The Raven and the Dove (The Raven and the Dove #1) - Kaitlyn Davis Page 0,93

And when his cheeks grew wet, he imagined there must have been a storm. And when the loneliness became a physical pain clawing at his gut, for a moment Rafe wondered if the dragon had come back to finish the job. But when he opened his eyes, no one was there.

He stood, wiped his cheeks, and flew back to his room at the top of the castle to do what he had done many times before—wait for Xander to return from a dinner he hadn’t been invited to, and do his best to be needed.

39

Lyana

By the time Lyana returned to her rooms that night, she was numb. Numb from all the talking. Numb from the monotony. Numb from the sheer amount of information they’d tried to shove down her throat. Just numb.

“Long night?” Cassi crooned.

Lyana found her friend curled against some pillows by the balcony, an open book in her hands, tan cheeks rosy from the breeze.

“Long week.” She sighed and collapsed into the nearest chair, dropping her head in her hands. “I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to call this place home.”

“Ana,” Cassi reprimanded, “it’s only been a day.”

“I know, but everything is just so, so…so different. Everyone gawks at my wings. They stare at me like I’m some piece of art on display instead of a person. The queen is… Well, she’s just miserable. She won’t even allow you to come to breakfast, though I plan on revisiting that later. And everyone is just stuffy, too focused on work, not making room for even the slightest bit of fun. And the prince, he seems to enjoy it! The work, I mean, not the fun. I’m not even being myself—not joking, not teasing, not playing, because I feel so uncomfortable, I don’t even remember how to act.”

Cassi threw her a keen look over the rim of her reading glasses. But Lyana didn’t back down, and after a moment, her friend released an exaggerated sigh as she eased to her feet and left her book facedown against the floor so as not to lose her place.

“It can’t be that bad,” Cassi said.

“It is,” Lyana insisted and dropped back her head to stare at the shadows the oil lanterns made on the ceiling. Even her room was drab—drab and sullen and sulky just like her. “I’m not comfortable in my own skin here. They forced me to have a bath this morning while you were sleeping, like the dead I might add, but didn’t give me a second to grab my own soaps. Now even my skin feels dusty, like it’s thirsty for some excitement. And whatever they put in my hair made it dry and itchy. I don’t know where to find my combs to fix it.”

“Hold on,” Cassi muttered, changing direction midstride as she made for a trunk on the other side of the room that hadn’t been there that morning. Before she opened the lid, Lyana raced to her side, releasing a shamefully pleased breath as she took in the contents.

“Help get me out of this thing, please?” she asked, spinning so Cassi could untie the laces at her back while she worked on the buttons of her overcoat.

Within a few minutes, the formal gown was off, replaced with the silk sleeping trousers and shirt she pulled from the trunk, a set to match the ones her friend was already wearing. Immediately she could breathe again, and she did, inhaling for a long moment, trying to draw the air from the balcony until it was under her skin to keep it there, fresh and wild and full of life.

Lyana untied the messy bun she’d woven that morning, dipped her fingers into the salve her grandmother had given her before she’d gone to the gods, and rubbed it into her scalp. Lyana’s bluebird mother had skin as pale as a raven’s. Her hair was stick straight and easy to brush, more similar to Cassi’s wavy locks than her daughter’s coiling ones. Lyana, like Luka, had inherited her father’s looks—strong traits that Aethios himself gifted to all the doves. At least that was what her grandmother used to say as she gently forced a comb through Lyana's tight curls. The memory brought a smile to her lips as she tried to do the same now.

“Let me.” Taking the comb from Lyana’s hand, Cassi perched on the edge of the bed and motioned to her friend to sit on the floor, as they had often done before. “Small braids this