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07:06Look
07:07Owazal and pictures soon, and the lie of the sand is seen in a large way.
07:11Damn the people who follow him, all of them are followers of his artistic mornings.
07:14Peace be upon you, Vinsky. It is Vinsky, do not blame him. The first is true, so follow him from Christ so that the Messenger may enter him into the great end.
07:22So hello, hopefully, he remembers how the house is in the small one,
07:25This is the great imam from the sermon, Afnsky, who is bringing you this small video, people at the end
07:37Every glance Finn ever threw across a room always landed on her.
07:42Even agreeing to bond with me, I finally understood that too.
07:46It was just a reflex.
07:48A moment of wounded pride after she chose the dragon instead of him.
07:53Samara, they were right.
07:54Every bit of this was you lying to yourself.
07:57I made up my mind.
07:59I would dissolve the bond before it was complete.
08:02I wasn't going to wait around to be discarded with an audience.
08:05I started looking for an available beast man.
08:07Anyone willing to bond with me before my birthday.
08:10I finally tracked down Riven, a low-rank lizard in the Outer Territory, and he agreed.
08:16I ran home, told Finn.
08:18He didn't look relieved.
08:19He looked furious.
08:23Samara, are you serious?
08:26You'd bond with that low-rank lizard instead of me?
08:31I didn't show up that day, but I had a reason.
08:34You saw-
08:34I stopped listening.
08:35I already knew the reason.
08:37Sienna's ceremony was approaching.
08:39He was busy.
08:40Too busy for me, never too busy for her.
08:43Because of my face.
08:44Because I was the ugly one.
08:46Because apparently being born with a birthmark means I deserved to be stood up, mocked in public,
08:53and made to feel grateful for scraps.
08:55I closed my eyes.
08:57Yes, Finn.
08:59I'm bonding with Riven.
09:02Fine, Samara.
09:03Don't come crawling back.
09:05He said it like I was the one abandoning him.
09:07I really could not locate his logic.
09:10I had no time to figure it out.
09:13My birthday was three days away.
09:15The next morning, I went to find Riven.
09:17Somehow, he'd changed his mind overnight.
09:20Apparently, someone had introduced him to a girl last night, and they'd already scheduled their ceremony for that afternoon.
09:26You think I would take someone else's rejection?
09:31Then closed his door in my face.
09:33I stood there, lifted my hand to knock again, let it fall.
09:36People like me weren't meant to survive in a world like this.
09:39If I had maybe three days left alive, fine.
09:43I was going to spend them eating well.
09:45I walked to Mayfair Garden Cafe, the expensive coffee house I'd never dared enter before,
09:50and ordered everything that looked good.
09:52I was halfway through a plate of honey cake when I caught the conversation behind me.
09:56I heard the phoenix is giving Sienna the thousand-year heartwood?
09:59The one with healing properties?
10:01Healing?
10:02If it can heal, why didn't Finn use it years ago on Samara's face?
10:06Oh, wait.
10:07Obviously, because Sienna matters.
10:09Samara never did.
10:11He had a cure.
10:12He had a cure for my birthmark.
10:15He watched me get beaten, ridiculed, spat on my entire life,
10:20And he had the antidote in his pocket.
10:22He chose to give it to Sienna as a backup plan instead of giving it to me.
10:27Tears ran down my face, and I bit my lip until it bled to keep from making a sound.
10:33Tomorrow was my birthday.
10:34I was going to die.
10:35They would laugh at the way my body destroyed itself, so I would not cry.
10:39Not tonight.
10:40Not where anyone could see.
10:42I went home.
10:44Nowhere else to go in this world.
10:45The house was blazing with light.
10:47The crowd had packed the main hall, shouting over each other.
10:50Alaric, Sienna's dragon.
10:52The feral curse had taken hold.
10:56Without a completed bond to tether him, Alaric wouldn't just hurt Sienna.
11:00He'd tear through the entire city.
11:03Dragons and rogue state always did.
11:05Everyone was screaming at Sienna to go through with the bond immediately.
11:09Only Finn was standing in her way, locking her, keeping her back.
11:12But Finn couldn't hold the crowd forever.
11:15I looked at him one last time, but Sienna sheltered behind his back like she was made
11:19of glass, and walked to my room.
11:21His footsteps came fast.
11:23He threw open my door.
11:24Why was he here?
11:25His priority was right down the hall.
11:28Samara, you're the only one who can save her.
11:30Me?
11:31The dragon bonded with Sienna, not me.
11:34You and Sienna are identical, except for the mark.
11:36No one will know the difference.
11:38I opened my mouth to ask how I was supposed to remove a birthmark on three seconds notice.
11:43And then I remembered the conversation at Mayfair Garden.
11:46He already knew.
11:47Finn raised his hand.
11:48His expression showed something I might have called regret, but his arm was completely
11:53steady as it swung toward my throat.
11:56Samara, I'm sorry.
11:59But Sienna once saved my life.
12:02I can't let her...
12:03Those were the last words I heard, before the darkness took me.
12:07Finn, even now, not a single word about me.
12:10I came back to consciousness, in a moving carriage, dressed in red.
12:14Finn's dress.
12:15The one he made for Sienna.
12:20I almost laughed.
12:21He worked so hard on it.
12:24And it ended up on the wrong twin after all.
12:26Outside, drums and horns.
12:29The city is celebrating.
12:30They weren't celebrating at the honest yet.
12:33They were celebrating trading my life for their safety.
12:36The altar was already in sight.
12:38I didn't struggle.
12:39I walked up the steps.
12:41Heard the crowd's murmur shift.
12:43A single, sharp inhale of surprise.
12:46The kind of sound people make when they see something unexpected.
12:49How funny.
12:50I had heard people gasp at my face my whole life.
12:53Always in revulsion.
12:55The one time they gasped in something else, I was walking towards my own death.
13:00My gaze found Finn at the base of the steps.
13:02He stood very still, staring up at me with an expression I couldn't read.
13:06This is what you wanted, Finn, isn't it?
13:09I looked away.
13:09Alaric stood at the center of the altar, radiating red light, barely controlled.
13:15His muscles looked like they were about to rip his clothes off.
13:18His eyes were burning.
13:19All animals.
13:20No human.
13:22But as soon as our eyes locked, a flicker of blue light flashed in his eyes.
13:26He got closer to me and cupped my face.
13:29You are different.
13:31The ceremony will now begin!
13:36We exchanged the bond tokens.
13:38Blood on both sides.
13:39The bond snapped into place.
13:41The nightmare dimension opened instantly.
13:44It swallowed us both.
13:45I closed my eyes and waited to die.
13:48When I opened my eyes again, I was overtaken by the beauty.
13:53Not darkness.
13:55No pain.
13:56Trees.
13:57Dense.
13:57Ancient.
13:59Green.
13:59A stream so clear I could count the stones at the bottom.
14:03A spotted deer drinking at the bank.
14:06This wasn't what the nightmare dimension was supposed to look like.
14:09And Alaric was gone.
14:11I turned in a slow circle.
14:14No dragon.
14:15No hulking rogue state predator.
14:18Something cool brushed my ankle.
14:20I looked down.
14:21A tiny white snake.
14:24Transparent scales.
14:26Two small, delicate horns catch the light.
14:29Everyone who'd ever studied beast man biology could recognize those horns.
14:35Alaric.
14:36Reduced to his infant form.
14:38Small enough to fit in my palm.
14:39As long as there was breath, there was a way out.
14:42I carried baby Alaric through the valley.
14:47Trying every technique I knew.
14:50Healing herbs.
14:51Binding chants.
14:53Binding chants.
14:53Energy redirection.
14:54Nothing worked.
14:55He stayed small.
14:56His red light pulsed faintly, but never faded.
14:59I gave up for the night and went foraging instead.
15:04In the morning, I woke up with something heavy on my chest.
15:08Baby Alaric had coiled himself on top of me at some point in the night and was fast asleep, rising
15:13and falling with my breathing.
15:17I picked him up by the scruff.
15:20I don't know what you heard about mate binding, but sleeping on top of people is generally considered a personal
15:27boundary violation.
15:28He stared at me, completely unapologetic.
15:31His tail, however, slowly turned red.
15:41His tiny horns flushed darker as I kept holding them.
15:45I raised an eyebrow.
15:46I spent the next ten minutes poking his horns until he'd turned fully pink.
15:50Only then did I put him down.
15:52Satisfied.
15:54I went back to trying to fix him.
15:56Nothing worked.
15:56I pulled some leaves off a low branch and shredded them while I thought.
16:00One leaf caught my skin.
16:02Blood welled from a clean slice across my fingertip.
16:05Before I could move, Alaric flicked his tongue and licked the wound.
16:09The bleeding stopped.
16:10The cut started closing.
16:12Then he convulsed.
16:13I scrambled for medicine.
16:16Useless.
16:17Because he was already growing.
16:21The feral curse, gone.
16:24He was healed.
16:25We could go home.
16:27But he was also the most famous, coldest, most untouchable alpha in the territory.
16:34And I had spent the last two days poking him and calling him a personal boundary violator.
16:41I didn't get to figure out.
16:42He'd already shifted back to human form and landed in front of me.
16:46He was exactly as described.
16:48Sharp jaw.
16:49Cold eyes.
16:50The kind of face that made people get out of his way before they knew why.
16:56Samara, are you familiar with a prophecy passed down through dragon bloodlines?
17:02Can't say I am.
17:03Only the goddess can break the curse.
17:07That he knew my real name, or what he was calling me.
17:10I've examined the surrounding space.
17:12This isn't the nightmare dimension.
17:14It's a separate realm.
17:15One that appears to belong to you.
17:18I had a private dimension.
17:21I, Samara, the uglier twin, the spare, the girl who couldn't get a lizard beast man to bond with her,
17:27had a private dimension.
17:29We return to the city.
17:31The streets stopped when they saw us.
17:35I went straight to Finn's estate.
17:38Alaric walked in beside me.
17:41I looked at my sister.
17:44Finn and Sienna were in the morning hall, performing grief in front of the assembled guests.
17:49Sienna, the name on that banner is wrong.
17:52The one who bonded with the dragon was me.
17:55Samara, not you.
17:56Prove it!
17:57How do we know you're even Samara?
17:59I smiled.
18:01I raised my hand.
18:03Sienna's birthmark.
18:05The one she'd painted on her face to impersonate me.
18:09Dissolved.
18:09I already knew she wouldn't have actually damaged herself.
18:14She sent her own sister to die in her place.
18:16What is Samara's face like?
18:20The heartwood.
18:22Finn had it the whole time.
18:28The feral curse.
18:29Is it lifted?
18:30You can't possibly be walking around if it's not.
18:33You tear this city apart.
18:36The curse is gone, Finn.
18:39Samara cured it.
18:42The entire room pivoted to look at me like a single organism.
18:45Finn looked like he'd been hit.
18:48Alaric, you don't have to protect her.
18:50I know my sister.
18:54I'm not protecting her.
18:56Samara is the goddess our bloodline's prophecy describes.
19:00Her blood neutralizes the feral curse.
19:03Finn's hand tightened on Sienna's arm.
19:06Did you forget, Finn?
19:08Your feral curse broke the same way.
19:11Sienna who saved you that winter.
19:14It was me.
19:22I left that sentence in the middle of the room, like a lit match, and walked out with Alaric.
19:27The best revelations are the ones you don't finish.
19:30Life in Alaric's estate was the best 17 days of my entire existence.
19:35Food brought to me.
19:36Warm rooms.
19:37No one spitting on the ground where I walked.
19:39Then the requests started coming.
19:42Word had spread.
19:43A rogue beast man, a firefox, had been brought to the gates.
19:47People wanted proof.
19:48Alaric and I looked at each other.
19:50Perfect timing.
19:51The crowd outside was enormous.
19:53I walked to the firefox without haste, ignoring the way his curse form snarled at me,
19:58and drew a clean line across my palm.
20:01A few drops of blood.
20:02His throat.
20:03He screamed and convulsed.
20:05The crowd turned on me instantly.
20:07She's a monster!
20:08That birthmark was a sign all along.
20:11And she's poisoning him!
20:12I don't answer.
20:13I don't negotiate with panic.
20:15Alaric stepped in front of me.
20:17One look.
20:18That was all he did.
20:19One look at the crowd.
20:20And every voice stopped.
20:21I watched his back.
20:23The width of his shoulders.
20:24The steadiness of his stance.
20:26And something warm cracked open in my chest.
20:2917 years.
20:30First time someone stepped in front of me.
20:32The firefox stopped convulsing.
20:34The red light faded.
20:35He blinked.
20:36Calm.
20:37recognizably himself.
20:38The person who'd been loudest about poisoning him now looked like they might faint.
20:42Goodness!
20:43Started moving through the crowd like a wave.
20:45Within a week, my name was on every street in the city.
20:48Sienna, I heard, hadn't left Finn's estate in days.
20:52The neighborhood children had discovered she made an excellent moving target.
20:56I was not sorry.
20:57A servant announced a visitor one evening.
21:00I already knew who it was before I reached the hall.
21:02Sienna, on her knees.
21:04Samara, tell them you went willingly.
21:06Please, just issue a statement.
21:08She was pale, shaking, still managing to make it sound like a command.
21:12My voice came out very quiet.
21:15Give me one reason.
21:16You watched them torment me for 18 years and said nothing.
21:20You knew I was the one who healed Finn, and you let him fawn over you anyway.
21:24And then you sent me to die in your place.
21:27Her mouth moved.
21:29No sound came out.
21:30She grabbed the hem of my sleeve and pulled like a child.
21:33Alaric had her escorted out.
21:35The moment he appeared in the doorway, something in me simply gave up.
21:39The tears came without warning.
21:41I couldn't stop them.
21:42Didn't try.
21:43Alaric pulled me in without a word.
21:45I cried so hard I couldn't breathe.
21:4718 years of it.
21:48Finally out.
21:50I woke up in bed.
21:51Alaric was beside me, asleep.
21:52I remembered, distantly, grabbing his sleeve and refusing to let go as I passed out.
21:58My face was on fire.
22:00I had approximately 5 seconds to be mortified before a servant announced another visitor.
22:05Finn!
22:06He stood in the receiving room, looking wrecked, like he had not slept.
22:09His eyes found my face and stayed there, unblinking, full of something painful.
22:14Samara, I'm so glad you're alive.
22:16You have interesting timing, Finn.
22:18I'm only alive because you swapped me for Sienna.
22:21So technically, I have you to thank?
22:23Samara, every word you say right now is a blade.
22:27Good.
22:27I turned to leave.
22:28He caught my wrist.
22:29Mara.
22:30My old name.
22:31The short version.
22:32The one he'd used before he stopped seeing me.
22:34I hadn't heard it in years.
22:35Finn, you didn't lose me.
22:37You put me down a long time ago.
22:39I'm the one who finally stopped for you to pick me back waiting up.
22:42Finn and Sienna stayed away after that.
22:44What they didn't stay away from was a scheme.
22:48Rumors spread.
22:49I heard a second goddess had appeared.
22:51One more generous than me.
22:53No conditions.
22:55No questions about character.
22:57And apparently effective.
22:59I sat in Alaric's garden eating candied plums.
23:02And really could not find it in me to care.
23:06But I noticed something.
23:08Dead animals kept appearing outside the city walls.
23:12Strange variety.
23:14Wrong season.
23:15Sienna, if you actually had this ability, you would have used it before tonight.
23:21Alaric's people quietly investigated.
23:23The count of dead animals matched the count of beastmen Sienna claimed to have healed.
23:28Exactly.
23:29She'd been extracting beastman essence.
23:33Killing animals to fake a cure.
23:36She was arrested within the week.
23:38I went to see her before sentencing.
23:41She was barely recognizable.
23:44Dirty.
23:45Small.
23:46The careful performance of herself is completely gone.
23:51This is your fault, Samara.
23:53You sent Alaric after me.
23:55I didn't.
23:57But go on.
23:58You, you and your goddess title, you ruined everything.
24:02And Finn is throwing me out.
24:05Dissolving the bond.
24:08He's leaving me to die.
24:10I went still.
24:11Sienna, what you did to me, that only hurt me.
24:15What you did to those beastmen, to this city, that was bigger than both of us.
24:19The reason you're here isn't me.
24:21It's every choice you made when you thought nobody was watching.
24:25She was still screaming when I left.
24:27She died three days later.
24:29I had her remains collected.
24:32Whatever she was to me at the end, she was still the person I grew up beside.
24:37Then Finn appeared at the gate, and every inch of him was glowing.
24:41The feral curse, taking hold.
24:44He didn't ask for my blood.
24:53Before I lose myself completely, let this feather find the person it belongs to.
24:58I recognized it immediately.
25:00Finn, do you know what the last thing Sienna ever said to me to me was?
25:04The lizard who rejected me?
25:07You arranged that.
25:08You sent someone to him the night before.
25:11You made sure I had no options left, so I'd have to stay within reach.
25:15That night, Alaric came to my room and set a dragon scale on my desk without a word.
25:20I pushed it back three times.
25:23His face went darker with each refusal.
25:26I took the scale.
25:30Alaric's estate was enormous.
25:32I spent two weeks learning the layout and still opened the wrong door half the time.
25:36One wrong door led me to a room full of dried flowers.
25:39Thousands of them.
25:40Every variety.
25:42Pressed.
25:42Labeled.
25:43Arranged in careful rows.
25:44After my mother died, I'd go out before dawn and pick whatever was blooming.
25:49Then spend the hot part of the day hawking them in the market.
25:52Until one morning, a house steward appeared and said his employer was very pleased with
25:56my work and wanted ten full baskets delivered daily.
25:59I had never seen the employer's face.
26:02It was Alaric.
26:03I summoned him to the main hall that evening.
26:06He stood in the center of them, unsure what to do with his hands.
26:10I didn't realize dragons had so many quirks.
26:13Sleeping on people's chests.
26:15Collecting flowers.
26:17Truly a complex inner life.
26:19Alaric, when we were little, you used to follow me around and call me Big Sis.
26:23I know I told you to stop once we were grown.
26:26I lied.
26:27I liked it.
26:30I looked at him.
26:32Waiting.
26:33He didn't move for a long, agonizing moment.
26:39Big Sis.
26:40We'd met before Finn.
26:41Before any of this.
26:42Him for being born without dragon horns.
26:44Me for the mark on my face.
26:45Left in the mountains to survive or die.
26:47He arrived after me.
26:48So obviously, I adopted him immediately.
26:51We lived like that for years.
26:53Looking out for each other.
26:54Then his horns grew in.
26:56His family came to collect him.
26:58He didn't want to go.
26:59They tied him up.
27:00They told him if he fought it, they'd come back and kill me.
27:04He left to protect me.
27:06He found me again years later in the market.
27:10He was too afraid to approach.
27:13Afraid his presence would put me in danger.
27:16So he bought all my flowers instead.
27:19Every single day.
27:20At triple the market rate.
27:23He agreed to bond with Sienna.
27:25Because he knew what Finn was planning.
27:26He'd seen Finn watching Sienna.
27:28He knew the swap was coming.
27:30He let himself be exposed to the feral curse of my family.
27:33To give me a way out.
27:34His own family found out and took it from him.
27:36An investment in keeping the dragon estate's power centralized in the younger side.
27:40And he nearly died.
27:42So did I.
27:43And we both came out the other side.
27:46I turned the dragon scale over in my hands.
27:49A reverse scale I'd found out.
27:51The most sensitive point on a dragon's body.
27:53The thing they guard most carefully.
27:55He'd given it to me in a panic.
27:57Terrified, I'd changed my mind.
27:59I pressed up on my toes and kissed his horn.
28:03You absolute idiot, I said smiling.
28:07Why didn't you just tell me?
28:09He picked me up without any further discussion.
28:12And carried me inside.
28:14I learned that night.
28:15Thoroughly and at length.
28:17Those dragon horns are not, in fact, for casual affectionate kissing.
28:24Life after that was sweet.
28:26Genuinely, embarrassingly sweet.
28:29Except for the bird.
28:31The phoenix had started appearing in the tree outside my window.
28:34Wherever I went.
28:35It followed.
28:36She said nothing.
28:37Just watched.
28:40Finn had disappeared.
28:41Some said dead.
28:42Some said he'd left the territory entirely.
28:44Today was my bond ceremony with Alaric.
28:47Some stories end with a bang.
28:50Mine ended with a bird being firmly escorted off the property.
28:55Works for me.
29:01This is finding a Rhys Aye.
29:01We're gonna go.
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