Page 59 of Dreams and Dragon Wings
“I wanted to carry this pain for you.”
Every moment I’ve ever stolen with Bene flickers past in rapid succession. Every letter. Every midnight flight. Every memory. Are they mine? Or his?
I no longer know. I can no longer separate one from the other.
Pain rips through me, horrific and wild, as I relive the moment I leapt off the balcony to escape Friedemar. Except this time, Bene doesn’t catch me. This time, he binds me in threads of Spirit. He pulls free from my heart a pulsating globe of light.
And then he lets me die. Shattered against the ground.
Bene’s roar thunders deep in my soul—the tortured cry of a dragon mourning hisdrakiraeven though I still don't know what that word means—as I witness myself die again and again at his hands.
Tremors wrack my form just as surely as they wrack his. This is his fear.
And now it is mine.
“Therya’kai?” Velda’s voice swims toward me as if from leagues away. I barely hear her over the racing of my heart, over the terror that slicks my body with sweat beneath my gown.
“Savren na,”Bene repeats again, the words ricocheting off the swiftly crumbling walls of my mind. We are delving too deep. Into corners of my thoughts I never wanted him to see.
Another vision flickers past—a vision I recognize all too well. I desperately try to shy away, to break the link, mortified as I unwittingly reveal to Bene one of my many dreams concerning him.
Embarrassment floods me, threatening to drown me completely. I try to run, but I am rooted in place, forced to stare down the corridor at Bene as dream after dream flashes through my mind.
Dreams of his fingers combing through my hair. Dreams of him holding me close. Dreams of him crushing his mouth to mine.
I want to die. I want to dissolve through the floor and disappear for all eternity. I would rather witness more death and destruction than this. I would rather witness him murder me in countless horrific ways than this.
Anythingbut this.
Please, I try to scream, begging Bene to sever the connection between us. I don’t know how. I don’t know how to expel him from my mind. But I dare not let him see more. I cannot bear the thought of him seeing more.
As if from far away, I hear a shout. Through the haze of my tears and Velda’s Spirit, I see the set of Bene’s shoulders tense as he shakily pushes himself away from the wall and back to a standing position.
Within my mind, I feel his urgency. And something else—a dark hunger I do not dare name.
His ghostly hold on me tightens. Protectively, possessively, he tugs me against his body even though he still stands so far away. How? That is impossible. But I feel it so plainly.
The strength of his chest. The warmth of his arms. The thrum of his heart.
Steady. Solid.Real.
I tremble, trying not to fracture into a thousand little pieces as my deepest desire plays out with such intangible clarity. Only my skin keeps me from flying apart. This is all I have ever wanted—for Bene to hold me, towantme as more than just a friend. But this can’t be real.
It can’t possibly be real.
Bene, I breathe across the link as my heart flutters wildly, as my pulse spirals out of control. I want to ask what is happening, but I dare not.
What if this is all in my mind? What if he can’t feel it, too?
Warmth stirs against my mouth like breath exhaled, and my lips instinctively part to greet it. I am truly going mad. That is the only explanation.
“Na’drakira.”That word brushes against the skin of my cheek, whispered aloud rather than in my thoughts. A fleeting caress. But it’s Bene’s voice. Warm. Rich. Yet honed to a sharp, dangerous edge.
I would know it anywhere.
“Na’therya.”Those three syllables rumble through me, sapping what is left of my strength, my resolve. I would surely collapse to my knees from the strange sensations assailing my body and mind were it not for Bene’s impossible embrace holding me secure.
I know without him saying that my dragon king wants to delve deeper still. That he wants something from me that I so long to give but dare not:
