"Why are there two mattresses?"

Meya paused with one foot into her and Coris's shared tent. Coris nudged her in the rest of the way with a featherlight finger on her forearm, then turned towards the hay-stuffed mattress on the right.

"I'm not fit to lie by your side. I never have been." He slumped onto his bed, his head bowed in shame, "That didn't stop me taking advantage of your trust, time and again."

Meya blinked, surprised and somewhat miffed, which in turn surprised her again. On one hand, she was satisfied that he was sensible enough to know he had been scratched off her good books. But on the other, he seemed to have given up on winning her back even before he had tried. And that all-too-familiar resignation rankled her. Wasn't he in the least inclined to right his wrongs? To improve himself?

And Zier was saying he loved her? What dung.

"It's not entirely your fault." She settled down on her mattress with a sigh, shrugging at Coris's raised eyebrow, "I pressured you into it, and you were too polite to say no. We should've taken more time to get to know each other."

Coris's lips tightened in distaste. Yet, Meya's contrition was genuine. Then, a sly smile crept onto his lips.

"Does this mean our short-lived contract is back in effect?" Meya started, then cracked a smirk of annoyance.

"Yeah. Go shag Arinel. I'll see if I could ask Zier to give you a merciful death."

Coris chuckled in triumph, having seen through her act as simple jealousy. As amusement faded, silence seeped back in. Meya watched as Coris's gaze wandered. He wrung his hands, hesitant. Finally, he braved a timid proposal.

"Since it's clear we're both attracted to each other nevertheless, what do you say we experiment with courtship?"

Meya's heart gave a leap, then pained at the sight of Coris's fidgeting hands and pursed lips, his wavering eyes doing their best to weather her scrutiny and convey his sincere intentions. He hadn't surrendered, after all. Still, some kinks needed to be ironed out before they could proceed.

"Could we call it a courtship if our parents don't even know about it? And we have no clue if we could ever wed?"

Coris bit his lips, his eyes sealed in anguished defeat. Meya sighed and leaned closer.

"Do you see us getting married and having a babe, Coris? What exactly is it that you want out of our affair?"

"What I want, I could never have." He was cautious as ever when it came to his true desires. He met her gaze, and tenderness replaced bitterness, "What I could have is you by my side, in whatever capacity. That I already do, and I'm content."

"Well, I'm not."

Coris froze, his eyes wide and fearful. Meya told herself to be staid.

"I can't have you dying on me again, Coris." She shook her head, her voice breaking as a flash of his lifeless, broken form flitted by her eyes. "You have your duty as a Hadrian. Your betrothed. Your shortened life. Your prodigal brother. You have valid reasons why we couldn't marry. And I can take all those, but this?"

She produced a vial of laudanum from her pocket and rattled it before him; Coris was to take dwindling amounts of laudanum daily to ease withdrawal and assist with his recovery, and she was in charge of it. For a long, excruciating moment they stared. She could see relief in his eyes as he realized the true cause of her fury, and she doubled down to make sure her message got through his haze of delight,

"You could die for anything, anyone. Just not for nothing." She thrust the hated phial under her pillow, glaring into his eyes.

"I want a man who would try to live until he really couldn't, who wouldn't leave me unless he really had to. Who wouldn't go behind my back in every—single—thing!" She hammered out each word with a thump on the mattress. "I told you that day—no more lies, no more secrets! I need to be able to trust you!"

Meya's arm dropped lifelessly to her lap, yet her eyes clung on to his, her whisper hoarse and tear-choked,

"And if that's more than you're willing to commit, then perhaps we're never meant to be. No matter how strong our feelings are."

Their stare lingered. Coris's resolve seemed to solidify as the seconds wore on, and Meya's heart was bolstered at the sight. He was no longer the dying boy of that night that she must convince to fight; he was beginning to live.

"I understand. All I ask is a chance to prove myself worthy." He said, solemn as his piercing gaze. Meya struggled to keep her lips from curving up in pride as her heart melted in her chest. She nodded, striving to remain cavalier.

"And you shall have it."

Coris cracked a smile so boyishly, so innocently joyous, Meya had to avert her eyes lest her cheeks grew so hot the pink blossomed. He clasped his hands with replenished optimism,

"So, what are the rules?"

"Standard courting practices. Sex is off the table. So is kissing. Holding hands and hugging permitted for emotional situations only."

"No sex? Are you sure?" Coris unfurled a devious grin. Meya glowered.

"Dead sure."

"Understandable. My impressive manhood would hold great sway over your judgment."

If there were a furnace inside her, Meya would have burst into flames and blasted the unrepentant donghead to a cloud of sooty smithereens. She twisted up a smile lined with grinding teeth, her words hissing out like tongues of flame,

"I'm more concerned for you, actually. Until I deem you trustworthy, you're not getting a taste of these—" She jabbed two thumbs at her proudest possessions. Coris sealed her lips with a gentle finger.

"—We're still courting. We shouldn't be discussing our sexual attributes so soon."

Growling, Meya batted his spider-like digit aside,

"You started it, donghead!"

Their eyes met. Their hands caressed. Their lips parted but words had died. In that frozen split-second, all seemed forgotten but pure, mad lust.

After a charged, ominous moment, the young lovers tore their welded gaze apart with great effort. Meya panted as her pulse pounded in her ears, avoiding Coris's eyes at all costs.

"Wish Arinel were here." She breathed.

"Wonder if Zier would chaperone." Coris muttered in agreement. Meya cast her eyes about the spartan tent, hoping for a new form of distraction, as banter seemed to be serving the opposite purpose.

"You brought Heist?" Coris shook his head, "Chess?" His eyes lit up, and Meya hitched up a sly grin, "We could play a match or two. For old times' sake."

"I see you are prepared to be annihilated." Coris steepled his fingers before his pitying smile.

"Underestimating me already?" Meya thrust him a sneer just as nasty to cover up her shudder. Coris didn't need to know she hadn't touched a pawn since gamble chess nearly landed her a spot in Meriton's Greeneye brothel just last Fest.

"Coris Hadrian does not over- nor underestimate. He simply estimates with precision."

"And exaggerates."

"How impertinent. I'll make sure to include that in our next vocabulary drill. Along with impertinent."

After taunting Meya's smoking fangs with a smirk of triumph, Coris edged over to his chest of belongings to retrieve the chessboard.

Perhaps we could pull this off, after all—Meya reassured herself as she watched Coris set up the miniature battlefield with well-acquainted fingers—we could learn to be friends before man and wife.

In typical Freda fashion, they were only five turns in when Coris broke the sacred silence of friendly competition.

"Meya, there's...something I've been keeping from you."

Meya looked up. Remembering Coris's startled glance, that evening he revealed their plans to Simon and Christopher—his horrified gaze, that time she relayed her recollections of the Crosset Famine—she couldn't decide if she should feel betrayed, gratified or delighted, and settled on indifference for the time being.

"I'm aware." She fell back on her propped arms, deadpan save for a raised eyebrow, "Was it singular or plural, again?"

Coris winced, then bowed his head, ashamed,

"I wasn't even doing it purely for your sake; I was worried it would derail my plans, should you react like last time and reject your dragon body." He cradled his temples in his palm,

"In the end, I'm no better than those I condemned. I, too, was planning to exploit your powers. Zier's right; I'm the monster, not you."

Meya narrowed her eyes as fear gripped her. What horrors had he kept from her now? Surely nothing could be worse than learning you were a dragon, could it?

"Old habits are hard to shake, I guess. At least you're taking a step forward." She strove to appear nonchalant, yet her voice trembled, "Is this why you brought those five Greeneyes? To use as backup in case I won't fly you to Everglen?"

Coris blinked, aghast and hurt, then shook his head.

"No, I've just realized this after we left Hadrian. It's still a theory. I don't have proof yet." He met her gaze, his voice firm, "But, regardless of whether I would turn out right or not, know this: it is not your fault."

As silence drifted down between them, freezing fear permeated every inch of Meya, such that if Coris would touch her then, she reckoned she would have felt cold to him even without Lattis. Shivering, she willed up every last ounce of courage for her numb lips to thaw,

"Tell me, Coris."

Coris sagged under the weight of the truth. His head bowed over the abandoned chess match, his voice was no louder than a trick of the wintry gale whistling through gaps in wattle and daub.

"Meya, I—I think you may have actually brought about the Crosset Famine."

⏳

For a moment, there was no sound but that of the night wind pummeling the walls of their tent. The leather rippled at the peripherals of her eyes, like the gleams in Coris's eyes.

Meya had heard this statement before. Countless times. She had never contested it, yet she also had never once believed in it. And she would have done the same this time had it not been uttered by him. The man who had just urged her kind to rise above the prejudice hammered into their heads their whole lives.

"What makes you think that?" She whispered. It was as if she still held out hope that there would be a pitfall in his theory. Coris squeezed his joined hands. His eyes roamed the bare gravel at their feet.

"You said the crop failings in Crosset began after you were flogged at the town square. From what I've heard of the Famine, the phenomenon was limited to Crosset. Neighboring manors had regular harvests and reported nothing of the sort."

Church bells were ringing in her head, but the connection was still out of reach. Shrouded by her soul's last attempt, perhaps, to preserve her sanity.

"My theories are; One, in a moment of vengeful rage, you may have wished for Crosset's demise. Or two, your battered body may have reacted to your fear of death, tried to heal your grievous injuries, and overcompensated."

Meya started. Was it the tent flapping? It sounded like the clap of the whip when it broke through her dress and split her flesh. Heavy chains with links thicker than her thumb erupted in jingling giggles as she fell facefirst onto the stake it was coiled around, clinging for balance. She ground her teeth over the bridle's bit. She didn't know if the metallic taste was from the rusty bit or from the blood oozing out of her tongue or both. The whip came down again. Again. The once sharp claps now had a waterlogged, slippery ring to them.

She wrenched her eyes open against the pain and looked up. Lord Crosset. Spiteful old man with empty eyes like ice-chips. His three daughters all had them, too, and she loathed them all. All around her the crowd jeered. They flung brown mud at her, and it slid off her red. Somewhere, she heard Mum scream and sob for mercy, for restraint, for the chance to take the blows in her place.

Lord Crosset could always hear Alanna's Song. It was the only thing he chose to listen to. It was that realization that sent rage roiling inside her like she had never felt before.

If I'm getting the whip and the bridle anyway, she thought, I might as well have them.

Icy fingers on her numb arms pulled Meya back to the present. Coris was hovering over her. Her elbows had buckled from the force of the truth, and she was hanging halfway on her back.

Coris was pale with worry. Avoiding his gaze, she picked herself upright and warded off his fretting hands.

"Go on."

After a wary pause, Coris nodded in defeat, but settled down by her side on the mattress, just in case.

"In any case, with your dragon ability to absorb nutrients from the earth, you absorbed all nutrients in Crosset's soil into yourself. That would explain why you were fully armored when you transformed, that night you rescued me. Even when you were fed human proportions of food all your life, and had weathered months of starvation."

Coris simply fell silent. He didn't seem inclined to ask which it had been—vengeance or fear, and Meya turned away in relief. She couldn't bear to see his disgust and disapproval. Not when she was already disgusted enough with herself.

She longed to crawl out of her skin and inhibit anyone else, anything else. Fyr, even a rat might be preferable. A rat never killed a hundred of its kin out of sheer spite. There was no taking back what she had done. There was no redemption. Even death was not enough to escape this sin. Their blood would follow her to Fyr's Lake and she would sink to its bowels. And she deserved it.

"Like I said, it's still just a theory, and none of this is your fault, Meya."

Coris's voice echoed in her delirium, like a ripple on the face of the tarlike water. She struggled to believe. She knew she should believe. But she also didn't want to believe it.

"You were a child. You didn't know better. You were treated unjustly. You were in unimaginable pain. You were never taught about your powers—let alone to control them. You were scared and angry, and no-one could blame you for that. Not even Fyr himself."

Coris shook her arm, desperate at the sight of her listlessness.

"But now that you've grown and we know better, we must make sure this would never happen again. As I've said, your only duty is to learn to control it."

As the heat of his gaze intensified, Meya succumbed to a nod. She remembered the insults the villagers had hurled at her, that day as she dangled from the Ice Pillory.

"Well, guess that's one thing the folks back home got right all along, eh." She remarked with a chuckle, shrugging even as she felt Coris's glare of disapproval, "I mean, I wouldn't want a hundred deaths on my hands if I could help it, but now that I know for sure it wasn't Freda's damnation, that I wasn't wrong for working in the fields, the truth did set me free. Only to stab me in the back out of spite. Typical Freda."

"It's not—your—fault, Meya!" Coris hammered out. He turned away and tore at his hair in frustration, "Oh, Fyr."

Meya could guess what he was thinking, and she tugged on his sleeve to stop him. Still, she didn't know if she regretted hearing the truth—if she would hear it again if she had the choice to go back.

Guilt was too terrible to bear. Hope was nowhere in sight. And Meya dealt with it in the one way she knew best—sarcasm.

"So, looks like I could wipe out a whole town with sheer willpower." She chuckled, then cocked her head, "That's going on the list next to lizard limbs and relieving men of their manhoods."

Coris let loose a string of curses. Meya had never heard him curse this long, yet it seemed she had lost the capacity for surprise, numbed by the hatred she felt for herself. Suddenly, his arms bound her, tugging her into his embrace. She fought and strained back as she felt she had begun to thaw at the cold of his bony chest.

"I don't think—this counts—as an emotional situation." She grunted as she pulled and wriggled, but for once, Coris trumped her with masculine strength. He buried his face into her shoulder, whispering through gritted teeth,

"You forgave all of us." He tightened his embrace as she continued to resist, "Now forgive yourself."

At his command, Meya let go. Overwhelmed by her tide of anguish and grief, she couldn't hear the quiet sobs leaking from the women's tents. Nor the crunching footsteps of sleepless Greeneyes as they slunk away to the privacy of solid darkness. Throughout the night, for the first time in millennia, the desolate plains of Caesonai echoed with the song of dragons.