Light Dragons 01 - Love in the Time of Dragons

and his frown melted into a smile. “You’ll leave me no room for the house. We’ll have nothing but garden.”
    I looked behind me. The house was there, but like the flowers and shrubs of the garden, it seemed to shimmer and fade in and out of view.
    I was seeing a memory of the land as it was before the house and gardens had been built.
    “And here, Madonna lilies and pinks, heartsease and leopard’s-bane. Campion over there, against the wall, and daffodils and violets down by the pond. On that side, we’ll have beds of wallflowers and lavender, marjoram and roses, great long beds of roses of every hue. And we’ll have an orchard, Baltic, with apple trees, pears, plums, and cherries, and on the long summer days, we will sit beneath one and I will love you until you fall asleep in my arms. We will be happy here. At least . . .”
    A shadow fell over her face. She looked into the distance for a few seconds.
    “ Chérie , do not do this to yourself.”
    “I can’t help it. What if it was true, Baltic? What if I was his mate?”
    “Constantine wanted you as all males want you,” Baltic said, taking her loosely in his arms. “But you were not meant to be his mate.”
    “How do you know?” She looked troubled, and I understood the worry and guilt she felt at causing pain in another.
    “I just know. If you were to die, I would cease living. That tells me you are my true mate, and no one else’s.”
    “But you don’t know —”
    “I know,” he said, catching up her hands and kissing her fingers.
    She hesitated, and Baltic smiled and brushed a strand of hair off her face before pulling her past me, toward the place where the house now stood. “Enough of these dismal thoughts. I have something that will please you. I have designed the house. If you approve of it, it will be done by Michaelmas.”
    “I will get started on the gardens right away,” she answered, smiling up at him again. My throat ached at the joy in her face, at the love that shone so brightly in her eyes. “And there I will pledge my fealty to you, surrounded by the sweet-smelling flowers.”
    He growled something in her ear I couldn’t hear, and she ran off ahead of him, laughing, her long hair fluttering in the wind as he chased her out of my sight.
    I held on to the tree for a moment, my fingers clutching painfully at the bark, possessed with a sorrow so great it seemed to leach up out of the ground.
    A noise caused me to look up, and I noticed the third figure as he took a step away from the tree against which he’d been leaning. He dropped suddenly to his knees, his head bowed, his shoulders shaking as if he’d given in to the most devastating anguish, the grief that racked his body so profound, waves of suffering rolled off him, choking me with his despair and hopelessness. Mindlessly I stepped forward, driven to comfort him by the bond of one living being to another, even knowing as I did that this shadow figure was beyond my reach.
    Gravel crunched beneath my foot and the figure looked up, getting clumsily to his feet. He stepped out of the shadows of the trees and my breath caught in my throat, my heart pounding so loudly I thought it would burst out of my chest.
    “Ysolde?” His voice was ragged and raw, as if he’d swallowed acid. He stared at me in stark, utter disbelief.
    “You’re . . . Baltic?” I asked.
    My voice seemed to bring him from his stupor. He took a step toward me, stumbling, his head shaking all the while his eyes were searching me, searching my face, trying to tell if I was real or not. “It cannot be.”
    “I saw you in the park. You are Baltic, aren’t you?”
    “You . . . live?”
    “Yes,” I said, chills running down my arms. He looked nothing like the man in the visions—except for his eyes. Those were the same onyx, glittering like sunlight on a still pond. “My name is Tully now.”
    He stopped a few feet from me, reaching out tentatively, as if he wanted to touch me, but was afraid to do so.
    “Ysolde?”
    A woman’s voice called my name. Baltic froze, then whirled about.
    “That sounds like May,” I said, frowning as I gazed back at the house. “I wonder how she got here?”
    “Silver mate!” Baltic spat, running a few yards away from me as if he sought something.
    May emerged from behind the tree, smiling as she saw me. “There you are. We’ve been looking all over for you. We thought something might have happened to— agathos daimon ! It’s Baltic.”
    “Yes, he is