30. Aurelia

Chapter 30

Aurelia

S he stared at me poignantly, and goosebumps covered my body. Suddenly I wasn't at all sure what we were talking about.

Without another word, she turned and started walking.

Damn her long stride. I had to jog to keep up while trying to stare at her beautiful, impassioned face and trying not to trip. It was a lot to handle.

Before I could even think of which questions to ask to get a better handle on this very personal conversation, she had stopped at a little house on the outskirts of town.

"I remember coming back here with Hadriel," she said in a hush, stepping up to the door. "It was before I was queen. He was in one of his very colorful outfits, and the people here had no clue what to make of him." Her face broke into a huge grin. "He lost a shoe going over a fence and freaked out about it." She began laughing. "Those were good times. I mean. .." She raised her hand to knock. "Shitty times—the literal worst, actually—but there were some gems amongst all the horror."

The door swung open to show a frail man with loose jowls and white stubble along his jaw. His eyes widened when he saw who was at the door, and he held on to the knob as he tried to bow. "Your Majesty."

"There's no need for that," she said with compassion, putting up her gloved hand to stop him. "I have been informed that you habitually take Granny's snacks, but to make it safer, you take off the coating."

The man froze, his eyes suddenly wary.

"I've not come to punish you," she said smoothly. "In fact, I've brought the drugmaker." She indicated me. "Aurelia does not make that coating—that is Granny's addition—but she does make the product itself. She is very passionate about it. She has expressed an interest in meeting with people like you to see what might be improved. Do you have time to speak with her?"

I jerked my head to look at the queen in dismay.

Shortly after the fiasco with Granny's cheap drugs, I'd asked Hadriel to ask the powers that be if I could return to the villages to take more notes. No answer had come, so I'd assumed they weren't interested. It had been a long shot, after all.

To hear that I not only got to make those notes—with a royal escort, no less—but might also be able to actually improve upon my product?

I knew my smile was giddy.

"Yes," I gushed at the older man. "The queen is correct. I heard some feedback the other day and wondered if you'd be willing to share some more? Maybe you could gather all your like-minded friends together, and we can get into it."

"Oh... yes." The man looked back and forth between the queen and me as though this might be a trick. "You're the drugmaker, you say? That captive they got over there at the castle?"

"Yes." I clasped my hands in front of me. "I am being made to repent for my sins as part of my punishment. I am eager to clear my name, and am working on a way to make recreational and medicinal products safe for all. Part of that, per the queen's orders, is to address the woes and concerns of the people in this kingdom. Please, help me repent."

I wasn't sure where all that had come from, wondering if maybe I hadn't evacuated all of the trial product from my system after all, but the man seemed to thaw.

"Oh, right." He nodded. "That makes sense. Yes, of course. Here, come in, come in. Have a seat, please. Can I get you some tea?"

"Maybe just a glass of water?" I asked politely. "And something to write with. And on. Thank you."

"Sure, yes." He hesitated, doing a double take at my shirt. "Are those penises on your shirt, young lady?"

"Um..." I looked down at myself. "Yes?" I grimaced. "It's part of my punishment."

His frown was clearly meant for the queen. "Some punishment," he muttered.

He collected a few people from within the village. All of them were eager to share feedback, and I was just as eager to write down the things they had to say. We visited one other house before we traveled to another village, and then a town, my wolf running straight there, keeping in line with the dragon flying slowly overhead. Her annoyed roar when my wolf passed through the middle of an Everlass field made me want to snicker.

Wolves ran forward to greet us as we traveled the wood, the full night no longer a hindrance to my wolf's vision. They didn't run all the way with us, though, instead staying at our flank until another wolf took up the position. It was clear they were offering themselves as our protection, and each one of them extended the bond for us to grab on to. Given their offer wasn't grabby like Dante's had been, my wolf didn't slap it away. Instead, she did the equivalent of politely refusing, veering a little to bump into their sides to ensure there were no hard feelings. Flexing was one thing, but disrupting the bond of the pack was entirely another. I was sure Finley would agree.

After visiting a few houses, it quickly became apparent that I wouldn't need to visit every village or town in this kingdom to get a good idea of things that weren't working or that needed to be fixed. Most of the issues that were cropping up were universal. The few that weren't? Well...

"I need something for pain relief," one woman told me. "My back is always hurting me."

"You already have access to something for that," Finley replied. "There are many remedies for various types of pain, all of which use Everlass, which grows just..." She twisted and pointed. "Just in the wood there. Any of your neighbors, I'm sure, can help you make it. It won't cost you anything. Everything you need can be collected in the wild."

"I have that. But. .." The woman had issued a dramatic sigh. "You have to boil the water and pour it in and wait for it to cool.. ."

"Your solution to that is to stop being so lazy," I said without thinking.

The other people in the room laughed.

"No," the woman persisted, "it's not just all the work. I mean, just popping something into my mouth would be much easier, but it's not just that. The Everlass pain formula doesn't work very well with the Dream Scape. My back ends up being much worse."

The Dream Scape was Granny's name for one of the stronger hallucinogens.

Finley tilted her head in that way that said the woman's information was noted. She waited for me to write it down.

I didn't bother.

"If you take something like Dream Scape," I told the woman, "you're going to be twisting and turning and doing weird stuff that your back is not going to appreciate. You either need to take care of your back and work on fixing it, or you need to feel the pain after taking a drug. I am not going to help you ignore a physical problem so that you can make questionable choices and end up crippling yourself for life. If you want to cripple yourself, you're going to know about it. Stop treating me like a common fool."

Everyone gasped. Silence followed. I stared at her stubbornly.

"Well, you're wearing dicks on your clothes," the woman had muttered, crossing her arms over her chest.

"My willingness to wear dicks on my clothes but refuse your request should tell you how absolutely absurd said request actually is. Next?"

If I'd stepped out of line, Finley hadn't chastised me for it.

"Do you think you have enough information?" Finley asked as we left the house and headed toward the center of town. It was the fastest way back to the wood.

A small collection of emberflies drifted through the quiet lane. The silver moon shed its light overhead.

"Yes, I think so." I organized my collection of papers. "Question, though. Will I actually be reformulating any of these products, or am I just getting a fun brain teaser?"

"We will sit down and talk over your thoughts, and then choose one or two things that you can fix. We can think about putting them into the local market. We'll see how that goes. If it goes well, we can improve and/or expand. If not..."

"The axe, I get it." I nodded, thinking about, not just the things I'd heard, but the various other problems people had described. "I like this," I murmured as I took in the dwellings. The buildings were larger than those in Finley's old village but similarly maintained, with window-box flowers and manicured front gardens. Cobblestones didn't line this street, not until we neared the square, but the fine rock and hard-packed dirt did the job, the road smooth and well maintained. Every town we'd been in was the same. It seemed the royalty took care of their whole kingdom, not just the castle.

"What's that?" she asked as raucous laughter drifted into the night. Glass shattered and Finley glanced toward the sound, but it must've been behind this row of little storefronts with hand-carved signs of scrolling text.

"Talking to people, finding ways to help them... I've always liked this kind of work because of the challenge, but... I don't know, I guess I just like helping people. That sounds a little trite, but it feels like a better purpose than just trying to make gold."

She raised an eyebrow at me. "That's because you've never gotten to reap the rewards of that gold," she said.

"That's true, I guess. Hard to miss something you've never had."

She side-eyed me again. She was doing that a lot tonight. "You're so.. ."

" Pliant is the word used most often, I think. Boring is another one. Dragons tend to think I am too agreeable."

"Yeah. Why are you so agreeable?"

"I'm open to new ideas, but more importantly, what's the point of arguing when it's not going to get me anywhere? I'll argue if I can change the outcome of a situation, but there really is no point in expending energy just to be right about something that doesn't actually matter. It just takes longer."

"It takes longer for what?"

"To be left alone."

She stopped and put her hands on her hips. "Fuck, man. That's really fucking tough to hear. It's one difference between us?—"

"I'd imagine there are many. Like height, for example."

"You were never on equal footing in Granny's village. Not ever. You were young and small, and you weren't trained to fight to compensate. You didn't have the strength and speed and ability to heal as everyone else around you. You were mercilessly bullied, right?" She didn't wait for an answer. "But there was fuck-all you could do about it. You just had to take it. Right or wrong, you had to silently take it." She shook her head and turned away. "Fuck that shit. That really pisses me off. Fuck those people." She turned back and put a finger in my face. "You're on equal footing now, do you hear me? You will learn to fight, you will join the fucking pack, and if I need to take over your training to make sure you are pushed, I will. Flexible is good; being pushed around is not. We need to make sure you are never pushed around, not ever again."

Swearing under her breath, her rage clearly needing an outlet, she turned and screamed into the night. A light clicked on down the lane, and I shrank back, not really wanting to be implicated in the madness. Somewhere not too far away, a scream matched hers, deep and guttural and clearly wild. And sounding very drunk. The town tavern, or one of them, was clearly over there.

I stared at her with a quickly growing fondness. She was the sort of wild my wolf craved, and had the sort of passion that spoke to me. She made me feel better about life, mostly because she made me feel better about my future. She was the sort of person that lifted up everyone around her, and I wasn't above admitting that, at times, I needed that.

She began ambling up the lane, and I jogged out of my hiding spot to catch up to her again, glancing back to make sure no one had come outside to check out the disturbance. I mean, I was with the queen, so it wasn't like I could get into trouble, but still.

She lifted her hands and twirled, and the emberflies scattered away from her reaching fingers. She dropped her arms again and watched them for a moment, and it occurred to me that she was stalling going back. Her duty was over for the night. She clearly wasn't in a hurry to rush back to it. She probably didn't get much time for herself where she could truly let go.

"I can't get enough of the light bugs," she said, her voice hushed.

I walked over to a shop, lowering myself onto the little two-seater bench out front. "Emberflies."

"Right, emberflies. I've never known the name. I've seen a few here and there within the wood, but this... They are so beautiful. It's like walking within a tranquil sea, slowly floating and swaying and drifting. Do they follow you everywhere?"

"They don't follow me. They just kinda... congregate."

"Around you." She wandered over to me slowly.

"No, around peaceful places."

"There is nothing peaceful about dragons. We had almost none of them before you came. Now we get to exist in a fairytale."

I scoffed. "A dark fairytale, maybe."

She laughed and took a seat next to me. "Is there any other kind? Mine was dark as fuck. Worth it, though." She was quiet for a moment, watching the glowing lights. "Listen. I'm going to be brutally honest with you. Magically speaking, you don't only need training as a wolf. You also need training in that other type of magic you have—the emoting thing. It's fairy magic, and we simply can't help you with that. As much as it pains me to admit it, you are going to need them. We can train your wolf, but they need to train the fairy part of you." She held out a finger. "Neither camp owns you. Okay? Weston is your true mate, and I know you love him, but he—and this pack—aren't entitled to you. They don't dictate your life. The fairies don't either. If help comes with strings attached, that's not help, that's a contract. Don't enter into anything you can't easily walk away from unless it is your choice. Remember what I said? Don't allow anyone to push you around."

I nodded as the emberflies shifted and moved. Loud talking approached from around the corner.

"If you get stuck," she went on, "Hannon can get you free, even just for some space in which to think. He has a soft spot for you, and you two are very alike. If you need to get out, ask him. He can leave at a moment's notice, and he will, to help someone in distress. He'll get you out."

"I don't think?—"

"That's not to say I don't think Weston will do right by you. I know for a fact he will. You've made him question the rightness of the orders he follows. Given his past, that is a very good thing. It's annoying Nyfain right now, but he'll come to appreciate it in the long run. It's just one more guarantee that this kingdom will do right by the people it governs. And I'm sure Weston is making plans of his own."

"Plans for what? Why are you telling me all of this?"

"I am not telling you any of this. We are talking about plants and improvements and things we need to look into. This whole outing has been to get information from the people. I've said absolutely nothing about anything outside of that. I haven't even sworn. I've been distant and aloof and royal, as I am expected to be until things are decided."

"What things are decided?"

"I'm not at liberty to discuss. Neither is Weston, so don't ask. Just remember this: you are in charge of your destiny. You make the decisions. The days of people pushing you around are over."

She patted my shoulder and moved to get up, but paused.

"One last thing," she said. "Weston is a damn fine alpha, but he's an even better human. You got lucky with him. Whatever you need, whatever you want to do, he'll stand by your side. I hate telling you that, but sometimes doing the right thing is sticking to your roots. My roots, not yours. Yours are fucking depressing."

I huffed out a laugh. "That sounded like something Hadriel would say—compassion steeped in crass humor."

She nodded, then paused, looking at the emberflies.

"Maybe just sit here for a moment," I murmured, taking a deep breath to lead the way.

She laughed softly. "You're going to be a damn fine alpha someday, too." She leaned back, her muscles loosening. "You're doing the emoting thing to force me to relax."

"Sorry. I don't know how to stop it. Or start it. Or even that I'm doing it."

"I know." She sighed. "In this moment, I like it. And in this moment, you've clearly realized I need it. It feels good to just sit here in anonymity and stare at the pretty light bugs."

"Emberflies," I whispered.

"Emberflies," she repeated, just as softly.

A shadow blotted out the light of the moon, moving across the street. A great green dragon curved through the sky as the patrol did its checks.

A moment later, a loud belch announced a man coming out of an alleyway up ahead. He staggered to the right before turning, his top half swaying a moment before his bottom half joined in. He worked at his pants, moving like he was on the deck of a ship at storm, before untucking himself. A steaming stream of urine splashed against the shop face.

"What the . . ." Finley surged upward, striding over to the man and grabbing him by the collar.

"Wha—" He flailed, letting go of himself. The stream went wide, spraying the sidewalk as Finley flung him into the street. He dribbled the rest across his pants as he rolled across the ground.

"How about a night in the dungeons to sleep it off, huh?" Finley stalked after him.

"Bitch," he growled, rolling over and pushing shakily to his feet. "Fuck you."

He swayed and staggered as he tucked himself back into his pants, watching her approach.

"Stupid bitch." He didn't bother buckling his pants, instead clenching his fists, clearly ready to fight. He couldn't have known it was the queen.

Finley's wide smile made it clear that was the best news she'd heard in a long time.

"Or maybe you'd like to spend the night facedown in the gutter, knocked out? What do you think? I'll leave you lying near all that piss so you can clean it up tomorrow."

He swung at her, his movements slow and jerky. She hardly moved, dodging easily, circling him. The emberflies started to clear away from the disturbance. He growled, a line of drool escaping his mouth, and swung again, way wide.

She dodged and slapped his fist before throwing one of her own. A jab only. It smacked him in the jaw, and his head snapped back.

He wiped at his face and swore before launching at her.

I was distracted from the fight when I realized the emberflies weren't fleeing from the disturbance—they were headed that way and beyond, fleeing from behind me.

My heart jumped into my throat, and I spun around just in time to see a large shape pull away from the corner where it had been watching me. It dashed between the shops. Shadows moved over the form, the person dressed in black, my night vision unable to pierce the gloom enough to discern if it was man or woman, young or old.

"Finley!" I shouted, up in a flash and rushing that way.

"Let me do it!" my wolf said. "I'm faster!"

"It will take too long to shift, just like with that rat."

I slipped between the buildings, following the sound of fleeing footsteps ahead of me. Feet scuffed along the gravel just as the shape disappeared around a corner.

With a burst of speed, I was there in an instant, grabbing the edge of the building and swinging myself around it. I slammed into someone, knocking the wind out of me. Hands grappled at me, spinning me around so I couldn't see his or her face, a thin arm holding me put, a glint of metal catching my eye.

A knife!

Panic surged through me, enhancing my reflexes.

"Stall so the dragon can catch up," my wolf yelled. "You have hardly any training and don't have a weapon, but a knife in your stomach won't kill you. Play defense!"

I took the suggestion, slapping at the hand with the knife and throwing my head back to smash it against a chin. Still the person held me, but their movements turned sluggish. They stabbed at my side again, so slow it almost seemed like a joke.

"Aurelia?" Finley called, panic lacing her tone—panic and blistering rage.

"Here!" I yelled, smashing my fist down on the person's wrist to try to dislodge the knife. They held on to it, but their other hand started to loosen from around my waist. They were aiming to release me, trying to get away from the dragon queen.

She turned the corner in a moment, power blazing through the air, her eyes on fire.

"There's a knife," I yelled, latching on to that loosening arm as Finley barreled into him.

She tackled him to the ground, and I was jerked down with them, wrestling with the weapon as she punched him. The person yanked, trying to free the weapon and stick it into Finley. I held on, just barely, until Finley hopped over to his other side and jostled me in the process.

My fingers slipped from the person's sweaty skin, and the knife was suddenly freed, but their muscles still coiled in the struggle. It slashed through the empty air where Finley had just been. The person, slow to process her movements, followed through on their swing, still sluggish. The knife sliced through empty air until the blade slid into their neck. They ripped it out again in confusion. Blood spurted from the wound.

"No! Fuck." Finley reached out to grab the knife and toss it away. Blood splashed across my face. She pushed her hand to the person's neck to apply pressure to the wound.

A wolf tore around the corner like a phantom. It pushed into me, separating me from the fray. Another was right behind, teeth bared, striking for the person's wrist and pinning it to the ground as blood pumped between Finley's fingers.

"Stand down!" she yelled, moving to crouch over the injured person. "Back off. I've got it. Get some elixir. We don't want them to bleed out. We need to question them."

The wolf released the person's weakly flailing hand. They feebly kicked at the ground.

"Fuck," Finley ground out as blood seeped all around her fingers. "How the fuck did you make him stab himself?"

"What? No, I didn't. He did that by accident!" I bleated, even though I hadn't actually realized we had been trying to keep him alive.

"Some fucking accident," she muttered, looking behind her and then back down at the man. "And making him slow?"

I winced, remembering what my goal had been. "I might've done that. I was trying to stall him until you got here."

"Well..." She tilted her head and huffed out a laugh. "Looks like you managed that just fine." She looked at his stilling feet. His hand went limp. "Dumb fucking luck," she whispered. "You're lethal even when it's just dumb fucking luck." She pulled her hand away, looked at the wound for a moment, and then sat back on her heels. "What the hell happened?"

I explained about the emberflies and the chase that followed as two more wolves showed up. I felt Weston through the bond, concerned but stoic, clearly concentrating on his job, sending people to check on me. He would not be pleased about this.

Finley sighed and pushed to standing before reaching down a bloody hand to help me up. I grimaced as I took it.

"You probably shouldn't have given chase," she said, her hands on her hips as she looked down at the body. "You don't have enough training. Weston will scold you for it. For my part, I say that you did a good job here. At least we have an identity. We can look into him."

"What if he was just watching you handle a drunk?" I asked in a small voice, realizing that I'd acted before logic had a chance to filter through. "I personally didn't feel any danger."

She glanced at me and then did a double take. In a moment, she shook her head.

"Come on. Let's get you back to the wood and close to the bulk of the pack." She walked me that way, her pace much faster than earlier. "You're new to this kingdom, so maybe you don't know this, but you do not run from dragons unless you know you'll be chased if spotted. You certainly do not run from the dragon queen when you possess a knife unless you know your life is on the line. That's just a recipe for a horrible death. If he was watching me, he wouldn't have run from you. And he wouldn't have run from you unless he didn't want you to see his face." She paused. "I do wonder why he waited for you, though. Maybe to render you ineffective so he could escape before I caught up to him."

"Very likely."

"Yeah. Idiot." She scoffed. "He definitely does not know this kingdom." She put out her hand to stop a wolf that was about to jog by. "No, you come with us. Aurelia needs to go back to the castle. She's going to need a guard when she runs."

He slowed and turned to fall in behind us as we left the edge of the town and headed toward the trees.

"You didn't sense danger because he hadn't originally planned on attacking you," she said, peering into the trees up ahead before looking to both sides, assessing the danger.

It almost felt like she was hoping people came after us.

"That's a guess, obviously, but it stands to reason, since he ran. They're watching and reporting. Keeping an eye on you. Probably trying to learn the schedules—yours and the castle's schedules of patrols, guards, etc."

She stopped at the edge of the wood. A wolf stepped out of the trees, clearly waiting for us.

She nodded and then turned to me with a smirk. "We have the best alpha wolf in the world, and Granny has just shown us her cards twice . That's all it will take, mark my words. Granny is outclassed. She won't ever nail Weston's schedules. She won't ever find a hole in his planning after tonight, because there won't be any. The only reason that person got close is because Weston hasn't put his fortification plans into full effect. He's been rolling it out in stages. That, and the fool hadn't meant you harm. If he had, we both would've felt him long before you noticed him, and it would've been me who'd gotten there first."

A shiver ran through my body at the rage burning brightly in her eyes. She really, really would've liked to have gotten there first. That thought was both exciting and terrifying. Also a little endearing. She was providing safety for her people, not just for me. There were no strings. She enjoyed meeting danger head-on. She belonged with that golden king; they were both clearly a little unhinged.

Or maybe they were just dragons.

"I'm going to fly ahead," she said. "I can feel Nyfain's suspicion through the bond. I'm going to go antagonize him so that he forgets how long I was with you and fucks the hell out of me instead. Weston's got you covered. He had the pack watching you closely through the woods earlier. He'll be having them guard you now. I'm sure I'll get an ass chewing about stalling with you in the town, but..." She shrugged. "I'm the queen. I do what I want."

She made like she was brushing off a speck of dirt from her shoulder before winking at me.

"Hand over your clothes. I need to go." She put out her hand.

Trying not to be self-conscious in front of the wolf still waiting near the trees—I was really trying to desensitize myself to nudity, since I shifted a lot now—I stripped out of my things and handed them over.

"No dallying this time," she said, stuffing everything into the bag. "Straight back to the castle. Take the main roads. The pack will guide you in." She paused, looking me straight in the eye. "You reacted well tonight. Remember I said that. You have excellent instincts. We can build on them, and next time you won't need to stall. You'll just need to kick a little ass."

She shifted before pushing off into the sky.