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She gasped.
“My knight.” She couldn’t explain it, yet somehow, she knew the knight—her knight—now lived within this beast. A man who's very soul called to hers so fiercely, it was a presence she could almost touch. They were bound, her and this knight who was no longer a knight.
We meet again in a dream, she thought. If only we could touch.
“He leads a team of others like him,” Ceres said. “They make camp a short distance from here, and though they are all beasts, the company is as good as you’ll find anywhere.” As she spoke, fire crackled behind her, casting a flickering light over the rough ground. “On a night such as this, with the moon about to swell in the night skies, he will not join them.”
The amber light beckoned, and the snap of embers urged Maren to abandon the cliff for the promised warmth, but she could not turn away from the creature. His back was to her, as he stared across that shadowed stretch of land beyond the fall.
He stood with the stillness of the damned.
“Why isn’t he with them?” Maren asked.
“Because the rage is harder on nights like this, and he would never forgive himself if he struck out at those in his care.” The goddess lifted an arm, as if cradling the figure in the palm of her hand. “There is only one thing that could ease his suffering.”
“What?” Maren whispered.
“You,” Ceres said.
“But how can I help? This is not real.” The dry, barren air might taste real on Maren’s tongue, yet somehow, she knew they still dreamed. Or at least she did. But why was the Goddess tormenting her with such visions? She turned to demand an answer of Ceres, but no luminous green figure stood beside her—she’d been left to dream alone, it seemed.
A cold wind snaked over the ground and she shivered.
On the ridge, her knight’s massive hands were curled into fists and his head dropped, as if burdened by impossible pain. A creature condemned by his own sense of honor, and betrayed by the people he sought to save. He wasn't the man she'd dreamed of—he wasn't a man at all—and yet she still longed to reach out to him and soothe his pain. But this was a dream, and she was naught but a ghost here, unnoticed and untouchable.
“Why would you send me here, Goddess, if I cannot do anything.” Refusing to torment herself any further, she wrapped her arms around her body. Tears filled her eyes, and she could no longer hold back a cry. “It is too much!”
He turned and his eyes flashed in the falling dark. “Who goes there?”
Her eyes widened with shock.
Holy Gods, had he heard her?
“Show yourself.” His voice was a roll of thunder that trembled through her.
Was another approaching them, or did he speak to the Goddess? She searched behind her for Ceres, wondering if the Goddess had chosen to let this noble man see her, but she had not reappeared.
“I said show yourself.” He took a single step toward her, broad shoulders towering above her, blocking out the remaining shreds of light and casting her into shadow.
“I would,” she called out to him. “If I could.”
His nostrils flared. “Then do. Your scent disrupts me.”
She blinked with shock.
He'd not only heard her—he'd smelled her? Impossible. She was in a dream, and that meant she was trapped in a prison of watching, unable to affect anything around her. Unless this was the gift the Goddess had spoken of?
She sucked in a breath, and took a tentative step toward him. "Dearest knight," she said, "can you see me?"
Fangs flashed white against dark fur. “I don’t know you.”
"I think you do," she said, and kept approaching him. She doubted she could have stopped herself, even if she'd wanted to. It was as if every wish formed a thread, tying them together—pulling her toward him.
His eyes widened as she drew near, the same blue she’d seen within the knight’s helm.
"You should not be here, lady," he said, his voice rough as gravel.
"I think I must," she replied, her heart pounding in her chest.
