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Do I yell at him too much? Is his sniping justified?
“No? Nothing more to say?” He tosses his head toward the sofas that were shoved against the side wall of the massive family room. They’re made from a gorgeous, top grain leather, and the back cushions are beautifully embossed. Now that I realize what role the earth dragons play, I can’t help thinking that we could spare some hides after tomorrow’s feast and make a dragon scale sofa with them.
With powerful, intelligent creatures, some of whom I’ve met.
Ugh.
“I just can’t believe you eat them. Aren’t they your friends?” I shake my head. “I can’t wrap my head around it. You’re their prince, and you just let the other dragons eat them.” What was it he said when Jade was ranting about the evils of eating meat?
Lions and dogs and other predators all consume the flesh of other animals. I suppose he’s right about that, but they don’t eat other lions.
Or do they?
I’m not a scientist. I suppose I really don’t know much about cannibalism, except that humans think it’s wrong, and praying mantises get a lot of flack for doing it. I huff once or twice, but eventually I sit on one corner of the sofa. He sits next to me, but with a whole person’s space between us, so he can shift sideways and look right at me.
“I’m not going to sit at a table across from any of the blessed tomorrow and watch as they eat a dragon leg. I just want to get that out there.”
“I think it’s time I tell you the reason we’re here,” he says.
“I already know. You came to recover the heart,” I say. “Right?”
“Yes, but why do you think we need it?” He lifts both eyebrows, his shining golden eyes intent.
“I—” I shake my head. “I’m not sure, but knowing might help me do a better job of finding it.”
Axel sighs, his broad shoulders drooping. “I said nearly that same thing to my father before we left, back when I was begging for more details. He didn’t give me a very satisfactory answer, but I’ll tell you what I know, starting with the most basic part, something that all blessed now know.”
He’s making this information seem much less valuable by telling me everyone knows it.
“There hasn’t been a single new egg laid by any of the blessed since we left Earth. . .except among the earth blessed.”
I blink. “Wait, so only they can reproduce?”
“That’s correct, but before we left Earth, all of us could reproduce, and all of us could consume most anything. Local animals, flora, fauna, fish. Any of it. Once we left Earth, none of us could lay eggs anymore, and without consuming others of their own kind, the blessed began to waste away.”
Waste away? “You mean they were starving?”
Axel shrugs. “I don’t know, exactly. I wasn’t there. I hadn’t hatched yet.”
“Wait—you don’t remember anything, then?”
“I was actually the very last non-earth-blessed egg to hatch. Two others hatched the week before me, but. . .”
“But?”
“My egg was a brilliant color of crimson, Liz. And technically, according to the records, three eggs hatched in the hatchery the week before me.”
Because he’d have been recorded as two separate hatchlings, by Euphrasia. He said she kept his secret. He’s both Axel and Azar.
Wow.
“Your nanny’s pretty considerate, and I think she must really care about you,” I say. “When we started seeing blasts of flames in the sky, she came to check on me, first thing.”
“I’m surprised you even knew what was going on.” Axel folds his arms. “You seemed pretty. . .distracted.”
I almost roll my eyes. “Please. One little kiss and you bolted like a trail horse who just saw a plastic bag rolling in the wind.”
“Like—what?”
