Page 39 of Ashborne: Defiance

“You can wash now,” I muttered as I stomped past Grace, who’d sat down in the clearing where I bound myself.

This place viscerally reminded me of the torturous hours fighting my own flesh. I wanted out of here. But, in order to do that, I had to figure out what the fuck to do about the fact that the court of Fyrehold probably believed one of their precious nobles was dead, or abducted—and at the same time, figure out what had happened to my general, Donavyn.

My squad-brother, Gil, who’d joined me on this mission, would be convinced something had happened to both of us by now.

For the fiftieth time, my stomach plummeted to my toes.

I’d been so consumed. So diverted. For almost a week! Now, two kingdoms hovered on the edge of war, because I had a fucking noblewoman to turn into a dragon rider?

Who said God didn’t have a sense of humor?

I slapped at the head of a weed as I stormed across the clearing.

Donavyn Arsen, the Battle Commander and the general of the Vosgaarde Furyknight Army, and the king’s most respected strategist, had disappeared. I’d come out here to find Kham so we could fly in search of his dragon, Kgosi, the Primarch of our home herd. Those two would never be willingly separated on enemy soil.

My dragon, Kham, was a goldscale. They were gifted with a long mental reach. He could speak to another dragon at a much greater distance than others. If Kgosi was anywhere within miles of our flight path, Kham would find him.

Except, how would I keep a noted, Fyrehold noblewoman hidden in her own kingdom, and search for my general, who’d disappeared just days after we uncovered a plot to kill him?

The weight of the conflicting duties pressed me into the earth.

“Vane?”

I stopped walking, startled. I’d assumed she’d gone off to the creek the moment I told her I was done. But here she was, just feet behind me. And once again, I hadn’t heard her.

Kham wanted me to tell this woman my identity?!

Rage heated my blood. “How do you do that?!” I snapped. “How do you sneak up on me? No one sneaks up on me. Are you a witch?”

Her head snapped back and she took a step away. “I’m… what? No!”

I swallowed back a curse and made myself take a breath before speaking again. “This isn’t arrogance, Grace—ask the dragons. I have a gift. I know when I’m being followed, or ambushed. I know when enemies are close. I can feel them. But you? You just appear! From nowhere!”

She blinked, her mouth open. “But, I’m not your enemy.”

Spoken as simple truth. Bald fact.

For a moment, at the look of hurt on her face, my heart swelled, and the urge to apologize, to soothe her fear, to get closer, rushed through me—immediately followed by the voice in my head that had saved my life on more than one occasion.

You don’t know she’s not an enemy, you merely hope.

She plays the innocent woman, the helpless maid—yet she’s proven she has skill and training no normal woman, let alone a noble, would have.

Don’t trust that wounded shock—they use it to make you soften, to lower your defenses.

“I saw you,” I spat.

Her eyes went wide like a child discovered with their hand in the sweets. “You saw me what?”

I took a step closer. “I saw you. In the castle. Sneaking through the hidden passages. Watching private rooms.”

Was it my imagination that she felt relief before her brow furrowed? “If you saw me, weren’t you there as well?”

“Yes! That’s exactly my point.”

Her frown deepened. “So, I’m an enemy for watching the same people you suspected?”

“No! I mean—yes, possibly. I mean… gah!” I stopped stammering—she made me look like a fool!—and raised my chin to use my height to stare down at her. Grace’s worried look only increased. I cursed under my breath and made myself slow and think. “I meant to say, I know that you’re not all that you pretend to be, Lady Grace. So, don’t expect me to trust you. I don’t. And don’t play the innocent maiden. I know you aren’t.”