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Chapter Four
The i
“Irina has given her medicine to bring the fever down,” the i
Sevrrn did not need his permission to see Madja. He waited in the dining room by his own choice.
Two days. For two days he had lain by Madja’s side, watching her tan skin turn pale and sallow, smelling her scent grow stagnant with decay and death. All the while, she had been hostage to delirium, unaware of her surroundings. Unaware of him. It was already abundantly clear that he could do nothing for her, so why should he bother going upstairs to see her like that? To watch her die?
“Will she live?” Sevrrn found himself asking.
He had never seen a creature come back once it began to smell of death, but he knew that over the years, humans had made great advancements in extending their lives beyond the limitations of their mortal bodies. This man was a prime example. A thousand years ago, perhaps even half that time, a human would have never lived without full use of his legs or with his eyes fogged by blindness.
The i
If.
The answer was meant to be optimistic, but Sevrrn found himself wishing the man had instead said that she would die. Then, Sevrrn could have at least dealt with whatever feelings that knowledge would arouse. Instead, he was left in the same limbo that he’d been in for days: hoping Madja would get better, but knowing she may not.
Hope.
Had he ever hoped for anything before?
No, he decided. He had never felt such a pointless and acutely disturbing emotion.
Lost in grim contemplation, Sevrrn almost forgot that he wasn’t alone in the room.
“I lost my wife to sickness,” the i
Sevrrn frowned, his lips becoming a thin, white line. “Why are you telling me this?”
“I want you to know that I understand your pain.”
“I am not in pain.”
The words snapped out of him reflexively, and even as they spoke them, Sevrrn knew they might be a lie. He wasn’t sure exactly what it was he was feeling, but regardless, he would never expose such a weakness.
But after more consideration, Sevrrn realized how absurd that was. This man was no threat to him. So what if he knew that Sevrrn’s mental state was, perhaps, slightly compromised? What did a lion have to fear from a lamb knowing it had a splinter? It was with that final thought that Sevrrn found himself speaking.
“I should have never allowed her to become a part of my life,” he said. “She was too weak.” Too human.
Months ago, he had awoken even before she had breached the i
The few times that such men had tried stealing from him, it had gone one of two ways. They had either come seeking a particular item, in which case they bypassed all of the riches strewn about the floor in favor of seeking out their prize. Or, they came merely to plunder his lair, bringing with them many bags and filling them indiscernibly with whatever was closest to the tu
Madja had done neither of these things. She had explored his lair, picking some things up and putting them down, picking other things up and examining them, and even wearing some of the jewelry and garments. Once, she had put on a robe and crown, then grabbed a scepter and danced around, singing a bizarre song. She had not seemed in any hurry to leave, nor had she seemed to be searching for anything in particular. She had seemed to simply be enjoying herself, as though sneaking into a dragon’s lair was some sort of game.
For a while, Sevrrn forgot all about killing her and had found that he was enjoying himself as well. Even when he had later picked her up, dangling her in the air in front of his sharp teeth, he hadn’t really wanted to kill her.
He had wanted to keep her. To watch her. To see what silly thing she would do next.
Then, she had shown him another side of her. Not only did she possess an extensive knowledge of ancient artifacts, but she spoke of them with such genuine enthusiasm. Even when faced with a dragon—a sight that caused most men to soil themselves—Madja was capable of becoming lost in her own stories.
She…enchanted him.
Her words were like a spell and he had wanted to hear more of them, had wanted to know everything that was inside her strange mind.
There was a depth to her that he had never experienced in anything before. She possessed endless layers of intrigue. First, he had enjoyed watching her. Then, he found it even more interesting to hear the things she had to say. Then, she surprised him again when he found that he also enjoyed talking to her.
And then there was her body. Her nudity alone had done little for him in the begi
When they were together, he was simply a male, claiming his female. Thrusting in and out of her in an age-old ritual of creation.
Perhaps that was why he had forgotten. Just as Madja lost herself in her stories, Sevrrn had lost himself in her body. He had forgotten that when the mating was over, they were what they had always been, always would be. A human and a dragon.
I should have killed her.
If he had killed her on the night they first met, all she would be right now was a mildly confounding memory. Nothing but a girl who had once danced in a crown and sung a song about a king and his mule. He would never had known what it was like to hear the things she had to say, what it was like to tell her the things that were in his mind, what it was like to bury himself so deep inside of her that he forgot everything and wanted nothing more. He would never have known helplessness, nor this terrible, suffocating hope.
The i
“It ca
Perhaps that works for mortals, Sevrrn thought distastefully.
Another thought occurred to him. “Had you known your wife would die, would you not have avoided her?”