Go away, all of you. Thunar looks angrier than he did before when he turns toward me. Slice it out of her. She can’t have it.
She’s bonded to Prince Azar, Prevalus says, scowling at Thunar, who’s at least ten times his size. And she’s using it to strengthen our people. We’ll fight you to the end if you try to harm her.
Hyperion flies past then, looking for a place to land. With all the blessed showing up, finding a space on the ground is difficult. For once, I’m not the only one trying to keep my ensnared human alive. It’s a good feeling. At least, it mostly is. Because as the blessed crowd around her, I have an overwhelming urge to scoop her up and fly away, screaming mine.
Unfortunately, I know just what Liz would say if I tried.
I hate the human word ‘share,’ but I am relieved that we’re all still alive to do it.
Chapter 4
Liz
I’ve had functional wings for two weeks or more now, so I suppose I shouldn’t be too alarmed that there’s a magical rock the size of my fist lodged in my chest.
I cough a time or two, but the pressure I’m feeling doesn’t diminish.
Pity.
I’m sure it’s like anything else, like cutting my hair short, or getting fake nails put on. Eventually I’ll grow accustomed to it. Everything like this has a learning curve.
My wings, for example, take forever to clean. The bottoms are constantly getting dirty—which makes the whole feathered mess look a little dingy. I really should’ve asked for an upgrade the last time I hit the volcano. Leathery or even tiny-scale covered wings would be so much easier to keep clean, and then Azar and I could coordinate. As it is, I look like a dove to his pterodactyl. It’s hard enough dating the king of the dragons. I don’t need to look like the mascot.
If I were making a list of all the things I dislike about life right now, the heart in my chest wouldn’t even be near the top.
That’s definitely Thunar, Daddy’s horrible envoy.
He has temporarily stood down, but only because he doesn’t want to attack all the blessed he brought with him who don’t want me killed thanks to the miracle they’ve witnessed.
Really though, more than helping me, they all want a miracle of their own. Humans aren’t the only greedy ones.
It was pretty draining to power up the hundred of them who crowded me before stupid Thunar flew back, alone, and scared me half to death. All I was getting out of the bond was hazy, dark, and overwhelmed, so seeing three leave and one fly back. . . I disliked that quite a bit. It seemed like a no-brainer to try and grant the newbie dragons’ request for wings and more, but I’m not sure how much I can replicate or how fast.
A manual on all of this really would have been nice. If I ever meet this Jörð in person, or her stupid boyfriend, Veraldan Radian (why does he get two names and Jörð just one?), I’m going to have a lot of things to complain about. The mess they left us to clean up is worse than assembling an entertainment center from Ikea.
But that’s not even our worst problem.
Azar tells me, the second he gets Thunar to relocate to another dwelling a few miles down the coast, that we need another ten thousand brights.
“I’m not going to lie,” I say. “That’s a lot.”
I’m worried we’ll need more than that. Azar explains what Thunar told him. All the blessed back home are unable to eat now, even the non-upgraded earth blessed. It looks like the ones who weren’t close got the bad part of my deal, but not the good part.
“But you can still get them wings, right?” Sammy asks.
I startle. I had no idea he was even listening. “Hey, sweetie.” I spin around and force a smile. “What are you doing in here?”
Sammy tilts his head and frowns. “Getting food. Coral said I had to hide until just a few minutes ago. Were Hyperion and Azar fighting with the new red dragon?”
“He’s their older brother,” I say, “and I’m afraid he’s not a very nice one.”
Half-brother, Hyperion says. His mother and ours were different, and he has always seen us as. . . He pauses, and it makes me a little happy to see him acting like he cares about how Sammy deals with this information. Coral’s been a really good influence on him, though I’ll never admit that. I’m still sore that all my siblings ignored me and bonded dragons in spite of being very young.
“He thinks you’re annoying?” Sammy asks.
Something like that, Azar says. But he’s the kind of dragon who likes to kill things that annoy him.
“Me too,” Sammy says. “Mosquitos and ants. I kill them both.”
