Page 26 of Dragon's Captive

"Cold," I whisper, the word scraping my raw throat. "So cold."

"You're burning with fever," he corrects, pressing something blissfully cool against my forehead. Ice, wrapped in cloth. "Your body believes it's cold, but it's overheating."

Another violent shiver wracks my frame, and I curl toward the only source of heat nearby—his massive body radiating warmth like a furnace. Normally that draconic heat feels overwhelming, especially during claiming. Now, it's salvation against the bone-deep chill of fever.

Kairyx hesitates for just a moment before shifting on the bed, pulling me against his chest with surprising gentleness. One arm cradles me while the other continues to press the cold compress to my forehead.

"Better?" he asks, the rumble of his voice vibrating through my body where we touch.

I should resist this intimacy outside of claiming or heat. Should maintain the emotional walls I've tried to rebuild since my biology betrayed me so thoroughly. But the fever strips away pretense along with strength, and I find myself nodding, burrowing closer to his unnatural warmth.

"Don't leave," I murmur, the words emerging without conscious permission. "Please."

His chest expands with a deep breath, then contracts on a sigh that feels almost human in its weariness. "I won't."

The fever rises higher as night deepens, dragging me in and out of consciousness. In moments of clarity, I'm aware of Kairyx's constant presence—his hand replacing warm cloths with cool ones, lifting my head to drink more bitter medicine, adjusting pillows and blankets as needed. In my delirium, these careful ministrations blur with memories of my mother tending childhood illnesses, creating a confusion of comfort and fear that dissolves my carefully constructed barriers.

"I was so alone," I confess to the shadows swimming across the ceiling, unsure if I'm speaking aloud or just thinking the words. "For years. Always watching, always hiding. No one to trust. No one who knew me. The real me."

Fingers brush sweat-soaked hair from my face, and I turn toward the touch without thought.

"Even before you found me," I continue, dragged along by fever-loosened tongue, "I wondered sometimes if it was worth it. All that running. All that hiding. For what? The Primeswon. Humans lost. Everything else is just... prolonging the inevitable."

"Is that what the resistance believes?" Kairyx's voice cuts through my rambling, soft but distinct. "That you're merely postponing defeat?"

I shake my head, instantly regretting the movement as nausea surges. "No. They believe... we believe... in recovery. Reclamation. Return to human autonomy." The familiar phrases feel hollow now, spoken in this place, to this being who defies the simplistic monster narratives I've built my resistance around. "But sometimes, in the quiet moments when I was alone, I'd wonder if we were just... children playing at revolution while giants reshaped the world."

His golden eyes study me with uncomfortable intensity, seeing too much behind my fever-bright gaze. "What do you fear most, Clara Dawson? Beyond the obvious loss of freedom. What truly terrifies you?"

The question pierces straight through defenses weakened by illness and exhaustion. I should deflect, should offer something meaningless or remain silent. Instead, the truth spills from my lips.

"Belonging nowhere," I whisper. "Being neither here nor there. Not truly human anymore after being claimed, but never accepted as anything else. Just... adrift. Alone in a different way."

Something shifts in his expression—surprise, perhaps, or recognition—before he masks it with careful neutrality. His massive hand engulfs mine, thumb tracing circles on my palm in a gesture that feels surprisingly soothing.

"Even apex predators experience isolation," he murmurs as he presses a fresh cool cloth to my forehead. "Dragons are solitary by nature, but territoriality makes poor company."

The admission startles me, cutting through fever-haze with unexpected clarity. For the first time, I hear something beyond the commanding presence, beyond the confident alpha, beyond the monster of resistance nightmares. Something almost... vulnerable.

"What do you mean?" I ask, my voice barely audible even to my own ears.

His gaze shifts to the shadows beyond the bed, his profile sharp against the dying firelight. "Dragons maintain distance from one another. We must—too much proximity triggers dominance displays, challenges, violence. Even allies meet rarely, communicate sparingly. It's biological necessity, not choice." His voice drops lower, revealing something he perhaps wouldn't share if he believed I'd remember this conversation later. "Leadership elevates the isolation further. Commander. Warlord. Emperor. Impressive titles that essentially mean 'untouchable.'"

I stare at him through the fever's veil, seeing—truly seeing—Kairyx Emberscale for perhaps the first time. Not just the monster who claimed me, not just the alpha who reduced me to begging, but a being existing in his own form of solitude.

"Is that why you preserve human books?" The question emerges as my consciousness begins to fade again, darkness crowding the edges of my vision. "Connection to minds beyond your own?"

His expression shifts to something I can't interpret through the fever's distortion. "Perhaps," he acknowledges. "Or perhaps dragons simply recognize the value of knowledge that outlasts civilizations." His hand moves to my cheek, the touch gentle against burning skin. "Rest now. Fight the fever, not me. At least for tonight."

Darkness claims me completely then, dragging me down into dreams filled with fire and flight, with scaled wings thatshield rather than threaten. The fever burns through my system, purging something beyond physical illness—perhaps the last walls between the woman I was and the woman I'm becoming.

When consciousness returns, watery dawn light filters through the balcony curtains. The fever has broken, leaving me weak but clear-headed, drenched in cooling sweat that makes me grimace with discomfort. I try to move and realize I'm not alone in the bed.

Kairyx's massive body curls around mine, one wing partially extended to cover me like a living blanket. His breathing remains deep and even in sleep, his face relaxed in a way I've never seen before, the perpetual alertness of predator temporarily suspended.

I should feel trapped, should feel revulsion at this intimacy outside claiming or heat. Instead, a disturbing sense of safety washes over me, as if I'm protected rather than possessed. His wing shifts slightly, adjusting to my movement without waking him, the leathery membrane warmer and softer than it appears.

The realization hits with quiet devastation: in my illness, cradled against the chest of the very being who shattered my carefully constructed life, I feel more secure than I have in ten years of desperate independence.

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