“It can be in your maw,” Syla made herself say, though thathad been a dreadful means of transportation, “if you won’t allow humans to ride on your back.”
Fel issued something between a groan and a grunt to opine on that.
“I’ll ride with the enemy captain,” Tibby said faintly.
“It’s not that long of a trip.” Syla gazed into Wreylith’s faintly glowing golden eyes, though it was unnerving. Everything about the huge muscular dragon and the power she emanated was unnerving. “We can find our own way back.”
Where did you get the krendala?Wreylith looked toward the pocket where Syla had tucked the statue.
“From my father, who apparently got it from his mother.” Syla glanced back, and Tibby nodded.
You are descended from Queen Erasbella?
“Uhm, yes.” Syla blinked in surprise that the dragon knew anything about her lineage. “She would have been my great-great grandmother. She passed long before I was born.”
Long. Wreylith’s eyes slitted, and she snorted out a breath. Was that… a laugh? Maybe the dragon equivalent?
“To humans,” Syla said, reminded that dragons could live for centuries.
Humans are so inferior. Why the gods deemed them important enough to give them wondrously fertile islands and protect them, I cannot imagine.Wreylith looked at her foot, flexed it, then sprang into the air, wings flapping.
Syla stepped back before remembering that Vorik was behind her. He lifted a hand, stopping her with a light touch before she would have stepped on his foot. Oh, if she had but half the coordination and athleticism of a rider. She would even delight in Fel’s somewhat aged and injury-affected athleticism.
“I don’t think that dragon is carrying us anywhere,” Tibby said.
“Good.” Fel grunted. “Ships don’t have fangs.”
But could theyfinda ship? Exhaustion made Syla’s shoulders slump as she imagined having wasted the last hour.
“This is magnificent,” Vorik said.
She looked at him and realized he was holding the cobbler rather than his sword. It was still sheathed in its scabbard on his back while he wielded the spoon, the dessert half gone.
“Stormer cultural norms would suggest I share it with the others of the tribe, but nobody here is of my tribe, and I don’t feel kinship to your aunt or bodyguard.” A baleful glower toward them should have accompanied the words, but Vorik smiled at them instead, as if the dessert was putting him in too amiable a mood for harsh gestures.
A little zing of awareness went through Syla even though his gaze wasn’t directed at her. As she’d noted before, Vorik was striking when he smiled, the gesture softening the hard, lean lines of his face.
“I don’t think they feel kinship for you either,” she said.
They nodded.
Unconcerned, Vorik turned his smile toward her and gazed at her through his eyelashes. Her awareness of him intensified. More than that, she felt drawn and wanted to step closer, to rest her hand on his chest. The wordstrikingfloated through her mind again.
But even if Tibby hadn’t warned her about what Vorik was likely up to, Syla wouldn’t have let herself act on her attraction. She stepped back, not even wanting to acknowledge it. There could be no attraction. He was the enemy. She couldn’t forget that.
“I appreciate you making this for me,” Vorik said, ignoring or unaware of her reaction to his smile. “We don’t have any of the ingredients in it, I don’t think. Is it honey that makes it so sweet? It’s more than the berries themselves, though they are amazing.”
“Sugar. We grow beets on several of our islands and processthem for it. I do have recipes that use honey too. We have a lot of hives throughout the kingdom.”
“Hives that aren’t raided relentlessly by honey-loving predators?” Vorik brought his berry-stained fingers to his lips, bits of the sugary crumble from the top of the cobbler on them. “That’s amazing too. I only once ever found a beehive in the wild, and it was way up in a tree. I climbed up and got stung repeatedly before I got a taste, but it was worth it.” He licked the crumbs off his fingers, his tongue sliding along them as he closed his eyes, visibly enjoying the treat.
Syla stared, almost hypnotized at his tongue dancing along his fingers. She didn’t think he meant the gesture to be sensual, but it made her think of what else he might do with that tongue, and her body tightened. Storm-cursed seas, shewasattracted to him.
His eyes opened again, still slitted as he watched her through his lashes. Maybe hehadmeant the gesture to be sensual. An… invitation?
“How old were you?” she asked.
“Eleven or twelve, I think. I haven’t spotted such a delight since. As I said, hives are rare out there.” Vorik didn’t quite polish off the entire pan, leaving a third of the dessert and setting it on the fence before waving that Fel or Tibby could finish it if they wished.
