“I remember that, too,” Florence commented.
Theo crossed his arms over his chest. “He’s not now. I had him moved.”
“What?” I stared. “How? You can do that?”
Theo glanced at Visha. “Not normally, no. But I talked to Blake. Vaughn didn’t want to be in Drakharrow. I knew he was hoping for Orphos. So Blake had Lysander take him.”
“That’s amazing,” Florence exclaimed. “That was so kind of you, Theo.”
Visha was staring at Theo oddly. “Very kind. Not very highblood.”
Theo rolled his eyes. “Maybe I’m not a very good highblood. Are you?”
Visha shrugged. “I’m whatever the fuck I want to be.”
“Then you’re lucky,” Theo said, almost accusingly. “I can’t be. But Vaughn...” He took a deep breath. “Vaughn can be whatever he wants. He has a right to be happy.”
I was fairly certain that Blake had requested Vaughn for House Drakharrow because he’d been hoping to make his cousin happy. I wondered how Blake felt knowing his work had been undone. But maybe he was simply relieved that Theo planned to avoid Vaughn.
“Hopefully you and Vaughn can still see each other sometimes and talk,” I said softly. “If you both want to, I mean.”
Theo frowned down at the floor. “Right. Maybe.” He looked at the door. “It’s getting late. Tomorrow’s our first day. I’d better be going.” He gave me a wistful look. “But it was good to see you, Medra. Outside the Tribunal chamber and alive and well, I mean.”
I came towards him and put my arms around his shoulders briefly. “You, too, Theo. I mean it. You’re one of the good ones.”
Someone punched me in the shoulder from behind.
“Hey, I resent that,” Visha complained.
“I wouldn’t dare call you ‘good,’” I teased.
She cocked her head at me. “Now you’re getting the hang of it.” She punched me lightly in the arm again. “See you tomorrow, Pendragon.” She nodded to Florence. “Good luck, Shen.”
“Thanks, Visha,” Florence called, from where she was still curled up on my bed. Neville had jumped up and joined her. He looked up as Visha and Theo left, then put his head down on his paws sleepily.
“This little fellow needs a nap,” Florence observed, running her hand over the fluffin’s back. “He’s still growing.”
“He’s lucky to have you as his mother,” I joked.
She smiled. “Well, I’m his mother half the time...” She trailed off and I realized the implication. That Blake was Neville’s part-time father.
I sighed. “I don’t want to talk about Blake.” Or think about him being responsible for raising a tiny, impressionable fluffin, even half the time.
“Right. What about dragons? Can we talk about that?” Florence asked hesitantly.
“I’ll give you the short version.” Briefly I filled her in on how my relationship with Nyxaris was going–and how it wasn’t.
“Well,” she said cautiously, when I was finished. “At least Nyxaris seems open to some communication. That’s fairly reasonable, for a dragon, I mean.”
“He saved my life,” I said bluntly. “And I won’t forget that. I owe him.”
“But can you keep this going over the year?” Florence asked quietly. “The charade, I mean.”
“I don’t know. I’m supposed to be a dragon rider. But I really doubt Nyxaris is going to suddenly agree to daily rides.” I told her what he’d said about not even thinking about a saddle and she winced.
“No saddle, all right. Well, maybe he’ll change his mind about a saddleandabout bonding with you once you get him more information about what happened to him,” she said.
“That’s the hope.” I sighed.