The Dragon's Match

XXII

XXII
＊*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚ ˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚＊

Of all the emotions that flashed across Lillian's expression, he was most anguished by the brief glimpse of hurt and betrayal he witnessed enter her gaze, feeling them rip through her senses as eloquently as if they were his own.

However, she reined it in, masking her volatility under a facade of coldness that glistened from the depths of her glacier stare with muted rage.

Aëghan made to step towards her, but her shoulders stiffened and she jerked her hand up in a gesture that halted him immediately.

"Don't," she clipped. Her chin notched up proudly, defiantly, as she considered him. "Don't come near me. Don't touch me."

His brows pulled tight as he realised that the laughing, passionate woman she was but moments before was gone- a woman who had made every nerve-ending in his body come alive with the one delicate sound of her husky laugh- and now he would pay the price of his subterfuge.

"I should have told you," he conceded.

Instead of acknowledging this, she demanded with severe imperiousness, "How long have you known?"

He hesitated for a moment before telling her, purely because the knowledge would bring her distress and it was the one thing he loathed to cause her. Suddenly, he hated himself for it. Lillian Adams did not deserve the sort of subtle manipulation he had attempted to use with her to attain his own ends which only served to drive home the fact that he was not suitable for her.

He should leave her alone, take her back to her sister- after all, he had acquired what he needed from her, had he not? There was little reason to urge her to linger with him alone and isolated, away from haranguing matchmakers and idiotic beastkeepers.

That's what he should do, what he should offer her right then...

"Since our first meeting at Ravensfield," Aëghan admitted.

"You should have told me then," Lillian snapped, her fists clenching at her sides and he knew she was staving off the tremors that activated whenever she experienced heightened emotions of distress. He longed to pull her into his arms and hold her tightly against his chest to quell them, despite being the cause, but he resisted knowing full well that she would most likely claw his eyes out.

"I should have," he agreed gently.

She appeared to baulk at his tone, her feet shifting backwards. Behind her but a few feet away was the edge of the comfortable bower they were enclosed in, and though it was covered by a sheer screen of glistening vines, he felt briefly concerned over her nearness to the precipice. The view would have provided her an uninterrupted view over the tops of the trees and far into the distance, at once calming and beautiful. He had hoped to impress her, to ease her into the revelation of the mark with soft words and perhaps some romance.

He had not exhibited wisdom when he threw himself at her, but, gods, the sight of her laughing and smiling...

"You deliberately made me into a fool," she hissed, her cheeks heightened with colour. "You knew, all this time, and allowed me to anguish over the unknown? Have you any idea how tormented I have been these few days knowing that I am inevitably bound to someone when I want nothing less than to wed any man?"

"That was not my intent." He held up his hands imploringly but she shied from the gesture, jerking backwards once more. "Lillian, if you'll just grant me a moment to explain and listen-"

"You have no right to ask anything of me again!" Once more, her heels sidled backwards and Aëghan felt perhaps for the first time in his life something akin to terror seep through his veins. "I was fool enough to allow myself to trust you even though I suspected you harboured an alternative agenda, though I had little inkling about the mark!" As if furious, she jerked her arms taut, her elbows disturbing the curtain of vines behind her.