Hurt and Ruined - Healed and Loved

While He Was Gone

I'm back!! Anyway, this story takes place about two months after Cardan is restored to his human form. Sorry, Fae form lol... so spoiler alert(I think lol). 

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Cardan's black scales shine in the faint light of the moon. He looms over me. 

"I love you," I say and he strikes. Blood. There is black blood everywhere.

"Jude?" Someone is shaking me. "Jude!" 

I bolt upright, taking in my surroundings. I was in our bedroom. That was just a dream. More like a nightmare. I look over to see Cardan sitting up, looking at me with concern. 

"You... cried out in your sleep, and I thought I should wake you up." He said, reaching out and putting a hand on my shoulder.

I nodded, taking in a shuddering breath. The same dream, over and over and over. I'm so weary of it. So tired of fighting my own mind. 

I get up from the enormous bed, not wanting to lay down anymore. Cardan follows too, sitting next to me on the couch. 

"Are you all right?" He asks, looking at me worried. 

I give him a tired smile. "Fine." 

We sit in silence for a few minutes and I start when Cardan begins talking. "I know this probably isn't the time to ask, but..." He hesitates, and I nod, encouraging him on. "When I was a serpent, what was it like for you?"

I blink. That was not what I was expecting him to say. "For me?"

Cardan nods, his gaze scrutinizing me. "Yes. Everyone refuses to tell me what happened when I was a serpent."

I stare at him. I usually try not to recall those days when he was gone. I had given up all hope near the end, and that thought was more than I could bear. My eyes filled with tears and I quickly swiped at my face. 

Cardan grabs my hands. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you cry."

"No, your right. I just didn't..." My voice trails off. I really didn't want to talk about this, but at the same time, I wanted to be the one to tell him what had happened. 

I take a deep breath before starting. "It was chaos, once you transformed. The Folk—"

"I don't want to hear about the Folk," Cardan interrupts. "I just want to know: did you mourn me? Were you upset about my transformation? I know you said you missed me when you were in the mortal world, but you are High Queen now. You have the power—"

"Cardan!" I don't want to hear any more of his nonsense. "Of course I missed you. But... I wasn't allowed time to grieve. I did mourn you. I did miss you. And I do love you. When Madoc came with that bridle, I wanted nothing more than to use it. To bind you to me."

Cardan swallows audibly and I stand up from the couch and lay back on the bed. "Like I said before, I didn't want to lose what little there was of you."

"So why didn't you?" Cardan asked.

I sighed. "I know how much you hate being contained. And I thought how cruel it would be of me to chain you to me and call it love. How could I?"

Cardan looked at me as tears ran down my cheek. "Thank you." He said simply, holding me to his chest. 

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This was a super short short story lol and I don't really think it flows well, but I got it done in abt 1 hour which is prob why it's not as good as it could be. So... stick with me and Jude and Cardan! I'll start my next story right away :)