Chapter 32:

Slowly, he pulled back from me, like it was the last thing he ever wanted to do before turning over onto his side, still facing me, still watching as I followed him. Turning back onto my side once more, I faced him. I just couldn't bring myself to let go of him, not now, not after that. Instead, I curled in against him once more, pressing my forehead against his chest. I still didn't fully understand this draw, this bond between us, but when I was around him, I never wanted to let go. 

"Thank you for everything," I whispered to him as he wrapped his arms back around me, cradling the back of my head as he just held me there. 

"You're welcome. Now, just try to sleep for a little while longer, princess." 

"Will you wake me up when you get up, please?" 

"Ari, you need to rest as much as you can right now. While there shouldn't be anymore of that poison in your veins, it still took a massive toll on your body." 

"Xavier, I've practically been in bed all week, and we both know that I'll have to be back in classes by Monday. The easiest way to get my strength back is by using it, and I'd much rather be with you if something happened." He took a breath, obviously weighing my statement, but it was the truth. Even if Lexi and Genie were with me, if I just fell over after being gone for almost a week, they would just cart me back off to the medical ward again, and I would be in danger of all of Xavier's work going to waste. It's not like either of them knew enough to know if someone was poisoning me or actually helping me. Honestly, I didn't even know if Xavier would be able to tell the difference, but at least he wouldn't take me to the medical ward. He would know that I just needed more rest and would just bring me somewhere safe to do it. 

"Fine, you can bathe while I go out for a little while in the morning, then I'll come back and get you for breakfast." 

"You're going to go shift, aren't you?" I questioned as I looked up at him. If he was leaving to shift, then I absolutely wanted to go with him. I had only seen him briefly before, and it was dark out, not to mention the fact that I was half delirious with blood loss and terror, but now, now I really wanted to see him. Now that I've actually gotten to start learning about the man, I wanted to see him, all of him. 

He sighed as if knowing that I wasn't just going to stay put and looked down at me. "If I say yes, you're not going to stay here, are you?" He asked with a raised eyebrow, and I just smiled at him. 

"Look who's catching on." I teased, and he just shook his head at me. 

"Even if I ask you, very nicely to?" 

"I'll just follow you." 

"You can't get up the mountain without a ride." 

"Well then, it sounds like it would be in the best of both of our interests if a certain someone gave me a ride with him up the mountain, because I'm not the best climber," I whispered with a grin as I slipped my hand up his chest to brush my thumb over his sharp jaw.

"You're going to be the fucking death of me, woman," he whispered, and I grinned at my victory before leaning up to gently press my lips against his once more. My hand trailed down the side of his neck, and he nipped my bottom lip when my fingers grazed over his scales, but this time they were far more defined as they spread even further over his neck. "You're pressing your luck." He growled out, low and husky against my lips, causing me to gasp, but he pulled back from me once more, laying his head back against the pillows as I dropped my hand back to his chest, where it was at least a little safer. Curling further into his arms, I finally closed my eyes and drifted back to sleep. 

Soft kisses to the side of my neck and jaw slowly pulled me out of sleep, and I smiled as my hand found its way into the silky strands of his hair, while the other held the back of his neck. He growled against me, nipping the side of my neck as my hand gently traced over those scales once more, although right now, they weren't under his skin anymore. They were fully formed dragon scales.

Lexi and Genie were never going to believe me when I told them about this shift in dynamic. Xavier fucking Knight had not only actually bent to my will, but had given me easily the best wake-up call of my life in doing so. 

Sure, it was probably simple to anyone else, hell, anyone else probably would have expected more, but to me, this, the simple press of his lips on my skin, the occasional soft nip of teeth, was all so perfect. I couldn't stop the soft moan from slipping from my lips as his tongue traced up towards my jaw, and he growled low in his chest once more. 

"If you keep making those sounds, princess, we won't be leaving this bed for a long while this morning." He murmured right under my ear, and maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing with this man, but then he slowly pulled out of my grasp as I opened my eyes and watched him climb off the side of the bed. 

Slowly, I turned my attention to the room around us, finally, actually taking it in for the first time since I've gotten here. The sky outside the huge window beside his bed was just starting to turn purple and pink with the rising sun, casting the room in the slight glow of dawn before he walked over and lit one of the lanterns hanging on the wall. 

The warm light bathed the large, fairly sparse room in orange and yellow as the flame danced. The only furniture he had was a dark wooden dresser, a matching desk with a padded armchair, a wooden nightstand, and his sword rack. Everything was neat and tidy, not a single book or piece of paper out of place on his desk. They were all perfectly stacked in three neat little piles. One of two books that wouldn't fit up on the built-in bookshelf above the desk, one of folders that were all labeled on careful little tabs, and one of loose papers that had all been shuffled into a perfect pile, not a single corner out of place. 

I watched as he pulled out one of the drawers of the dresser, and even that was perfectly organized in neat rows of folded clothes. 

Xavier Knight was a neat freak... That one took a moment to settle in before I smiled to myself. 

"What are you smiling about now?" He asked as he pulled out two perfectly folded stacks of clothing, making me smile even wider.  

"I never took you as a neat freak," I told him, giving a pointed look between the perfectly folded piles of clothes and the stand of knives and swords by the door. Every single blade was propped up at the exact same angle as the next in line and perfectly ordered from the smallest to the largest, with his two swords on the end. 

"Organization is a soldier's best friend. If everything has its rightful place and always goes back there, then it will never be lost even when you're in a rush." Fair, I guess, but I'm not even close to this organized. Folding your clothes and things is one thing. Sure, it makes sense for him to keep his desk orgainized considering the amount of paperwork he does, but this went far beyond that. 

Everything was perfectly in place to the extent that my things had been placed perfectly right alongside his own. I raised an eyebrow at him, pointedly looking at his sword rack once more. "Okay, fine, I may be a little anal about it since I had to leave Carnavia, okay? My room was an absolute wreck, and I couldn't find something very important to me before I was rushed out." He bowed his head, reliving the memory, and I instantly felt a little bad. "If it bothers you... You can change things around." 

"I'm not saying that. I just found it a little surprising, is all. It's not a bad thing." I told him as I got up and went over to him. I pressed my palm against his back, and that seemed to snap him out of whatever memory he had been trapped in. He glanced down at me for a moment before shutting the drawer, and I moved in front of him, leaning in against his chest. "They haven't gotten as far as the capital, Xavier. I'm sure it's still there." I whispered, feeling him swallow hard before wrapping his arms around me. 

"That's not what I'm worried about still being there anymore, princess." He whispered before pressing a kiss to my forehead and pulling back from me. Taking one of the two piles of clothing off the top of the dresser and leaving the other as he gestured to the bathing chamber door. "I had your uniform laundered. You can have the bathroom. Everything you need to clean up is in there, and we have some time if you want to take a quick shower." 

"Thank you," I smiled at him as I took my clothes and went to the door.