“I can’t order her to—”
“Don’t order her, then. Ask her.”
“Tay.”
I stop breathing. Even my heartbeat seems to fade away.
“Tay, if you can hear me—” I’ve never heard him so uncertain. “I know you have no reason to trust me. I should have protected you. I promised you salvation, but the orb won’t be enough now. Not for you, not since…” He breaks off, cursing under his breath.
“I swear to you, whoever has hurt you will pay. You’ll never have to fear being enslaved again. Just come back to us. Please.”
Come back. Back from the darkness. Back from the endless despair I’ve been running from all these years.
Ygdris brushes his fingertips across my cheek. He’s gentle, tentative… scared. The dragon who I saw incinerate a whole squad of stormbreakers is scared.
I open my eyes.
Ygdris and Raechtar are both leaning over me. I meet Raechtar’s eyes and linger in their smouldering heat for a few breaths. A warm rush of reassurance travels down his arm, through his hand and into my heart, and I flick my eyes to Ygdris.
His eyes are twin frozen stars, ringed by thick eyelashes the colour of golden sands under a hoarfrost. I leap into them. Ice kills, but the burn of frost is better than the numbing blackness inside me.
But I don’t fall. My body doesn’t go limp and boneless, an empty slate waiting for his command. Ygdris is looking at me, but at my lips, my cheeks, anywhere except my eyes.
“I told you,” he whispers, “I won’t compel you.”
Something flutters in my heart, half-relief, half… something else. I bite the inside of my cheek.
“You said…” My throat is dry. I cough, and Ygdris presses something cool to my lips, which I drink greedily. I’m parched, body and soul. “You said there was something inside me. Something growing.”
Raechtar sighs and draws back. Ygdris helps me sit up, and I see that I’m lying on a low bed in a Protectorate-style room. I can’t hide my flinch of fear.
“We’re on my ship,” Ygdris says quickly. “I promise, you’re safe here.”
“Shielded,” Raechtar explains. He stretches awkwardly, his single wing brushing the ceiling. “Protectorate can’t see it. Even I couldn’t, until Ygdris turned the camouflage off.” He shoots the dragon a half-aggravated, half-amused look. “That’ll be trouble, if it gets out.”
Ygdris waves his concern aside. “The mechanism will dissolve if anyone tries to see how it works.”
My brain is fuzzy, but my eyes aren’t. Raechtar’s still only part-transformed. “Are you okay?”
Raechtar frowns at me, and I gesture to his wing. He snorts. “This? I just need to sleep it off. And eat something. Is the kitchen stocked, Ygdris, or have you been surviving on misery and spite for the last year?”
“Sleep it off, bah. Now who’s lying?” Ygdris mutters. Raechtar glares at him, then pushes through a door and disappears. Ygdris sighs. “Forgive me. It was only the two of us for so long, and now to have you both, after this year without him…”
“Forgive you for what?” I ask. Inside, I’m screaming. He’s been without his pair for a year? He should be dead. Or mad, at least.
His gaze crackles across my lips. “For not giving you every atom of my attention.”
His attention? He wants to…?
The pit cracks open inside me. Worthless. Useless.
“Tay!” Ygdris’ voice is like a shining spear, piercing the darkness. But it’s not enough.
I can’t be his mate. Why does he think I am? Because I’m broken. Disgusting. A crawling, mewling human whore who’d degrade myself for any dragon who—
Ygdris pulls me to his chest. “Raechtar!” he yells.
Broken. Disgusting. No one would ever want you except me.