Page 10 of Lady Dragon
Kirek was still frowning after her. “But how can she have that particular appendage”—she waggled a finger in such a way that made Samansa choke again—“and yet understand she is a woman? Even more, how can women treat her as one of them if she is thus different, even going so far as to bathe with her when not allowing the likes of Jamsens near?”
There was no hesitation in Samansa now, her serious tone drawing Kirek’s eyes back to her.
“Men tried to keep us in very specific roles until the War of Fire freed us. We needed the space to grow, to become all that we were capable of. Now that we have it, we generally don’t deny those who want to join us— or if someone wants to leave us. ”
There was something calculating in the dragon girl’s gaze now.
“So men could decide to be women if they wanted, and then gain access to much more important things than a bathhouse—such as the throne. Your aunt is now a surplus sister to challenge the queen, just as my own aunt is to our Queen Mother.”
“You’re always one to see the worst possible outcome, the enemies who might not even be there in the shadows, aren’t you?
” Samansa couldn’t help an exasperated sigh.
“It’s not something you decide. It just is .
My aunt didn’t become so to get closer to the throne—I was already born and named my mother’s heir, anyway.
She’s simply a woman. Likewise, most men are simply men, and have no choice but to stay that way.
” She gestured about, her arms flapping in an ungraceful way.
“Otherwise, indeed, they would try anything to reclaim the ground we gained. This is why we can’t share the throne with them, because they wouldn’t share for long, in return. ”
Kirek raised a dark eyebrow. “That, and because dragons won’t tolerate them on the throne.”
Samansa smiled wryly. “And that. My brother even—oh, I shouldn’t mention it,” she said quickly, cursing herself. Somehow, she’d gotten too comfortable talking to Kirek. She wasn’t supposed to show the dragon girl fear or weakness, never mind blurt her insecurities about Branon aloud.
“He wants men to sit the throne.”
Samansa started in surprise.
But the dragon girl didn’t look the least bit surprised herself as she continued, “ He wants to sit the throne, instead of you.”
Yes , Samansa thought. And sometimes I wonder if he wouldn’t be better in my place.
But she couldn’t admit such a thing. Instead, she grimaced.
“I won’t spread rumors against my own family, especially not with a dragon.
” Her eyes popped, and she covered her mouth.
“Oh, that sounded terribly ungrateful. What I mean to say, my brother aside, is that our situation could get very complicated without the dragons’ support.
” She hesitated, tentatively meeting Kirek’s eyes, which weren’t angry in the slightest, rather more rueful.
“Thank you for helping us. Why did you, long ago? It can’t be because we’re both female. Even I doubt that, as my brother does.”
Kirek shrugged, but Samansa could see tightness in her shoulders that wasn’t there before.
Wariness? “I’m not entirely sure what passed at the end of the War of Fire, after our queen died killing your king.
But, no, I don’t believe we allied with women because we saw a connection between us as females.
The distinction between dragon and human is far greater than that between male and female.
” She rolled her shoulders and stretched her arms, as if she wasn’t quite used to them yet.
“Perhaps more significantly among our kind, dragons are brooding or not brooding. Thus, unlike you, we can’t feel differently in our minds from our bodies, because our bodies are all the same, only in different states.
We can’t believe we’re brooding when we are not. Does that make sense?”
She seemed to be changing the subject from the War of Fire and the Treaty, so Samansa didn’t feel too forward asking, “Wouldn’t that make you feel more human than dragon, then, as you are now? You have a human body—different from a dragon’s, or at least in a very different state. A human state.”
“I am a dragon,” Kirek snapped, looking at her sharply. “And I always will be. Don’t forget that.”
Samansa nodded hurriedly, prepared to let it drop, until a thought occurred to her that she blurted out as if she were six years old instead of a young woman of eighteen with supposed social graces. “Still, in this body, could you… you know… partake in the more human act that leads to brooding?”
Kirek stared at her quizzically for a moment, before her eyes widened in outrage. “I’m not going to justify that revolting question with a response.”
Now Samansa wanted to flee the courtyard before she could say or do anything else she might regret.
She’d taken a step away when Kirek said, “Though I feel I’m owed a question in return for your impertinent presumption. Could you select a woman as your consort, especially if she could give you an heir—a woman like your aunt, for example?”
Samansa blinked, halting in her tracks. “Maybe. It never occurred to me.”
“Could you love a woman, the same as you wish to love a man?” The dragon girl still said the word with disdain.
“I—I don’t know,” Samansa stammered, pierced by those silver eyes. They bled the truth from her. “Maybe.”
“Hmm,” Kirek said. “Interesting.” And then she turned on her heel as if it weren’t very interesting at all, just as she had from the princess’s favor. She stalked off across the courtyard without another word, let alone a farewell.
“Wait,” Samansa called after her. “Why is that interesting?”
She received only the dragon girl’s back in response, and even that vanished around a corner with the rest of her.
“Cat,” Samansa muttered, and then turned and hurried in the opposite direction, hoping that dragons didn’t have excellent hearing in human form. She wasn’t only fleeing from Kirek; she needed a bath even more now, after her exertions.
The image of water sluicing over smooth skin and taut muscle, slicking back dark hair, flashed once again in her thoughts.
Except this time, she didn’t let herself imagine a face, so she didn’t have to feel awkward and attempt to stop the feeling that flooded her, warming her from head to toes, dizzying, as if she were already thoroughly steamed in the bath and had perhaps downed a couple of glasses of wine beforehand.
And so it was, with her mind entirely elsewhere, she didn’t see the masked figure leap out at her from within an alcove. Not until it was too late. She did, however, see the dagger plunging straight for her heart with almost perfect clarity.
Not that she could do anything about it.
She didn’t even have time to scream. She could only throw up her arms, cringing away, fully expecting to feel the blade pierce her breast. But nothing happened.
Her eyes, which she had screwed shut like a fool, flew open, and she slowly dropped her hands.
Kirek was standing between her and the would-be assassin, pivoted at her narrow hips, the hilt of the dagger caught in her grip. The princess had no idea how she had gotten there in time. The stranger was quivering, trying to push the blade closer. To reach Samansa.
The dragon girl didn’t budge. She wasn’t straining herself in the slightest. In fact, she was grinning, a long breath hissing through her bared teeth, silver eyes alight.
She looked terrifying.
Samansa stumbled back, not only from the assassin, but also from the expression on Kirek’s face. She definitely understood better what it meant when a dragon smiled.
Kirek’s grin flew even wider as she twisted sharply. The snap of breaking bones pierced the air, along with the stranger’s scream behind the cloth mask. A woman’s scream.
Of course. Easier for a woman to sneak into this area of the castle, which was off-limits to men.
“ You will not touch her ,” the dragon girl breathed, low and deadly.
The woman’s strangled reply didn’t last long, cut off by the dagger that Kirek wrenched from her limp fingers and slammed into her throat.
Samansa heard a gurgling of blood behind her mask, saw the whites of her eyes rolling back, but Kirek didn’t stop there.
She planted herself in front of the woman, seized her arms in either hand, and gave them a swift jerk.
The limbs tore off at the shoulders, as if they’d decided to part ways all by themselves. It all happened so quickly, and Kirek had barely seemed to move. Blood sprayed in wild arcs. Some of it splashed across Samansa’s cheek.
A scream tore through the air again. Samansa only belatedly realized it was hers.
Cut loose, the body teetered and collapsed like a felled tree trunk, armless and gushing fountains of blood.
Kirek turned to Samansa, the severed limbs still in her grip.
Her own arms were painted red up to her elbows, the silk of the princess’s mark of favor blossoming with new scarlet droplets amidst the flower pattern, her forehead and chest spattered in gore.
The dragon girl’s face was expressionless. At least she was no longer grinning.
Samansa’s breath was ragged and panicked in her ears as she tripped backward over her skirts in her haste, falling, and scrabbled away on hands and knees. She wasn’t sure if it was more to escape the corpse or Kirek.
“Apologies. I should have kept her alive for questioning, but I apparently got carried away.” Kirek sounded a touch surprised, and then made an impatient noise. “See, I told you I have less control like this. And that you wouldn’t want to see it,” she added.
Samansa couldn’t meet her eyes. She could only stare at what the dragon girl still held.
Kirek glanced down as if remembering, herself. She merely dropped the limbs atop the body and frowned at her blood-splattered attire.
“Now I need a bath,” she said, as irritably as if she’d gotten herself muddy. She turned and held a red hand out to Samansa where she sat stunned on the ground. “Shall we both go together?”