Authors: G. A. Aiken
Tags: #Science Fiction & Fantasy, #Romance, #dragons
Ragnar stepped closer, looked into her eyes. She was too tired to play any games. Too angry to tease or taunt him. And when he looked, he saw only the truth. Perhaps if he’d looked closely before, he wouldn’t feel like such a fool now. Because his cousin and brother had been right all this time—Ragnar had misjudged Princess Keita. He still believed she would bed any and all in her path, but this dragoness was far from stupid. Dangerously far—as that noble lord bleeding out on Athol’s cobbled courtyard now knew.
“Is there something else you want to ask, my lord?”
Hoping to open up their conversation again, he asked, “What about Esyld?”
She looked away. “I don’t know.” Then, under her breath, “But I think he knows something.”
“Who knows something? Lord Reidfurd?”
Keita began to speak, looking as if she planned to confide in him, but she stopped and forced a safe, bland smile. “It’s nothing,” she replied to his question.
And in an instant, they were back to the boring noble and the insulting warlord…again.
Ragnar couldn’t stand it.
“Keita—”
“We should get back. More travel tomorrow and I do need my sleep.” She gave a small bow of her head as royal etiquette would dictate—and it made him want to throttle her—and said, “Thank you so much for your assistance this evening, my lord. It was greatly appreciated.”
But he didn’t want to end it like this. He was, in all honesty, becoming desperate. A feeling he was not used to and did not enjoy. “Keita, if you’d only talk to—”
But without waiting for him to finish his thought, she headed off down the road, and Ragnar was forced to follow. Again.
Keita found Ren hovering a few inches off the ground, meditating. How he did that, she didn’t know. She needed actual wings to fly.
Without her saying a word, he sensed her presence and lowered himself to the earth.
“How did it go?”
She shook her head and pulled off her clothes. She dove into the lake, shifting from dragon to human several times before settling on her human form and swimming up to Ren’s side. He’d also shifted to human and waited for her in the water by the lake’s edge.
“Athol played games,” Keita said when she broke through the surface. She had no intention of telling her friend about what had happened with DeLaval. It would only upset him, and there was nothing to be done now, was there? “I didn’t like it.”
“You think he knows something?”
“Perhaps. I don’t know. He was always a little odd.”
“Maybe he hoped you’d barter as some of his guests do.”
Keita chuckled. “I can say with all honesty, I’ve never bartered my pussy or any other orifice on my body, and I’m not about to start now.”
She rested her arms on the lake’s edge, resting her cheek on them. “Perhaps when we get home I can send word to Gorlas. Maybe he can get the truth for us.”
“Perhaps.” Ren kissed her shoulder. “What else happened there?”
“Oh, nothing much. That idiot followed me, though.”
“Good,” Ren said, surprising her. He’d been livid with the warlord ever since Keita had told him their wager was off and why. “I didn’t like you going there alone.” And Ren had been right to be concerned.
“Athol wouldn’t have trusted you, Ren.”
“But it went all right, though? With the Northlander by your side?”
“He came as a monk. So it worked out perfectly.” And, Keita realized that in the end, she’d been quite grateful for Ragnar’s presence. He’d protected her and kept her safe.
Too bad, though, he still hadn’t apologized to her. Instead he kept trying to “talk” to her. She hated that. If Keita fucked up, she said she was sorry and tried to make it right. What she didn’t do was try to explain away what she’d said or how she’d meant it or any other load of centaur shit that males like Ragnar came up with rather than simply apologizing. Until he did that, she’d have no reason to “talk” to him. No matter how pathetically sorrowful he might appear.
Ragnar found a quiet spot close enough to the campsite to deal with any problem, but not so close that the constant chatter of a big blue dragon would distract him. Once he’d settled down, thankfully back in his dragon form, he did what he always did when he felt this way—although he didn’t think he’d ever felt this bad. Ragnar opened his mind and called out. A few seconds later, came a reply.
My son.
Mother.
What’s wrong?
Ragnar sat down on the ground, his back legs bent at the knees, his elbows resting on them so he could drop his head into his claws.
I’m an idiot
, he told her simply.
He heard his mother’s sweet laugh inside his head, felt eased by it.
Oh, my sweet boy. There’s nothing I can do about that, I’m afraid. It’s in the bloodline. Like the lightning.
Fragma heard the warning horn blast through her tiny Ice Land village and, terrified, she caught hold of her youngest daughter. The other women of her village all did the same thing. They grabbed the youngest of their female children and quickly took them into their homes, away from the streets, away from the danger they knew lurked hundreds of leagues behind the mountains framing the north side of their village.
But they were coming closer, down through the dangerous mountain pass and through the village, smashing all in their way that might deter them—even for a second—from their final destination. Or, even worse than that, perhaps they’d stop. Perhaps Fragma’s little village
would be
their final destination. Perhaps it would be Fragma’s daughter that was claimed. Or her friend’s daughter. Or her neighbor’s daughter. It could be
any
of their youngest girls, and absolutely no mother Fragma knew was willing to take that chance. Because once anyone’s daughter was taken—she was never seen again.
Another warning blast rang out, and Fragma ran into her home with her daughter held tight against her. She slammed the door behind her with her back pressed against it.
They’d be coming now. And all Fragma could do was pray to her gods that they’d keep riding right through—and that it would be someone else’s child they’d come for. But not hers. Please, gods, not hers.
Taking the hand of her mate, Morfyd the White Dragonwitch left their room and walked down the hall to the stairs. Before they reached their destination, Brastias stopped, and when Morfyd turned to him, he kissed her. She sighed, her mouth opening under his, her eyes closing while a fresh wave of desire coursed through her.
His big hand caressed her throat, her jaw; and when he pulled back, he asked, “Do we really have to go down today? Can’t we stay in bed?”
“We both have work to do. Besides”—she gripped his wrist, smoothed the pad of her thumb against his work-hardened palm—“if we stay in bed today, we’ll want to stay in bed tomorrow and the day after and the day after.”
“I don’t see a problem with that,” he teased.
As hard as Brastias was trying, he couldn’t fool her. She knew he wanted to cheer her up, keep her distracted. And he was doing that for one reason and one reason only—the return of Keita the Family Darling. Or, as Morfyd liked to call her, Keita the Momentous Pain in Morfyd’s Ass.
It had always bothered Morfyd how easy it was for Keita to get under her scales and pluck away at the last nerve she possessed. From the moment their mother had brought Keita back to Devenallt Mountain from the hatching chamber, Morfyd’s sister had the unmistakable ability of pissing Morfyd off at every turn. And every time she did, Morfyd was blamed for it. Keita would toss all that red hair, smile at their father as if butter wouldn’t melt and the next thing any of them knew, Bercelak the Great would turn to his eldest daughter and gently remind Morfyd that she was older and she should be taking care of her little sister—“not trying to throw her off the mountain when you know she can’t fly yet.” Which, if Morfyd remembered correctly, had only happened one time and the little brat damn well deserved it!
But they were adults now. And they would act like adults, even if Morfyd had to twist that snotty little cow into a knot and rip the scales from her body to ensure it!
Morfyd wouldn’t worry about that now, though. Not when the man she loved was smiling at her, teasing her, doing his best to make her happy. Honestly, she could never ask for more.
“You, my lord,” Morfyd teased back, “will not lure me into a life of laziness.”
“Why should we be different from everyone else in this house?” he asked, kissing her again when she laughed.
“Must,” a voice snapped, startling them out of their embrace, “you do that right here in front of everyone?”
Morfyd glared up at her brother, all gold and beautiful this morning, as he was every morning. “Must
you
do that every time you see us? You could simply walk away.”
“You’re my sister, Morfyd, not some whore. He’s treating you like a whore!”
“You treat everyone like whores.”
Gwenvael the Handsome shrugged. “And your point?”
Brastias, rarely taking her brothers seriously these days, pulled Morfyd around a glowering Gwenvael and toward the stairs that led into the Great Hall. As they walked down, she saw that most of her kin were awake and halfway through their first meal.
As soon as they stopped at the bottom step, Brastias released her hand and walked around so that the dining table separated them. Keeping inanimate objects between them seemed to lessen the glares from Briec and Fearghus. After two years, she’d thought her brothers would become used to her choice of mate. But for some reason they all seemed to feel “betrayed” by Brastias. She didn’t know why, and she didn’t care. The arrogant bastards would simply have to accept their union…one day. In the next thousand years or so.
“Annwyl?” Brastias asked the entire table, reaching between Talaith and Briec to grab a loaf of fresh bread.
“Training,” Fearghus mumbled, his attention on the parchments in front of him.
“My, my,” Gwenvael said, his big body dropping into a chair beside Morfyd, “she certainly does train a lot these days.”
Fearghus raised his eyes from the papers in front of him. “Meaning what exactly?”
“Just an observation, brother.” Gwenvael reached for his own loaf of bread and ripped it into several pieces before adding, “Although we never actually
see
her training. Not like we used to. She simply disappears for hours before returning all sweaty and looking rather used. I wonder where she goes…and who she goes with.”
Morfyd opened her mouth, a caustic reply on her tongue, but Talaith—Briec’s mate and, although human, a fellow witch—beat Morfyd to it, a big, round fruit winging its way across the table and slamming into Gwenvael’s nose.
“Owww!” he cried out. “You callous viper!”
“Sorry,” Talaith hissed with no obvious remorse to back up that apology. “But it seemed like your never-closed mouth needed something to fill it! Tragically, my aim was off.”
Briec threw his head back and laughed until black smoke snaked from Gwenvael’s nostrils. Then Briec sneered, silently daring Gwenvael to do something. Gwenvael, of course, sneered back, and then they were both reaching across the rather wide table for each other’s throats. Morfyd leaned in, swinging her arms wide to separate them.
“Stop it! Both of you, just stop it!” They pulled back—neither willing to hit her in the face—and Morfyd again wondered how much longer they could all tolerate living under one roof. As humans no less!
“Honestly!” she complained, tugging her witch’s robes back into place. “Lately all of you have been acting like fighting dogs in a pit.”
“Dagmar doesn’t let us do that anymore,” Gwenvael uselessly reminded her. “She says it’s wrong.” He glanced off. “Although I still haven’t figured out why.”
Morfyd slapped Gwenvael in the back of the head.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“For being a prat!” She pointed her finger across the table at Briec, cutting his laugh off. “You, too! Either both of you start acting like you’ve got some sense”—she moved her finger to Gwenvael to stop the next words out of his mouth—“even if you have none, or you find somewhere else to live.”
“You can’t throw us out,” Briec argued. He’d never liked being told what to do.
“I bloody well can. I’m vassal of Queen Annwyl’s lands, and I can toss anyone off them that I see fit. So don’t
push me
!” she finished on a healthy bellow.
“You mean Queen Annwyl who’s always off”—Gwenvael cleared his throat—“training?”
Morfyd had her fist pulled back, ready to pummel the whelp, when Brastias grabbed her arm and dragged her from the hall and out the enormous doors. He didn’t release her until they were down the stairs and around the corner.
“Brat! He’s such a brat!”
“He’s restless. So’s Briec, I think.”
“That’s not my problem!”
“Sssh,” Brastias crooned softly, big, calloused fingers gently brushing against her lips, across her jaw. Only Brastias knew how to settle her. The gods of mercy knew he had the kind of skills most males would kill for, and she thanked those gods every night for giving his heart to her. “Don’t let them trouble you so.”
Morfyd took a breath and released it. “You are right, of course. It’s simply that we haven’t spent this much time together as a family since we were hatchlings. Now you can understand why Mother insisted on having a nanny and armed guards around us on most days. And when she didn’t—there went Gwenvael’s tail, Éibhear’s hair…Briec’s back fangs.”
Brastias chuckled, kissed her mouth. “What I see is you protecting Annwyl.” His head lowered with his voice. “Is there need to protect Annwyl?”
Morfyd couldn’t answer that, not honestly, so she didn’t answer at all. Instead she kissed Brastias until his arms wrapped around her, and he pulled her to his chain-mail-covered chest.
“You have work to do,” she finally reminded him when she pulled away, both of them panting.
“You’re right. Even if the legions are going nowhere at the moment, I need to make sure they keep up their training.” He kissed her forehead. “Perhaps we can meet later this afternoon…in our room? A quick luncheon.”
Morfyd grinned. Her day already looked brighter. “That sounds perfect.”
Brastias walked off, and, as she always did, she watched him. And, as he always did, he looked back at her and smiled.
As a group, they landed on a plateau that held steps leading directly into a mountain. Devenallt Mountain, the seat of power for those who ruled the dragon Clans and Houses of the Southland. And hundreds of leagues below was Garbhán Isle. The seat of power for the human queen.
“You two wait here,” Ragnar told his brother and cousin.
“You sure?” Vigholf asked. The idea of letting Ragnar go in alone bothered his brother, but it was for the best.
“I’ll be fine.”
“Don’t worry,” Keita said, patting Vigholf’s shoulder. “Ren will stay here with you in case there’s trouble.”
“I will?” the foreign dragon asked. “You sure you don’t—”
“It will be easier and quicker to get through this if my mother doesn’t have you to fawn over. Besides, I need you to make sure my kin don’t mistake dear Vigholf and Meinhard for problems.”
“What fun for me.”
She laughed, a sound heard rarely during the last of their journey. “We won’t be long.”
“Better not be.”
“Come on!” the Blue demanded, sounding like the eager pup he was. “Let’s go!”
“All right,” Keita told him, waving him on. “We’re coming.”
“Good luck,” the Eastlander told her as she headed up the stairs behind the Blue. Ragnar glanced at him as he passed, but the foreign dragon turned away, giving him his back.
Of course, Ragnar had been told he’d deserved that and more.
“Good,” his mother had said. “You should feel ashamed. It was horrible what you said to her.”
“I know,” he’d responded.
“You’ll have to apologize to her, my son.”
“She won’t make that easy.”
“You can’t apologize on your own terms, Ragnar. That isn’t really an apology, but a perfunctory action simply meant to appease. To make
you
feel better. If you truly are sorry about what you said—”
“I am.”
“You’d better be, because I didn’t raise you to be mean, my son. And we both know that was mean.”
He did know. That’s what ate at him. It was one thing to be cold and calculating, a necessity when dealing with politics and world rulers. But it was another thing entirely to be mean and cruel because he had issues over his long-dead father. So whatever he had to do to fix this with Keita—in all honesty, he could care less about the Eastlander, except for his connection to Keita—he would do. If only she’d give him the chance.
And, for the remainder of their journey, she hadn’t given him a chance. Since he and his kin planned to head home as soon as they were done here, he had no choice but to push the issue now. He refused to return to the Northlands with her hating him.
Ragnar met her at the top step before entering directly into the mountain. He touched her shoulder, and she stopped. After a moment, she faced him. He wanted to look away from her. All that royal coldness staring down at him made his shame even worse because he knew he had no one to blame for it but himself.
“Yes, Lord Ragnar?”
“Before we go in,” he said, “I want to tell you how sorry I am. About what I said to you. It was wrong, and I understand if you can’t forgive me, but I do hope that you’ll at least accept my apology.”
For a moment, Ragnar wasn’t sure he’d said those words out loud. Nothing about her changed. Neither the expression on her face nor the coldness in her eyes. She showed no anger, no sorrow, not even boredom.
And without saying anything, Keita walked away from him and inside the Dragon Queen’s mountainous court. Ragnar followed, sighing heavily. It appeared as if he’d be going home with Keita hating him after all.
Another set of stairs awaited them, and the Blue stood in the middle of them, tapping his front claw and glaring. “You two are taking forever.”
Keita walked up to her brother and stood beside him on the step.
The Blue’s impatience turned to concern. “Are you all right, Keita? You’ve been looking like this the past couple of days. You’re not worried about Mum, are you? You know how she is sometimes. She doesn’t mean half of what she says.”
Keita didn’t respond to her brother, instead focusing on Ragnar, who now stood at the bottom of the stairs.
“You were saying, Lord Ragnar?”
Damn. He knew she wouldn’t make this easy, but…damn. Ragnar briefly closed his eyes, girded his loins, and said again, “I’m sorry, Keita, and I do hope you can forgive me.”
The Blue frowned, his gaze bouncing back and forth between them. “Sorry for what?”
Keita continued to stare at Ragnar. She wouldn’t answer her brother’s question, but instead patiently waited for Ragnar to do so.
Never before had the desire to run away like a panicked cub filled him like this. But he remembered his mother’s words clearly: “You can’t apologize on your own terms, Ragnar.”