by Shana Abe
Before. Everything was beautiful, everything was better before.
Except for one. One thing had improved: He wasn't going to spend the rest of his life alone. He was going to spend it with a creature whose grace and bravery surely canceled out all his own fresh new flaws.
Whether she liked it or not.
Morning sunlight warmed the narrow dining room of the maison. It lit through the lace curtains in fanciful pieces, fell along the table to highlight the white ceramic serving dish of buttered eggs and burnt toast they all shared. The manacles were here as well, one resting on the chair between Rhys's legs, the other in the coat pocket of the prince. It seemed an equitable compromise, at least in the eyes of Prince Sandu—who'd been right displeased to discover them both missing this morning.
Zoe had only ignored him, dismissing his complaints with an impressively Gallic shrug. Neither she nor Rhys mentioned her spell of the night before. He didn't know the reasons for her silence but he knew his own. By not sharing what she had done, it became a precious secret that bound them. A gift from her to him—the first she'd ever handed him—and Rhys was going to treasure it.
And it seemed to have worked. He no longer heard the symphony. Even when his skin brushed the iron, the sharp little stones, he heard nothing. He'd never, ever been so pitifully grateful in his life to have silence ringing in his ears.
Zee had made the breakfast. None of them trusted the Zaharen woman to concoct their meal, and blackened toast was a small price to pay, he reckoned, for safety. Rhys had devised an awkward yet effective manner of getting the food from his plate to his mouth: After several messy tries, he'd eschewed the fork and knife for the end of one bladed talon. Since then, he'd cut himself only twice. Handling his cup of coffee, however, was more hazardous. He'd had very little coffee.
But the eggs and toast were like manna. He savored every bite.
His future bride and the cook ate in silence, seated across from each other at the table. Neither made eye contact with the other.
"The lease here is done in a few days anyway," continued Prince Sandu. "With the sanf all about, we never wanted to lurk in one place very long. You will be welcomed in my castle. And there we may together invent a new scheme against our enemies." His crystal eyes lit upon Rhys. "You're the brother of Lady Amalia, who was our guest so many years past. She was the daughter of the Alpha of your tribe. As his son, do you have the authority to speak for him?"
"Yes," Rhys said.
"No," said Zoe. She placed her fork beside her plate. "I mean, no, Highness, I won't be traveling with you."
The boy flicked his hair back from his cheek with a pale finger. "Are you certain? It's far by human means, of course, but if we fly, we'll be there in days. It's a strong sanctuary. A fine place to regroup."
Zoe addressed Rhys. "Can you Turn?"
"I don't know." He stirred a swirl into the leftover butter on his plate. "I have not tried."
He was afraid to. Stupid, cowardly, mortifying. He was afraid. He didn't know how he would be able to bear losing one more slice of himself.
The iron cuff against his leg still felt cold through his borrowed breeches. Rhys wore the clothing of Hayden James now, only slightly ripped; the dragon prince was too slight, but James had been about the right size. If Zoe had noticed or minded the garments, or his hands' effect upon them, she'd had no comment about that either.
"Even if he managed smoke," she was saying now to the prince, "his dragon will be as wounded as he is. I doubt you'd fit that female and me both safely on your back, Highness. Much less a third person."
"Then, very well, we may hire a carriage."
"No," she said again. "Thank you. I'm staying here."
The prince leaned back in his chair—ah yes, so easy, another mechanical contraction of muscles, no spasming, no pain—and then lifted his voice to the cook, saying something to her in his native tongue.
"Da,"she whispered, her eyes glued to her plate.
Sandu lifted his coffee to his lips, blew at the steam, and spoke in English. "I told her to forget what I'm about to say." He took a taste, set down the cup with his lips puckered; it was bitter black, and there was no cream or sugar or even honey left in the house. "Here is the problem: I cannot control the female forever. My Gift is good, but perhaps not as strong as some. I spoke with her last night, enough to realize she was taken from my hills just for her blood—and that due to a traveling father, she speaks a rudimentary French. She swears only three men ever came to the house—one was killed days earlier; I assume your fellow from the dance hall—but she cooked for many. I need to get her out of Paris, back to my castle. She's a weakness for us. No doubt she has information that she isn't even aware she possesses. Any small memory may help. In time, I can access it, or someone in my clan can."
"So your strategy is to leave Darkfrith to their mercies?" Zoe asked. The sun beamed behind her, spreading fire through her unbound hair, scintillating gold over silver. She had that same slight, chilly smile as last night, lovely and fearsome together.
"No, my lady. The sanf are shrewd enough to remain fragmented as a group. Hayden and I learned that much from the first ones we encountered. There is a leader, he is here in this city. There is a plan. Yet no one man—or woman—seems to have been given enough information to stitch all the fragments together. I will not abandon your family, Zoe. I pledge it now. But my initial hunt was meant to last only a week. I'm the Alpha of the Zaharen. I must go home to them. I must rally them. And I must get this female away from Paris." He reached for his coffee, reconsidered, and returned his hand to his lap. "And you two should come with me."
Zoe's eyes went to Rhys. "You may. If you wish."
Rhys managed, with great effort, not to grimace as he shifted in his chair. "Surely. And what do you imagine you'll be doing whilst I'm relaxing in this fairy-tale castle?"
"I will be here," she answered calmly. "I will be killing sanf"
"My, that's absolutely splendid." He dug his fingers into the table to sit as high up as he could; the wood ripped like paper beneath his claws. "Do you even remember that night at the dance hall? Do you remember at all what happened? The two men? The knife?"
"I remember everything," she said, impassive.
"Really? Because I could have bloody sworn you just said you'd be tripping about, killing the sanf inimicus, when I couldn't even get you to bloody smother a dying man who was doing his damnedest to kill you first! But now you're ready?Now you're lethal, willing to murder in cold blood?"
"Yes. Now."
He nearly smacked his palm to his forehead but caught himself in time. "Zoe! This isn't what he would want!"
She shoved back from the table so quickly her chair tipped over. "Don't tell me what he'd want."
"Why not? I can't speak his name? I can't imagine myself in his position? I love you! And God help him, if Hayden ever loved you, he wouldn't want you in danger like this!"
She stared at him with her cheeks gone bloodless and her eyes so black he thought he'd see eternity in them. She looked like she wanted to spit in his face. Then, without another word, she turned around and left.
Rhys unstuck his hands from the table. The gouged wood shone in long, pale scars against the otherwise warm cherry stain.
"You'll agree I managed that nicely." His claws clicked against his plate. "It bodes well for our wedded bliss, don't you think?"
Sandu was staring at him with his brows drawn into a frown. "You were at the dance hall with the sanf?"
Rhys sighed, wishing for more coffee. He stabbed a piece of toast instead, lifted it to the light. "It's a long story."
"I believe I have time." The prince glanced back at the cook, who watched them both now with wide brown eyes. "Oh. Yes." He switched to French. "You're to forget all that, as well."
* * *
He found her in the back garden. She felt him approaching from the hallway, felt his living warmth, the odd, unexpected whisper of gold that wafted about him now. More
significantly, she heard his sliding, mismatched pace upon the floor. He could not walk well. It must hurt, putting weight upon his feet.
Yet he came to her. She was seated on the steps again because there was nowhere else dry to sit. The garden had been devoted either to grass or gangly tall herbs; it had no benches or chairs or even flat stones. So she sat upon the steps.
The rain had swept to the south around dawn. Droplets dewed everything before her, grass and twigs and leaves, darkened the trunks of the trees. If she angled her head a certain way, the sun lit the beads of water into thousands of round perfect jewels.
At least the fence around the yard was high. No one would easily see them, not unless they crept up to press an eye against the slats.
"Please do not say you've come to apologize." She'd wrapped her arms around her knees, interwoven her fingers hard to keep herself fixed.
"I haven't. My parents told me never to lie."
She narrowed her eyes at the colors of the alder, tan and red and brown. "Laudable."
"And fruitless. Lying can be marvelously useful, especially if you're good at it, as I know you've already discovered."
"You're not going to change my mind."
"Am I not?" He sank down two steps above, slowly, in jerks. "As you wish. Listen well to the opinion of an educated lady. That's what my mother used to say."
"Did she."
"Yes. She liked you, you know."
She turned her face, gazed deliberately at the mangled mess of his right foot on the stair above her. "Now you're lying."
"No. Honestly. Even when we were young, she thought you had . a certain zest of spirit. It was Father whom you scared. Mother was all out for you."
Zoe dropped her forehead into the cup of her palm. "My sister was in love with you."
"Was she?" He sounded much brighter. "Excellent. Er, I mean . how nice."
"You are as insubstantial as the specter I thought you were, Lord Rhys. You feel nothing with your heart. You test nothing with your depths. You say you love me, but I think it must be merely the reflection of my face. My Gifts. I don't know how I can be expected to live the rest of my life bound to someone who doesn't even know my favorite color. The name of my childhood pet. The ages of my nieces."
"It was that rooster, wasn't it?" he said, after a moment. "I recollect that. You called him a pet. Nasty thing. Kept attacking me, even if I was just strolling in the remote vicinity of your cottage. I vow it hid in trees just to ambush me. I never harmed a feather on his malicious little body, but by God, he hated me."
"Yes." She rocked a little, started to laugh, but it choked in her throat. "All right. You win. We're meant to live happily ever after."
He eased down another step. "Is your favorite color blue?"
"No. Definitely not."
"Ah—wait. I do know. You don't have a single favorite color." She felt something inside her fall into silence. Waiting and still and arrested.
"It's three colors," Rhys said. "Gold, silver, and pink."
Zoe lifted her head, scooted around in place to stare at him. "You found my diary."
He lifted his terrible hands. "No, love. But I've seen you, the other side of you. Your dragon self. Those were your colors."
"What are you talking about?"
"From before, when I was a ghost, and you were my light. I saw you once as a dragon in the palace. You were asleep." He looked down, curled his fingers closer to his palms. "Gold and pink and silver. We'd look very well together, I think. As dragons. In that ghost world."
The children next door had been set free into their yard. The dog on the other side was gone, but high-pitched laughter and shouts began to punctuate the clear morning air.
"I do not know the ages of your nieces," the monster confessed in a low voice. "I don't even know their names. I left the minute details of our tribe to my father and my brother. It seemed to matter more to them. I was a flippant fellow, Zee. You know that. I was more concerned with the cut of my coat than the ways of the shire. Mostly."
She surprised herself with his defense. "I don't think that's true.
"No? You're too kind. But it is true that I went adrift for some while. I let the shallows move me, when I should have not."
A little girl next door let out a furious screech, then a babble of words. Another girl shrieked back at her.
"We're all meant to learn our lessons," Zoe said at last, under the screaming. "If you drifted, at least now you have the chance to head home."
"Yes." Metal ribbons at the corner of her eye; the soft, slight pressure of his hand upon her shoulder. "I'd like that. I'd like to go home." His talons skimmed her dress. "Will you come with me, my heart, my compass and anchor, Zoe Langford?"
She did not answer. In time, as the sun climbed and climbed, as the shadows shortened and the children tired and returned back inside their home, he rose. And then he left.
The prince departed that evening. He truly meant to fly, something that would have been unthinkable back in England, but he would carry a satchel and the female Zaharen, and claimed they'd reach the borders of his realm within days.
The backyard was too narrow for a grown dragon to take flight, and the front was far too open and visible to all the other homes. So the four of them climbed up into the garret—even Rhys, though he arrived minutes after the rest of them—and waited for the last of the twilight to thicken into true night.
No one spoke. Enough had been said already; she'd refused over and over to leave Paris, and the prince had finally given up asking. Rhys had made it clear he wasn't leaving if she wasn't. And that was that.
The cook maintained that petrified stillness she had perfected whenever Zoe was near, the prince's hand on her arm. Rhys lounged against a box shoved against the canted attic wall. The slant of the ceiling nearly matched the curve of his back.
Zoe amused herself briefly imagining the councilmen's faces should they hear of this: an unshielded dragon atop an unshielded roof, soaring off across an open city sky.
"I think now," said Sandu, breaking their silence. They'd opened the skylight to monitor the heavens; he was barely visible, a face and vanished hair, a sheet wrapped around his shoulders for propriety. He wore, of course, no clothing beneath it.
They climbed out to the roof, first the prince, then the cook, then Zoe and Rhys. The great blue bowl of heaven was cloudless. Stars fought the yellowed haze of the streetlamps below them in fierce prickled dots.
The prince made his way to the most level section of the roof. He glanced around him, took in the hills and mighty spires and steeples of the horizon that was Paris unfolded.
"Come to me whenever you wish," he said to Zoe and Rhys. "If you need me, come to Zaharen Yce."
"Yes," said Rhys. "Thank you."
The boy inclined his head. He lifted a hand to the cook, said something in Romanian, and released the sheet.
Before it even finished rumpling to his feet, he Turned to dragon. In the space of a heartbeat his human shape was gone, smoky twists that expanded, re-formed into a being of silent, glistering magnificence.
He was ebony with bands of sapphire and deep purple shaded along his sides, silver-dipped talons and wingtips. Zoe's people were more colorful, living rainbows in the sky, but the prince of the Zaharen had a sober, serpentine beauty she'd seldom seen.
The dragon turned his great head and gazed at the cook. They could not speak in this shape; they had no vocal cords to command. But the woman moved forward without hesitation, picking her way across the shingles, carrying the satchel. She climbed onto his back as if she'd done it a hundred times before, settled the bag against her stomach, and dug her fingers into his mane.
"Farewell," murmured Rhys, and the prince nodded in return, tensed his powerful haunches, and leapt from the roof.
A sharp wooden clatter from below: shingles tumbling free, striking the cobblestones.
Neither Zoe nor Rhys looked down. They watched Sandu instead, his beating wings, his sharp ascent, t
he skirts of the cook flapping hard around him like laundry stolen by the wind. They watched until he was nothing more than a speck against the indigo heavens, a black star in the east that gradually shrank to nothing.
By mutual, unspoken agreement, Rhys slept in the princes old room. If it could be called sleeping, which he didn't think it could, as it really didn't involve anything like rest, or dreams, or blissful relaxation. It was far more a matter of him attempting to get flat upon the surface of the bed, small fluffy feathers kicked up every time he moved, tickling his nose and sticking to his lips, because no matter how he tried, he could not stop his talons from piercing the mattress.
He had pulled a quilt across his chest. He felt too cold and then too hot, too restless, but knew better than to attempt to rise and pace or read or brood alone in the dark. It had been far too much work just to get here, right here, in the center of the bed.
So he remained as he was. He kept his claws embedded in the ticking because it was easier than not, and he was tired of accidentally cutting his skin.
Zoe was in her room. He felt her. He couldn't tell if she slept either, but at least she was in the maison tonight. He'd half feared she'd want to start her hunt at once, that she'd wait for nothing, especially not him.
But after the prince had left, they'd shared a small meal and each retired, no more than five words spoken between them.
He was relieved. If she'd wanted to leave tonight, he would have had to find a way to stop her or else stay by her side. And he honestly didn't think he was capable of either at the moment.
The prince's room contained a looking glass. Nothing so ominous as the one back in Zoe's palace, just a small square mirror mounted in pewter, set at an angle upon the chest of drawers. He glimpsed no other faces in it but his own. His own was surely alarming enough.
He hadn't realized it was there at first. He'd walked by it, caught the motion of his reflection from the corner of his eye, and instinctively turned.
He didn't know the creature there staring back at him. It looked like him, but some exaggerated, gruesome version of himself. He'd brought his hands to his face, touched his palms lightly to his cheeks. Stubble—that was familiar. And the shape of his jaw, that too. Same eyebrows as always, black and straight. Same nose and eyes. A series of shallow nicks across his lips from before he'd mastered breakfast.