Page 163 of Between Soul and Vessel
Sage
My mother always had a calm, flowing way about her, much like a gently rolling tide, smooth and rhythmic. She loved to laugh, and when she did, it was infectious. Soon, you’d find yourself laughing too. Her smile was bright—so bright, it could light up the dark. That was why she’d been given her name. Luna.
When I was a little girl, I would sit on the floor in front of my mother as she brushed the knots from my hair. As she did that, she’d tell me stories. Sometimes, they were funny ones, and we’d laugh and laugh and laugh, no matter how many times I had heard them before. Other times, she would tell me fables, full of warnings.
There was one in particular she didn’t tell it often, but when she did, it always stuck with me for a while. It was of a girl whose family had left their war-torn country in hopes of finding a better life. While the girl went down to the riverto bathe, she caught the eyes of a giant wolf who stood downstream. Frightened, she waited to see what the wolf would do, worrying it had come to devour her, but the wolf simply sat there, watching her. For the next three weeks, as the family continued their travels, the wolf would appear to the girl every so often, to the point she started to trust it. One day, she was walking through the woods, searching for food, and she heard the roar of a bear. It emerged from the trees, and then it charged at her. She started to run but tripped and fell. Seconds before the bear’s massive mouth nearly clamped down on her, the wolf showed up, growling and snarling as he flew into the bear’s side, knocking it away from her. It was a bloody battle between the two animals, but ultimately, the wolf won, and the bear ran off into the trees. The wolf approached the girl. “You saved my life,” the girl said to it. She opened her arms to give the animal a hug, but its maw found her throat, and it snapped her neck. Then, the wolf ate her. He wasn’t her savior—he had just been protecting his food source all along.
Initially, the girl’s instinct had been not to trust the wolf, but with time, as it appeared to her over and over again, she’d let her guard down—something which ultimately led to her demise.
I realized now I was no different from the girl—in place of a wolf, though, it was a dragon. And instead of my life, it was my heart I had given to him. During the months we’d spent together, locked away from the world, I’d fallen deeply for the male who’d told me his name was Von, and I’d thought he had fallen for me. We vowed we would betogether. On the day that I planned to give myself to him, a bird passed through the barrier at the top, flying out of it. It didn’t ripple or wave like it had done before, and we realized the barrier that had kept us in was gone. Von flew us out of there. When we reached the top, he said he needed to get back to the emperor, to speak with him, to tell him he would take me as his wife. Then, he would return for me.
But he never did.
He never came back.
And I never saw him again . . . until today.
I could have done so much worse to him than just tossing my wine in his face, however wonderfully cathartic it felt. My only regrets was not grabbing a wine jug and dumping the entire thing on his head instead.
As the spectators cheered outside, Empress Avena strode in front of me, her too-pretty face twisted in anger as she snarled, “Explain everything. Now.”
I dabbed at my tears, wiping them from my face. “Fine, but can we speak somewhere else?”
“Very well.” Her light wrapped around us both.
We returned to the Celestial Opal Palace, and there, I told her what she wanted to know, although I left a few parts out.
Wolves came in many different forms.
Later that night, I felt exhausted, my body emotionally spent. All thanks to the bastard who had played my heart like a fiddle and then tossed it into the flames like it meant nothing to him, letting it burn to ash.
I laid on the soft, luxurious bed in the grand chambers I stayed in, an arm draped across my face, covering my eyes. Despite everything, the empress was still hopeful that I’d be able to charm Nockrythiam again. It was as if she had completely missed the part about me saying that he’d promised to come back for me, but he hadn’t. The empress seemed quite intelligent, so I couldn’t possibly understand where her blind faith was coming from. I couldn’t shake the feeling she knew something I didn’t, but what could it be?
What was I missing?
Knuckles rasped against the door.
I jerked upright and looked out the window, clocking the position of the moon. It was late, well past midnight.
I grabbed my robe off the chair and put it on as I walked over to the door and cracked it open.
A dark, brooding god stood on the other side, dressed like a regal mercenary. Leather pants wrapped around his muscular thighs, cut off by knee-high leather boots—sleek and polished, forged for combat. The neckline of his tunic was cut to a low V, granting view to the swell of thick, hard muscles waiting beneath. A cloak, pinned to his shoulders, swayed gently behind him, as if it needed to move in order to handle the immense power he exuded. Black eyes burned like coals as they lowered to mine.
“Open the door, Little Mortal,” Nockrythiam said fromthe other side.
I knew what I was supposed to do—the empress had made the role I was to play in this little charade loud and clear. But what I was supposed to do and what I wanted to do were two very different things, and damn it all, I was stubborn. I couldn’t stand the sight of the bastard.
“Go away,” I snarled, muscles firing as I tossed the door back—
Whack!
In a blur of tanned skin and silver rings, his hand slammed against the door, stopping it before it had a chance to latch. He shoved it open, and I stepped back.
Lungs heaving, my pupils turned into daggers as I stared at him. “What do you think you are doing?”
“Coming to collect you,” he said, shadows pooling around him, seeping down to the floor. Somehow, he seemed even bigger than I remembered, his towering build even more imposing. He moved with confidence. Purpose. Like some ancient predator on the prowl. A merciless, unyielding black dragon coming to retrieve his treasure.
“It’s a little late for that,” I hissed at him with the veracity of all my angry foremothers who had been left with a broken heart because of a man.
