Page 22 of Redeeming the Dragon

For the first time since I’d addressed him, he moved, sitting up in bed. I hadn’t meant to betray my anxiety, but I found myself jolting back, scrambling away on the mattress. I was against the wall now, with nowhere else to go. He was between me and the doorway.

I should have thought better of this, I realized. I should have gotten off the bed before I confronted him, in case I needed to run.

I couldn’t second-guess myself now. As matters stood, he’d made no threatening gestures. Rather, he turned his head to look at me, and I saw gleaming, golden eyes, slitted, exactly like those of his dragon form. I shivered, and not from the cold.

“How?” he repeated, his tone forceful. Demanding. “How did you discover the dragon and I were the same?”

“I…I noticed your breath,” I faltered. “Your scent. I noticed…” I swallowed against the dryness in my throat, against the fear inspired by his unblinking, unnatural golden stare. “…your heartbeat,” I admitted at last. “I noticed that your heartbeat as you lay next to me and the dragon’s heartbeat as I flew on its back were the same.”

Was he angry? I could not judge. I felt as though I was waiting for him to explode. To lunge at me and wrap his hands around my neck. To shapeshift into a dragon and spit gouts of fire at me.

Instead,

“Unbelievable,” he said, his voice much calmer. Quieter. “I knew it must be so, and yet…to hear it confirmed…”

“What?” I swallowed down the dryness in my throat. “You knew what? What is being confirmed?”

He lifted a hand, his movements slow, so as not to frighten me. I was frightened, although his manner indicated no violence. He raised a palm to my face, gently placing it against my cheek. His skin was shockingly warm against the cool air of my bedchamber.

“That you are my mate,” he answered, his voice deep with meaning and calm with assurance. “You are the second half that will make me whole.”

Chapter 12

“I…what?”

I did not mean to, but I reared back in shock. The dragon-man’s hand fell from my cheek.

“I am not your mate,” I sputtered. “I do not even know what that is. But I know I am not it.”

“You are,” he replied calmly. He had taken no offense. “I sensed your life thread, connected to your father. That is what drew me across the sea towards your island. That is what led me to him when he was in peril, causing me to pluck him from the sea. When I flew your father home, your being, your life, your existence, guided me towards your island. And when I landed before your house and said I must have either you or one of your sisters, I knew it would be you. Fate has bound us together, lass.”

“Fate has most certainly not bound us together,” I snapped. “This is madness. You do not know me. I do not know you. I am uncertain what you are, beyond a creature of strange magic.”

“I am Warkin. Dragonkind,” he responded. “Surely you’ve heard of my kind.”

“Only a little. And I am Sanlyn. What matters it? We are not mates.”

“It is a rare and strange thing for a Warkin to find his mate outside his people,” the man acknowledged. “But that is probably because…”

He stopped.

“Because?” How I wished for light so I might see his face! I could scarcely believe the strangeness of this moment. A strange man, possessing bizarre magic, was claiming I was his mate? I did not even know what he looked like, beyond his frightening golden stare. How fearful should I be?

“I wish I could tell you,” the man replied soberly. “There is a great deal I will tell you. One day.”

To my surprise, he started to rise. Without thinking, I lunged across the bed, fear forgotten, to grab his hand.

“Where are you going?” I demanded. “I will have answers, and as you are the one with answers they must come from you!”

The man turned, regarding me soberly. Again, it was so dark I could not make out his features, except his eyes. But they were so piercing, so powerful, that I released his hand as if his skin had set mine on fire.

“Lorna,” he said quietly, his accent placing a slight burr on the “r” in my name. I’d never heard my name spoken this way. Never heard it uttered in a fashion that made it sound interesting and exotic. “You will have to trust me, lass. I mean you no harm. You are my salvation.”

“Trust you?” I shook my head to physically shake off the spell his words had thrown over me. “I do not know you,” I said, “beyond the beast—the man,” I quickly corrected, “who terrorized my home and kidnapped me. How am I to trust you? What is there to trust?”

He lingered a moment in the gloom, his body very still. I could not say why, but I had the strangest sense that I’d offended him. Or that my words had pained him. Which was ridiculous. Nothing I’d said was untrue.

“Trust that I would never hurt you,” he answered solemnly. Rather than pain, there was a gentleness to his tone, overlayed by a coat of honesty. Reassurance. “Simply wait a while longer and I will prove it to you.”

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