By the deep, steady rise and fall of Kyrith’s chest, Vesper had thought she was asleep long ago, though he had no clue how she could sleep with that silver slab of metal over her face.
As his eyes flicked between his dragon and the series of charcoal smudges, he crumpled the paper in his hand. He’d desperately tried not to think of the long ride back to Ellynne and the lack of good news he had. How he would have to leave Nef here and how she would fare in the coming months if they didn’t find a cure. She was off with Dimitri and Gaelen today doing gods only knew what. At least she’d made some friends and once he left, she wouldn’t be alone.
He tossed the paper aside then swiped the first line on the fresh page.
Kyrith sat up and tugged up her mask from where it had slipped during her nap. Vesper’s stomach plummeted as she retrieved the scrunched ball and unfurled it on her thigh. For an agonizingly long moment, she smoothed the creases and traced her finger along the silhouette of his dragon. Judging.
She shuffled through the grass until she knelt beside him. Her lush hip brushed up against his side as she placed the crinkled paper on top of his new sketch and leaned over him. Her hair fell in a lush blackberry waterfall. “I know you don’t think so, but it’s actually sort ofgood.” The last word came out bewildered, as if she couldn’t believe it herself.
“You’re just saying that,” Vesper grumbled. He splayed his hand over the drawing. “I should’ve lobbed it over the ledge. Let the sharks have it.”
Kyrith’s laugh mimicked a melodic chime. “When have I ever been concerned with hurting your feelings before?”
She had a point. And as Kyrith slid closer, tucked her hair behind her ear, and her shoulder grazed his, though it was absolutely moronic and made no sense, Vesper momentarily forgot how to breathe.
“You see here?” She fingered the outline of those reptilian eyes. “The shape is right, but the shadowing is off. Think about the light and where it hits.”
Vesper nodded, though he barely heard her over the roar of his heart.
She snatched the charcoal out of his hand and leaned over him. Her hand glided across the page as her attention warred between the sketch and the dragon who now, of course, sat like a perfect pet. Such a bloodytraitor.
And as she smudged her finger and bent the shadows to her will, Vesper merely watched. Admired. What couldn’t this woman do?
Beside her, Stiggy woke, stretched and gave a yawn that revealed every single sharp fang in her mouth. The dragon then bounded away, likely off to hunt a rat or whatever sort of post-nap snack she could find. Kyrith was too transfixed by the arching sweep of her hand to watch Stiggy go.
“There,” she said softly. She offered the stick of charcoal back.
Somehow, she had transformed the drawing into a masterpiece by mirroring the ferocity of Kaida’s stare and had spilled the dragon’s beauty onto the page.
“Maybe if Kaida wasn’t such an uncooperative model”—he shot her a glare as he retrieved the charcoal from between Kyrith’s fingers—“I could dothat.”
“You only need practice. Here, use me.”
His chest became a too tight somersaulting circus. “You want to model for me?”
“To clarify, fully clothed,” she said. A tiny giggle slipped from her. “But, yes. And I might sit still. If you’re nice. I do respond well to treats.”
“Guess you’re not so different.” Vesper nodded to Kaida and the blood clouded in the air that fed her, before he gave the dragon his back. “Are you sure?” he teased. He flipped the charcoal along his knuckles in the way he remembered Kyrith marvelled at that one time. “I’ll have to stare at you intently for some time. Doesn’t that make you uncomfortable? And want to thrash around in the grass like this one?”
Kyrith raised a single brow and leaned back on her hands. She opened her mouth to speak when the crunch of brush behind them raised the hair on the back of Vesper’s neck. His ears strained as Kyrith and him held each other’s gazes. Because that crunch wasn’t a small twig or branch, but rather the sound of foliage beingtrampled.
Kyrith’s gaze slid and locked on something behind him. Her breath hitched, and the whole world seemed to slow as Vesper heard a sound that tormented his dreams. A growl he knew well. The one that lived in that cavern with those crimson eyes and those festering bodies.
Vesper spun and his heart stopped. Sputtered. Burst into a gallop.
Because a great black monster loomed behind him, the colour of Thorrin’s dragon. Life had returned to his scales that were once the black of death and sickness and endings. Those blood-red eyes fixed on him as Kaida squealed.
Arborious.
Vesper’s blood froze over and his heart wound into a callused knot.
He couldn’t hear.
His surroundings fell away.
He stared at the colossal black paw that pinned down her wing, and the teeth that hovered above her throat, ready to rip into her. To tear apart that part of Vesper’s soul.
A rumble started from the dragon’s chest and spread to the trees and ground beneath them. Practically shook the bloody cliffside. “What a delight to see you again, Vesper—”