Chapter 2
As I rounded the corner at full speed, my skirt and petticoats bunched in my hands, I collided so hard with a man that I fell straight back, clacking my elbow on the stone floor.
Dazed, I rose to a seated position, cradling my elbow.
My eyes traveled up the man’s legs, to his bloodstained white shirt, to his mop of disheveled blond hair.
Blazing sun above. It was the duke’s younger son, but I’d never seen him up close.
Only from a distance as I’d dumped dung into the train as he’d waltzed from the lair to his family’s castle perched a little higher on the hill.
This close, his sky-blue eyes, so bright they were almost luminous, rooted me to the floor like I was a moth on a pin.
My gaze dropped back to the blood. “Are you all—”
The sound of snarling dragons stole my attention.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” he snapped, stepping around me, away from the dragons. Red seeped into his white shirt beneath his suspenders.
I got to my feet, my elbow throbbing but still able to bend and straighten. He darted deeper into the lair, into his personal tack room, and emerged with a long lance. The killing lance, tipped with steel to pierce dragon scales.
He stormed past me without a word.
“What can I do to help?” I asked, following.
“Leave.”
A scoff escaped my lips. Like I could leave. The duke was not known for his generosity or understanding, and if anything happened to his prized Mirantha while I was on duty, it would somehow be my fault. And now that the duke’s son had seen me, I couldn’t deny my presence here today.
Heart beating madly, I followed Rushland Covington. Second son of the duke. Not destined to inherit but destined for glory nonetheless, according to the papers. Golden boy of the night races. Heartbreaker. Troublemaker.
A few quick steps brought us to the courtyard, where Azeron, the duke’s son’s deep blue dragon, crouched on the ground, neck flat against the stones as a black dragon flecked with gold on his scales hovered in the air above him, talons out. Deep red spread on the courtyard’s pavers beneath Azeron.
“He’s injured!”
“Saints, you're clever,” snapped Covington, tossing me a fierce scowl.
Mirantha, perched on the top of the nearest wall, omitted a high-pitched screech as she watched the blue dragon, one of her many offspring, bleeding onto the stones below.
Covington lifted the lance over his shoulder, tip pointed at the black dragon. “Now get out of here.”
“Wait!”
Covington’s arm tensed. Then he bent his knees and hurled the lance with a shout.
The lance sailed beneath the black dragon and clattered to the stones. Covington curled forward, one arm cupped against his bleeding side.
Without waiting for permission, I lunged forward, arms pumping, as I raced toward the lance and grabbed it.
“What are you doing?” bellowed Covington from behind me.
I didn’t have a strong enough arm to throw a killing blow at a flying dragon. Few grown men did, for that matter. Instead, I slammed the flat end of the lance into the stones at my feet.
The blue dragon bared his teeth at me, and Mirantha floated off the wall and resettled. The attacking dragon lifted higher.
“You idiot, he’s wild!” Covington shouted at me, hanging back.
I slammed the lance into the stones once more, heart turning somersaults at Covington’s words. Wild dragons had their flame. No wonder Covington wanted to kill him.
If that dragon opened his mouth and flamed us, we were dead. But the wild dragon turned his face away, circling a little higher.
Again, I beat the stone with the metal lance. Tap, tap, tap. Tap-tap.
The beat was simple but resonant, filling the space. The dragons stopped growling. The wild one cocked his head at me as I kept the beat, arm reverberating with each impact. Then, with another warning growl from Mirantha, the wild dragon screeched and darted away.
The lance clanged one last time as I dropped it and collapsed to the ground, arm tingling, mind reeling.
Covington charged toward the fallen dragon.
Heaving blue scales rose and fell as Azeron lay on his side in the center of the courtyard. Dark red dragon blood pooled on the ground, iridescent in the brightening light of day. I searched the dragon’s body for the wound. One scale was bent inward, a slice of raw flesh visible underneath.
“We need to stop the bleeding,” I said.
“We?” Uncorking a small bottle with his teeth, Rushland Covington dropped to his knees beside the dragon, sinking into the shimmering blood. He pressed a hand against one large, smooth scale and tipped the vial nearer the gushing wound. “Go. Now.”
Instead, I dove for the dragon’s neck. “I’ll hold him.”
Covington’s eyes widened as my arms slipped around the dragon’s neck just behind his head.
He was strong, but he was also in pain, and my weight was only enough to hold him for a moment.
The growls issuing from his throat rattled in my blood.
I nodded at Covington, and without hesitation, he poured the contents onto the wound.
The dragon bucked.
I leaned my entire weight over the dragon’s neck, stroking downward on his scales and speaking calmly to him.
“Hold him!”
“I’ve got him,” I seethed through clenched teeth. The vial’s contents smelled like licorice to me, but I knew they contained wintercress, an herb with numbing properties.
After a moment, the dragon went limp against the stones. I looked over at Covington. He raked a hand through his hair, which was so damp from sweat that half of it stood up at strange angles.
“I’m going to bend the scale back into place.” He drew from his waistband a pair of dragon scale pliers. I’d seen them hanging in the lair but never seen them used. Dragon scales were thick and extremely strong, but with the proper tools, they could be bent or, in this case, straightened.
I again braced myself against the dragon’s neck.
In a swift motion, Covington dug the pliers into the wound, leaned his weight into the dragon’s side, and pulled up with both hands.
Azeron wailed, a high-pitched scream from deep in his lungs that made me scream in return.
Mirantha lifted from her perch and hovered over us, her claws clicking at us but missing.
Then Covington was hurling himself backward, slipping in the slick blood, pliers in hand. “Move.” His voice was sharp and commanding.
I lunged away from the dragon, sprinting without looking back.
Mirantha circled overhead, her wings as wide as the entire courtyard. I didn’t stop until I reached the nearest wall, slinging myself against it as I spun to see if the dragons were coming for us.
Azeron was on his feet, but his nose was tucked down under his wing, where he sniffed at his wound.
Mirantha, meanwhile, had settled back on her perch above, orange eyes fixed on us.
Somehow, I sensed there was no more anger or hostility in her gaze, almost like she was thankful.
I nodded at her, startled to think that the stories were true.
That people could really understand dragons if they knew them well enough.
Beside me, Covington bent forward, hands on his knees.
Only then did it occur to me that he wasn’t wearing riding clothes.
Rather than the thick leather pants and high-collared jackets associated with dragon riders, he wore only pleated slacks and a white shirt.
He didn’t even have on riding boots. His shirt peeled slowly away from his chest, but the fabric stuck to the sweat on his back.
Through the sweat-dampened fabric, the hint of a dark tattoo stood out between his shoulder blades.
I’d never seen nobles with tattoos before.
At his waist, a pistol’s holster peeked out from under his loose shirt hem. It was empty.
“Is there any of that wintercress left? For you?” I asked, eyeing the bloodstain on his shirt.
He angled his chin toward me. “I need you to leave. Now.”
I huffed. “You’re welcome.”
Ignoring me, he stood to his full height, tilting his head back against the wall. “This place was supposed to be empty.”
“Where did the wild dragon come from?” I asked, disregarding his comment.
He leveled a sharp glare at me, all angles and hard lines that accused me of the highest treason with a single glance. The sunlight gave his blue eyes a translucent quality, almost like they were made of ice. “I don’t have to answer your questions. Now, get out.”
“Fine.” I marched around him. “But I will at least finish my work first.”
“No, you will not,” he snarled. His shoes pounded the stones as he followed me.
I didn’t stop. He might be a cousin of the queen’s, but he was also rude, and I didn’t think he deserved my manners. He wasn’t the one paying my wages anyway.
“What’s your name?” he demanded.
“I don’t have to answer your questions,” I retorted, grabbing my shovel.
“Look, if it’s money you need, I’ll pay you. Leave now and don’t speak of this to anyone.”
I froze. Was my desperation that apparent? My eyes remained fixed on the floor, where I’d tracked dragon blood on one of my shoes. A single footprint marched its way into the stall.
I glanced over my shoulder. His eyes were wild, not with pain. With fear. What sort of trouble had the duke’s son gotten into that he didn’t want anyone else to know about?
“Good luck keeping that a secret,” I said, nodding to his midsection. “Besides, are you planning to clean all that up yourself?” My eyes angled to the bloody footprint. The pool of blood in the courtyard was another matter.
“Here.” He flicked a coin onto the floor that bounced, rolled, then spun for an agonizingly long time, each sound slicing at my dignity.
When the coin at last stopped moving, I took a breath then bent to retrieve it, hating the boy for the way he’d tossed it, as if to a beggar.
Hating how badly I needed it. Hating the way my dirt-stained fingernails scratched the floor as I snatched it up.