Arabella stared at Xavier as he flew away. She felt as if an electric current had been run through her body, holding her in place against her will. “What the hell?” she whispered. Nothing responded to her. In a matter of seconds, Xavier had taken to the skies, away from the barony.
Why would he do that?
Was he running away again?
Hurt and frustration welled in her, finally galvanizing her into action. She bolted from the room and ran for the staircase, nearly falling down in her haste. She was stopped by the manor’s housekeeper at the foot, who grabbed her arm.
“What’s this about?” she asked indignantly. “You could have knocked me over!”
“I—it’s complicated, I think,” Arabella replied. She felt like crying. “I need to get to my ornithopter.”
“Phillip brought it on the property a couple of hours ago,” Mrs. Tuplin replied. “It will be waiting for you at the side of the house.” Her gaze searched Arabella’s face. “You understand it isn’t wise to go outside right now?”
“The wolves don’t eat people, do they?”
“Of course not, but they don’t know you. We just don’t want to see you injured.”
“I don’t care about that. I need to get to my ornithopter, now.”
At last, Mrs. Tuplin seemed to understand Arabella’s urgency. “Shall I get the lady of the manor?”
Arabella didn’t want to bother the pregnant baroness at this late hour; she’d retired to her rooms not an hour ago. She might have an idea of where a stupid dragon might be hiding in this part of the country. “Please.”
“I’ll fetch her,” Mrs. Tuplin said. “You get your flying machine ready. What’s this about, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“My companion is a stubborn idiot.”
“I see.” The housekeeper nodded.
“I might have been an idiot, too. I told him something that probably should have waited until he was back in his human form.”
“Are dragons more difficult than wolves?”
Did it matter? They were wasting precious seconds. Still, Arabella didn’t want to appear impolite. “I couldn’t tell you. Xavier’s the only dragon I’ve ever known and the baron the only wolf.” She started walking to the foyer, eager to see the conversation over. “I’ll get to my ornithopter now.”
Mrs. Tuplin dashed up the stairs with remarkable speed for a woman who looked old enough to be Adelle’s mother.
It wasn’t until Arabella let herself out of the house’s grand wooden doors and prowled the side of the property that she realized she was rushing into things like an idiot again, too. Just like she had done with the Antarctic expedition, just as she had taken to the skies as a solo aviator after her father remarried. Just as she had always done: run headfirst into something without a plan. Where the hell would she go? She didn’t know this part of the country. She hardly knew Scotland at all. If she took flight now, she would be doing so blindly and would end up crashed on the side of a hill or something. There wouldn’t be a dragon to save her this time.
“Arabella?” A ghostly figure appeared at the side of the house. It took a few seconds for Arabella to recognize her as the baroness, wearing a thin white nightgown under a white knitted shawl that had to be too warm for the summer weather. Her long dark hair was unbound. In her hand she held a flameless candle and a sheet of foolscap. When she handed it to Arabella, she saw it was a map. “Mrs. Tuplin said Xavier’s gone?” The artificial candle’s flame made her look angelic, but the effect was marred by the concern in her voice.
Arabella nodded. She opened the flight basket’s door and stepped inside. “He came to our window.” Just thinking about it made her want to cry. “You know, it was like something out of a fairy tale, the dragon coming to visit.” She almost said “the fair maiden,” but she was neither of those things. “Anyway, I told him about the mate mark and I suppose he panicked. He flew away from the house, away from the barony. I think he headed north.”
Adelle hurried to the ornithopter and stepped inside the flight basket. “Well, let’s look for him.” She held her candle aloft, looking around the basket. “Is there somewhere we can strap ourselves in?”
“Do you seriously mean to look for him with me?”
“Of course. You don’t know Roseheath. I do and I’ve never taken a trip in an ornithopter before. It will be an adventure.”
“Are you sure you should be doing that in your condition?” Arabella strapped her flight goggles to her face.
“I’m pregnant, not helpless, and if I could survive all that vomiting in the first few months, I can survive this.” The baroness shuddered. “No one told me I would be that sick.”
Arabella handed her Xavier’s flight goggles.
“I don’t know how to navigate or fly,” the baroness cautioned her.
“That’s all right, I do but it will be helpful for you to direct me with the map.”
“That I can do.” The baroness adjusted her goggles.
Arabella wound the engine’s lever until it gave a faint steamy hiss, then directed the machine into the air. Its wings flapped, shaking the flight basket in a way that could make the most experienced aviator nauseated, but the baroness only squeaked and gripped the basket’s edge. Then they were airborne. Arabella directed the ornithopter in the direction Xavier had flown.
“There’s a forest that runs along the barony in this direction,” Adelle said, voice raised to be heard over the engine’s noise. “It ends in a cliff overlooking a lake. There’s a network of small caves in the area. We thought that was where you two would go to look for fossils.”
That was as good a place to start looking for Xavier as any. Below them, a group of werewolves gathered and followed their path. “Should I be worried?” Arabella asked.
The baroness looked down over the edge. “I don’t think so.” She waved and shouted, “Everything’s fine!”
The largest werewolf stood up on his hind legs and gave such a growl that Arabella could hear it, thirty feet in the air. She couldn’t be sure in the light offered by the full moon, but it looked like Henry in his wolf form. All the gods in all the heavens above, she hoped he understood she wasn’t trying to kidnap his wife.
Henry was the only wolf to keep following them, even as they approached the forest Adelle told her about.
Arabella directed the ornithopter higher to avoid the treetops but kept it low enough to see the ground. Unfortunately, the tree cover was too thick see it clearly. She felt like stamping her feet and swearing. As it was, she yelled out, “God damn it, Xavier, why did you have to do this? Where are you?”
Adelle took that as a cue to lean over the edge and shout, “Xavier!”
That was a good idea, actually. Not just to find him, but to reassure an angry werewolf that his mate wasn’t being spirited away.
Both of them continued to yell Xavier’s name as they flew over the forest. At one point, the baroness retched over the side and threw up. “Should I return to the manor?” Arabella asked.
Looking a little green under her candle’s flame, Adelle shook her head. “No.” She took a few deep, fortifying breaths. “This is more important right now.”
The forest gave way to a clearing that ended in a cliff with a sharp drop off. “You mentioned there’s a cave system here,” Arabella said. “Shall I land here or on the beach?”
“There’s a path that leads to the beach. Why don’t you land here, and we’ll look in the forest?”
It seemed like a sensible solution. Arabella brought the ornithopter to a halt and landed it as gently as she could.
Trees rustled, and a few moments later the naked baron appeared, unbothered by his being in the altogether. Before he could speak, Adelle rushed to his side. “We’re looking for Xavier,” she said hurriedly. “Arabella is going to look for him along the beach.”
“It’s the middle of the night!” Henry said.
“And she’ll stay on the beach,” Adelle added, giving a knowing look to Arabella. “We’ll look for Xavier in the forest. You should shift back to your wolf form, anyway. You really do need the full experience under the moon.”
“My love…”
“Please, Henry. We need to find him.”
“Why the hell did he run away?”
“I’ll explain that to you later. Or Arabella will, when she’s returned with Xavier. He couldn’t have gone very far.”
Arabella wasn’t so sure about that, but she nodded anyway. She looked through the ornithopter’s supplies and found a small kerosene lamp, its fuel reserves full. “I’ll head to the beach now.”
“We’ll be there shortly if Henry can’t pick up Xavier’s scent in the forest.” The baroness gave Arabella directions to the beach, cautioning her to be careful along the path.
At least the path was brightly lit between the moon and her lantern. Arabella was still careful with her steps, boot soles a little slippery against the path’s stones and sand. The beach itself was rocky and inhospitable, a sharp contrast to the one Xavier shifted on in Aberdeen. There wasn’t a sandbar to speak of, just sharp rocks the water lapped against. She couldn’t tell if the sandbar was washed out because of the tide or if this was how it always was. “Xavier?” she called. Her voice carried across the water. “Are you here?”
The only reply was the quiet slap of the waves.
“If you are, please come out,” she pleaded. “Let’s talk about this. I think I deserve that much.” He was here, somewhere. She could feel it. She hoped it was because of their mate bonding and not a figment of her imagination.
Keeping her lantern held aloft, she carefully walked along the beach, looking for caves that he might have hidden in. “Why is it so insane that someone might love you as you are?” Did wildlife make their homes in Scottish beach caves? If so, was it dangerous? “I was so disappointed when I found out you couldn’t turn me into a dragon,” she said. “I didn’t want you to be alone anymore. I don’t have to be a dragon for that. I can still be your mate even if I’m only a human.”
She shone her lantern into the first cave she approached, but there was nothing there.
It wasn’t a cave so much as a closet in the side of the cliff, too small and short to hold a human, let alone a dragon. “Is it because I’m not enough?” she continued. “Are you running away because I’m only human?” She kept walking along the beach until she reached another cave, this one deeper, its entrance larger. Its floor was recently disturbed, pebbles brushed aside in the way a dragon’s tail might swish through them. Oddly shaped paw prints appeared in spots where there was more sand than rock. More than that, there was a faint glow at its opposite end, the sort a homemade torch might give off. Her heartbeat quickened. “Xavier? Are you down here?” She followed the footprints to the other end of the cave until she reached the torch.
Xavier sat huddled against the wall in his human form, a stricken look in his eyes. A torch made from driftwood burned in a hole in the wall, its flame dying.
“Oh, thank God.” Arabella set the lantern aside and crouched down next to him. “Are you all right? I’ve been worried sick!”
His voice was ragged. “Arabella…”
“Why the hell would you do that?” She sat in front of him, deliberately blocking his path out of the cave. “Why would you run away when I told you something good?”
“Is it?” His angry shout bounced off the walls. “I really am a monster. I’ve done something terrible to you. I—”
“No.” She pressed her finger against his lips, silencing him. His eyes widened in surprise, but he didn’t speak. “You didn’t. I knew what I was in for when I hauled you aboard my dirigible in Antarctica. I knew I was getting tangled up with a dragon and I’m not willing to disentangle myself now. I think that mate bite thing is the whole reason I found you tonight at all.” She remembered the baroness’s help. “Well, Adelle started me in the right direction.”
“What happens when you realize what I’ve done?” he asked hoarsely. “I’ve tied you to me forever. I—”
This had to be the stupidest reason to run away that she ever heard. “Yes, we’re tied to each other forever. There are other ways that can happen, too. What if I’m pregnant?”
Xavier stiffened, eyes wide. “What?”
“It’s an example. If I had a baby, we’d be stuck together anyway. It isn’t as though we’ve taken precautions, so it could happen.”
He ran his hand through his hair. “Christ, Arabella, I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Obviously not. It doesn’t matter if it’s a mate mark or a baby, we’re still bound together.” Her voice softened. “You wouldn’t have done it if I wasn’t your mate. It’s a thing werewolves have. We assume dragons do, too. It’s because you love me. I love you, too.” She rose to her full height, then held out her hand but he didn’t move. “You can’t keep running whenever you’re frightened about your dragon,” she said. “You’ve already learned how to live with this. You’re getting better at it.”
“You said you wished I turned you into one.” He turned beseeching eyes to her.
“I did, if it meant you wouldn’t have to be alone anymore. Even if I’m still human, you aren’t on your own again. I’m not leaving you.”
Xavier finally stood up and gave her a look that pulled at her heart. “I know you mean that.”
Hope flared in her heart. “Of course, I do. I would never lie to you. Both of us are too odd to function in polite society. We may as well be odd together.”
“As long as I’m not running away again, promise me something.”
She nodded. “Anything.” Relief poured through her at his change of heart, his reassurance that he was willing to give what she knew they could have together a fair shot.
He pressed his forehead against hers, breath ragged. “Promise me you’ll never fly an ornithopter at night in unfamiliar skies and then wander around a cliff side in the dark. Both of them are incredibly dangerous.”
That was what he was worried about? “I promise.”
“I’m not even considering the added danger of doing those things when it’s a full moon and you’re surrounded by werewolves.”
“I was with Adelle. She wanted to fly in the ornithopter.”
“My God.” He looked at her like she was insane. “You took the wife and baroness of a werewolf leader in that death trap?”
“We were all right.” Arabella didn’t tell him about the baroness being sick over the side of the basket.
He shook his head. “Just… promise me you won’t do these foolish things again.”
“What about another journey to Antarctica?” She thought of his glittering lair, all the things he’d had to leave behind. She wondered if he missed them.
“No. I’ll tie you to the bed first.”
Arabella felt herself blush. “You would?”
He flinched.
“I wouldn’t mind it if you did,” she said. She reached for his shoulders, sliding her palms over his skin. “In fact, while we’re here and you’re already naked…”
“Not in a cave. These aren’t safe.” There was a catch in his voice, like he wished it wasn’t the case. A few stones shook themselves loose from their moorings on the wall, as if to articulate Xavier’s point. “We need to get out of here,” he announced. Grasping her hand, he led her out of the cave as pebbles rained down around them. A larger rock dislodged itself when they crossed the cave mouth, landing with a wet plop on the ground. “I would never look for fossils in these caves. They’re unstable.”
“Then why did you hide out in them?”
“I didn’t know where else to go. I just flew until I reached the water.”
“Would you have come back to me at the manor?”
He looked at her, then at the water. “I don’t know. I was so panicked when you told me what the bite meant and I thought I’d ruined your life.”
“Stop.” She placed a hand against his cheek. He leaned in to her as he did in his dragon form at the bedroom window. “You didn’t. Every day since I crashed into your mountain has been an adventure and I was the one who ruined your life.”
He clasped her hand and brought it to his lips. “You did no such thing. I could’ve left your dirigible if I really wanted to. I could have schemed my way aboard another expedition back in Santiago. But I couldn’t bear the idea of not being with you, even if it meant returning to England.” He pressed his forehead against hers. “I love you so much, Arabella.”
She kissed him, wrapping her arms around his neck and putting everything she could into it. His response was immediate, and she thought she might have changed his mind about staying on the beach a little longer. A wave splashed them, soaking her boots and trousers.
“It feels like it’s going to rain,” Xavier announced. “We should get out of here. Let me shift and I’ll take you up the cliff.”
“Really?” She remembered the last time she sat astride his back when they were still in Antarctica. She hadn’t had a chance to truly enjoy the experience.
“What’s the use in being a dragon if I can’t carry my love on my back once in a while?”
In a moment, he stood on the beach on all fours, scales shining in the moonlight. He snuffled the rocky beach, some smoke issuing from his nostrils, then crouched so his belly nearly touched the ground.
Arabella steeled herself and climbed on his back, grasping his shoulders for support.
Rain lightly misted them as they rose in the air and she leaned against him, feeling his heartbeat course through his body. Above the beach, he roared. A bright ball of flame exploded over the rocks, a declaration of his love.