"Do dragons normally use magic to be among people?" I ask.
He shakes his head. "Dyes, mostly. There are other technologies for altering eye color for those of us who have more uncommon human coloring, but I haven't had access to those in many years. I sometimes still dye my hair black, though. It's... easier, in a way."
To look and feel like himself.
"You've lived your whole life in hiding," I say softly.
That damned shrug again. "I am not sorry that I have knowledge that will be useful to you in deciding how you will be most comfortable."
My anger ignites in an instant.
"I am sorry that you developed a martyr complex," I snap. "I didn't ask you to make yourself unhappy for five hundred years for my benefit."
Zan's glance back at me is cutting. "And I haven't lived this way for your benefit for hundreds of years. I stopped believing you would wake up ages ago. Not everything is about you."
"Good." And I mean that, even if I don't entirely believe him. "Because if it were up to me, I'd tell you that I won't be comfortable until you can be your whole self, too."
"I'm a dragon," Zan reminds me. As if I'd forgotten.
"I'm a sage," I retort. "If I'm going to get a chance at freedom, there's no reason you shouldn't, too."
I can practically see him grinding his teeth. "I told you. I've lived as freely as possible for an unmated dragonâ"
"Arguably I've lived as freely as possible for a sage."
"You have not," Zan snaps. "You can't even imagine what living in the world can be like."
"That's true."
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
His eyes narrow. "Is it."
Ha. Already he understands me better than many of my tutors.
"It is," I say easily, with a sharp smile.
Zan scowls. "I see. You think you're going to think of something that I haven't in centuries."
Put that way, it does seem not only ridiculous, but borderline offensive.
"I think I am angry on your behalf," I say slowly.
"You don't need to be." His frustration is evident.
"You don't get to decide what I feel," I snap. "And if you think I will somehow learn to be so happy and simply never get angry again, you do not understand me, and what it means to be the incarnation of Wrath."
Zan takes a breath. "That isn't what I meant."
"And I didn't mean that I'm simply going to sail in and tell you how you obviously should have been living your life all along. I don't think you're stupid, and of the two of us of course you understand what it's like to actually live in the world."
He nods slowly. "But?"
"But you're right that I can't imagine what freedom looks like for me. And the options that have apparently existed up to now don't fill me with enthusiasm. But now the Quiet is gone, and maybe there will be new options. And if you are going to try to help me have the space to find them, there's no reason I shouldn't do the same for you. Yes, you haveâso much more practical experience than I do. But I am not a child you have to lead through life. And what I bring is a new perspective and a lot of anger. Don't patronize me."
Zan's gaze glows. "I don't think you're a child."
I pull the bow out of my hair so that mine glows right back. "A victim, then. The Quiet was my idea, Zan. I didn't do it by accident."
He scowls. "I didn't think you had."
"Then maybe remember that I can think of and do things no one else can."
"I do," Zan snaps. "And I hope you imagine and do whatever you want. But you don't need to treat me as a problem to solve, either."
Oh.
I hesitate for a second, and then reach for his hand.
He tenses for a second as that rush suffuses me again, softer this time, and leaving the same tingles in its wake that I felt when he put the bow in my hair.
And then he grips mine with quiet strength.
"You're not a problem," I tell him firmly. "You're a person. And I want you to be able to imagine and do whatever you want, too. That's all."
His gaze meets mine and holds it.
There's a fraught moment where I hold my breath, unsure what the next moment will bring.
Our eyes glow at each other, pink and blue.
But I don't know what I want yet, and I need to decide. I deserve to decide, and he deserves that, too.
I turn my head, showing him the back of it. "Could you fix the bow again, please?"
"Of course."
Our hands separate like nothing happened. His fingers in my hair are quick and efficient and don't linger.
But for the remainder of the hike there's an air between us that's at once easier and on the edge of possibility.
And Zan tells me the names of the trees.