Page 33 of Star Bright
No, she was thinking more, much more…
He paused, his fingers blanching on the door handle. “You won’t be afraid of me, will you? When you see the beast?”
Despite other things trying to grab her attention, she found her focus arrowing to those gray eyes. “I didn’t panic when I saw those green eggs.”
He snorted. “Let’s go before I beg off. I can’t shift in here because I won’t fit through the regular doors. You’d have to openthe larger bay doors for me, which would let out all the fireplace heat, and we don’t want that.”
Yeah, a dad for sure.
But as she followed him outside—her disobedient gaze falling only once to his bare backside—she had to admit she wasn’t exactly thinking about his kindness, his gentle parenting, his environmental sensibilities, or anything like that. She wrapped her arms around herself, not even feeling the cold, just holding herself together so she didn’t start babbling.
He glanced over his shoulder at her. “Not too close. It’s been a while—more than a hundred years—since I let it out.”
She bit her lip. “If this isn’t a good idea, or you want to do it alone—”
“No, not alone.” He half crouched, one hand braced in the snow, thick thighs flexed. Then he leaped into the sky.
Before she could finish her startled inhale, he was a dragon. To her dazzled eyes, it wasn’t really a change or even a shifting of shape. He just…showed her a different facet of himself, like a dancer’s body didn’t leave humanity behind but simply unfurled into something more, a thing of music and beauty and power.
The rush of his takeoff pulled vortices of snow upward, like a snowfall in reverse. She took a few stumbling steps forward, as if she too was caught in his flight. His wings were dark against the failing light, but some iridescence caught the snow shimmer, like a disco ball in black and white.
He was like nothing she’d ever dreamed of. She would’ve been entirely thrilled with the magical moment, watching him trace intricate shapes above the pine trees, but then he came arrowing back to her, those wide wings folded tight as if he would crash once again. But at the last moment, his wings flared wide in a riot of snow, as she laughed out loud as he landed in a crouch in front of her.
She clasped her hands together under her chin, enchanted. “So this is a drakling. You are amazing.”
He arched his serpentine neck, angling his head toward her. She yearned to pet the smooth snout, but that seemed weird when this was still Vash. So she kept her hands to herself. Angling back on his haunches, he lifted his front legs out of the snow. His talons weren’t quite as shocking as an eagle’s, but neither did they look as gentle as the grasp that had held his children. Especially when he made grabby hands at her.
She blinked. “I guess I was thinking I would ride you,” she said to explain her hesitation. Then a particularly lurid image popped into her mind. And she was definitely not going to explainthathesitation. “You mean you have to hold me?”
He made a noise that her translator couldn’t parse. She’d read in the handbook that in beast shape, draklings lacked the vocal apparatus for speech. But the overemphasized nod of his head was clear.
She swallowed. “It’s not that I don’t trust you…”
Except wasn’t that exactly a problem? Just because Christopher had let her go was no reason to fear the same with Vash.
She’d just watched the way he’d stepped out naked into the snow and launched into the sky. Couldn’t she do the same?
Not by herself, of course.
She stepped toward him. “Don’t laugh if I scream,” she whispered.
He enveloped her, wings coming around like a different sort of fantastical refuge. The vanes were partly leathery, partly notched with tiny scales like a butterfly. Those little scales had been what caught the light, she realized.
His claws around her were even more exacting than when he’d carried his children, as he was clearly aware of the sharpness of his talons and the tenderness of her jacket, notto mention the flesh within. He gathered her close to his breastbone. So warm and sheltered. When he pulled her even closer, as if he would make them one, she felt his muscles all around her, an intimacy like she’d never experienced.
And then he flung them into the sky.
Her head would’ve rocked back painfully, but she was cradled to his chest, his clawed feet wrapped around one shoulder and her opposite hip like a seat belt. As they swooped and soared, the treetops and the snow whirled in a thrilling dance, and she and Vash were part of it.
Though they flew a little longer than the snowball fight, she didn’t feel the cold, but by the time they returned to the clearing beyond the patio, she was as breathless and giddy as if she’d been the one flying. When they touched down, his claws released her only slowly, as if he wanted to make sure she was steady back on her feet.
Overcome by the moment, she turned in the protective circle of his wings and threw her arms around his neck.
But he had already started shifting back, so she found herself with her arms around Vash’s neck, pressed to his bare chest.
The bulk of the beast had settled him deeper in the snow than her, which left her staring directly into his eyes. The gray sparkled with rings of fire. And that fire warmed her from within.
“Vash, that was—”
