Every time I pushed open the door Nyte lay beyond, hope that he might have somehow awoken flickered like a candle in my chest. That he would be sitting up, and when those amber eyes found me, they would light up brighter than all the lost dawns our world had suffered.
Countless times now, that candle snuffed out the second I saw him lying in the same bed, as still as death. I didn’t think there would be a time I wouldn’t look at him and feel like a hand had punched into my chest and taken a tight grip of my heart.
Taking off my weapons, cloak, and boots, I climbed in beside him, hooking my leg over his and tucking myself into his side. He wasn’t warm, but my magick glowed under my palm on his chest, heating both of us, and I reached for the shallow song of his heart. Relief flooded me when I found it, and I closed my eyes.
My moment of peace barely lasted a minute before I heard the steps march down the hall and burst into the room without a hint of a knock. My eyes flew open and I pinned Drystan with a glare. His eyes beaming of excitement was a grating contrast to my irritation.
“Dragon bonds,” he said, grinning.
It was the brightest expression anyone in this house had mustered for weeks.
“Explain before I cast you out without moving an inch,” I warned.
Things between us had been tense. Though we’d colluded in a ploy to get the power of Lightsdeath, that’s where our alliance was supposed to end. He blamed me for leaving—dying—long ago and taking his brother away from him when Nyte closed himself off from everyone. Now it was again my fault Nyte was gone. I didn’t know if my friendship with Drystan could be mended, if he would ever forgive me, but I wasn’t giving up hope, even if I couldn’t show it right now.
“Your bond with Nyte was already forged when the curse took him,” he continued, “but what if it hadn’t been before he fell under? What if you tried to claim your bond with him now, so he would have to claimback? What if it would have been enough to awaken his consciousness?”
“As you said, our bond is forged, so that’s not an option anymore.”
“What if another bond could do the same?”
I pushed myself up, frowning and turning it over in my mind.
“A dragon?” I concluded. Drystan gave me a nod of confirmation before crossing the room to where stacks of books lay.
He spent most of his time studying in his own room, but occasionally he brought his books and journals here. We never spoke, but I had to admit the company was welcome sometimes. Even in silence, sharing the weight of the burden between us for a while was a reprieve from bearing it all alone.
“Eltanin doesn’t have a bonded rider. If we get him back by his second cycle, maybe with your persuasion he’ll choose Nyte. Forging that bond could reach a part of Nyte’s subconscious that might snap him out of his sleep,” Drystan went on, flipping through pages.
I leaned on my thighs at the edge of the bed, contemplating.
My hope began to spark as I dwelled on the possibility. There had always been somethingfamiliarbetween Nyte and Eltanin that made me believe the black celestial dragon might choose Nyte as his rider.
Drystan thumped his book shut when he found the enchanted map that seemed to have been haphazardly used as a reading placeholder at some point. What I recalled about him, and what hadn’t changed, was how chaotic and disorganized he kept his things. Yet he always remembered exactly where everything was when he needed it.
“You still haven’t learned the concept of a bookmark,” I mused.
It was an attempt at normality, kindness, but even that felt awkward between us. I despised the rift I didn’t know how to disperse.
Drystan slipped me a look, debating whether he wanted to reflect on the past with me. His jaw worked, then he busied himself with papers.
“Do you remember everything from the past?”
“Not really. Most of the time I recall things in the moment, like just now with your inability to organize a thing.”
“It’s organized my way.”
That twitched a smile onto my mouth.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. Drystan’s shoulders locked. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“So don’t.” His sharp eyes cut to me. “Let the past die.”
“I can’t,” I said desperately, pushing up from the bed. “You were my friend. The first I had beyond my suffocated life around the High Celestials and my duty.”
“Then youleftme. Both of you did, and I hadno one. You can’t blame me for healing that wound over centuries and denying you the blade to do it again.”
That hurt so deeply, a physical wound would be easier to bear right now.
