The trouble came when they had to work in close proximity.
“Hold this.” Cassia thrust a sensor array into his hands and leaned past him to adjust a dial on the main console. Her shoulder brushed his chest. Her scent enveloped him.
He clamped down on it. Hard. The effort made his jaw ache.
Cassia jerked back, eyes wide. “Was that?—”
“Static buildup.” The lie was smooth, practiced. “Common in high-energy environments.”
“That wasn’t static.” She studied him, those sea-shifting eyes seeing too much. “Your eyes just flashed. Actual lightning, not a reflection.”
“A dragon trait. It happens occasionally.”
“Does it happen when all dragons touch storm witches, or just you?”
He didn’t have an answer for that. Couldn’t formulate one, because the truth was caught in his throat and his dragon was howling for release and every cell in his body wanted to close the distance between them and?—
“We should break for lunch,” he said.
Cassia’s expression flickered. Frustration. Curiosity. Something else he couldn’t name, but that made his pulse spike.
“Running away, Elder Tau?”
“Maintaining proper research protocols. Even you must eat.”
She snorted—an inelegant sound that shouldn’t have been attractive and absolutely was. “Fine. There’s a café on the main dock. Try not to terrorize the locals while I’m getting sandwiches.”
She was gone before he could respond, the door swinging shut behind her with a force that rattled the windows.
That wasn’t good. That was the opposite of good. That was a complication he didn’t need and couldn’t afford and absolutely refused to acknowledge.
He set down the sensor array with careful precision and crossed to the window. The harbor stretched below, fishing boats and pleasure craft dotting the water. The sky was clear—genuinely clear, not Cassia’s emotional weather—and the sun glinted off the waves.
It had been easier that way. Safer. After his parents?—
He cut the thought off. That way lay pain he’d locked away long ago, and he wasn’t about to unlock it now.
He pulled out his notebook and began documenting the morning’s anomalies. His handwriting was precise, each letter formed with the same control he applied to everything else in his life.
Day 4 — Haven Shores. Subject C.G. demonstrates unprecedented magical resonance with standard survey equipment. Personal physiological response continues. Cause: unknown. Hypothesis: surge-related cognitive interference affecting dragon perception.
He stared at the words. They looked reasonable. Scientific. Completely inadequate to describe what was actually happening.
Aero closed the notebook and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes.
He was not having a conversation with his own beast about mate recognition. He was not contemplating the possibility that after all this time, his dragon had suddenly, inexplicably, decided to claim a mortal witch with unstable magic and a sharp tongue and eyes that?—
No. Absolutely not.
He was ill. That was the only logical explanation. Some surge effect that hadn’t been documented yet. He would study it, quantify it, and cure it.
He was a researcher. That was what researchers did.
FIVE
AERO
The afternoon was worse than the morning.
