Page 36 of Deven and the Dragon
“Then the curse will take me,” Fiora said, and the words seemed to settle into his very bones, which ached with the weight of them. “And that will have been my own doing. You can’t blame him for this. He doesn’t know.”
“We’ll find a way,” Andrei said fiercely. “We will. And I’ll wring that bastard’s neck if he doesn’t do his part. I might anyway. But wewillfind a way.”
Fiora nodded, even though he knew, from the burning of his esophagus and the slowly-increasing pain in his throat, that they wouldn’t.
Riding in the rainwas actually fun — or it might have been, if Deven hadn’t been forced to go more slowly so as not to risk the mare’s ankles in the mud, thus delaying his return to the castle.
“Fuck it,” he muttered. “We can trot.” He urged the horse on, patting her when she whickered at him.
He’d hated to leave Fiora that morning — hated even leaving the bed. Getting up and leaving that room meant dealing with everything else that wasn’t Fiora, all naked and warm and willing, andeverything elsewas bloody well overrated.
“When you come back, I think I’ll try my hand at makingyoubeg,” Fiora had whispered in his ear as he draped himself over Deven’s back, while Deven sat on the edge of the bed and tried for the fourth time to get his boots on.
One of the laces broke, Deven startled so much at that.
And fuck, but his cock had gone rock-hard again. That didn’t seem possible after the morning they’d had. Fiora had begged. His wanton pleas had been so detailed and explicit that even Deven’s ears burned, and Deven had satisfied every single one of them. At length.
“What did you have in mind?” Deven asked hoarsely.
“Well,” Fiora purred, licking the curve of Deven’s ear, “I thought I might ride you very,veryslowly,” and licked again.
Deven had fixed his boot lace and gotten out of the castle at last, but he’d certainly felt motivated to return.
Riding in the light summer rain was pleasant enough. Riding with a cockstand to rival the flagpole in front of Ridley’s town council hall was not so pleasant.
At last the castle gates came into view, and Deven pushed the mare into a canter. The drive was graveled and the rain hadn’t affected it much. The sun wouldn’t be setting for a couple of hours yet, but with the overcast it felt later. Deven had tried his best to keep his visit short, but he’d already promised his aunt and uncle in a note written a few days before that he’d visit that day, and no matter how much he’d hated to tear himself away from Fiora, he’d needed to keep his promise. Uncle George had roped him into fixing the latch in the stable after all, and then there’d been a few more little maintenance issues to see to, and then Aunt Phina had wanted to sit him down and harangue him about what the hell he thought he was doing, exactly.
Still dazed from a night spent with Fiora, he hadn’t been able to answer to her satisfaction.
“Have you managed to buttonhole Holling and find out how Peter’s doing?” he’d asked her when she paused for breath, after telling him again what a damn-fool idea the whole thing was. “Because there’s a reason I’m doing this, remember?”
She’d promised, grudgingly, to go to see Holling again after Deven left. When she’d called the day before, she’d failed to track him down. “This is going to end poorly for everyone, Deven,” she’d said. “I know you’ve wanted to get out of this inn and out of Ridley for a while — you’re so much like George’s sister,” she added. “Not that it’s entirely a bad thing, mind! Susan was always an imaginative girl, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But she got carried away, and dragged your father along with her. And you’ve lost your wits if you think trying to beg a magical scale off a dragon, of all things, isn’t stupid. Ask this Lord Fiora for one, and if he says no, come home.”
Deven had spent every moment of the ride back turning her words over in his mind, trying to square her common sense with his conviction that he’d lose Fiora forever if he asked directly.
He’d mention Peter over dinner, he finally decided. Say that he’d heard about the boy’s illness from his aunt that day, and see if Fiora took the hint. If not, Deven could ask for the scale in a few days, once he’d had a chance to pretend to have just thought of the old legend and to wonder if it had any truth to it.
It was the only way Deven could have everything he wanted at once — except for his own sense of decency. But he could live without that, if he had to.
He couldn’t live with the knowledge that Fiora hated him.
Deven cantered into the stable yard and hopped down, tossing the reins to the lad who trotted out to lead the mare inside. He felt in his pocket to make sure its contents hadn’t gotten lost on the ride. No, still there, and he hoped Fiora liked candy — Aunt Phina made the best fudge in Ridley. It wasn’t much, not for a man who could afford anything he wanted. But simple pleasures were all Deven could offer him, and it had to count for something that he’d been thinking of Fiora while he was away, didn’t it?
Fred popped out of his chair in the front hall as Deven stepped inside. “Hello, Fred,” Deven said, “don’t trouble yourself, I’m going upstairs.”
“Wait a moment, sir, I’ve a message for you from Lord Fiora,” Fred said.
Deven stopped, turned, and stared. “A message?” Why the hell would Fiora need to send him a message, when Deven was going straight to him on his return? Fuck, he’d changed his mind already. Deven should never have gone, even for a few hours. What had he done? His mind raced. He’d left Fiora in such good spirits.
“He’s not feeling well, sir, and he won’t be down for dinner,” Fred said. “He thought he might rest. He asked if you could amuse yourself for the evening, and he’ll ring when he’s feeling better and might like some company.”
“Not feeling well, how exactly?” Deven demanded, and Fred’s blond eyebrows went up. The whole castle was aware, of course, that Fiora and Deven had grown closer and had been spending most of their time together. But as far as they knew, Deven wasn’t entitled to any information Lord Fiora didn’t share with everyone else. Deven cursed himself. He’d give their newfound intimacy away, and Fiora wouldn’t like that. “How did he look?” Deven asked in more reasonable tone, even though his blood was pounding with the need to know. “Only, I saw him this morning before I left, and he seemed like he might be coming down with a cold.”
“It might very well be that, sir,” Fred said, visibly relieved. “He was a bit pale and peaky. But he was very, very adamant about being left completely alone for a few hours.” He added meaningfully, “And I think Andrei’s sitting in his lordship’s study in case he’s needed.”
In other words: Deven might get past Fred’s vigilance, but he wouldn’t escape Andrei’s.
Fuck. Deven could hardly shove Andrei out of the way and charge up the stairs, demanding to intrude on Fiora’s indisposition.
