2. Spitfire: Rekindled | Prologue: A Memory

Feon

I will never forget the first time we met. It is burned brightly into my memory: the day my eyes opened; the day I became whole.

I don’t remember much about my family—my blood family, that is. I remember the heat of dragon fire and the warmth of other bodies pressed in against mine. I remember songs warbled from above full of a deep, persisting love. I remember the darkness of my own eyelids and the red glow of light shining through them and the taste of fresh blood, sweet and sharp and wild.

But more than anything, I remember him: the feeling of hands, soft and weak and human, pressing unbearably gently against either side of my face, lifting my head towards his; the feeling of his short breaths ghosting across my scales; a quiet reassurance whispered in a tongue I did not yet understand.

I remember the tearing pain of opening my eyes for the first time, nearly blinded by the sun’s radiance. And I remember his face.

Back then, he wore his worries readily: his small, fleshy face framed by dark ringlets, full brows pinched up in the middle, eyes wide with empathy. My prince has always been kind.

I knew from that first moment that he was mine: mine to serve and to keep, mine to lose if I failed him.

Mine to love, if I dared.