Chapter Seven

W HILE RUNE HAD no idea why their memories of spending time in the Forest of Memories as children had been repressed, she suspected it had everything to do with the darkness that would soon befall their land. She said as much, too, as they settled into the tent she had manifested against a sizeable ash tree.

"We saw things, jorn," she said as he sealed the flaps against the blustery wind and snow, and she lit a small fire to warm them. "You and I saw things when we played in this forest, and I am only remembering them now."

She wished they could go back to all the fun they'd had just minutes ago tossing snow at each other, but the time for that had passed. As had the laughter that filled her, made better by him laughing too. It had been too long since she heard him laugh, and it had warmed her heart. Warmed every part of her, for that matter.

"What did we see?" jorn asked, no doubt alarmed by her expression. He manifested wooden plates of food and cups of ale and mead, removed his snow-caked fur, and sat beside her at the fire. "Tell me."

"Memories, I think." She sipped her mead and stared into the flames. "Of this place in another era. An earlier one. Flashes of us...but not us."

When he frowned in confusion, she elaborated.

"I think we were together in another life and even though we saw us together, I don't believe we truly understood what we witnessed." She met his eyes, and though she hesitated to share should the images make things more difficult between them, she rested her hand on his forearm and let him see. "We were very much in love, if I'm not mistaken."

In response to her touch and opening her mind to his, jorn's dragon eyes flared, and he glimpsed at what she saw. A young, hooded couple walked alongside a river holding hands, sometimes laughing, other times not. Sometimes, they chatted while gathering herbs and other medicinal substances, and other times, they argued.

"But they were always so in love," he murmured, trying to follow the memories, but as it had been for her, they faded and cut out as if they were only ever supposed to remember so much.

"If that is not the proof you need that we are meant to be together, just as we were before—" he pulled his hand back when she knew he was tempted to cup her cheek again and risk being shunned— "I do not know what is."

"It's proof of something ," she granted, equally tempted to grab his hand and rest it against her cheek anyway but held back. "Yet I cannot say if it means your safety in this life if we love as we should." Something about the dashed flicker of hope in his eyes made her cup his cheek instead. "Yet I hope..." She bit back emotion. "So very much, min store kj?rlighet. "

His dragon eyes warred with his human eyes as he cupped her hand with his and leaned into her touch as she had his earlier. He longed for her as she longed for him, but despite the flailing of his inner beast to claim and make her his, jorn fought his urges and rose above them.

"And that's what I have always loved about you most," she whispered, adoring him more than ever for staying true to who he had been since birth. "You have such immense inner strength and admirable will. A truly kind heart that will only ever seek the best for others. A need to find peace amid dissent." Desperate for the connection, she rested her forehead against his. "And whether you will ever truly believe it, those traits, what you are at the core, makes you just as powerful as the high king Ulrik will become and me, the seer you love."

jorn offered no response, but she hadn't expected him to, given she could say such admirable words, but he couldn't act on how he felt. He could not kiss her for the first time or lay her back and come between her thighs. Could not sink deep inside her as they both craved so intensely. Yet that didn't stop their need for each other from intensifying. So much so when their breathing picked up and the heat simmering between them bordered on the point of no return, she forced herself to pull away before their desire grew unstoppable.

"We should eat and rest, my friend," she said softly, nudging one of the plates of meat he had manifested closer to him. "And mayhap speak of lighter things?"

" Are there lighter things?" He was no more interested in food than she was as his gaze lingered on her face. "Because I sense those are swiftly falling behind us."

While tempted to sink into his gaze and travel down a path that would lead to his mouth on hers and his cock buried inside her, she rallied every bit of strength she could and gave him the sort of smile she knew he longed for. One that would make him smile in return if she did it long enough.

"Well, I remember how our snowball fight ended the last time we had one as children." She cocked her head and narrowed her eyes. "But do you, I wonder?"

Despite clearly fighting a smile, he gave in, reminding her how his handsomeness was accentuated when happiness overtook him. True happiness, free of the boundaries that had slowly grown between his kind and hers.

"If I recall correctly, we ended in a dual made up of equal parts snow whipped at each other and snow smothered in our faces," he mused, remembering how they had been relentless in their raging battle until they were both soaked, lying in the snow together staring up at the sky.

"Do you remember how we were laughing so hard we could not catch our breath?" She couldn't help chuckle, loving the way it felt as jorn chuckled too. "I think that might have been one of the best days of my life."

"On that, we agree."

She thought for a moment he would grow serious, as days like that were so far away now, but he seemed to understand she wanted this time to be happy. More cherished memories of them together whether they could love as they wanted to or not.

"If I recall, the day after our snowball fight only got better," jorn went on. He winked, showing his playful side no doubt for her benefit. "You decided it would be great fun for me to shift and take you for a ride so we might dry off using the wind."

"Which, of course, did not go well at all." She laughed and sipped her mead, remembering what a mess they had made of things. "It was my first attempt at riding your dragon, and I ended up in the sea because we were foolhardy and determined to make a show of it."

"We were ," jorn granted, grinning at the memory. "After all, we thought ourselves quite powerful and clever." He flinched. "Little did I realize how slick my scales would be."

"Indeed," she concurred, recalling the rush of the whole experience and then the mortification. She sat up straighter and notched her chin like the ruler she had thought herself at the time. "I believe you warned me I should use a harness, but I was quite full of myself in those days and wanted to show the world I could easily ride a dragon without one."

"Yet you did anything but." He sipped his ale and kept chuckling. "Instead, as we swept in from the mountains, then out over the sea and circled back in what we thought was a rather impressive display, you leaned over, thinking to steer me, and slid right off." He narrowed an eye and offered a crooked grin. "You should have known I could not be steered, friend." He sat up a little straighter and notched his chin, too. "For wee dragons, especially when young and foolhardy, are stubborn and arrogant things."

"And you were until you were not." She narrowed an eye in return. "If I recall correctly, you valiantly raced into the sea after me, only for the wind to catch you unaware, leading you to belly-flop into the water. That left your dragon stunned, and I, having crashed into the water from too high a height, was equally stunned and sank right alongside you."

"Yet it was not all that terrifying, was it?" he said softly. "Not really."

"No," she agreed just as softly, remembering the moment they realized they might very well die together. It had been peaceful until it had become something else, and she saw the amusement on his face, telling her he recalled it just as vividly. "Given how fascinated we became by the great whale swimming by."

It was a telling moment that reminded them, with the great beast's gentle beauty as it passed between them, that they were great beasts, too. To this day, it amazed them it was so brazen given he was a dragon, however little at the time, but she suspected perhaps there was more at work. Perhaps the beautiful whale had been sent by her father, Loki, to remind her of life's wonders and, better still, that in his eyes she was one of them.

"And that whale did make us remember who we were," jorn mused. "I shook off my fall and swam after you as you ignited in seer light. After I scooped you up, we were going to burst out of the sea together, a great display, to be sure."

She winced and bit the corner of her lip before chuckling again. "Yet it did not go as valiantly as we'd hoped, did it?"

"No." He chuckled as well and swigged his ale. "How could it when my father swooped down after us and carried us out for all to see whether we liked it or not, much to our shame as a relatively large crowd had gathered."

"It was not our finest moment," she granted, remembering how embarrassed they had been as Knud flopped them down on the shore and made an example out of them. He had cared little if jorn was his son and Rune, a powerful seer, as he explained how foolish and deadly it could be to pull stunts like that without proper training.

"No, it was certainly not our finest moment." jorn kept grinning. "But what fun in the end, ja ?"

"Fun, indeed." Rune recalled how they had spun the story to a crowd full of curious children, who had hung on their every word. "How we had executed the whole thing on purpose so we might communicate with the monstrous beasts of the deep." She puffed out her chest. "We were nearly ready to rise up out of the water as mighty warriors who now understood the sea's wondrous secrets." She motioned as if snagging something from someone else's grasp just as she'd done years ago when they spun their tall tale to their avid audience. "Yet your father ripped our glory from us before we could."

They laughed at that, and the smiles and laughter didn't stop as they reminisced about story after story from their youth and felt something neither had felt in too long.

Joy.

Happiness.

Freedom from who they were. What she was. He was.

And the two of them felt and cherished it for hours. They ate, drank, and enjoyed each other's company until, as they had as children, they laid down, pulled furs over them, and whispered to each other by the fire's dying embers.

jorn made no further move to turn things romantic but seemed as content as her to reflect on happier times and their life together. Just as he had when they were children, he wrapped his hand with hers beneath the furs while facing each other and murmured his take on this story or that while the wind and snow battered the tent. She did the same, loving every moment until they must have drifted off because the next thing she knew, jorn was shaking her awake.

"Something has changed," he said softly but urgently. "Something is very wrong."