A Time For Dragons

Chapter Three-- Gerath

Sweat beaded on the tip of Madara's nose as she squinted at the amber fluid she poured into the clay pot. Gerath sat in the corner of her cottage flipping a small dagger as she'd spent the last however many hours making smoke bombs and pots of ever-flame. She was such a pretty thing, golden skin and hair of the darkest auburn she was like molten gold in the dark, and he knew at her moist center she was almost as hot. The thought made him swallow as his desire stirred. Nothing would ever come of it.

"Are you sure this is what you want?" Gerath asked for the thousandth time, the look she flashed him brought to mind the last time he'd asked her such a question, though the "this" had nothing to do with his cousin.

"Yes." She rolled her eyes muttering under her breath, which did nothing but elicit his smile to widen.

"Then I want absolution," his verbal riposte was swift. Were things between them good he wouldn't have made the request though usually he did nothing unless he got something in return. It was how he learned to survive the aftermath of the fall of the great Vaelian houses.

"No, you want back in my bed," she said looking up from the pot for the briefest of moments with a smirk. He chuckled, the sound bright and mirthful. Gods he'd missed talking to her.

"You know me far too well." He wet his lips and looked away from her, trying not to be lured in by just how sheer her shift was. Nothing would come from it. He wasn't stupid, even if she said she'd absolved him that wouldn't be some spell to fix the wound between them.

Madara finished the last of the bombs, and braided the wicks carefully. At a different time, he might walk behind her and watch her work with his temple pressed to hers. It seemed so long ago now. He shook his head and cleared his throat before standing, focusing at the task at hand. His arm, still stiff from the stitches, prevented him from the active role he craved. No, tonight, unlike all other nights, he'd watch his men from a safe distance and make sure everything went as planned.

Somehow both too hot and too cold, Gerath rubbed his throat. What would he say to his cousin? On more than one occasion during the tournament he'd gotten a room near Tournament Square, but he'd never said anything, never even got close enough to even pass him a note. It was for the best, or at least he told himself that every time thoughts of his cousin crossed his mind. In truth, he'd had the means to help his cousin escape for years but didn't. Self-preservation became his motto after he learned of his father's death. At fifteen he blackened his shield, colored his hair and joined the first group of bandits he crossed within hours of learning of his new status as Lord of Orwen and head of House Andexian. Even as a boy he knew if his father couldn't survive they were all so royally fucked.

"Gods you look grim," Madara whispered, wiping her hands on her yellowed apron. He helped her pack her herbs earlier, the barren shelves made the place seem so strange, like she was gone already.

"I'm a grim fellow." Lulling his head to the side, he smirked and glanced over the ceramic pots she'd left on the floor.

"I heard you muttering to Padrig while we rode here. You're leaving your men."

"Aye." Because if I don't one of them will sing where we're going for a sack of gold. The thought turned the corners of his mouth to a frown.

"I suppose it will be a sad farewell."

He spread his legs wide, and began drumming his fingers on the tabletop, the shoddily smoothed planks scraping against his flesh. "They're each getting a fat sack of coin, so I doubt that. We need to travel light. Most of my possessions are going to the men."

"For services rendered." She paused her work in the middle of the last wick, inspecting the braided fibers with narrowed eyes and plump lips pursed to scrutinizing nothingness.

"Half payment," Gerath corrected. "No doubt they'll come out of the woodwork if by some stupid gambit of fate Vhaeryn ends up back on the throne." Sunset spilled through the dirty window and caught Madara's hair, igniting those inky tresses and infusing them with garnet, blood red, and copper. Gerath paused for a moment and realized he'd never have her again. He didn't deserve her, but his cousin did. They might have said little more than a word or two between them, but she'd be his because the handsome prince always won the girl's heart. The bards repeated it for a reason, it did happen. He could almost see them together...or was that himself he saw in his minds eyes, hair silvered as at birth and his pale flesh pressed to her golden as their bodies married in the night. "Payment," he continued, voice as tight as his chest. "They'll want payment for their silence."

"Are you sure they'll even do it?" she spoke to the wicks.

"Oh, they'll do it. The pay is too good not to." He let out a booming laugh. "Think of it, after the ashes fall there'll be castles to be had and lands to settle upon those who helped Vhaeryn come to the throne."

"Except there'll be no ashes. There are no dragons anymore at least none with wings." She wrapped her hands around her throat and leaned back against the counter. He opened his mouth but closed it, it wasn't his secret to tell. If Vhaeryn remembered or knew he could tell her, but Gerath wouldn't break the family trust. Small though it may be, Gerath still possessed a shred of honor, a remnant of a life now little more than a dream. Maybe he could come back from the brink? He scratched his ear and smirked. No, the time for boyish dreams of redemption died the moment the first notices went out for his capture.

He threaded his fingers back through his short locks. Focus on now, there might not be a tomorrow. His limbs were slightly sluggish, but he stood all the same and lifted one of the ceramic pots. It took longer than it would have, but he managed to carry it.

"Careful or you'll rip your stitches," Madara cautioned when he reached the doorway with a glance over her shoulder giving him a quick glimpse of her knit brows and drawn features. In return he gave her a smile wide enough to reach his eyes before taking the pot the rest of the way to the cart.

Groaning he placed the pot in the back and paused. Above the sky burned with orange, red, yellow, and gold, the sunset lacked all the faintest traces of indigo which so often gave a pinkish cast to the sky.

A Dragon Moon, fat and yellow, would rise on a blood red sky. He could almost hear his father and uncle's voices whispering on the wind about Vaelian omens. Red skies and dragon moons meant one thing. War.