“If my hands fall off, so will my iron cuffs, and then I’ll call upon Clode to suffocate you in your sleep.”
“Such pretty promises,” he muses, his tone so dry it could wick all the moisture from my body.
The path opens to another plateau, though this one supports a small stone dwelling that looks like it grew straight from the ground. It’s got two levels, bearing oddly shaped windows not round or square but somewhere in the middle. The dwelling is crooked one way at the bottom, the other way on the second floor, the roof peaked. The walls are knobbled in places and dipped in others, like little thumbs pressed them into place.
I pause, transfixed by it, a smile catching the corner of my mouth.
It’s like a youngling drew the building on a piece of parchment, then peeled it off and whispered life into its walls, giving it the strength and substance to stand.
This south wall boasts a makeshift trellis of crisscrossed branches clothed in a vine heavy with fat purple molliefruit, their scent zesting the warm air. Beneath it are rows of raised garden beds, each bearing a flush of frilly vegetables, some of which appear to have gone to seed …
My gaze lifts, sweeping over the structure, unable to shake the feeling that this place isn’t attended as much as it once was despite the warm sensation that fills my chest just looking at it.
I wonder what song it sings, picturing it a deep, rumbling, happy one. More content than a regular slab of stone. I wonder if Clode twirls past its rounded edges, sipping from bits of its serenity.
Most of all, I wonder why just looking at it makes the backs of my eyes sting—blisters of emotion I pop faster than Kaan popped that tick.
He moves between the garden beds, drops his laden bags on the ground, then grips a lush tuft of vegetation around the neck. He rips a canit root from the heaving dirt, its squiggly length dusted in rust-colored soil that falls back to the ground as he shakes it off, then thumps it against my chest.
Frowning, I curl my arms around the vegetable, cradling it while he repeats the process, over and over, adding to the growing pile until I can hardly see over the top of it.
“Are you cooking Rygun vegetable soup?” I mutter, wondering how I’m expected to see where I’m walking with my arms packed so full.
“I’m making enough so we don’t have to stop at any villages before we reach Dhomm,” he tells me, dumping something that’s particularly hard to balance upon the pile and almost undoing me. “I’d prefer not to be seen with you if I can avoid it.”
Fuck you too, Kaan Vaegor.
“I’m not particularly fond of being seen with you either. Not unless I’m toting a pike with your head on the end.”
He lumps another vegetable on the pile without shaking it off, dusting me in soil that peppers my hair and clings to my damp skin.
Maybe he’s getting sick of me …
Good.
I’ll keep agitating him until he drops his guard, then make a move. I quite like my chances of surviving in these mountains, given the abundance of water and fertile vegetation. In fact, I’ll probably thrive—gather my strength as I move south. I think these mountains finally kneel somewhere near Bhoggith. Perhaps if I charm a full-grown Moltenmaw, I can easily hunt Rekk Zharos. My options are endless now that I’m free.
Well …
My thoughts drift to my rope-bound wrists. To the nulling iron cuffs still locked around my arms and ankles.
Almost free.
First, I have to get away from this male and his dragon and these filthy Creators-damn vegetables. And this cozy little house with its pretty, idyllic view and a warmth that tells me it’s held so much more happiness than I’ll ever understand.
“I think we have enough,” Kaan rumbles, placing a flush of herbs atop the pile before I hear him gather his saddlebags, the sound of his heavy boot steps making my ears twitch. “Follow me.”
Ahh …
“How?”
“Tether yourself to the alluring tone of my voice,” he drawls, and I roll my eyes, tentatively following the sound of his steps instead—sliding my bare feet through the fluffy grass at a slow and steady pace in the effort not to trip.
I crash right into the back of him and dust myself in another layer of dirt, suppressing a cough so I don’t drop anything. I wait for him to place his bags on the ground, then unlock the door, hearing the squeal of metal hinges before he shifts out of my way.
I’m about to step into the dwelling when he says, “Wait. I’ll unpack you first. Don’t want you dragging more dirt across the rug than necessary.”
“Ever heard of a bucket? You just threw me in a pool and tossed a bar of soap at my head. Now I’m more filthy than I was before.”
“No,” he grinds out, relieving me of my pile one bulbous, overgrown root vegetable at a time. “Before, you smelled like spew, rage, and dead things. Now you smell like soil. This smell calms me.”
“You don’t seem particularly calm.”
He removes the final vegetable, transferring it into a large wooden bowl with all the rest of the produce. “I’m calm.” He cuts me a dark look. “You’ve just been lucky enough to avoid witnessing my other temperaments.”
Yet.
The unsaid word slams between us like a gavel.
I hold his pointed stare, clumps of dirt rolling down my cheek and falling from my jawline. I, too, have many temperaments I’d like to test against his not calm.
Grunting, he severs our stare-off and strides through the room.
I attempt to brush myself down, flicking more dirt onto the grass while I take in the dwelling’s cozy, eclectic interior, rich with a soft assortment of organic furnishings—mostly in Burn tones.
Burnt orange, warm umber, black, bronze …
A large kitchen takes up half the floor, bearing three long benches that run the walls in the shape of a giant U. There’s a butcher block that breaks the space in two, the right half of the room garnished with two low seaters and a small table—all without any gaps beneath. Like they were grown from the ground, embellished with plump cushions and tufted throws.
A crooked staircase on the right leads to what must be the second level. My gaze cuts to the windows—tawny glass that’s distorting to look through. Quirky and organic like the rest of this tiny home.
What really catches my eye are the stone carvings lining the windowsills. Sabersythes in all shapes and sizes, though no bigger than my fist. No two are the same, some bearing more tusks than others, more or less spears adorning the tips of their tails. Almost as if they have little lives and personalities of their own.
“What is this place?” I ask, stuck on the threshold.
“It was Mah’s retreat,” Kaan says from his spot before the basin, rinsing a vegetable beneath the gushing tap. He places it in a different bowl, then grabs another, drenching it.
Was …
I didn’t know his mah had passed. Have never researched The Burn’s reigning history beyond the fact that the three Vaegor brothers each rule one of the three kingdoms.
Now I wish I had.
I glance around, failing to shift the heaviness now sitting on my chest, crushing my ability to breathe properly. “Is there somewhere else I can spend the slumber?”
He pauses what he’s doing, turning his head the slightest amount as he says, “Somewhere else?”
Feels wrong to step into a female’s warm, homely dwelling when I’ve fantasized about killing her son.
“This feels like a family space,” I murmur, taking in the artwork littering the walls. The crooked alcoves and shelves packed full of bits and pieces that can only be precious memorabilia. “I’m not family.”
Kaan’s coarse growl fills the space so abruptly I jolt, stare whipping back to him as he says, “Get in the dwelling, Prisoner Seventy-Three. Or you’ll miss out on this meal.”
His shoulders appear taut and stiff, and there’s a tension in the air that makes it hard to inhale. Part of me wants to tell him to choke on the order he just gave me and die a painful death, but then my stomach rumbles loud enough to wake a sleeping dragon.
He raises a brow.