To Tame a Dragon - Tiffany Roberts Page 0,38
human cities along these very mountains, cities rising from the dunes. I have seen ships on the sea with sails of every color you can imagine. I have seen the jungles to the north, so thick with trees that you cannot even glimpse the ground from above, and I have seen fields of grass seemingly as endless as the sea.”
Falthyris could not stop himself from raising his hand then. He hooked wet strands of her hair with his talons and guided them back from her face, which he studied anew. Every time he looked upon her closely, he seemed to find a new detail, a new feature that belonged solely to her—like the little flecks of gold in her eyes that were visible only under bright sunlight.
“I have seen many things of great beauty, Elliya, and I long took them for granted.” He brushed the pad of his thumb over her cheek. “But none of those sights compare to you.”
Something flickered in her eyes, a gleam of longing and hope, but it was gone as quick as it had come, replaced with uncertainty and hurt. Her brows furrowed as she reached up, took his wrist, and guided it away from her. She released him and stepped back. “I do not need your lies or mockery, dragon.”
Anger sparked in Falthyris’s gut, an instinctive reaction to a human speaking to him in such a manner. It was the same anger that lay at the heart of the expanding chasm between them. He’d always told himself that a dragon’s fury could shake mountains, that it was the most potent force in the world, that it made him akin to a god to creatures like this human.
But he was beginning to understand that none of that was true—and even if it had once been true, what could it have accomplished for him now? What had it accomplished for him already?
Falthyris forced that anger down, crushing it beneath his swallowed pride. “I am neither mocking you nor being dishonest, Elliya.”
That only seemed to kindle more anger in her eyes. “First, I am an insect—no, I am beneath an insect—and now you praise my beauty? If you need to use my body to relieve your heat, you do not need to tell me falsehoods.”
She moved to step around him.
He shifted aside and blocked her path, his heartfire surging and bringing heat to the surface of his scales. “I have had right to be angry with you, human, for what you did to me—”
“And I have apologized, and I have given and given, but I will stand for no more of your abuse,” she said, glaring up at him. “I am not the only one at fault for that night. You came to me, dragon. You sought me as much as I sought—”
“And I am attempting to apologize to you, female!”
She flinched, startled by his outburst, and nearly fell backward into the water. His hand darted out reflexively, catching her arm and steadying her.
If only it were that easy to steady his emotions.
Falthyris released a huff through his nostrils and tried not to notice the feel of her soft, wet skin under his hand, or the warmth coming from it. “I have had right to be angry, as I said. But the rage I have turned upon you, Elliya, far exceeds anything you have earned. You became the target of anger I’ve harbored for centuries, and you do not deserve it. I am sorry for that. Especially considering that you did not know what your touch would do. What it would mean.
“Allow me a chance to be better. To do better. For you.”
Elliya’s eyes were wary as they searched his. “You are sorry?”
“I am.”
“Even though I have stolen everything from you?”
He did not miss the vulnerability in her gaze, nor the tiny, accompanying gleam of hopefulness. “You have taken from me, yes, but not everything. And I feel there may be much to gain, so long as I set aside my stubbornness and rage.”
She stepped closer, raised a hand, and settled her palm over his forehead.
Falthyris frowned, brows drawing together. “What are you doing, human?”
“Trying to determine if you are ill.”
He took gentle hold of her wrist and guided her hand down. “Why?”
“You…are not acting like yourself.”
“We barely know one another, Elliya.”
“Ah, I but I know you are stubborn, arrogant, overbearing, rude—”
Falthyris moved her arm again, this time to cover her mouth with her own hand. “My goal in this is to avoid an argument.”
Though her mouth