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Kerrigan balked. “What? They’d kill you?”
Dragons are still animals, he ground out. They cull the weak.
“And after all of that, we still didn’t bond.”
Tieran nodded, turning his head away from her. I sometimes wonder if it didn’t work because I never wanted it to.
“But you can’t go back.”
No, I can’t.
“I can’t go back to my life either,” she told him. “It’s this or nothing.”
Then, we really are in this together.
“Until the end.”
He nodded and then dropped down next to her. She leaned her head against his side. Something had shifted between them. That old animosity burned off. It had never been personal for Tieran. It had been about the loss of the love of his life. And she couldn’t blame him for wanting to avoid the very place that had shattered his heart.
They stayed liked that until the sun finally fell on the horizon, and then they got to work. Neither of them could be left behind. So, one way or another, there had to be a solution.
40
The Confession
When the moon rose to its zenith, Kerrigan and Tieran finally called it a night. She was bone-weary and could probably sleep through a full day if she were able to. But they didn’t have the luxury.
They’d tried everything short of bonding again. They didn’t have the materials, and the last thing she wanted was a third look at her father being beaten by some unknown man. She’d really thought that they’d had it when they tried going into the spirit plane. But it didn’t work here.
For one, she had to be out of her body for the spirit plane to function. She’d fallen clear off of his back the first time they tried. She hadn’t been holding on tight enough, and she just plummeted. Tieran dropped back into his body long enough to catch her, but it had been problematic. The second problem was that while Tieran could fly straight while out of his body, he couldn’t make any other movements until he returned. So, even after figuring out how to keep her attached to him, it took precious time to drop onto the plane, explain what they were doing, and come back to make the maneuvers. It wasn’t like she could direct from the plane. Which would have surely been too convenient.
We’ll try again tomorrow, Tieran said, nudging Kerrigan lightly after he dropped her off in front of the estate.
She shot him a forced smile. “Sure. Tomorrow.”
She watched him fly away before creeping through the empty estate. She stepped into her room, stripping out of her warm gear, and collapsed into the bed. Theoretically, she should have been so exhausted that she passed out. That was what normal people would do. But her brain was going a thousand miles a second, and she couldn’t shut it off. This thing with Tieran was a huge problem. There had to be a way to fix it, but she couldn’t figure it out. And she needed sleep to be able to get there. Only she couldn’t sleep.
She tossed and turned for what felt like ages, but she huffed and pushed herself out of bed. Tossing on a pale nightgown, she eased back out of her room. Her feet moved before she knew exactly where she was going. It wasn’t until she stood before the door to her old room that it dawned on her.
Kerrigan gulped and then pressed the door open. She blinked in the moonlight. The room was perfect. It was set up exactly how she’d left it twelve years ago. As if it had been preserved in history. She drew a finger over the dresser, and no dust had collected there. It was well kept.
The four-poster with thick, gauzy white curtains, the palest of pink coverlet, and light-honey-colored furniture all brought her right back to that moment when she’d been taken away from this life. But what drew her eye was the open balcony door and the breeze flowing through the window. That should have never been allowed.
Kerrigan drew her magic to her and headed toward the balcony doors. If there was an intruder, she would stop them from hurting her home. Even if the word home made her chest hurt. But when she got to the balcony, she only found her father leaning against the railing. She released her magic at once.
“I wondered when you’d come up here,” he said without turning around.
She didn’t know how he’d recognized her. She’d been as silent as a mouse.
“Your shadow,” he told her, as if reading her mind.
Kerrigan glanced down and saw where her shadow overlapped with his. Smart. “What are you doing up here?”
“Enjoying the view.”
Her room always had one of the best views from Waisley. She could see for miles from her vantage point. She leaned forward against the railing. The moon cast enough light to see the edge of the forest and the tops of the homes in Lillington. Many of the House of Cruse subjects lived and worked in Lillington. Though there were other farming villages all across their feudal land.
