She could have warned him of the effect, but she’d wanted to see his unschooled reaction. Eons had passed since she’d been able to experience space like this, to sever the tethers to the solid world and be alone with the universe. Except now there were two. A time, an experience, a life shared.
“This is wild. I feel like I’m free-floating through space,” he said, still hanging onto the chair.
“The observatory is a bubble jutting out of the ship,” she explained. A bubble of infinite possibilities. A bubble of dreams.
“This is mind-blowing.” Moving from chair to chair, he inched toward the transparent starboard hull.
She stifled an amused chuckle. “Everything is quite solid. You’re still on the ship. It’s an illusion we’re floating in space.”
“What an illusion. It feels like space-walking.” He pivoted in a slow circle, taking in the full view, then extended his hand to her. She took it, and he pulled her into an embrace of comforting warmth and exotic scent. “Thank you for showing me this.”
Her head bumped his chin as she nodded. “Much better than an empty flex chamber?”
“This is the best part of the ship.”
On the outbound journey when the exploration team had searched for a new planet, she’d spent many hours in the observatory, dreaming of possibilities, realizing her life could be much grander than she ever imagined. She’d seen nebulae, satellites, asteroids, comets, planets. Entranced, she’d gazed upon the blue orb of Terra and then watched forested land grow close way too fast as the ship lost control of the descent and crashed.
She didn’t know if the rescue ship had had an observatory. On the trip home, she’d been too consumed by despair and rage to care about the stars.
She slipped from his embrace to flatten her palms against the clear wall. This voyage would be her final glimpse of space. “This view, the vastness stirred my curiosity, aroused a desire to explore, and to experience firsthand the wonders of the universe.”
She would have followed that dream if not for the grief and rage after the loss of her daughter having driven her to the temple. Then, exalted to priestess, she’d used her powers to destroy those who’d wronged her. Quicker than a blink, her transgressors ceased to exist. She, however, remained in despair.
His touch gentle, H’ry traced a line from her temple to her jaw. Nerves lit up. Her core contracted. Her fyre danced. She wanted to fling herself into his arms, but the burning in her chest reminded her she could not. “You impress the hell out of me, lady,” he said. “I’ve never met anyone like you.”
Despite her angst, his comment struck her as funny. “Can’t imagine you’ve met many dragon priestesses.”
Blue eyes were serious. “I meant your courage, your dedication, your presence.”
She’d never considered herself courageous. Embattled, often. Resigned, usually. Unworthy, always. She wished she could be what he believed she was. She averted her face from the admiration in his eyes. She was unworthy of him, too.
A finger beneath her chin turned her face. “Will you show me your demiforma?”
She opened her mouth to deny him.
“Please—unless it’s dangerous. Unless in demiforma, you’d eat me or toast me,” he joked.
If he only knew. As priestess, she could conjure fire no matter what form she took. “That wouldn’t happen. I’d still be in full control.” The dragon didn’t gain command until fully actualized. She hadn’t been demiforma in 10,000 years, since she adopted her woman form in honor of her child. “Why do you want to see it?”
“When our time ends, I want to know I saw the real you, all sides of you.”
Heat flooded her face at the intimacy of his admission, at the temptation. Oh, to be seen. To become real in someone’s eyes, and not a paragon, an icon, a priestess, an object of fear.
Her fyre flared bright and hot, burgeoning with expectation, anticipation, trepidation. He’d seen only her woman form, and she knew he found it pleasing. What if he thought her demiforma ugly?
“Please,” he asked again.
She gave a slight nod and gave herself space. Taking a breath, she called to the fyre within.
Chapter Eight
Seeing O’ne shift was like watching a time-lapse video. Her features and body rippled, as if something lived under the skin, and then a leathery frill emerged out of her neck to frame her changing face, her mouth and nose compacting into an abbreviated snout. Her clothing adapted as her body broadened and lengthened, and a tail jutted from the base of her spine.
Beautiful as a woman, she projected a majestic, commanding presence in demiforma. He could only imagine what her dragoness looked like. He wished he could have met her, too.
She curled her talons into the folds of her skirt and gazed at him with familiar but wary amber eyes.
“You’re magnificent.” He cupped her cheek, her scales smooth against his palm. Shyly, she rubbed her face against his hand. Maintaining eye contact, he smiled, and when she dropped the lower jaw of her snout in a grin, she revealed short but sharp fangs. Her alabaster hair, still braided and coiled, appeared to have coarsened.
He brushed his thumb over her knuckles and sharp claws then lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it.
“Thank you,” she said. Her voice sounded rougher, more gravelly, but his body reacted with a surge of heat, as if a fire had been lit in his belly.
“For what?”
“For being you. Many humans would not accept a dragon.”
She was right, but there had been enough distrust to go around on both sides. Biggs’s attempt to steal Elementa had fostered and exacerbated political tension and animus, but Draconians clung to their own prejudices about humans. O’ne’s dragoness would kill him if given an opportunity.
“I’m not like most
