Page 51 of First Light
She couldn’t say Cadell was handsome. He looked exactly like a dragon—somehow—just with a human face. When he’d transformed, he’d been clad in sleek leather armor the same color as the dark emerald dragon skin that molded to his body. His muscled arms were bare, but he didn’t look cold. In fact, every now and then Carys thought she saw a flicker of a glow shimmering at his throat.
It was as if dragon fire lived inside him no matter what body he wore.
The dragon hadn’t said a word out loud, though Carys could hear his voice in her mind.
The Alban chief is deciding what to do with you. Say nothing.
Carys didn’t think she could speak to Cadell in her mind. She’d tried projecting questions at him, but if he heard her, he didn’t respond. She was desperate to get away from the hall and ask Cadell a million questions, but instead, she was trapped in a stone chamber with Lachlan’s family staring at her like she was a strange bug.
Lachlan was sitting next to his father, watching the dragon. “Cadell, how did you come to fly to our court?”
The dragon finally spoke, and his voice sounded just as it did in her mind, like a low rumble of distant thunder. “I felt my lady’s presence.”
“Carys is not your lady.” Lachlan’s voice was rough. “Seren was your lady.”
“I know who my lady is, Lachlan of Moray.”
A muscle jumped in Lachlan’s jaw. “She is of the Brightlands. She cannot be nêrys ddraig.”
“But she is,” Cadell said. “How that came to be is for human minds to worry over. She is my lady now.”
Carys turned to Cadell and whispered, “What does that mean?”
He spoke into her mind.I am your dragon, Lady Carys. I will protect you with my life, and no being, human or magical, shall harm you unless they kill me first.
Well, that was… intense.
“How are you my dragon when we’ve never even met before?”
I will explain later.
Duncan was sitting off to the side, lounging on a bench with his legs kicked out. “The kelpie and the unicorns.”
Aisling turned to him. “What about them?”
Duncan lifted his head, his voice gruff as he looked at Carys. “She was touched by magic yesterday. A kelpie attacked her, and the unicorns healed her.” He looked directly at Cadell. “That’s when you started to feel her presence, isn’t it? Yesterday afternoon.”
Cadell nodded to Duncan before he turned back to Carys.
Forgive me, Nêrys, for not coming to you sooner. Do you want me to kill the kelpie? I will hunt it and destroy it, leaving its bones as an offering to Llyr, the sea god who created it.
She quickly whispered, “That’s really okay.” She reached up and patted Cadell’s shoulder. “I’m… good. No bones needed.”
“Whatever Carys is,” Duncan said, “she can’t beentirelyof my world. Not if she can hear dragons.”
Carys glared at him like the betrayer that he was.
Duncan shrugged and raised an eyebrow but said nothing more.
“My lady’s arrival in the Shadowlands has already been reported to the Cymric court,” Cadell said. “High King Dafydd is readying a party to fly north. I will wait with my lady until he arrives.”
Lachlan sat up. “Just a moment. Carys was born in the Brightlands no matter what anyone says. She doesn’t belong here and she’s not safe. People are already asking questions about her connection to Seren. She’s now going to attract attention from the fae and the wolves. Sheneedsto go back with Duncan.”
Carys glared at Lachlan, but he pretended to ignore her.
“It’s freezing!” Lachlan wrapped his arms around her. “We’ve got to get you inside. You’re soaking wet, Carys.”
“It’s fine.” She held on to him, elated by his declaration in the forest. “Tell me again.”