CHAPTER 21

So, This Is Awkward

 

 

IT DIDN’T take long before we started to descend again near the base of the Northern Mountains. The dragon had kept silent through the remainder of the flight. I thought about drilling it with as many questions I could think of (because when was I ever going to get the chance to talk to a dragon again?), but I instead spent the majority of the time trying to keep my gorge from rising again.

So it was with immense relief when the ground came into view again. And when I saw a stone structure rising out of the middle of another valley, I knew we’d reached the keep that Dimitri had first spoken of weeks ago.

“Jesus,” I said. “Dimitri was right.”

“Who?” the dragon asked.

“Fairy king,” I said. “Tried to get me to marry him. Don’t ask. It was this whole thing that spiraled out of control. Like the time I was kidnapped by a dragon.”

“I didn’t kidnap you.”

“Um. You took me against my will. That’s, like, the definition of kidnapping, dude.”

“Dude?” the dragon scoffed. “Dude? I’ll never understand why the king of the fairies would want to marry you, dude. Unless you suck cock as good your lips indicate you should.”

“Ugh,” I groaned. “You are the absolute worst. For once I’d like to meet a celibate person and/or magical creature so I don’t have to fear for my virginity. This is getting ridiculous.”

“A virgin?” it asked, leering at me as we circled the keep. “Well, now. That certainly is unexpected. I suddenly feel the urge to despoil you completely. You know what they say, once you go dragon, all the rest is just laggin’.”

“No one says that,” I said. “Absolutely no one.”

“Six people say it,” he insisted. “I made sure of it.”

“That’s… isn’t that bestiality?”

“We’re all just animals,” he said. “Wild, sexual, writhing animals.”

“Yeah. No.”

“You say that now. Just you wait.”

“Gross.”

He landed in front of the keep. The keep itself was a large stone tower that rose from the center of the valley. It looked ancient, and there was evidence of a larger structure that had once stood around it. Large chunks of stone lay strewn around the tower as if the building had been blown apart or collapsed. I couldn’t tell what its purpose had been, be it church or a small castle, but I didn’t think it mattered.

The keep itself was large, and the entrance at the base was tall enough to accommodate the dragon. It pushed against the massive doors with its nose and they creaked open, scraping against the stone floor, grating against my ears. I gave maybe a second of thought to run screaming in the opposite direction with my hands flailing above my head, but I was able to curb that back and follow the dragon into the keep.

It’d been a church. I was sure of it now. Long gone were any pews or religious icons hanging from the walls, but the raised dais at the end and the size of the bottom floor suggested a congregation had once gathered here.

Now, though, it was a dragon’s nest.

And where it hoarded its treasure.

There was gold, of course. Massive amounts of gold in bricks and coins and nuggets. Shining jewels and goblets and scepters. That was expected.

What was not expected was the books.

Castle Lockes had a library that rivaled any in all of Verania. Scholars from all over the world came to the castle and could spend weeks getting lost in the stacks, finding scrolls and texts that hadn’t been touched in centuries.

This was bigger.

Against a far wall, stacked from floor to vaulted ceiling that I couldn’t even make out in the shadows, were books. More than I’d ever seen in my entire life. From what I could see, most were in good condition, though some looked to be in tatters or were burned.

“I thought dragons only hoarded beautiful things,” I said. “Objects that shine and glisten.”

The dragon followed my gaze to his book collection before he looked back at me. He cocked his head and for a moment, I wondered if I’d somehow committed a faux-pas, that it was insulting to discuss a dragon’s possessions with said dragon. But then it said, “There is beauty in the written word,” and I couldn’t really think of anything to say after that.

And it wasn’t until Grand Prince Justin of Verania came stomping down the stairs in the rear that I was able to find my voice again.

“Dragon,” he snapped, and I jerked at the sound of his voice. “Why do I hear voices? Who have you brought with you? I thought we were going to finish reading the—”

And his eyes widened when he saw me.

He looked good. His hair was a bit longer (which, of course, made it curlier and more devastating; when my hair got too long, I looked homeless), and he was maybe a bit leaner, but he appeared to be in good health. He wore a simple tunic and trousers. He was barefoot, and for some reason, I found that oddly disarming. The whole thing felt surreal. Normally he was poised and pinched, and here he looked like anyone else.

“Sam?” he said, voice slightly choked.

And this was the Prince of Verania, my Prince, but for some reason, instead of addressing him as such, all I could think about was how his fiancé wanted to do me, so I said, “Heeeyyy, buddy. You doing good? You look good. For being kidnapped. By a dragon. Like I just was. But I’m here to rescue you. I think. I really don’t know. I might be confused as to why I’m here.”

Justin stared at me.

“You’re very strange, pretty,” the dragon told me.

Justin’s eyes bulged as he looked up at the dragon. “You can talk again?” he demanded.

The dragon said, “You can understand me now?”

And I said, “So, this is awkward.”

“Why haven’t you been talking this whole time!” Justin shouted.

“I have been,” the dragon snapped. “You just couldn’t understand me!”

“I understand you just fine now! What did you do differently?”

“I didn’t do anything! I brought the wizard here to translate!”

“Oh, isn’t that just perfect! I’ve been sitting here for weeks with you just growling at me, when we could actually have been having conversations this entire time!”

“I wasn’t growling,” the dragon growled. “I was actually talking to you, but you don’t speak dragon so you didn’t understand me!”

“Wait,” Justin said. “Are we speaking dragon or Veranian?”

“I… have no idea,” the dragon said.

They turned to look at me. So I said, “Heeeeyyy, buddy. You look alive. That’s just super,” all the while thinking guiltily of how Ryan’s breath felt upon my cheek. I was an awful person and where the hell did I get off thinking about someone else’s man? And maybe, just maybe, Justin had turned over a new leaf while being held captive by the dragon. Maybe he’d found in himself his heart and was able to see that the world was a wonderful and mysterious place and there was no reason to go around being a gigantic dick all the time.

Justin rolled his eyes. “Did you break him? He sounds broken. Well, more than usual.”

Nope. Still a gigantic dick.

“I found him tied up to a pole not far from here.” The dragon puffed out its chest. “Apparently there’s a cult that made a religion because of me and they were sacrificing people to me because of it.”

“I wasn’t tied to the pole,” I said. “By the time you’d gotten there, I’d already freed myself.”

“Oh yeah,” the dragon. “That’s right. And then you tripped off the altar and landed facedown on the ground.”

Justin snorted.

I glared at both of them. “I’m not a fan of either of you.”

“Feeling is mutual,” they both said at the same time.

“Great,” I muttered. “Now there are two of them.”

“Why are you here, Sam?” Justin asked.

“Um. I told you. To rescue you? I thought that much was obvious.”

He laughed. “And this is your idea of a rescue? Seriously?”

“Hey! I was fine until the cult!” And the Darks and fire geckos and fairies and drag queens, but he didn’t need to know any of that.

“The cult,” the dragon whispered. “The cult that’s for me.”

Oh gods. He and Gary could never meet.

“I’m actually a little insulted,” Justin sniffed. “My father sent just you to rescue me? I thought at the very least I’d warrant the knights.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me!”

“Well, that’s certainly not true, Sam,” Justin said. “I don’t know why you try and convince yourself otherwise.”

“Well,” I said, feeling slightly vindictive. “It isn’t just me. It’s Gary. And Tiggy. And Ryan.”

Justin’s eyes narrowed. “Really,” he said flatly. “You. And Gary. And Tiggy. And Ryan. That’s who my father sent.”

“It’s supposed to be some sort of test, I think,” I said. “To be honest, I’m not really clear. I think he said something about how it was romantic if Ryan rode up on a steed to slay the dragon and rescue the Prince, but then that turned racist because of Gary, so there is no steed and so I’m pretty sure the King’s idea of romance is slightly whack. He did try to marry me off to Captain Bad-Touch, after all. He had rapey eyes. Kind of like someone else I know.” I turned and looked at the dragon pointedly.

Of course it ignored me. “Slay the dragon?” it said. “How barbaric.”

“You tried to set us on fire!”

“I tried to set you on fire,” it said. “You’re a wizard. You deserve to be on fire.”

“Rude.”

“No,” it said. “Truth.”

“And if I hadn’t been a wizard, then Justin and I would have been flambé and you wouldn’t have been able to hoard him like you did.”

“With your whizbangs,” the dragon said. “Ice sparklies.”

“Exactly,” I said. “You’re welcome. The both of you.”

They rolled their eyes.

“Where is the rest of the really sad rescue party?” Justin asked.

“Oh shit,” I said. “They’re still with the cult. I think. They fed us some kind of coercion and truth spell mixed with corn and we couldn’t do shit about it.”

Justin took a stuttering step back. He cleared his throat. His eyes darted over my shoulder then back at me. “Truth spell?” he said.

Godsdammit. “Uh. Yeah? Yes.”

He coughed. “And… what sort of truths were there?”

“Wizarding truths?” That sounded believable.

“Wizarding truths.”

“Yes. That’s why they tried to sacrifice me first. They thought the dragon would be impressed by me.”

“I’m not,” the dragon said. “I might need to smite my subjects because they got it way wrong. You’re pretty, but you stink of magic. And you threw up on me. That’s not how I want to start a sexual relationship.”

“You dropped me,” I reminded him. “Uh. Not that I’m trying to argue about getting into a sexual relationship with you. You’re not my type. I like my men more… not you.”

The dragon huffed. “You don’t know what you’re missing.”

“Thankfully so.”

“Any other truths, then?”

Yes. A shitload of them. So many fucking truths that I couldn’t even be sure if it had been a dream or not. So I said, “No. That was pretty much it.”

“You never were a very good liar,” he said.

“I do okay,” I said.

“Tell me.”

“What?”

“What did he say?”

“Ryan?”

“Sam.”

“I’m not stalling.”

He took a step toward me. “You’re totally stalling.”

I said, “A little,” because how do you tell a prince that his Knight Commander of a fiancé has a magic kink and wants to do things to your butthole? It’s hard.

(Sex pun.)

“Did he tell you about us?” Justin asked, eyes narrowed.

And. Wait. What? “What about you?”

“Uh. Never mind.”

“Justin.”

“I think I might love you,” the dragon blurted out.

I prayed to the gods he wasn’t talking to me.

And he wasn’t. He was staring right at Justin.

“Heh,” I said. “Awesome.”

“What?” Justin said.

“Your face,” the dragon said. “I want to do things to it.”

“Heh,” I said. “More awesome.”

“Uh. I don’t even know your name,” Justin said, hedging.

The dragon pulled himself up to full height. His wings fluttered behind him. He looked proud. Regal. Terrifying.

I waited for it with bated breath. Because this was a big moment, maybe even historical. Dragons named themselves after they were born. After trial and experience. Their true names were supposed to be words of power that they rarely shared with others. The fact that the dragon was willing to share his true name with us was nothing short of a miracle. I reminded myself to write it down in my Grimoire, which I’d sorely been neglecting these past few weeks.

I knew, I just knew that he’d be named something majestic like Mountain Storm or Fire Eyes or HeartWing (granted, my track record for guessing the names of magical creatures was certainly not the best).

The dragon said, “I am from the Old Line; the blood that runs through me stretches back hundreds of thousands of years. I hail from the faraway jungles, in a land never before seen by man. I am fire and skin and wings. I am the dark dragon. I am the Beast from the East. I am…”

“Ohmygods ohmygods ohmygods,” I muttered half-hysterically.

“…Kevin,” the dragon finished triumphantly.

“OHMYGODS OHMYGODS OHMY—wait. What?”

“Kevin,” the dragon repeated.

“Your name is Kevin.”

“Yes,” Kevin said, chest still puffed out proudly, eyes gazing off into the distance as if imagining dragony things us mere mortals could never understand.

“Kev-in,” I said, trying to understand why it didn’t sound like Fire Eyes when I said it. “Huh.”

He glanced quickly at me before going back to being regal and staring at the horizon. “Kevin.”

“Well,” I said. “That’s… a name. That you picked. For yourself.”

“Yes,” Kevin said. “I spent ten years ruminating on it before I picked it.”

“I can see that,” I said slowly. “And Kevin is… the best you could come up with? Obviously,” I added quickly when Kevin stiffened. “It’s fitting. For you. And your being. All your dragon-ness.” I was making this so much worse.

“Isn’t it?” Kevin said, though I could hear the word of warning in his voice.

Justin rolled his eyes. “A dragon named Kevin is in love with me. I just… I don’t even. Gods.”

“A dragon named Kevin wants to fuck me,” I said without meaning to. And then I cringed.

“What?” Justin said, voice all low and dangerous.

“What what?” I asked.

“Baby,” Kevin cooed to Justin. “I don’t even. No, baby. Look at me. You’re the only man for me. Hey. Hey. Look at me. Look at me, Bright Eyes. Hey. Who’s my big strong Prince? Hmm? Hey. I don’t. Not anymore. That was so long ago. Before I even met you. I was a different dragon back then.”

“Um,” I said. “That was, like, weeks ago. And you also said I had lips made for sucking cock when you kidnapped me. And you just said you wanted a sexual relationship with me. Like five minutes ago.”

Kevin went down on his stomach and put his head near Justin, who stood with his arms crossed and his back to the dragon. “Hey. No. Listen. I didn’t mean it. Baby. Look at me. Hey. You’re the only one for me. I don’t care if he’s got cock-sucking lips.”

I scrunched up my face in disgust. “Um. Ew. And also? Offensive.”

Kevin bumped his nose into Justin. “Baby,” he purred. “It’s you. Even when we couldn’t understand each other, we spoke the language of love.”

“You had sex with Kevin?” I asked, my voice going high.

“What?” Justin said. “No. Gods, Sam. Do you ever think before you speak?”

“Yeah, Sam, gods,” Kevin said. “It’s not always about sex, even if you have those lips made for dick.”

“He’s very sexually aggressive,” I told Justin. “I don’t think you should sleep with him.”

“Stop cockblocking me!” the dragon hissed.

“He’s engaged,” I reminded Kevin. “To a knight.”

Kevin snorted, a lick of flame curling from his nose. “Easily remedied. I shall eat the knight and then he won’t be engaged.”

“You don’t eat people, though,” I said.

“You don’t?” Justin asked. He uncrossed his arms and turned back toward the dragon.

Kevin glared at me before turning back to Justin. “No,” he admitted. “Too boney. I try to stay healthy. I’m mostly a vegetarian. Every now and then, I’ll treat myself to a cow on my cheat day, but that’s about it.”

“You’re a vegetarian,” I said.

“Mostly,” he said.

“You’re mostly a vegetarian.”

“Yes.”

“You’re ruining dragons for me,” I said. “Everything about you is ruining dragons for me.”

“Oh?” Kevin said. “Is it because I’m your first?”

“Yes. My one and only and—”

He reached out with a claw and scraped it on the ground next to my feet. “How did it feel to have your dragon cherry popped?”

Justin coughed quite angrily. It was impressive.

Kevin quickly pulled his claws back and turned to Justin again. “No, baby,” he said. “It was just a joke. Just joking around. Sam and his cock lips mean nothing to me. You’re my one and only. You complete me. Without you, my six hearts are just forty-pound organs that beat dully and without cause. You’re so special.”

“Aww,” I couldn’t help but say.

“You’ll see,” Kevin said. “I’ll make sure you have everything—”

His nostrils flared as he jerked his head toward the great doors. A low, rumbling growl started somewhere in his middle and crawled its way up his throat and out his mouth.

“What is it now?” I sighed because it was always going to be something.

“Something approaches,” Kevin said. “Three heartbeats. Coming down the road, maybe ten minutes away.”

“It’s probably the cult,” I said. “Bringing you corn. Don’t eat it because you’ll end up telling someone embarrassing things that you’re not ready for, like how much you want to do them—”

Justin glared and took a step toward me.

“Do them no wrong,” I finished hastily. “Because doing wrong things is bad and no one should do them. Especially to others.”

“Stay in the keep,” Kevin snapped and clambered out the front doors. He nudged them shut behind him, leaving Justin and I in relative darkness.

“So,” I said. “This is awkward.”

Justin sighed. “Come on. We can watch what’s going on from up top.”

Unable to think of anything else to do, I followed him as he turned toward the stairs.