Page 27 of Redeeming the Dragon

“Won’t and can’t are often the same,” he answered gravely.

I heard the swishing of blankets and sheets being moved. The mattress creaked softly as he stood.

“I will make you an offer, though,” he said. “If you wish to use the bed, I will sit in the corner, by the doorway. You may have your bed for this night. It is half-spent anyway.”

“What does being half-spent have to do with anything?” I demanded.

When silence met my inquiry, I laughed harshly. “Let me guess—you cannot tell me that, either?”

“I am sorry,” was all he would say.

“Sorry. You are sorry.” I stormed past him, practically flinging myself on the mattress, spreading out my arms and legs so he had no room to lie down, should he change his mind. “Are you sorry you stole me from my home? Sorry you are forcing a life of loneliness upon me? Sorry you took me from sunshine and sea to a tomb of rock?”

When I heard him utter a syllable as if in response, I cut him off.

“Never mind. I’ve no wish to hear it. Good night, Dragon. Even if the night is half-spent.”

Closing my eyes, I pretended not to hear his motions as he padded across the stone floor toward the thick curtain that served as my door. As I heard him drop to the floor, I pretended that I thought nothing of him sitting on the cold, hard stone with no blankets, no cushions, no pillows. I pretended I did not hear his quiet sigh, released into the shadows that filled the air between us. And I pretended I did not know he believed I was his mate—a strange idea, that. Even stranger that he believed his method of gaining my attention was the right way to go about impressing one’s mate!

He said nothing else, and the world fell silent. Despite my efforts not to think about him and not to care…I did. Part of me felt guilty, compelling him to sit alone on the floor. The other part of me thought,He deserves this. For all that he did to me, to my family, he deserves this. I feelno pity for him.

That was a lie.

I did.

I did feel pity for him.

Just…not enough to invite him to join me in my bed. After all, I’d wanted a night away from him, and that was what I got.

The following morning, I awoke when the artificial light brightened the room. I sat up, instantly seeking the doorway where my dragon captor had spent the night. Of course, he was gone. I felt vexed. Why could he not sleep in, just this once? I wanted to see what he looked like. I’d seen his dragon form, and it was terrifying and mystifying. However, I’d not seen his human shape, and the magic of the cave seemed determined to prevent me from doing so.

What sort of creature claimed me as his mate but only visited my bed under cover of darkness? What sort of creature claimed he was compelled to stay with me during the night? What did he fear? What could a dragon possibly fear?

“Oh, I’ll never get answers,” I groaned, raking my tangled hair out of my face. “I’ll probably die alone entombed in a cave where no one knows my location and nobody except my family will remember I exist.”

As I climbed from the bed, shuffling towards the washroom, my gaze fell on a bit of blue. Shimmering, bright, and shiny—a beacon of hope against the sterile grey walls of my prison.

Thedress.

My plan.

Yesterday, I’d been content to take the matter slowly, playing the long game.

This morning?

A certain nervousness dogged my steps as I continued into the washroom to clean up and change into fresh clothing.

What did a dragon fear? What did he fear so much that he felt he couldn’t leave me alone, even in the bowels of the earth, in an enchanted cave? I didn’t know, and the thorniness of the problem dogged my footsteps I spent the morning wandering the halls for exercise.

Chapter 17

As soon as I returned, crossing the threshold of my room, I knew something was amiss. No, not amiss. Different. Something was different.

I froze, scanning the interior, my senses heightened. Before I saw it, I smelled it. Heard it. The sea. Sand. Beachgrass. Seagulls. I felt it, too. The wind off the waves, tangling in my hair.

Home,I thought. The smells, the sounds…they all screamed of my former home on the Jeweled Isles. But…how?

The question had barely formed in my reeling brain when I spotted it. There, on the wall above the desk that I’d turned into my worktable, was propped a large, oval mirror, framed in a golden frame with intricate scrollwork. The mirror hadn’t been there yesterday or last night. Not even this morning. Either the dragon-man, or the magic of the cave, must have placed it there while I was eating breakfast and getting some exercise.

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