“How was your first class?” Thorne asks as I walk to him after leaving history. I slide the two textbooks under my arms before I answer.

“Good and bad,” I say thinking that I liked the teacher, but when she said I have to study all these books to catch up the two months I’m behind, that wasn’t so great. I love reading, but not this kind of reading. One book is just about the farming lands, and what we grow. I need to know every type of edible plant, as well as the unusable ones, grown in Dragca in time for a test in a month.

“Here, hand me those,” he says and I laugh a little.

“Just because I’m a girl, doesn’t mean I need a man to hold stuff for me. I can carry them Thorne, but thanks,” I say, squeezing around a couple of students to look at the locker numbers. I'm at eighty, so I keep walking until I find mine. Opening it up, I slide all my books in before slamming it shut again. I will have to remember to get them out, but I’m not carrying them around all day.

“What’s next?” I ask Thorne.

“Lunch, and then two hours in geometry,” he says and points down the stairs. Food. Food sounds better than it did a few hours ago.

“So how did you get here? Land a job as the dragon guard escorting me around?” I ask Thorne as I expected an older guard. Admittedly though, I don’t know much about dragon guards.

“My family is close to the throne, so they thought it would be smart to have me near you. I’ve also passed a lot of assignments,” he tells me as we get down the stairs and follow the students walking down the corridor by the door.

“Assignments?” I ask him.

“We are given tasks to train us, both here and on Earth. You may be born a dragon guard and live to the curse’s rules, but it doesn’t mean you instantly become a good fighter,” he tells me and holds a door open for me. I walk into the large lunch room, that has circle tables and what looks like a buffet towards the front, with a kitchen behind it. The tables are mostly full, and it's noisy as dragons walk around, everyone giving me hostile looks

“Help yourself, I’m just going to check on something. I won’t be far from you,” he tells me and walks out the room before I can reply to him. I turn away and walk across to the buffet. I am picking up a tray when someone bumps into me.

“Watch it,” a deep voice snaps, and I turn to see Dagan Fire staring down at me. His eyes are slightly black on the edges, but they quickly snap back to a deep blue colour.

“Oh, it’s the moody guard,” I reply blankly, and turn back around.

“Is that the princess?” I hear another male voice ask, and I turn to see a guy about our age watching me. He has a short, tidy black beard, curly black hair and tanned skin. He is dressed in the all leather uniform, and I can see two swords crossed on his back. His green eyes watch me curiously, just as I watch him. What is with this place and all the dragons being hot? Even thinking of any of them as attractive sends waves of pain through me and my own dragon stirring in my mind as I picture Jace. I quickly turn around when I realise I’ve been staring at them for way too long. God, everyone is going to think I’m mad.

“I told you Korbin, she is as crazy as they come,” Dagan says, chuckling. I take a deep breath, trying not to react to the idiots.

“And stunning, you said she was stunning,” Korbin replies, his voice low and deep.

“Well she is stunning, but the crazy ones always are,” Dagan replies, and I slam my tray down on the side before turning to face them.

“I am standing right here, don’t talk about me like I’m not,” I snap as they both look at me, and then at each other, before they start laughing.

“Little princess, you don’t have the throne yet and I won’t listen to a word you say. So, if I want to talk about you, I will,” Korbin finally says with a shrug. You know, after they both stop laughing.

“She won’t inherit the throne anyway, not since her precious little prince was killed,” Dagan says, “Such a shame about that,” he tuts. I lock my eyes with him as anger flows through me, both mine and my dragon’s. I let my dragon out, feeling my eyes glaze over as my hands start to freeze everything near us. Dagan and Korbin take a step back as snow begins to fall from my hands, and I don’t move as I try to calm myself down.

“Kill them?” my dragon whispers in my mind; her sadness and anger is overwhelming and makes me take a deep gasp. Unfortunately, she uses that as an opportunity to completely take over, shooting ice out of my hands in giant waves, and then spreading across the floor as I fall. I don’t hear or see a thing, as my dragon pushes against my mind, trying to make me shift and allow her to act on her anger. Her pain is clouding her judgement, making her view everything as a threat, and want to destroy all she sees.

“Listen to me dragon, this is not the way. They didn’t hurt Jace, and you could kill them,” I manage to grind out in my head, begging her to listen. She doesn’t stop, but she lets me speak to her, lowering the barrier between us a tad.

“We need to work together, to get revenge on the real dragon that did this to us, that hurt Jace. Killing these guards won’t do that,” I beg her, feeling my arms warm up and bones begin to move as the shift starts to happen.

“Please, no,” I beg her once more, and she whines in my head, a whine that transforms into a roar that fills my ears as she pulls back.

“Revenge, we have to get revenge,” she whispers to me and for the first time in years, we are in complete agreement. I blink my eyes open, looking up at icicles hanging from the ceiling. My breath comes out in cold white puffs as I struggle to sit up. All around me is a thick wall of ice; I can’t see anything, and no one can get to me. I lift myself up, trying not to slip on the ice on the floor as I walk to ice wall and place my hand on it. I punch my hand through the ice, cutting my knuckles a little. I punch a hole next to it and then another one, until there’s a big enough gap for me to climb through. The sight in front of me causes me to forget the cuts stinging my knuckles as I stop and stare in shock. All the students are frozen; the whole room looks like they tried to run away from me, but didn’t get far. Dragon ice can kill fire dragons if they are exposed to it for too long, shit. I run over to Dagan and Korbin, who are frozen in place with their eyes completely black, as if they tried to call their dragons before this happened.

“Naughty princess, tut tut,” I hear a deep, throaty voice say, and I turn around Dagan to see Elias Fire walking towards me, burning footsteps in the ice as he goes. He has a leather jacket on, and a cigarette in his hand which he drops on the floor, crushing it with his boot.

“I didn’t mean to–” I start to try and explain, and he grins at me, lifts his hand and places a finger against his lips. I step back as he swings his arms out, and fire shoots out of them in the shape of a dragon as he stands still. He burns away the ice, never harming the fireproof students, who fall of their chairs or collapse to the ground. The doors bang open behind Elias, just as his fire passes them, and there my uncle stands. He has a strained expression on his face, and his hands firmly planted on his hips.

“My office, now,” My uncle demands, as he walks further into the room, with Thorne at his side, and watches Elias put the rest of the fire out. Dagan falls to the ground when he is free of the ice, and Korbin following moments later.

“This is your fault,” Dagan snaps, glaring up at me.

“Dagan, Korbin, Elias, Thorne and Isola, get to my office. Everyone else to the medical bay to be checked over,” my uncle shouts as Elias lowers his hands. I look around at the students on the floor, wiping ice off themselves, and struggling to stand up. The hostile glares they gave me when I first walked in here are replaced with pure hate now. Best first day ever.

“Such a naughty little princess, aren’t you?” Elias taunts with a low chuckle, before turning and walk straight back out.