Chapter 89 CHAPTER 89
“What?” I gasped, “No I'm not going anywhere. Principal Draco's just being dramatic.”
“I can read you like a book, you're my favourite one after all. And I know you don't usually bite your lips that hard, you're tense and hoping I'll believe you. Your fists are so clenched your body is healing the palm you just tore open now,” he went on, taking my arm and prying it open to prove his point, “and your heart, the biggest teller, is irrational, erratic and telling me all I need to know. You're lying. You want to leave me, you want to run so far away from this planet that you never have to deal with me again.”
“Zade…”
“But the thing is, I get you.”
“Oh?”
“You didn't ask for any of this, the burden, the expectations, the danger, the constant threat to your life, everyone calling you a weakling when it's they that should be ashamed that you're competing with them even though you just got here and they've been preparing for twenty years ahead. Also, your body is changing, scales and claws popping out randomly and now, just as you're getting the hang of things, a leech attacks you out of nowhere, sending you so close to the arms of death that you can almost draw his face on paper. So I completely understand why you want to leave.”
I was speechless, his feelings blending with mine to make me an emotional mess inside.
“Do you want to take a nap now or I can read you a book, I have some –”
I stopped him, he was standing there talking as though he'd not just told me how much he sees me.
It's one thing to merely be aware of my existence but the raw way in which he described how everything happening has affected my decision was intense.
It was like Momma was here again but instead of making me speak out about my feelings, he knew them and was absolutely right about all of it.
So I pulled him into a tight hug.
“I'm sorry, I don't want to leave you,” I muttered in his chest, “but I'm just so fucking tired of everything..I haven't had a moment to rest, only when I'm sick and recovering from something.”
“I'll tell Draco to move you to next year's class so you can start afresh with everyone on the same pace, okay? But if you still want to go, I'll figure out how to get the accurate information, not the crap my cousin was trying to spill but you must promise me something.”
I pulled back and looked at him.
“What is that?”
“You'll let me come with you.”
My head was already shaking before he was done speaking.
“What? Why?”
“Don't make me say it Zade, I already look so weird now that I've stayed here long enough to change…”
“And I'm carrying a dragon inside of me, I know. But I've stayed in that library for decades, only coming out when Tharagaun took over. That won't happen anymore because we have a line of communication now.”
“Yes your pretty long tail and beautiful scales will arouse suspicion and I wouldn't even mind the extra protection but why I'm saying no is because there's something about Earth that sucks away all magic. You just got Tharagaun back, are you willing to lose him just to be with me? No, don't answer that, it doesn't matter what you choose, I won't let it happen. So if you love me, prove it by letting me go.”
He let out a strangled sound from his throat and completely untangled himself from me and went to sit on the very large bed.
I hadn't gotten a chance to look at the room until now and I still couldn't focus on it, just the big bed and the emotional and beautiful man on it.
Was it weird that I found his sobbing form attractive?
We've established that something is wrong with me so I didn't spend time overthinking it and I went to meet him.
“Maybe you can teach me how to travel back and forth? I'll come visit for a bit and then go back. No one would know.”
“No one would know you fell from the sky?”
“Isn't there a less… dramatic way? I appeared before in someone's garden, I didn't fall from the sky.”
“Which means there's no sure way to know where you'll end up every time. You might appear on Fae lands even, and I'll lose you completely. Just… don't worry I'll help you find a way to go. I've lived in misery for a while now and thought it was all over. I guess not.”
He faced away from me, leaving me stewing in guilt but I couldn't ignore this chance.
I've done it before, sacrificing myself and my goal for a man and I refused to do it again.
But I could do something while still here, which I proceeded to do.
“Zade?” I called him, moving closer to the bed.
“Hm?”
He didn't turn.
“Can you look at me at least? I feel like shit, you saved my life and I'm disappearing on you but it's not like that's happening tonight or tomorrow even. We still have some time together, I won't be going to classes anymore and –”
“No,” he grunted, “you have to keep doing everything as though nothing is amiss. I'm going to steal the book from Draco and give you a few minutes' window to go. Give me about a week, he's going to the Capital for something.”
“Oh my goodness, thank you so much!” I exclaimed and jumped on his body.
He was still on his side, but as my body collided with his, he turned around to look at me.
He had been crying.
“Zade?”
“You need to rest, just come this way and sle–”
I kissed him.
At first, he struggled but I was insistent, I didn't know what else to do, my emotions were all over the place but seeing him like that shook something inside of me that could only be expressed through physical intimacy.
No words could explain how terrible I felt, nothing said can bring him back from this brink of pain.
In that moment as he began to kiss me back, even if I ever had a doubt about it before, I came to a startling realisation.
Zade is in love with me.