The Dragon Who Loved Me

“The day a She-dragon can’t move around a cave as she likes is the day she should climb onto the funeral pyre.”

“Or you could just have an escort.”

Her brown eyes nearly rol ed to the back of her head, but before she could say another word, they both heard her name.

“What?” she yel ed over him.

One of her sisters, he didn’t know which, appeared in the cave exit. “They’re at it again.” Rhona’s snarl was so vicious that Vigholf briefly thought about moving out of her way. He didn’t, but it crossed his mind.

“By the unholy gods of piss and fire, I’l kil them both!” she nearly yel ed. “And if not them . . . I’l kil her. Then maybe this centaur shit can end!” Shoving past him, Rhona marched off in the direction her sister had motioned to, leaving Vigholf simply standing there. Instead of fol owing her, he kept on the way she’d been going. After a few minutes, he came to the underground waterfal . This had been where she’d been going. The female did like her bath times. But, as always, the needs of others had gotten in her way. Unfortunate, real y.

Rhona stormed through the chambers and caverns where the lower-ranking dragons resided when they weren’t out on the field.

And, as Rhona’s sister had said, her cousins were “at it again” while the rest of the young recruits stood in a circle around them, passing coin, taking bets, and cheering their favorite.

Seething and absolutely fed up with al of this, Rhona pushed past the troops and grabbed the wings of both males. With strength born of raising her siblings, Rhona yanked the pair apart, then slammed them back together again. Their hard heads col ided and they stumbled around in stunned confusion.

“That is enough! ” she bel owed, shoving them into the crowd surrounding them. “I am tired of this centaur shit!”

“He started—”

“You started—”

Rhona unleashed her flame, first at one, sending him careering into the wal , and then the other, forcing him to rol across the cave floor.

“I said that is enough! ”

She leveled her gaze at the other recruits. “Out! Al of you!”

And the lot scrambled out of there as if the gods of death ran behind them.

Once they were alone, Rhona said, “I don’t believe you two. Five years I’ve put up with this shit. Five years I’ve watched you two go at it like pit dogs!” She shook her head. “That brat’s pu**y must be mighty for al this!”

Éibhear the Blue, her royal cousin and youngest of Her Majesty’s offspring, stood to his lofty height. “Rhona! That’s my—”

“If you say niece, I wil rip your lips off! Because, you twat, we both know the real problem here is that Izzy the Dangerous is not your niece. She’s merely the whore who’s gotten between cousins!”

Her not even remotely royal cousin Celyn the Black suddenly grew bal s, and stood tal before her. “Don’t you dare talk about Izzy that way. If this is anyone’s fault—it’s his!” Celyn pointed an accusing talon at his cousin. “That overreacting harpy!”

“You took advantage!”

“That’s a lie!”

“Shut it!”

Both males snarled and looked away from each other.

Al this over a woman. Not a She-dragon but a human female. The adopted daughter of Éibhear’s brother Briec had decided it was a good idea to take Celyn as her lover while the human and dragon troops of Annwyl the Bloody and Dragon Queen Rhiannon fought the Tribesmen of the Western Plains a few years back. And the rest of them had been suffering from that girl’s idiotic decision ever since.

“Perhaps you haven’t noticed,” Rhona pointed out, “that we’re in the middle of a gods-damn war. Perhaps you haven’t noticed that every time you two idiots do this, you put your fel ow soldiers at risk. Our troops risk their lives every day and yet you two peck at each other like angry birds! As if you have nothing better to do!”

“Rhona—”

“I don’t want to hear it, Éibhear. Not a word!”

She rested her front claws on her hips. “I should just send both of you back to the Southlands. A few years’ suspension while your kin earn glory or death would certainly get my point across.”

As she expected, Rhona saw the panic in their eyes at the threat. And it was a threat she’d carry through on—if they could afford to lose the brute strength of either idiot. Of course as low-level privates neither idiot would know that.

“Please don’t, Rhona,” Éibhear begged. “It won’t happen again.”

“It won’t,” Celyn pleaded. “Just don’t send us back.”

“I don’t know. . . .” she hedged.

“We won’t fight again.”

“Ever.”

Rhona didn’t bother making them swear to that. What was the point when they didn’t even realize they were lying? But at the very least she was sure she’d put some fear into them.

“Al right,” she final y told them, watching their bodies sag in relief. “But if I catch you fighting with each other one more time—”

“You won’t,” Éibhear was quick to promise. “You won’t.”

“I better not,” she warned.

And with that, she headed out of the chamber and to her gods-damn bath.

Éibhear the Blue glared across the chamber at his cousin. “This is your fault.”