Sugar & Dragon Act I: Temptation (Sugar & Dragon #1)

II Dago

Hera Galenos. A maga from an unremarkably wealthy but respected family of healers. Hardworking, honest, and obliging.

Snooty.

No way , Dago thought, his eyes fixed on the blue sky visible through the transparent roof of the bathroom. Not her.

He’d known her since childhood. For seven long years in Arkadia, he’d been forced to watch her snooty face and her annoyingly fast progression in magic, which made her face even more snooty. She was so talented that the Archmagus himself took her on as an apprentice, even though he’d previously agreed to teach Dago, thus breaking his own rule of not accepting more than one student per year—and forcing Dago to endure the sight of her for another three years. In addition, she was friends with Pax Herkules, a mage-knight who the crowds called the Lion of Ilion, and who Dago had unofficially named “Buffoon” after the man publicly accused him of leading women off the path of virtue.

And then there was that issue with alchemy. As a self-proclaimed advocate of animal rights, Galenos conducted research on substitutes for mistberries—overexploitation of which forced the beetles that fed on it to migrate—and her success, combined with her angelic reputation and smart mouth, led to serious financial losses among the alchemists who specialized in producing potions containing the mentioned fruit. Even if Dago somehow learned to tolerate her character and friends, her revolutionary inclinations could threaten his businesses…

Nyx Nemesis , he thought suddenly. What am I thinking?

Was he really considering a marriage with Hera Galenos? He? Marriage? With Hera Galenos ?

“Nyx Nemesis,” he murmured.

He shifted into a dragon and dove into the pool. He gazed at his silvery white scales which, bathed in water and sunlight, glittered against the black tiles like stars in the night sky.

Like a treasure , Dago thought with a tenderness he never showed to anyone.

After an hour of staring at his scales, Dago regained peace of mind and clarity of thought. He admitted (reluctantly) that Haron was right about the marriage, rejected (categorically) the candidacy of Hera Galenos for the position of his wife, and decided (reluctantly, again) to look for a woman who would meet the requirements set by both society and him . He lived in a country bordering the Dreamland. It shouldn’t be impossible to find the woman of his dreams.

Dago swam up to the surface, filled with optimism, then froze. The image of Hera Galenos standing on the edge of the pool overlapped with the picture of his dream woman, causing a short circuit in his nervous system. In his daimonic form, he had no eyelids and couldn’t blink to make sure it wasn’t a hallucination, so he just had to wait until the hallucination disappeared from his vision.

He waited…

…and waited…

…and waited…

“Pandorian let me in,” said the apparition with Hera Galenos’s snooty face, brown locks, and bumptious voice.

Dago collected himself. Falling into a stupor wasn’t his style.

Meandering elegantly, he swam to one of the eight edges of the pool and slipped up the stairs. Even though his daimon was nearly ten chariots long, Hera didn’t flinch, cry out, or fall to her knees in admiration. He flicked his tail, which was still dipped in the pool. Instead of splattering her, the water evaporated after clashing with the wing of burning feathers the woman’s hand had partially turned into. He returned to his human form, annoyed. He no longer had any doubts that he was dealing with the original. In Olympus, there was only one maga with a phoenix daimon.

“So?” he asked, crossing his arms. “What’s the reason for this unsolicited visit?”

Hera cocked her eyebrow. “Aren’t you going to get dressed first?”

Dago cocked his eyebrow. “First you invade my house. Then, instead of waiting politely in the living room, you enter the bathroom while I am taking a bath. And now you expect me to indulge your whims. I didn’t think it was possible, but it seems you got carried away by your imagination, Galenos.”

He observed a blush creeping into her cheeks with satisfaction. He liked to embarrass her.

“Pandorian said that the living room was here ,” Hera said through gritted teeth, morphing her fiery wing back into a hand. “I was about to withdraw when you broke the surface.”

Dago added an argument with the imp to his to-do list, then curled his lips into a cheeky smile. “Sounds verisimilar.”

Hera glared at him, but he didn’t care. Unhurriedly, he walked over to a long wooden bench, reached for a white towel, and wrapped it around his hips. When he turned back to the woman, the blush on her cheeks seemed a shade darker, and Dago changed his mind.

He loved to embarrass her.

“Dorian is resistant to logical arguments,” he said. “How did you convince him to let you in?”

“I said I would turn his cookies into gold if he didn’t.”

“You amaze me, Galenos. I didn’t know you were capable of such confabulations.”

“It’s not a confabulation. I really think I could turn cookies into gold.”

Something in her voice made Dago look at her more closely. She seemed frustrated, but desperate. Like she didn’t want to be here but had no choice.

Interesting.

When he didn’t reply, Hera carefully removed a glove he hadn’t noticed before. Then with her other hand she reached into the pocket of her long, light dress and took out something that looked like a sugar cube. The moment she placed the cube on her right hand, the white structure smoothed out and turned golden.

“I think I’m cursed,” Hera said.

Dago approached her, entranced by the metallic sheen. “Is this real gold?”

“It’s a curse ,” Hera repeated, as if she was talking to an unbright specimen.

She transferred the metal cube to her left hand and the gold changed into sugar.

Dago shook off his awe and sank into dismay. He recoiled and looked around the dark, spacious room. He calmed down only when he remembered that the bathroom was designed in such a way that he was its only decoration.

He caught the gaze of Hera, who was watching him with moderate interest. He cleared his throat and asked in a neutral tone, “How did it happen?”

“I’m not sure.” Her gaze dropped to her hands. “I was doing research on the healing properties of gold…”

“Gold has healing properties?”

“Yes. Quite a lot. My research—” seeing his impassive face, she broke off and finished in a less enthusiastic tone “—my research showed that.”

Dago smiled politely.

“So…” Hera continued. “I was doing research, and when I finished, I washed the empty vials. I brewed some tea, but when I tried to put sugar in it, it changed into gold.”

Dago was appalled. “You sugar your tea?” Then the rest of her words hit him, and he added with even more indignation, “Using your fingers ? Galenos, don’t you know what a teaspoon is?”

Hera clenched her jaw.

“That’s why you’re here,” Dago guessed. “You came to borrow a teaspoon?”

“No,” Hera snapped. It seemed like she wanted to add something like a nasty epithet, but instead she repeated, “No.”

Dago waited.

“I want…” She faltered, as if the words were stuck in her throat.

Dago still waited.

“I need your help,” Hera choked out, reddening.

If Dago wanted to be nice, he would have suppressed the smile pinching his lips. But being nice wasn’t particularly fun, so he let his face take on a mischievous expression. “Is that so?”

She clenched her fists. “If you expect to hear me begging, Midais, then you got carried away by your imagination.”

“Perhaps,” Dago agreed lazily. “But it’s not me who has a problem, is it?”

Even though they were almost two chariots away, he felt the temperature rising around her and tensed, bracing himself for a blast of flames in his face.

But it didn’t come.

“What do you want?” Hera asked.

Dago didn’t know whether he was more unnerved by the question itself or by the grim acceptance with which it was asked.

“What do you want for your help with breaking the curse?” Hera repeated when he continued to stare at her instead of replying. “Just don’t tell me you want my begging. I’m certain there’s something that would be more useful to you.”

Something finally clicked in his reptilian mind.

Bargaining time.