Page 44 of Lady Dragon

Raka flicked her wings in indifference. I knew another dragon would eventually find my Heartstone.

Nakor or her new successor would no doubt come looking for it, so yet another dragon could degrade themselves, injure their pride and risk their very being, to enter the human realm and maintain peace, since Nakor had abdicated her duty—her very life as a dragon—to selfishly keep her stone to remain in secret at her queen’s side.

And if such a future dragon ever fell so far as to bond with a human, my spirit would rise up and awaken.

I would split the stone, overtake their beloved human from my half, and transform them with my wrath… and then turn their love to ash.

The girl’s silver eyes were shifting rapidly, as if trying to see what Raka had already explained to her.

“Turn them into you . But if human lives are held within the stone, why don’t we become them , when we take human form?

Like you slowly overtook Samansa as a dragon, with your life added to the stone? ”

Because their lives were given selflessly, to create a link to humanity.

Raka’s gaze traced the line from her skull along the fire-scarred ground to the more faded spot.

Mine, I gave with a different purpose. With a will for vengeance.

My wrath survived inside the stone, as if within an egg.

A future hatchling ready to rise and return to me.

Only the shells of those human lives remained, dormant and inert.

My wrath consumed some of them in order to keep burning, locked as it was in the stone with them—culling them like a queen would her clutch.

Protecting the future queen I would become.

Still, so much time passed that I worried all the human life would eventually be consumed and render the Heartstone useless, spent, before my curse could be born.

But then you came along. Her eyes shot to Kirek, and Raka started to salivate—to remember why she’d needed the girl here.

And you’re not truly a girl, are you? But a dragon. You bonded a human. You loved a human.

“I love her,” the dragon girl corrected with a growl.

Loved , Raka insisted coldly. She is nearly gone.

The two halves of the stone were connected, just like the Songstones were, communicating across the gap between them.

Balancing each other—the human versus the dragon.

But I have sealed the gap. The connection is blocked, now that I’ve found myself.

This is fully my half of the stone now, and you have what remains of the human half.

I’ve struggled to keep you like this—fought with tooth and claw to keep the human out of me .

Now you are trapped. And like this, you will die.

Raka drew herself up to her full height, sending Kirek into a ready crouch. That’s why you’re here, so I can ensure that you remove the humanity from me once and for all. I only needed her body, to make it my own. And now I need to kill you .

Raka expected the dragon girl to run, but she didn’t. Kirek only drew her sword, which looked as small as a toy from the red dragon’s perspective. A single, thin tooth against her many teeth and claws. Raka took a slow step toward her, her talons scraping over stone.

With your death , Raka said in a dragon’s low whisper, there will be no one to wield the lives in that stone to threaten mine.

The connection will be lost, like my bond once was to Nakor.

And I will truly live again. Although, it is tempting to let you stay like this, trapped in this human body forever, to mourn her.

“You are still her,” the dragon girl insisted, brandishing her sword before her.

In a way. But she’ll be indifferent. Where you would feel her loss so keenly, she wouldn’t mourn you. She’ll forever be a dragon. You would only be able to love her from afar. And in the end, you would only be loving me .

“Which is everything Nakor did to you, and everything you might have wished upon Nakor. But I am not Nakor,” Kirek snarled.

Then it’s best to kill you now, where at least Samansa can still watch. Still feel the pain that you won’t be able to, at least for a time, until I consume her mind and spirit, like I have her body.

Raka lunged. She’d relayed her intentions such that she wasn’t surprised when Kirek dodged the first swipe of her claws. But she wouldn’t evade the dragon’s jaws.

But Raka didn’t bite down. Instead, she shrieked, staggering to the side, Kirek falling out of range of her gnashing teeth. Raka scrabbled at the stone ground in desperation, trying to stay upright. Something was rising up within her, smashing her down…

And then she transformed in a blaze of red light. Not only from dragon to human, but from Raka to… herself . Samansa. She was Samansa, not Raka. Tears flooded her eyes and poured down her cheeks in sheer relief.

And fear. She looked at Kirek wildly. Kirek, the dragon girl . For a moment, Samansa couldn’t make sense of her.

They were both human. At the same time. The princess had overtaken Raka, for once. Suppressed her.

“I’m… holding her… in the stone,” Samansa gasped, twisting her kerchief aside and clutching her chest. She wasn’t literally holding Raka back with her hand, but she figured it couldn’t hurt. “I can’t let her kill you.” Bright red light flared angrily between her fingers.

Wanting to escape.

Kirek stood with her sword now slack at her side.

Her leathers were scraped and battered, but holding together, and her daggers remained in place.

Her dark hair parted in somehow still silk-smooth sheets around her perfect face, scratched and filthy as it was.

She was stunning—and she hadn’t been forced to transform into a dragon in return.

Which meant Raka still had the connection blocked. The balance broken.

They were both human. For a very short window—one that was rapidly closing; Samansa could feel it. Her strength was waning. She’d longed for this moment so she could hold Kirek in her arms, but it was taking every part of her to hold Raka back .

“Kirek, run!” Samansa cried, gesturing with her free hand. “Run until you’re safe enough to cut out your own stone, and be a dragon once more.”

Kirek didn’t run. Instead, she dropped her sword and clutched Samansa’s shoulders to help keep her upright, her fingers tightening as if she couldn’t believe what they held. The princess herself could barely believe it.

“But then Raka will overcome you once more,” Kirek said, dismay coloring her own voice, “and I won’t be able to use the power of the stone against her to try to get you back.”

Samansa grimaced. “It’s a losing battle. Her grip on me is too strong. I would carve out her stone myself, except I know I would die before I could manage.” She looked down at the dress that couldn’t be called a dress anymore, the yellow long overtaken by stains. Fitting, she supposed.

Kirek’s fearful, awestruck gaze was roving over her body as well, despite how dreadful Samansa must have looked, lit with an intensity that was far from disgust. Filled, rather, with longing.

“You said you wanted to touch me,” Samansa said suddenly, the thought sprung from the air. “I remember that much.”

The dragon girl swallowed. “Yes.”

“Then why aren’t you touching me while you still have the chance?” The bold words came to the princess as naturally as breathing now. After all, what did she have to lose that she wasn’t already?

“I am touching you. But I assume you mean—” Kirek stammered and glanced away, with a shyness so unlike herself. “I’m worried you’ll fall if I move.”

“Not if you keep holding on to me.” Keep holding on to me , the princess thought.

Kirek lifted a shaking hand to trace the line of Samansa’s face with a fingertip, eventually cupping her cheek in her palm. “So beautiful,” the dragon girl whispered. “So strong.”

Samansa’s eyes closed at her touch, a tear leaking out from under her lids that Kirek wiped away with her thumb. This was enough. It would have to be. Samansa wanted hundreds, thousands more moments with Kirek, but this was all they had.

She took a deep breath, steeling herself. “If you won’t run, then you need to kill me.”

Kirek’s silver eyes flew wide. They were so lovely, as bright as coins, Samansa thought—not so terrible, for the last thing she might ever see. But Kirek wasn’t snatching up her sword to stab her. She didn’t even respond.

“I have an ancient dragon’s life entwined with mine,” the princess said with rising desperation. “Take it, and regain yours.”

Kirek only stared, her hands frozen on Samansa’s shoulders.

“Kill me, Kirek!” she cried, her body seizing with effort.

“I can’t,” the dragon girl finally rasped, her grip tightening.

“You have to.” A sob tore out of Samansa. “I can’t live like this, as her. You told me what an honor it is when someone gives you their life in every way. Trusts you to kill them. Let me die as myself. It’s the only way to stop her.”

“I can’t,” Kirek repeated despairingly. “I’m—I’m too weak. I made myself weak, for you.”

The princess leaned her head against Kirek’s breast, pressing her cheek into the leather and breathing her in, the salt and sweat and human musk of her neck.

Wishing she could stay like this forever.

“You’re not weak. You are as strong as Nakor, the dragon queen who ended the War of Fire.

Who loved a human. Who became human, for love. ”

When she looked up, Kirek only shook her head stubbornly, her own tears making her eyes shine brighter.

“Fine,” Samansa murmured. “If you won’t kill me, then kiss me, you fool.”

She tilted her head up, and Kirek was there to meet her like an answering song—so ready and willing to do this , at least, once invited.

Her lips were soft, but not shy anymore—tender with deliberation and what Samansa imagined was barely suppressed terror that this might be the last they ever touched like this.

With reverence, almost, how they trembled so delicately against the princess’s mouth.

Samansa didn’t let their lips linger against each other for long, as much as she wanted to lose herself in Kirek. Because she was losing herself—to Raka. She was out of time. The fire was raging in her chest, as if in protest at their kiss.

When Samansa pulled away, she smiled at her dragon girl through her tears. “It’s all right, Kirek. If you’re too sweetly, beautifully human to kill me, it’s all right.” Her smile twisted wryly. “Because I have a dragon in me still—and she’s a bitch. And you forget I know how to use a blade.”

Samansa’s hand shot forward to close around the hilt of one of Kirek’s daggers before the dragon girl knew what she was doing. Kirek’s instinct must have kicked in as she tried to block against an attack—but the princess wasn’t aiming for her.

She flipped the blade around and rammed it with both hands directly into her own heart, right alongside the glaring shard of red stone.

Pain ripped through her, exploding from the wound in a blaze of white-hot fire, staggering her.

Tearing her free. Wiping her clean. The entire world tipped around her .

She could hear Kirek screaming her name, feel her pulling at the dagger’s hilt. But it was too late.

The time had come for the princess to save the dragon.

“I love you,” Samansa gasped with her last breath.

Finally , she’d managed to say it—just before she toppled into silent, unfeeling darkness that had no end.