kill him,” he vowed, but Marcus said nothing.
They rode in silence for a while until Marcus said, “I don’t think Clover will leave your sister. She’s taken a liking to the girl.”
Amos sighed. “I’ve thought about that, and I feel guilty for taking her from Amelia, but she’s my mate. I never should have sent her in the first place.” He didn’t know how much longer he could go without her.
“You did what you thought was right, and at the time, we all agreed, but I do think it’s time she comes back to train with the Hydra.” Marcus looked at him. “They plan to start striking soon.”
Rainer had told Amos as much. They’d start quietly, taking out high-ranking commoners under the highborns’ thumb, then moving on to low-ranking highborns. They’d work their way up, cutting off the legs of those at the top.
The biggest drawback from being sent to Dragon Village was that he couldn’t observe, but the men in power don’t change often, and what information he’d gathered while there should be a good starting point.
“I’ll beg her on my knees if I have to.”
Marcus snorted. “Rainer will love that.”
Amos didn’t care if Rainer teased him for the rest of their lives. He wanted Clover with him. His mind drifted to seeing her tonight.
I’m going to kiss her,he promised himself.No matter who is around.He’d told her as much in his last letter.
If you don’t want me to kiss you when I see you, we need a word for you to say as soon as you see me. No one will know what it means but us, and it will save me the embarrassment of others knowing you rejected me.
He’d never been as nervous as he was sending that letter. They’d flirted back and forth, but never had either been so blunt. All apprehension melted away when he received her reply.
Akiss? As in only one? I guess I can settle for oneanda hug. I know you don’t like hugs, but if I’m only getting one kiss, I deserve a hug too. I don’t think I’ll ever need a word to tell you no, but if it will make you feel better, how aboutcandle? I’m terrible at coming up with things, but there’s a candle beside me as I write, and it seems as good a word as any.
He and Marcus parted ways, and Amos took the long trail home. After passing Iris’ reins to the stable hand at the royal estate, he jogged toward the house. Clover still consumed all his thoughts. She’d become his obsession–reading her letters, watching her through Roland, feeling her in his chest.
He grimaced when he stepped through the door onto the freshly mopped floor with his dusty boots. The maid mopping glared at him.
“Sorry, Lucy,” he told the auburn-haired girl he’d saved last year.
Lucy had shown up at the estate not long after Amos moved to Dragon Village, requesting an audience with him. She’d asked if she could work at the estate for free as a thank you for saving her. Her light brown eyes seemed brighter somehow, and her medium warm beige skin glowed in a way it hadn’t the last he’dseen her. Dragon Village would do that to a person–bring out a lightness they didn’t know was missing.
