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Zabriel climbs up onto Scourge, taking me with him and settling us both into the saddle.
“What do you think it means that herriestawas taken?” I ask him.
Scourge spreads his wings and leaps into the air. Esmeral follows a moment later, flying by his side.
Zabriel casts a final dark look at the crumbling, glowing ashes spiraling away beneath us and shakes his head. “Nothing good.”
* * *
A few dayslater I’m returning from the city to the castle with Fiala and Dusan when something large and turquoise zooms out of the sky and lands before me on the cobbles. Esmeral’s wings brush the houses on either side of the street before she furls them and turns toward me.
I fold my arms and raise an eyebrow. “Well, hello. You’ve come to see me, have you? Finally torn yourself away from your handsome dragon lover?”
I ran to Zabriel in a panic to defend this dragon from her “bully” and she was doing perfectly fine, thank you very much. In fact, she was snagging the Alpha of the flare for her mate. I’d say she was living her best dragon life.
Esmeral trills and buffets her head against my body, almost knocking me off my feet.
“Yes, I know. You’re in dragon love. I’m thrilled for you.”
I keep moving through the streets, trying to act like I don’t see the huge turquoise and gold creature keeping pace with me. All the while, I’m thinking about the kiss.
Thatkiss.
The one Zabriel and I shared on the stone bridge to the dragongrounds. He’s given me several toe-curling kisses, but that one was the best. We watched the tiny Omega dragon allow the flare’s Alpha to bite and dominate her, which made heat and desire coil through my belly. The small, sweet Omega that no one likes or wants is protected and possessed by the fiercest Alpha in the flare. Esmeral has embraced her instincts like I’ve never dared.
Until that moment, when I raised my lips to Zabriel and silently begged for a kiss. His kisses are as hungry as fire consuming dry tinder, and my body went up in flames.
Alpha knew what I wanted.
Alpha gave me what I was craving.
It’s a little alarming that “the voice” I’ve been hearing which says the silliest, most embarrassing things is starting to sound more and more like my own voice.
There’s a tug on my dress, and I look down and see that Esmeral has her teeth clamped on my skirts and she’s pulling me toward a side street. “Esmeral, what are you doing? I’m not going that way.”
“She wants you to go to the dragongrounds with her,” Fiala tells me. “That’s the quickest way to walk there.”
“Why?”
“Probably so the two of you can go flying.” Dusan reaches out and touches Esmeral’s scales, but the dragon rounds on him with a snarl and snaps her teeth at him. He leaps back, his nearly bitten fingers clutched to his chest.
Fiala tuts and shakes her head. “You know better than to go touching someone else’s dragon.”
“I forgot. Lady Isavelle’s dragon is so cute,” Dusan grumbles, shaking his fingers.
“She’s not my dragon,” I say, turning to walk along the street in the direction I want to go. “I’m sorry, Esmeral, I can’t come.”
Esmeral follows hopefully along beside me, but a few minutes later, she slows down until finally, I don’t hear her behind us anymore. I turn and glance behind me and see her gazing after me with a bereft, confused expression in those gold and turquoise eyes.
All the strings of my heart are plucked, and every note sounds sad. I turn away and keep walking, but I feel like I’ve kicked a hatchling.
As we pass along a laneway, I ask my bodyguards, “What’s it like to fly on your own dragon or wyvern?”
Dusan smiles mysteriously. “I can’t tell you that. You’ll have to find out for yourself.”
“It’s the only thing worth doing if you ask me,” Fiala says, and then points to the right. “The western gate is up this way. It’s the quickest way back.”
I haven’t come this way before. The gate opens to a different part of the castle grounds. We pass by the barracks and the training grounds, a large, open space where dozens of soldiers are watching a sparring match.
