A Dragon's Heart (Book Three in the APK Trilogy)

Chapter 8 | At Last

A/N At the end of Chapter. Enjoy <3
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CIRCE

I fell back on my knees with shock, my hands sinking into the sand and my breath coming in shuddering gasps. It couldn't be him, it had to be some kind of sick joke, but I couldn't move and I felt as though the entire world had crumbled away leaving us and nothing else.

"I don't," My voice broke as my grief rose in my throat, getting in the way of my words. "I don't, understand?" My pitch rose at the end as I struggled to contain a sob. It couldn't be him, it can't be. It can't be.

He had raised himself slightly on his elbows and captured me in the stare that I had dreamt of for weeks, his eyes had been branded across my soul and I looked up to the heavens for a moment, trying desperately to gulp down the monsoon of tears that were on their way.

"Love,"

My head snapped back to him and I saw that he was trying to reach me, his hand stretching across what seemed to me, to be a canyon of emotion.

"Don't touch me." My voice was hoarse as I jerked away impulsively and I saw the shock in his eyes. I reached up a shaking hand to run my hands over the burns on my neck and my chest. I felt them, they were real. So were the ones on my arms, it was real, it had happened, I had seen him burn. These scars were a memory of that heat, of that horrible gut-wrenching pain, of his death.

He saw it coming before I felt it hit and I crumpled over my knees, my head falling to the sand, my hands cupping my behind my neck as I began to cry. I cried and cried and cried. Huge, racking, body shaking sobs that made me feel as though I was disintegrating into nothing. When I felt his hands in my short hair it only made me cry harder. Somehow he managed to pull himself closer to me and I felt his warmth for the first time in months, proof of his living, breathing body.

"I thought you were dead," I sobbed, grasping at his hand and bringing it down to press it against my face. "I watched you die! I watched you! I saw you die!" My words flung themselves at him with a sudden fury and I couldn't seem to grasp what emotion I was feeling. Was I angry? Angry at what? Angry that he wasn't dead? His death had been a lie. Had he known? No. He would have told me.

His hand moved down my tear stained face and rested under my chin, pulling it upwards so that I was forced to look at him. Forced to look into those eyes and be paralyzed by them, be lost in their depth.

"Tell me that you are really here," My voice hitched, a sob catching in my throat.

"I'm here, I'm not dead." His words were soft, his voice as deep and as velveteen as I remembered it to be.

"And this isn't a dream?" I whispered, my eyes lost in his. "Because if it is, you can tell me you know. I have had so many dreams about you, but this would be the best."

His golden eyes burnt into mine. "This isn't a dream Darling." His eyes were hooded as he looked at my mouth hungrily before leaning forward to brush his lips against mine in the softest of touches. "Does this feel like a dream?" He murmured.

We stared at each other for a moment as my tears continued to flow and his eyes flickered all over my face, taking me in. And then I grabbed him, pulling him in to close the gap and kissing him desperately, my arms wrapping around his neck, my hands in his hair, any part of him that I find to hold him closer. He had to be real, this couldn't be a dream, I could feel the warmth of his lips on mine, feel the wetness as our tongues touched, shyly at first before giving way to hungry, greedy passion.