Page 45 of Dreams and Dragon Wings
I had to ask. I had toknow.
“So… when is the wedding?”
Some emotion flickered through her eyes, too fast for me to name. “Next year. After I turn eighteen.” Her smile thinned. “Lord Harcourt is a few years older than us, so he wanted to wait until I came of age.”
How generous of him.
A hot spear of jealousy pierced my heart—sharp and blinding. But in its wake bloomed something far more dangerous.
Hope.
I still had one year. One year to break the curse. One year to fly back to her, to tell her everything. Who she truly was. What she meant to me. What we were always meant to be,together.
Then, it could be her choice as it always should have been.
And if she chose me?
I would bring her home. I would crown her queen.Myqueen.
“Bene,” she whispered, drawing me back to the present. “I hope you won’t hate me, but I… I didn’t bring you a present this year.” She winced, looking sheepish. “I almost thought… you wouldn’t want to see me again after I told you about Lord Harcourt.”
I didn’t know whether to be amused or offended that she thought I could be so fickle.
I finally landed on amused and cracked another smile. “You know simply seeing you is the best present.”
Then a sudden thought struck me—something I could try for my next experiment in breaking the curse. But I needed something from her first.
I took a step closer and asked, “Might I have a lock of your hair?”
Her eyebrows raised. “My hair? Whatever for?”
I hesitated. I couldn’t exactly tell her that I intended to use it in a weave, to see if perhaps her essence was some sort of key I had been overlooking all along. After all, the curse concerned her, too.
Her tone turned teasing when I didn’t immediately answer. “Bene, are you having one of your rare cheeky moments again?”
“I am,” I blurted out, happy for an excuse. “I hope you will forgive me for it.”
Drawing in threads of Earth, I wove a small dagger for myself. Nothing fancy—purely functional. With the blade in hand, I stepped in even closer and wound my fingers through Aurelia’s golden hair.
My pulse quickened at the feel of the silken strands gliding against my skin. At the sight of them nearly shining in the moonlight. Perhaps I would make something for myself from what was left over after my experiment concluded.
A ring?
I snicked my knife through her hair, taking that small handful for my own.
“Bene,” Aurelia gasped, making me pause.
I met her eyes in the darkness, afraid she was angry at me for taking too much. But all I found in her gaze was a sorrow that threatened to drag me under. To drown me beneath the weight of my own buried despair.
“Are you taking my hair to remember me by?” she asked. “Is this your way of saying goodbye?”
I thinned my lips and unraveled the threads composing my knife, seeing it dissipate into thin air. “No. If I ever say goodbye to you, Aurelia Weaver, it will be with words. To your face. I will not steal away like a thief in the night.”
A watery smile curved her lips, though it was a fleeting thing. Sad. “But we will have to say goodbye next year, won’t we?”
I froze. How did she know about that?
Cautiously, I pressed, “Why would we?”
