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The fear I felt when I saw her on the precipice of being hacked to death was more primal than any I have felt before.

In truth, I do not think I have truly known fear before this moment.

I have never had anything precious to lose before.

My reign in the kingdom has been largely peaceful, and I have never been as attached to my life as I am to hers.

She has become everything to me, instantly, all at once. We are bonded deeply, and we are becoming deeper and deeper evermore connected.

When the third breeding takes place, I will worry a little less, but not entirely. It will stop her from aging, but it will not stop her from being smacked in the head with a rusty bludgeon.

Her sense of self-preservation must be bolstered.

She must be taught to stay far from danger, to never allow herself to be in a position where she can be badly hurt.

I can do this only through the harshest discipline.

I would rather she hated me every day of my life and hers than ever put herself in this position again.

I reach out, scruff her by the back of the neck to pull her away from the tree, and pull her skirt down into a semblance of propriety. She isn’t even dressed for the weather. A decent frost could have taken her out.

“I cannot safely bring you and the horse back in my dragon-flight form, and I will not abandon the faithful beast for the actions of a faithless one. So you and I will go back on foot. All three of us, together. You, me, and Otto.”

“The horse’s name is Otto?” She sniffs adorably as she asks the question.

“What else would he be called?”

“I don’t know.”

“His name is Otto, he is native to the icy climes of our world, and he is worth more than I care to mention.”

“Oh,” she says. “I’m sorry. I would have stolen a less valuable horse if I had known.”

“You should not have stolen any horse at all. You should never have come here. This forest is dangerous. Even I do not like walking in it. Now come here.”

I go to each of the charred bodies and pick out the offerings hidden within. There is a bow, which she does not know how to use, and which is made of cheap wood. There is also a leather jerkin, cloth gloves, and a pair of plate grieves. I also find a dagger.

I hesitate. I do not want to arm this woman who does not know how to handle any kind of weapon at all, but it might be more dangerous not to arm her.

I look over my shoulder and see her standing there, staring at me with incredibly wide eyes.

“How are you doing that?” She breathes the question. “There’s nothing left of them, but you’re taking gear from them. Just like in the…”

“If you say game, you will be spanked again.”

“Game,” she whispers, in a display of frankly astonishing bravery given the state of her bottom. This young lady is strong. And she is fascinated by every element of what I am doing.

I raise a brow at her. “Do you want to be punished again?”

“No,” she squeaks. “But it is like in the… and it doesn’t make sense. It’s not possible.”

“And yet, here is some clothing for you. You need more than that light attire out here. I would have brought more, but I needed to find you quickly…”

“Why don’t you fly clothes out to us?”

“Still leaves the matter of the horse, and you, and requires me taking my eyes off you for a few seconds, which I do not want to do. So we walk back. It should not take more than a day to walk that which you rode.”

She takes the clothing from me. The gloves are blue wraps that looks quite cute on her. The leather tunic fits her perfectly, because of course it does. There is no other option in this place, where the spoils of slaughter conform to the body of the one who first wears them.

The grieves even look quite cute, though I am sure they are a little too heavy. I even manage to salvage boots, and finally she is clad in the manner of a small human adventurer. At this point, it feels as though I may as well give her the dagger and the bow.

“I do not want you to use these,” I say as she sheathes the dagger and slings the bow on her back.

“Well, I can’t, because I have no arrows.”

“Good. You don’t need any. Stop looking so pleased with yourself.”

It is hard to maintain discipline with this young lady.

She is absolutely glowing with pleasure and excitement right now, in spite of the complete ravaging I just gave her.

My seed is the problem. It soothes and it satisfies, and it makes her feel better no matter what.

If I really wanted to discipline her, I would have to deny her my cum.

“I’m not pleased,” she lies, swinging her hair over her shoulder and adapting a dashing pose.

“Stop looking rakish,” I tell her. “You are a human. You are not a scout, or a ranger, and you are a danger to yourself and everybody around you.”

“Am I a danger to you?”

“Not me,” I say. “No. But remember there have already been three deaths.”

Her face falls, which is the first encouraging sign I have seen.

She did not like killing the kobold. She was horrified by what she had done.

She was not made to take life. She was made to create it.

Even now, my seed may be sparking inside her, creating a new line of dragons.

I am already excited to meet our first whelps, to welcome them to the world and to continue our lineage.

“Why are you smiling?”

I did not mean to smile. I meant to stay stern and unreachable.

“I was thinking of the babies we will have,” I answer her honestly. “I was thinking of all the life that will spring forth from these moments, painful as they may be. You are here because I love you. I am here because I love you, and our love will create new life.”

She smiles shyly at my passion.

“If we have a boy, should we call him Kobold?”

“No. We should not. Do you really want to commemorate your first murder?”

“It wasn’t really a murder. I mean, it was. But I didn’t know at the time that’s what it was. Maybe a middle name?”

I can only hope that she is joking, or perhaps completely unable to understand the weight of a name. Humans are silly about such things quite often. They forget about the deeper magics, the power of words and of naming things.

“We need to start moving. The sun is beginning to set, and I do not want to be in the forest when night comes.”

She frowns slightly. “Why are you afraid of the forest? I can’t imagine you being afraid of anything.”

“I am not afraid for myself, but for you. I can protect myself, but you are soft, and when night comes the forest will be full of things that can kill without touching. And there is the matter of your third breeding, which is yet to happen.”

She swallows. “But I am so sore. And we already had sex three times!”

“One of those times did not take place in this world. It needs to take place here, before midnight. I would rather make love to you in a meadow than in a forest of horrors.”

“There’s no night in the…”

“Say it. I dare you.”

“No, I’m just saying it’s always daytime. I’ve never been in the forest at night.”

“You’ve never been in the forest at all,” I remind her. “You’ve experienced a digital representation of a place that is deeply more real than your imagination can begin to conceive. Real blood is shed here. Real lives are lost.”

She looks somewhat shamefaced, but not enough for my liking. As she looks toward her toes in an expression of submission, she spots something.

“What is that?”

“What is what?”

“The scroll there?”

I look down, following her eye line. A scroll must have dropped out of some of the gear. Strange, but not entirely uncommon.

“It might be a recipe for soup or something.”

“Or a message the kobolds were delivering.”

She snatches the parchment up, unfurls it, and looks at it, frowning.

“This says these kobolds were bearing a seal intended for the Lord Janessa.”

“Excuse me?”

“That’s what it says, a seal for the Lord Janessa. Did you miss the seal?” She frowns. “Maybe it doesn’t drop every time. Maybe you have to keep killing kobolds to get the seal.”

“Stop muttering nonsense, human,” I growl. “What are you talking about?”

She hands me the note. “See for yourself.”

It is written in a fine hand, which is instantly odd. Far too fine for kobold script. I expected some kind of a recipe or some incoherent scratchings, but this is clearly the writing of someone educated.

“Lord Janessa, please find the fifth seal enclosed. I trust you are well. —A Friend.”

There is no seal. This is not acceptable. I am going to have to look into this. There are many noble houses and species in this world. Mine is of course the largest and most powerful, but the politics of the realm are more complicated than I like to think about most of the time.

There are certain seals that have power that could be very inconvenient if sent to Lord Janessa.

And of course, there is the question why it is being sent by kobold.

They are not natural couriers. Kobolds are creatures of stealth, in the sense nobody would ever expect them to have powerful artifacts in their possession.

But where is the thing itself? I would feel the resonance of the seal if it were anywhere close. I do not think the kobolds took it with them. They may have kept the letter, but they certainly did not keep the thing itself.

“Maybe it is in the kobold den,” I murmur. “Maybe the creatures thought to keep it for themselves.”

Melissa brightens immediately, as if I have just suggested we go to an expensive store back on her world.

“Yes! We should go to the kobold den! We could try going in stealth. Do you have any stealth spells?”

“What do you know about spells?” I regret the question as soon as I ask it. Of course she knows about spells. And enchantments. And armor. And weapons. She knows precisely enough about all these things to be dangerous with them.

“If we go to the den, and I do not think we will, I will send men to investigate…”