Page 98 of I Dream of Dragons
How can you not love a man who gives you daggers? I ask you. However… “I’m not going to kill the king, Jai,” I whisper. “Not until I’m sure what is going on. Talk to me.”
“Do you know what it’s like to be taken in by the man who killed your mate?” he asks savagely. “To need him to keep the monster inside you in check so you can stop him from killing more worlds? To stand beside him, speak with him, eat with him, feel on you those hands that killed her? No, I’m not going to stop. If you want him alive,makhair, then you have to kill me.”
I shake my head.
“You make me want to fight,” he says softly. “Many times I thought to give up, but you make me want to keep going. To do what I came here to do. Do you feel it, Rae? Do you feel the bond between us?”
“My lady,” the page boy says. Impassive. Quiet. “We need to go or you will anger the king.”
The tug in my chest. The hook of gold.
“I…” I swallow hard. “Let’s go, then. What does the king want?”
The boy gives me a flat look. “I was only told to take you to him. Nothing more.”
“Well, then. Lead the way.”
I’m aware of Jai walking a few paces behind us as the slender page boy leads me through the palace.
“Do you know what it’s like to be taken in by the man who killed your mate?”
I shake my head to clear it. It’s like a buzzing in my ears, the answer clinging to the tip of my tongue.
It can’t be.
He said I am his mate, but his mate was killed. The shape of his face, so familiar… I last saw it a hundred years ago.
“Don’t you know me?”
“This way,” the boy says, and I focus on my feet to avoid tripping and falling as we go up some stairs.
Jai is right behind me. Acting as my bodyguard, since he sent Arkin away. Was that my fault? Did I drive a wedge between him and his only friends?
But I had to say it. Ask why Arkin and Tru had been there. I can’t regret that. Nothing good is ever built on lies and untruths.
I couldn’t hide the truth from Jai any longer.
And you can’t hide the truth of who Jai is from yourself any longer, either.Gods, my head hurts. But how can that be?He’s not… he can’t be…
“This way,” the boy says. It occurs to me that he looks exactly the same as last time. His uniform, his hair, even the little cowlick on his forehead.
“You are the one they always send,” I murmur. “Why? Who are you?”
“I am a spirit of this palace.”
I stop. “Spirit. You mean a ghost?”
“Yes. Come, my lady. We cannot linger.”
“But everyone can see you,” I mutter, hurrying once more after him, my heart thudding.
“Only those who have lost someone, and be honest, who hasn’t? They can see me like they can see Athdara. To be a shadow is to be a ghost.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“Truth often does.”
My head throbs. My chest aches with gritty emotions. “Jai isn’t dead.”
