Page 12 of Lady Dragon

The princess’s skin was pale as milk, her flesh silken and rounded, beginning to take on a rosy blush in the steam.

Her face, however, was a red bright enough to mask her freckles as she slipped into the water as if to hide.

But she couldn’t hide, not from Kirek’s piercing sight, as she began to scoop water over her shoulders and arms. She looked even softer and creamier under the sheen of water.

Kirek abruptly swallowed. Her mouth was watering as if she were looking at a bloody cut of meat. Except, devouring the princess wasn’t what she wanted to do.

She didn’t know what she wanted to do.

Ridiculous human bodies , she thought with a silent snarl, and did what she’d come to do, promptly ducking under the water where her eyes were less sharp and the heat burned her hated flesh clean until she could feel nothing else.

Kirek was inexplicably irritable as she returned to her tower quarters later that evening, taking the long, spiraling blue stairs instead of winging into the air and causing a stir.

And it wasn’t because of the endless questioning she’d endured from the humans regarding the assassin, but something else.

She forced the feeling down, because, as her queen would no doubt remind her, irritation without reason was just another chink in one’s scales for tooth or sword to pierce.

She couldn’t show any weakness. Not here. And not to her mother.

She took a deep, calming breath after securing the thick iron door behind her, and turned to the Songstone.

After ensuring she was alone in her chambers and had her mother’s attention, she said, “I believe Prince Branon may have attempted to have the daughter heir assassinated. I’m still only following my instinct, but I trust it’s correct with regard to him. Especially now. ”

And your instinct with regard to the daughter heir? That was the Queen Mother’s only response. No concern or surprise, of course, from her. Only what felt like an attack directed at a crack in Kirek’s human armor—just not one the dragon girl had anticipated.

“What instinct?” Kirek asked, feeling caught out, for some reason.

That she deserves her position.

“Ah, that,” Kirek said quickly. “Yes, she still strikes me that way, such that any human can deserve their position without a dragon’s help. She even tested herself against me in combat, and I didn’t find her lacking.”

And have you continued to gain her trust?

Kirek once more felt saliva gathering in her mouth at the thought of plump, exposed flesh—but, this time, as confounding as the last, it was not out of a desire to bite.

“Yes. To this end, I thwarted the assassination attempt.” She didn’t know if her mother would be displeased that she had so handily kept the peace, if only temporarily, unless Kirek had a good reason to.

But gaining the princess’s trust wasn’t the only reason Kirek had done it, nor did she wish to gain it only for her mother’s purposes.

Somehow, she wanted to be as deserving of Samansa’s trust as she wanted the princess to be deserving of her position as heir, neither one of them earning it under false pretenses.

Only because my honor demands it , Kirek told herself. Nothing else.

But of course she could tell the Queen Mother none of that. She was bound to follow her mother over any personal sense of honor, after all. Duty and loyalty flew above the rest.

You did well , the Queen Mother said .

At the same time as her pride swelled at the praise, Kirek felt her eyes narrowing almost against her will. “Do you have a plan for her yet?” she couldn’t help asking.

Several possible plans. But do I hear concern in these awkward sounds of yours, or does my understanding of human language deceive me?

She knew her mother understood perfectly well.

Never mind that most dragons could comprehend human speech, the dragon queen had once worn the Heartstone, so the nuances were certainly not beyond her.

Her words were meant to shame Kirek for having to speak like this and to expose her like teeth set against her neck.

Answering either way would offend and demand the queen’s judgment, which would unerringly come.

Still, Kirek countered as best she could without striking back or taking a mortal wound. “It is only the fault of this flesh that I must wear out of duty, Mother, and not your understanding. As you might remember, it is fickle and confusing. I am not myself.”

I hope that’s all it is. There was another heavy pause. If you ever hope to best me one day… as I hope you do… then you must be as strong as I know you can be. I won’t fall gently upon you.

“I would never expect otherwise, Mother.”

Good. Ready yourself for whatever is to come.

“Yes, Mother,” Kirek repeated firmly.

The dragon queen’s silent voice no longer came from the Songstone, leaving it dead.

Later that evening, as the torches began to burn low, Kirek found herself wandering down from her tower. She wasn’t aimless, exactly; she simply didn’t want to examine too closely where she was going on these tiny human-shaped feet.

Instinct , she thought. That’s it. And Mother told me to trust my instinct.

The wry thought twisted her lips.

As her leather boots padded silently along the marble floor of the castle, she knew where she was going: to check in on the princess, but why?

What did it matter to Kirek how Samansa was faring after the assassination attempt?

Kirek didn’t care about her well-being, she told herself—rather, she wanted to continue gaining the princess’s trust, as instructed, and assure herself that Samansa was standing strong, deserving of her place as heir, so that Kirek would never have to challenge it.

Never mind that Kirek would one day have to challenge her mother for the role of dragon queen.

It was the ultimate proof of strength. That was simply how things were done in her world, and she wouldn’t shy away from it.

But it was not the way of things in Andrath.

Here, the daughter heirs were protected, ensured they would live to reach the throne when their mother passed peacefully, both by their own kind and by dragonkind .

At least, thus far, dragonkind had helped ensure their succession.

Perhaps Kirek was only keeping up appearances by looking in on her. Or so she told herself. It was a strange itch she felt the need to scratch, like everything else strange about this body of hers.

Not my body , she reminded herself sternly.

When she rounded the corner and saw the four guardsmen, Jamsens among them, barring the way to the princess’s quarters, she didn’t lose her nerve so much as reconsider causing a stir. It would be odd, yes, for her to want to see the princess this late? Humans had so many absurd rules.

And yet, she was a dragon and wasn’t bound by their rules. Smiling to herself, Kirek dodged around the corner before the guardsmen saw her and ran down another corridor on whisper-light feet, heading for the window she knew was at the end of it.

The window was locked from the inside, but feebly enough to unlatch in a quick motion, and she understood why when she opened it and looked down.

There wouldn’t have been much risk of someone breaking in from outside.

The drop was nothing like from the wide doors of her tower, but it was considerable.

Not a problem for her.

If anything, she could prove how poor the guards’ protection was against her. How easily she herself could get to the princess if she wanted to cause her harm.

The thought was both reassuring and disturbing. Reassuring in that if it came to the worst and she had to hurt Samansa, she could do her duty. And disturbing because…?

No, she would stop trying to understand. She didn’t need to or particularly want to. Perhaps she would never understand how she felt about the princess, trapped as she was by this incomprehensible flesh, and that was an acceptable concession, in the moment.

Kirek slipped over the sill as silently as a shadow and reached for the inevitable chinks in the blue marble outside, the perfect handholds.

Human fingers might have a hard time gripping such tiny clefts, but not hers, human though they looked.

Wind whipped her hair as she pulled herself out of the window and onto the vertical surface of the castle.

She clung like a spider and skittered her way along—albeit more slowly than a spider—until she was under what she calculated was a window into the princess’s quarters.

Pulling herself up on powerful arms, she found it was ajar. And she could smell blood.

Someone else had gotten to the princess first. Kirek’s instinct—more real than imagined—might not have come fast enough.

She vaulted through the window, uncaring of what might be in her path or without even readying the knives at her belt.

She landed on her feet in the candlelit darkness and saw the shape of a body, sprawled in stillness on the ground, long, loose hair fanning above her feminine shape, a pool of blood spread around her.

A dark, shrouded figure stood above the body.

Away. The thought was not for herself. Kirek had to get this intruder away from the princess.

That was her only thought as she seized the figure—hearing a deep, masculine grunt—and she pivoted, dragging his bulk with her as if he were an empty sack and not a man twice her size.

In his obvious surprise at her intrusion—the shameful hypocrite—he barely had time to struggle before she hauled him to the window and threw him bodily over the sill.

He flailed, trying to catch Kirek’s arm, but she gave him a solid shove out into the darkness, and the night took him.

It was a kinder embrace than hers would have been had she paid him more attention—though no less final. In his defense, he didn’t even scream before she heard him hit the ground with a distant, yet significant crunch far below, never to move again.

Kirek dove for the body on the floor. She turned her over as gently as possible on the stained rug .

And… it wasn’t Samansa. The girl’s hair was darker upon further inspection, her features entirely different. Dara , Kirek recalled. The lady’s maid.

Flat, brown eyes stared at the ceiling, sightless. She was dead. Kirek could hear Samansa’s deep breathing on the other side of the double doors before her. Asleep, then.

Not dead.

A sigh of relief hissed through Kirek’s clenched jaw.

The assassin had come this far and no farther, though his true goal had doubtlessly been the princess.

Kirek had followed her instincts fast enough, thank the skies.

There was an open book on the floor next to Dara’s body, looking as though it had fallen with her from the daybed.

She must have been reading out here when the assassin had come upon her in his quest to reach Samansa.

A smaller, narrow door was cracked to reveal the maid’s simple chamber, the candle at the bedside table unlit.

Dara must not have been able to sleep, perhaps in fear of the earlier assassination attempt…

or because she had been watching over the princess, out here.

Although, why that would have been left up to a maid was beyond Kirek.

Standing, Kirek made for the outer door across the room that she now understood to be an antechamber to both the princess’s and the maid’s resting quarters. She unbolted it from the inside and opened it onto four startled guards. Jamsens drew his sword on her almost immediately.

Kirek bared her teeth. “You have the wrong creature, my friend,” she said softly, gesturing inside. “And the wrong place, and the wrong timing. Your princess should be dead as well, not only her maid.”

He blanched as his eyes snagged on Dara, but in credit to his training, he continued scanning the room for danger. “But only you’re in here.”

Kirek sneered at him. “Check the cobblestones below”—she caught him with arms of steel before he could step farther into the room—“ quietly , and remove the maid’s body first before Samansa can see it. She would be… unsettled.”

Kirek didn’t know why she cared, but she did. And she’d already decided to not care why she cared.

Jamsens himself looked sickened at the sight of the body, and yet he made some silent gestures to the other guards to do as Kirek had said while another guard held a sword leveled at her—a pitiful show of force. Jamsens moved to the window to verify the other body on the ground below.

“That still doesn’t answer the question of what you are doing in here?” he snapped—quietly, at least—spinning on her as the other two guards gathered up the poor dead girl and began to carry her out. The third guard still held his sword at the ready. Kirek ignored him.

“Checking on the princess,” she said simply.

“Through the window?”

She shrugged. “Same route the assassin took, not to mention the last one, who came by way of the women’s quarters—the easiest to get around the mere inconvenience of you .

” Jamsens started to sputter but she rode over him in a low, dangerous tone.

“Why weren’t there any guards in here , especially after the earlier assassination attempt? These aren’t the baths.”

“These are the princess’s rooms!”

“And?”

“She’s a young, innocent woman, as is— was —Dara, and it’s not appropriate— ”

Kirek scoffed loudly enough that she worried she might rouse the princess—who still sounded solidly asleep. Kirek wanted her to stay that way. Samansa could face what had happened in the morning, after she got some rest and, hopefully, regained strength enough to manage it.

“Then I’ll stay in here if you won’t, especially since Dara is no longer occupying the space.

” And with that, Kirek dragged the daybed out from the wall into a more advantageous position, scooped the book up off the floor, and threw herself onto the oversoft cushions, tossing her legs up while she was at it.

She needed to study humans, after all, and reading about them qualified.

“Get this mess cleaned up” was all she said after that, as she flipped to the beginning of the book and ignored the rest of them.

Jamsens could only stare. But he didn’t argue before moving to obey.