Page 26 of The Discount Damsel

“Excuse me.”

The princess’s words were like a soft hand placed upon a fearful dog’s head. Dirk turned towards that gentle voice, and Bradley bristled at the interruption. Again, a royal inserting her upturned nose where it didn’t belong.

It took Millie a moment of internal wrestling to force the damning words from her mouth. “I can tell this is a topic of great strife between you two. I’m not here to cause a rift between friends. As much as I want to be a pirate . . .”

She released a heavy sigh and quickly dabbed at the corner of one eye. To have her dream for a day only for it to be snatched away because her heart was already too soft for the little dragon. If she couldn’t harden it against him, could she even make it as a pirate?

“Master Dirk, perhaps you’d just best return me to Amberly before either of us get too attached to this idea,” she said in a rush.

“You’re not going anywhere,” the baby dragon barked.

Millie almost sagged against the railing in relief. Piss and plagues, that’d been close!

“First, because I want to fight those Heroes, and second, I don’t have another indurus spell to make the trip.”

“I’ll write one this instant,” Bradley volunteered. “You can take this hellion back to her castle⁠—”

“Hellion?” Millie shrilled.

“—no one will discover what you are, and I’ll finally have the peace and quiet needed to remove the curse and pass my Master’s exam.”

“I see.” Dirk held up a single claw. “One moment, please.”

He disappeared into the workroom and, a moment later, emerged with every sheaf of rice paper left in the tower. Bradley gasped and launched himself at the luck dragon.

Dirk swooped higher into the air, crumbled the rice paper to bits, and threw it above his head like confetti. Not a scrap of translucent white wafer hit the balcony floor. The desert breeze snatched every crumb and whisked it away into the dunes far, far away.

“Try writing me a spell now,” the luck dragon sneered.

“I’ll just place an order for rice paper with Miss Penelope.”

“You’ll have to force it down my throat.”

“Gladly.”

“I’ll bite your fingers!”

“You’ll gag on my blood, you little pescatarian, and then I’ll shove that wafer right into your stomach!”

“So? You can’t make me fly back to Amberly. You can’t tell me to go!”

“Then I’ll ask Master Excelsior to order you. I’m sure he’d love to know all about your little extortion ring, Dirk the Dangerous.”

The cerulean scales paled to aquamarine. “You . . . you wouldn’t dare.”

“T-t-try me,” Bradley ground out.

The look of betrayal in those golden eyes threatened to fell him, but the love in his heart for the little creature burned hotter. The luck dragon needed to be protected, even against himself.

The baby dragon and the sorcerer apprentice were startled out of their glaring contest by the princess yet again. This time, she slapped Bradley across the cheek and yanked on Dirk’s tail.

“Ouch!”

“Hey!”

“Quiet, both of you.” She jabbed her finger at each of them in turn. “You, Dirk, have just condemned yourself defenseless against any Heroes by trashing all that rice paper, and you, Mr. Donmarin, have just destroyed your trump card for removing your curse because you’ll no longer have access to Dirk’s luck, since he’ll be using all he has to keep his ownself alive. And all of your impulsiveness has endangered my chances of legally becoming a pirate. Again!”

Millie sucked in a frustrated breath and pressed her fingers against her temples, massaging away the tension headache that had formed there. “Men. And they call us women irrational creatures.”