Page 5 of The Naga Maverick’s Determined Mate

At least I felt better about my decision to change my clothing. The leather dress I wore now was not my finest work, the leather was tough on my fingers to work with. But it was much closer to the clothing I’d loved to wear before my life had taken so many abrupt turns. I shuddered and shoved away the dark thoughts that threatened to surface. No, I wasn’t thinking about any of that. I’d made a choice, I was going to be strong. I was determined to see that through, wherever that might take me.

“Chirp-kee-kee?” Kiwi asked from my left, and I turned my head to gaze down at the tiny jewel-green miniature dragon. He fluttered his wings and landed with a thud on the log beside me, tilting his head this way and that while staring avidly at the pouch of berries in my lap. Seems I wasn’t the only fan of the sweet treat.

“Don’t give him any!” Naomi warned, she waved her spoon at the tiny dragon. “He’s getting plump, and those berries make him farty. Trust me, you don’t want that!” She stuck out her tongue at Kiwi but the little fellow seemed unbothered by that, scuttling over the log a little closer to my pouch of berries.

I held my breath, uncomfortable with how close he was getting. I was no fan of snakes or lizards and Kiwi was too much lizard for me to find cute. Nah, that wasn’t true, those soft brown eyes were sharp and clever like a cat somehow. The rounded ears and whiskers were like those of a dog. He was soft like suede as well to the touch. Kiwi was cute, but I still didn’t know what he’d do if he got close. I had a feeling he was about to steal the berries right out of my lap.

I lifted the pouch, his head bobbing up to follow the movement, cocking sideways when I pressed them to my chest where he couldn’t reach. “These are mine, find your own,” I said to him with a smile, my awkward feelings fading when he plunked to his side and rolled over, exposing his belly. “He’s not like a cat right? That’s not a trap?” My grandmother had a cat I remembered fondly despite his belly traps, inviting me to pet him and then attack me with all four paws.

Naomi seemed more focused on the flavors she was still testing in her new stew recipe than on what her pet was up to. She glanced over and shrugged, “He just wants petting, all the time. Don’t worry, that’s not a trap.” So I reached out and gingerly tickled his little round stomach, watching as he tapped his left leg rapidly against the log in an involuntary twitch.

My face felt a bit foreign from smiling as much as I had in the past five minutes. This was good, I was making progress. I should have spent more time out here already, keeping Naomi company as she cooked wasn’t bad at all. I was no longer scared of a dragon snatching me up, and it was quiet around here because all the Naga were out hunting or working much further away.

Then a shiver rolled down my spine and I just knew that someone was watching me, and it wasn’t Naomi. I lifted my head and made eye contact with a pair of golden orbs. Something tingled through me, settling deep in the pit of my stomach. Heat and arousal that I didn’t want to feel, just from a single glance.

Why was Zsekhet staring at me? I felt like I couldn’t escape his piercing glance anywhere except inside my apartment. He was supposed to be working on the drying hut they were building along with Zathar and Corin. I’d seen them at it all morning. But now he was just hovering there, next to the frame, and staring at me.

I bared my teeth in a grimace, contemplating whether I wanted to stick up my middle finger. That male just made me so angry whenever he looked at me. Why was he so cheerful and friendly but when it came to me he got so intense? I just wanted him to be vapidly cheerful while he ignored I existed. This was exactly why I hadn’t gone down the slope yet to get a look at the ‘aspirant’ camp beyond the wall, even though that had been one of the goals I’d set for myself today.

“If you really want to get under his skin, I know what you should do,” Naomi said. She’d scooted closer along the log we were sitting on and Kiwi instantly took that as an invitation. He scuttled across my lap without hesitation and threw himself into the arms of his favorite person with some happy chirping noises.

She was smiling as she cuddled the creature and scratched him behind his flared little ears. Her blue eyes pierced me with a playful look. “Zsekhet I mean, you want to get back at him for all those heated glances?” So she’d seen it too, the way he stared at me all the time. That was actually a relief, I wasn’t sure if I wasn’t just imagining it, just like I had to be imagining my weird responses to him. He just put me on edge so much, and that was the last I needed.

“No,” I said, far more sharply than I meant to. I rose, ignoring the basket I’d brought out with leather to work with. I was too restless now to sit down and freaking sew, even though I had a list of requests for clothing a mile long. “I’m going for a walk.”

I stalked away, the bag of berries still clutched in my hand, without a backward glance. See, I was upset, but I wasn’t running off to hide. Progress. I was determined not to let that slip away from me, I needed to prove to myself that I could get out of this dark space in my mind. I needed to leave the past behind me, even if to me the past was still so very, very fresh.

Unlike the other girls, I hadn’t been fake executed for a crime they committed. They would say they hadn’t been either, Naomi had falsely confessed, and Vera had been framed for example. But they had known what was about to happen, sorta. I hadn’t. I thought I’d been rescued. The first weeks I’d been stuck on Serant I’d imagined that they’d made a mistake, that there was a mix-up and I’d still be rescued somehow. Now, I knew the truth, I’d been silenced and sold, betrayed by the UAR that I thought had rescued me.

Stalking across the purple grass toward the wooden gate, I stretched my legs and imagined one of those exercises my mom had been fond of. Let the negativity flow out through my feet and into the ground. Just let it drain away. That was much harder when I wanted to keep glancing over my shoulder at that golden-scaled Naga and his far too piercing stare.

Before I could let fear cripple me, I ducked out the gate with a half-assed wave at Krashe, Naomi’s mate. He was hammering away at some kind of double-barred system intended to work as a lock for this huge doorway. As I took a deep breath and just kept walking, I felt the first hint of curiosity take hold of me. When I came back this way I’d stop and have a look at what Krashe had designed, it looked complex and interesting.

The huge red male paused what he was doing to stare after me, his face doing that deep frowny thing that usually made others get out of his way. When I looked back to where I was going, I realized he’d been glaring at several of the aspirant males still at work in their tent camp. I paused to glance around, hands on my hips while I forced myself to stand still and just look. The urge to turn around and run away was strong, but I had to do this, I had to convince myself that I was safe and didn’t need to distrust the Naga here.

Nope, I wasn’t having it. They still freaked me out, there were too many snake coils, too many eyes looking at me. Then one flicked out his long, split tongue and others followed suit. They were tasting my scent, oh yuck! I turned on my heel and started to briskly walk back the way I’d come. Step one of desensitizing myself to their freakiness was not exactly a success, but as I started to approach the gate, I felt a hint of pride that I’d at least tried. Take that Zsekhet!

When a blue male suddenly threw himself in my path, my breath stalled in my lungs, and fear made my muscles seize up. I’d discovered that since I’d gotten to Serant, fear just made me freeze. I hated it, and I didn’t know how to fix it. So instead of ducking around him and just high-tailing it to Krashe and safety, I stood there like an idiot and stared.

There were a handful of blue Naga that lived in the aspirant camp, and besides unmated Corin, only one blue one so far had been promoted to the cave apartments. This male I didn’t recognize, but I had a feeling that he knew exactly who I was. The unattached girl without a mate, the one that was still up for grabs. He was going to touch me and hope that his mating sigils lit up.

The tip of his tail wound around my ankle and slid up my leg and I hated every second of those warm, dry, and slightly raspy scales touching my flesh. He was talking to me but I couldn’t understand a word he said, which was actually a relief. I didn’t want a mate, I had one, and he had been murdered.

The look on his face wasn’t indicating anything good for me though. I recognized the flash of disappointed anger when his damn sigils didn’t start their light show. Then I saw the shift in his expression as he decided that it was through no fault of his that he wasn’t getting what he wanted, it had to be me. I felt coldness flash through me at the sight of that look, I knew it, I’d seen it a million times in my father’s eyes.

He hissed more words, gesturing with his arms as he did so and sliding his long body over the ground, ever closer. That tail wound more tightly around my leg, sliding higher with each winding of his appendage along my skin. I wanted to vomit, I wanted to rail and shout, but all I did was stand there and do absolutely nothing. Trapped in my head as well as his grip.

I realized he’d set off something in the aspirant camp. Boldly touching me as he had, now the others all felt they should be getting a chance to do the same, to test if I was theirs. I felt them crowd closer, saw tails or hands reach out to me. None of the others were as bold and possessive as the one pinching my leg in his grip, but I hated every touch, every second. My heart was racing and my breath was sawing in and out of my lungs like I’d just run a marathon. Relief shuddering through me each time the sigils along their bodies remained unlit.

The first one didn’t like his competition, even if according to all the rules about their mating traditions, he’d already lost. He hissed and feinted left and right, making me stumble along in his grip. He even dared to slash at the other males with his spear, his warning yells growing louder and fiercer. That was good, I thought faintly, it would be over soon. Someone would hear and come to rescue me and then more panic hit me hard, rescue? No, I couldn’t trust that.

It was what finally unlocked me from my frozen fear. I didn’t have any weapon on me, so I just threw the pouch of berries I was still clutching. They nailed the asshole holding me square in the face but he just snarled and batted my projectile aside. I didn’t stop there, slamming my fists down on his coils and hitting him over and over as hard as I could. “You are not my mate! Let me go, you bastard! Do not touch me! Fuck off!”

I didn’t know I could shout like that but it felt good, it felt like a release. It was like these tight bands suddenly broke from around my chest and I could breathe again. Inhaling deeply so I could shriek into his face, raking my nails across his scaly cheek. It was his own mistake that he’d approached as much as he had, I was going to make him regret even trying. I didn’t need rescue, rescue was just a lie.

Then his arms snapped out, grabbing mine and pinning them to my sides with force. My fair, freckled skin bruised easily and I could almost see them forming right before my eyes. Angry, purple-red splotches across my biceps.

And that’s when he arrived. He dropped from the sky and wind blasted me from the mighty wing beats of his dragon diving low above our heads. Zsekhet threw himself at the male clutching me in his arms and tail, a whirlwind of flying, shimmering gold coils and black leather bands. Punches and snarls, grappling together like they were about to kill one another, the two males rolled away from me. Suddenly I was standing alone, swaying on my feet but without anyone touching me at last.