5. Andreas
ANDREAS
ACavendish.
We had taken a Cavendish prisoner. The very thought had driven me almost to madness, because there wasn’t a dragon alive who didn’t know the story of their progenitor, Athelstan, who had killed countless dragons.
The moment Gareth had told me, all I could picture had been Eilonwy. Her warm blue scales and swirling eyes. Her laughter.
Pieces of her strewn across the ground like so much refuse.
Humans had murdered my sister, and the humans who were best at murdering dragons had always been the Cavendish line.
And somehow, against all common sense, this soft, sweet little human my clan had spent the night fucking was a Cavendish.
I didn’t doubt it. His magic was undeniable.
The moment he’d been in danger, he’d snatched the air from my lungs.
Easily, because it wasn’t like he’d been in a position to pause and consider his actions.
He said he had never killed anyone, and . . . perhaps I was the most unwise dragon to ever lead others, but I believed him.
There was something disarming about Blake Cavendish.
Yes, he had the same cursed red hair as his brethren.
He had the magic they were known for, and however much he was unimpressed with his ability, it was impressive.
He’d been dressed in armor when I stole him away from his people, and he’d worn it like a man who often did—like it was comfortable, rather than a burden.
Even as we walked back to the caves, his lithe body treading lightly through the rocks, I could see that he was a man well used to physical exertions.
His shoulders were slumped, his footsteps heavy, as though he was tired beyond grace—and how could he not be?
He’d taken more dick in the last day than I thought I’d done in my entire life, which stretched into hundreds of years.
Maybe that made me boring, but I thought it more likely that it made him utterly fucking exhausted.
Evander.
That was the name of the Cavendish king.
The one who had ordered the death of any dragons found inside what they had claimed as their land—which insofar as I could tell, was all of it.
The previous two, Brandon and Edgar, had taken a rather kinder tact, that as long as the dragons left humans alone, they should do the same.
I’d found it sensible, but then, it was how I had always thought. If the humans left me be, I saw no reason to interfere with them.
But this? This was different.
Blake was saying that he couldn’t return, because the murderous Cavendish king wanted him dead as much as he wanted all dragons dead.
“Where’d you take the human?” Harri whined as I marched Blake past them.
They were all curled up sleeping on the dirt near damned stone slab table, which they’d left disgusting.
I glared at him. “I’m taking him to my cave, you oaf.
You understand the lot of you are sleeping on the ground, and you fucked yesterday on the table?
You’re cleaning that before we use it again. ”
He just gave me a sleepy, confused look for a moment, before curling back up next to the others and going back to sleep. Like it was just fine and perfectly comfortable sleeping on rocks and dirt.
In dragon form, it was. Scales were protective and dragon bodies were made tough. Soft two-legged human forms? They were easier to feed up, but they required something softer, more careful, than the hard ground.
They were going to wake in pain, the lot of them, and they entirely deserved it.
Blake, I hustled back to my cave.
I didn’t know why. I could have shoved him into one of the others. Harri’s or Gareth’s. They wouldn’t have even minded; the only complaint likely that I hadn’t woken them and sent them back to their own beds, like they were children.
But they weren’t children, and their comfort wasn’t my responsibility.
The human was different. I’d stolen him.
Every single thing that happened to him among my people—as well as everything he did to us—was my responsibility.
I’d made the choice to take him, and then made another choice not to just drop him into the middle of the ocean or onto the highest mountain peak I could find to the north.
In front of me, he sucked in a sharp breath, and it made my attention refocus. I couldn’t let myself drift off thinking about what I was going to do, when he was there, needing supervision.
Still, I didn’t know what had shocked him.
“This is lovely,” he finally said, and I had no idea what the hells he was talking about.
I looked around.
It was a cave.
We’d started to settle into them, but not really. Not yet.
We’d been living closer to the valley, and moved here in a rush when the humans had killed my sister. The only things I’d truly brought had been my bed and my rocks, and while I thought they were beautiful, no one else had ever much cared about them.
The others all had useful hoards—Bran with his tools and Gareth with the small bones he gathered and carved into needles. He’d made all our clothing with them.
Blake, though, wandered up to a three-foot-tall geode I had cracked open to display the crystals inside, staring in wonder. He reached up as though to touch the pointy tips, then looked to me—for permission.
He had good manners, for a human.
I nodded, so he touched the rock, running his fingers lightly over the pale crystals. Then he looked back farther into the cave, his eyes lit with wonder. “I’ve never seen anything like this. Did you find these in the cave?”
Find . . .
Did he not know about dragons at all?
“No, they’re mine. I . . . I collect them.” I didn’t want to use the word “hoard,” since the last humans I’d met had thought it a derogatory term to be used against dragons. Collections were good; they were a choice someone made. Hoards were bad. A compulsion. A weakness.
I supposed it was both of those things, but if the choice came to my life or my hoard, I would choose my life.
It wasn’t even in question. I’d left them behind when we’d fled after Eilonwy’s murder and only gone back later, under cover of darkness.
Perhaps it was foolish that I’d gone back at all, but it hadn’t been ill-thought-out or reckless.
We’d gone back for everyone’s things—hoards, beds, even the table—because entirely starting over had been ridiculous when we had the option of bringing some of our things along.
“What kind of stone is that? And why is it in the fire?” Blake’s words drew me back to the present moment.
He was staring at the egg.
Without thought, I rushed over to him, grabbing him by the shoulders and pulling him away from the fire, stepping between him and the tiny, innocent creature that was all I had left of my sister. “That is not for you,” I growled.
I couldn’t . . . couldn’t put my sister’s entire legacy in danger by having a loose human around an innocent child. Humans had a history with dragon eggs, and it wasn’t a good one.
Maybe Blake wasn’t the monster his brother was, but it didn’t mean he could be trusted.
Bring back the head of a dragon, his brother had told him. Who was to say it couldn’t be the head of an unborn baby dragon? If anything, perhaps that would be even better, stealing my people’s only chance at a future. The others and I could only survive so long, after all, without children.
Humanity would love to see the end of dragonkind all too well.
I glanced around the cave, and it only took a moment for my eyes to fall on the answer to my problem. A crate I’d used to transport my rocks, thick rope tied around it for me to hold onto in flight.
I took Blake by the hand and dragged him over to the crate.
“I’m sorry,” he was assuring me. “I didn’t mean to offend. I just didn’t know why that rock is in the fire. I’m not going to steal it or anything. Even if I could escape, I couldn’t possibly carry stones with me, let alone ones that hot. I promise, I—”
I yanked the rope from beneath the crate, spun Blake around, and tied his hands behind his back. “No, you will not steal my sister’s egg. Nor will you convince me you believe it to be a stone.”
He breathed out in what seemed astonishment. “An egg. I’m so sorry. I . . . your sister—”
“Killed by your people, as you know.”
At that, he went silent, so I shoved him over toward the bed. Maybe I didn’t want the little human in my bed.
Maybe . . . fine, maybe I did want him in my bed, at the same time as I was repelled by the very idea of a human, let alone one related to the cursed line of Athelstan.
But this wasn’t about that.
This was about keeping him in my sight until I could figure out what we were going to do with him.
Just what I needed to spend my time doing.
It wasn’t as though I was already worried about how we were going to survive our first winter in this place when we’d been forced out of our old home.
Sure, we could hunt in the water, but what about fuel?
We usually had tons of wood saved for winter fires.
It hadn’t been reasonable to carry all of that from our previous home; it would have taken dozens and dozens of trips.
More and more chances for the humans to discover and attack us.
And what about food other than meat? We only needed meat, but it was boring. And now, I was sure the human couldn’t survive on meat alone, so we needed to find something else for him.
He didn’t complain about being tied up, and that was . . . that was odd, wasn’t it?
I thought I’d have complained.
In fact, I was certain I would have.
But Blake just settled onto my soft, wool-stuffed mattresses, letting out a surprisingly satisfied sigh as he did so. There was a smile on his face.
What the hell was wrong with him, that he was not only accepting, but apparently pleased with this kind of treatment?
He should have been screaming at the top of his lungs that he was a prince and he’d not be treated this way. Instead, he acted as though a soft bed was the most luxury he could imagine, and smiled.
I had to choke down my urge to tell him he was being ridiculous, and he needed to be angry. It was justified, yes, but I also . . . didn’t especially want his anger. I liked that he was satisfied.
I had enjoyed the look on his face when he’d stared at my hoard. The joy and awe at their beauty, because that was why I kept them. Why I always kept new rocks; because that was how I felt when I found each one.
Against my will and all common sense, I thought perhaps I could like this Blake Cavendish.
And that? That was perhaps the most frightening thought I’d ever had in my life.