Molly’s eyes widened.

Her breath caught.

I had gone too far.

I released her, even though the feel of her skin—even just the slightest touch against her chin—left me wanting more.

“Come,” I said, shaking off the madness which I’d allowed to take control for one wild, heady moment. “You will be more comfortable inside, once you’ve unpacked your things.”

At least she didn’t fight me this time. Had I unsettled her so? Or was she simply free of the panic which had gripped her? Memories of coming close to death.

I could relate to that.

“You know,” I said, keeping her visible from the corner of my eye as I helped her sit on a wide, flat rock just inside the makeshift cave, “I had an experience not long ago which reminds me of what you just went through.”

“You did? I can’t imagine you being afraid of anything.” She slid her pack from her back with a sigh of relief and propped it between her and the stone wall to her right. “Are you thirsty, by the way? I have plenty of water left in here.”

“Still? After being out here all this time?”

“I always bring at least four days of water with me,” she explained with a shrug. “When I knew I’d be stuck for a while, I limited the amount I drank. It’s not like I was hiking and needed a whole lot.”

“I’m fine,” I said, wishing to save it for her.

I watched her uncap a bottle and tilt it back, watched her throat work as she swallowed gulp after gulp. For some reason, even that simple act stirred something deep within me, where the dragon waited. I was hyper-aware of every move she made.

When she’d had enough, for the time being, she capped the bottle and turned an expectant gaze my way. “So? What happened to you that reminded you of me?”

I turned away, poking at the fire before feeding it more wood. I’d never spoken of it with anyone outside the clan. Not that there was any reason to, not to mention my limited contact with the outside world. The coven was aware of what had been done to us. There’d been no one else to tell.

Until now, when I wished like hell I’d kept my mouth shut. She wouldn’t let it go. Not her. A dog with a bone, she would refuse to release until I’d satisfied her curiosity.

But how to phrase it? That was key. I could hardly explain the kidnapping, the testing, the fact that we were flown to a remote island and held prisoner. That so many of my clan had died in the process.

“My home was robbed,” I explained, somewhat clumsily as I searched for the right words. “My family were held at gunpoint.”

“My God,” she gasped. “I’m so sorry.”

“We were… in the midst of an extended family gathering at the time.” There I went again, digging myself deeper with every word. “And several of my family members… they didn’t make it, I’m afraid.”

“Jesus, Owen.”

I glanced over my shoulder to find her stricken expression.

“The people who did it. Were they caught?”

A grim smile of satisfaction touched my mouth, though I kept my face turned away so she wouldn’t see. “Aye, they got what was coming to them.” Including firsthand knowledge of what it meant to face down a full-grown dragon. They deserved so much worse.

“I’m glad of that. But I’m sorry this happened to you. That’s… I don’t know how I would make it through, honestly.”

I shrugged, tossing the stick I’d been using to stir the fire onto the pile of wood waiting to burn. The flames caught it, licking along its length before consuming it.

“One day at a time. Isn’t that what they say? It truly takes one day at a time. But what made me think of it was your reluctance to reenter the cave. I went through the same hesitation. I ought to have been pleased to return home, but it only held unhappy memories. I could still smell the blood, though it had all been long since washed away.”

We were both silent for a long time, with only the sounds of the night filling the air. Leaves rustled, the fire crackled, owls called out in the darkness.

Then, a sniffle. And another.

I turned to her, distraught to find her weeping. “Molly, lass. Forgive me. I did not mean to upset you.”

She shook her head. “I feel like such an idiot. Getting panicky over what? Walking into a cave? While your family was killed and you still managed to get through it. What’s wrong with me? I’m ashamed of myself.”

“There’s no call to be.”

I went to her because there was no staying away. She drew me to her like a magnet, pulling me in the way the moon controlled the tide. I was powerless. Me, an ancient dragon of the highlands, powerless before a mere mortal woman.

Dropping to one knee, I took her hands from her face as gently as I could. “You have no reason to shame yourself, and I do not wish for you to do so. I did not tell my story that you might compare it with yours. There is no comparing the two, because we’re completely different people with different lives. And those were different circumstances. Right?”

She nodded, sniffling, her head lowered.

“We both believed we might die, and we had no desire to return to the place where we questioned whether we’d live to see another day. That’s the common thread running between us, isn’t it? Just because I looked down the barrel of a gun and you stared down a hurricane—all on your own, I might add—doesn’t mean we weren’t both terribly frightened.”

“I’m just so sorry for you.” She chuckled a bit, shaking her head. “I don’t know why that hit me the way it did. I shouldn’t care like I do. I mean, empathy is one thing, but you broke my heart just now.”

“Forgive me, for I would never wittingly break your heart—or any part of you.”

Another chuckle as she lifted her gaze and met mine. “Somehow, I believe that. I don’t understand it, but I believe you.”

My dragon stirred, intrigued. No. More than intrigued. No one had ever caught his interest this way. No one had ever made him long for more—more time, more touch, more of simply being in her presence. More of her.

I had the feeling more would never be enough.

“Here.” I uncapped the water and held it out. “Splash your face.”

“What? Does it look terrible?” Though she cupped her hands, accepting the water I poured into them. “I guess I’m not a pretty crier.”

“I don’t care how you look.”

“Gee, thanks.” She splashed the water against her face, then held her hands out for more.

“I didn’t mean it that way. I only meant you do not look bad to me. I wanted you to be comfortable, nothing more.”

She splashed again, rubbing water out of her eyes. “But I’m an ugly crier, aren’t I? I know it.”

I laughed. “There’s no getting around you, and you happen to be far too hard on yourself. I wouldn’t call you an ugly anything. The word doesn’t come to mind when I look at you.”

“Oh?” The glow of the fire revealed a flush on her cheeks, and she bit her bottom lip, concealing a smile. “What word does come to mind?”

“Impossible. Let’s start there.”

“Thanks. I guess I deserve that.” She reached into her pack again. “Are you hungry? I have jerky in here, and granola bars.”

The thought of eating either of the two turned my stomach. I could so easily have returned to the cave and feasted on roast beef, or venison, or stew. Mary had warned the clan of our impending arrival, and they’d managed to get out to stock the kitchen before the hurricane hit. A clan of dragons tended to go through food rather quickly—especially meat.

“No, thank you,” I said, holding up my hands. “I had a large dinner.”

“Suit yourself.” She pulled out a strip of jerky and tore a piece from the end using her teeth. I noticed that as she chewed, she appeared to be eyeing me in a thoughtful manner.

“What’s on your mind?” I sat across from her, nearly close enough to touch. There was nothing beneath my backside but a carpet of leaves and needles, under which sat cold, hard stone, but I’d survived worse.

“I was wondering something.”

“I could tell, hence my asking.”

She snickered, studying the jerky as if it held some closely-guarded secret. “I wondered… if I should tell you what I was really doing up here before the hurricane hit. Why I decided to hike the mountain.”

I frowned. There was something different in her voice. A note of hesitation which hadn’t been there before. “Don’t tell me it was something illegal,” I attempted to joke.

“Not the last time I checked.”

“What were you doing, then? And why couldn’t you tell me before?”

“I didn’t know if you’d think I was crazy. You might still think I’m crazy now, but you seem like you’d at least be willing to hear me out rather than telling me straight-off that I’m a nutcase who would’ve gotten what she deserved if a tree fell on her during the hurricane.”

This didn’t exactly give me a warm and fuzzy feeling. Far from it, in fact, but I decided to play along. “All right, then. What were you doing up here?”

She pursed her lips, exhaling through her nose. Steeling herself, it seemed. I did the same.

“I was searching for something. One of those Holy Grail sort of things. A legend—well, a legend in my family. It’s really weird. Nobody I’ve ever tried to tell about it has understood, so I stopped trying a long time ago. But you seem like you would get it, Or like you wouldn’t judge me, at least.”

A legend. What were the odds that the legend in question had to do with dragons?

No, that was impossible. Wasn’t it?

I made an attempt at lightheartedness. “A legend, eh? What’s it got to do with?”

“You won’t think I’m completely nuts if I tell you?”

“That’s rather an unfair question,” I pointed out, still struggling to maintain a light tone. She was hardly giving me hope of this being some benign family tale handed down through generations. “I’ll do my best. How about that?”

She snickered. “Yeah, fine. Whatever. Okay.”

Leaning forward, she dropped her voice to little more than a whisper. “Remember when I told you my interest in archeology came from artifacts my father owned?”

The new light in her eyes hardly eased my apprehension. “Yes. I remember.”

“God, this sounds so dumb. I bet you’re going to think I’m a wacko.”

“Try me.”

“Well…” She grimaced, like she knew I would reject what she was about to say but now had no choice but to move forward. “They’re supposed to be artifacts from centuries ago. Maybe even a thousand years or more. He kept them sealed up, away from air and moisture, and tried more than once to sell them to museums. Only nobody really cared about them, so they never left the family.”

A thousand years or more. My mouth went dry. “What’s so odd about that?”

“They’re supposedly…” She rolled her eyes. “From witches. Witches owned them all this time ago, and when they were discovered—the witches, I mean, practicing their craft or whatever—the witch hunters killed them. Some of the treasures they guarded were taken as souvenirs by the hunters. I mean, you have to remember, this was forever ago. It was hardly settled, nowhere near what it is now, but what settlements there were—they were hardly understanding and accepting of newcomers.”

“Sure.”

“So maybe they weren’t witches at all,” she shrugged. “Maybe they were just a bunch of women trying to do their thing, trying to live their lives without men, and the men in the settlements they passed through didn’t take well to it. I can see that happening. Can’t you?”

“Sure,” I said again. What else was there to say? I barely heard myself speak over the roaring in my ears.

“Life was pretty dark back then,” she explained, sounding sage and learned and very much as if she thought she was teaching me a lesson. As if I hadn’t lived through those very times myself. I might have been clear on the other side of the world, but some things hadn’t changed with geography.

“I’m sure it was.”

“Anyway, I guess my great-great-however many times great-grandfather was one of the witch hunters. I shudder to think. It’s not exactly something I’m proud of. But I think it was far enough in the past that I don’t have to be ashamed of my ancestry. Right?”

I nodded. I didn’t trust my voice just then.

“He passed the so-called treasures down, and they’ve been in the family all this time. Along with a legend. And this is where it gets really weird.”

I could hardly wait.

She went on, unaware of the turmoil she’d caused me. “Legend has it, there’s a whole lot more buried somewhere under this very mountain. That the witches hid their treasure here, where no mortal could claim it, and put a spell over the mountain to confuse anyone who tried to find their way on it. No human can reach the top, or so the legend has it. And—this is where it gets really ridiculous, so bear with me.”

“Will do.”

She chuckled. “There were supposed to be dragons guarding the treasure. That’s pretty dumb, but I’m not the one who made it up. So my entire purpose for being up here was to see if I could make it to the top, and if I could find anything. Trails, ruins, something to point to the presence of others up here at some point. I’ve never made it much higher than we are right now, but you’re here, and you came from further up, and there are people living up there, so I know it’s possible.”

I swallowed, my mouth drier than ever. “I believe I could use some water now,” I said, reaching for her pack.

“There’s a full bottle in there,” she offered. “It should be down at the bottom, I think. Just be careful.”

“Why?”

“There’s something in there—maybe I should’ve been the one—”

But it was too late. My fingers had already brushed against something hard. Metal. Something which burned my skin as if it were on fire.

The world went black.