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Chapter Thirty-Eight

B riony

“A dragon!” Fly shrieks, backing towards the door, with his hands flattened against either cheek. “But … how? … what? … A dragon?”

“You said you wouldn’t freak out,” I say, trying my best to stop Blaze from dive bombing Fly and smothering him with kisses.

“Ahhh,” Fly wails, spinning around in circles, “he’s trying to eat me!”

“He’s not trying to eat you! He’s just trying to kiss you.”

“With his sharp little mouth!”

“He likes you!” I clap my hands. “Seriously, Blaze, give him some space.”

“Yes,” Fly says, “give me some space, please.”

Blaze goes for one last dive bomb, dragging his rough little tongue right down Fly’s cheek and making him shriek again, then zooms off, landing on my bed, gaze flitting between me and my friend, tongue hanging from the side of his mouth and panting.

He reminds me of a dog and in the few weeks I’ve had him he’s grown to the size of a small one.

Fly rubs at his eyes and mumbles to himself, “I must be seeing things, hallucinating. Or maybe I’m dreaming. Dragons don’t exist, do they? They died out like hundreds of years ago.”

I shrug and sit down on the bed beside Blaze, letting him climb into my lap and tickling under his chin. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

From the other side of the room, Fly examines both of us, eyes narrowed. “He seems surprisingly tame. In fact, he looks like he likes you.”

“He does,” I say, then make a kissy face at Blaze. “You love me, don’t you?” The dragon raises his head and licks my chin.

“What does he eat?”

“Woodland animals … and … erm … rats and mice.”

“Ew, gross.” Fly places his fist over his mouth, then wipes at his face with the sleeve of his blazer. “Are you sure he’s not dangerous?”

“No, he’s lovely,” I say beaming. If truth be told, maybe I’ve been a little bit desperate, waiting for an opportunity to show Blaze off.

He’s a hard secret to keep. A lot harder than a stone.

“Come on, he won’t bite.” I pat the mattress beside me and cautiously Fly approaches, lowering himself down carefully onto the bed.

Blaze watches him but he’s enjoying the chin tickles too much to attempt another love-bombing.

“I’m so confused,” Fly says, “when the hell did you get a dragon?”

“He hatched about three and a half weeks ago. ”

“Hatched?” Fly says.

I tell him about finding the stone and keeping it hidden all this time. I explain about how the stone started to crack the day of the maze trial and how placing the stone by the fire caused it to hatch open completely.

“This is so weird,” Fly says, shaking his head in bewilderment. “How did a dragon survive in that stone all that time? And why didn’t he hatch sooner?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. Thorne thinks that–”

“Thorne? Thorne Cadieux?”

“Do we know any other Thornes?”

“You told Thorne about your secret dragon but not me. Do all the Princes know?”

“No, only Thorne, and now you, know. You’re the only two people I’ve told.”

“But you told Thorne before me,” he points out. “What happened to hoes before bros, bestie?”

“He hatched the night I was meant to be at the Princes,” I say, then quickly change the subject because I don’t want to explain why I now trust Thorne Cadieux more than anyone else in this academy. “Fox may also suspect. He keeps complaining that I smell like lizard.”

“Fox?” Fly lifts an eyebrow.

“Oh, Professor Tudor.”

“On a first-name basis are we now?”

I chew on the inside of my cheek.

“Err, yeah, I guess.” That weird interaction with the professor a few weeks ago is another thing I haven’t told my friend about.

Mainly because I’m still trying to unscramble the whole thing myself – half convinced I imagined most of it.

Why would the professor want to touch me?

Why does the idea of it have strange sensations stirring in my belly?

Fly leans in and sniffs me. “You smell the same as always. I don’t know what the hell the professor is going on about.”

“Who does when it comes to the professor?” I mutter.

“I don’t know, you seem to have a better understanding of him than most.”

“What makes you say that?” I ask, with alarm.

“You’re similar, maybe it’s your shared background or something.”

“I am nothing like the professor!”

“You are! Moody, mysterious, secretive.” He points to the dragon in my lap. “You’d make a great couple.” He laughs.

“He kissed me!” I blurt out. It seems once one secret has leaked out, it’s hard to keep any others.

“He what?!” Fly shrieks his voice soaring several octaves higher than it was one second ago.

“Actually, he didn’t kiss me.” I shake my head vigorously.

Fly shakes his head too. “Huh?”

“He nearly kissed me. Or at least it felt like he was going to kiss me but then he stopped himself.”

“You’re sure?”

I pinch my friend on the thigh. “I may not have a heap of experience but I do know what it’s like when someone is going to kiss you.”

“Then why didn’t he?”

“I’m his student!” I point out.

“Meh,” Fly says. “Did you want him to kiss you? The man literally terrifies the pants off me. But if he tried to kiss me, I think I’d wilt like a violet in the heat. I’d be unable to resist all that dark, moody, broody, masculine energy.”

“Yeah,” I say, butterflies stirring in my belly just thinking about it. “But I’m meant to be with the Princes. ”

Fly rolls his eyes. “Just because you’re with one person – or three – doesn’t stop you from admiring other people, doesn’t prevent you from developing little crushes.”

“But I don’t admire Professor Tudor and I don’t have a crush,” I say decisively and I’m not sure who I’m trying to convince myself or my friend.

“So what exactly is your plan with this dragon, Cupcake?” Fly asks, as Blaze curls up and starts to snore.

“I usually take him for an evening fly about around this time. You can come if you want–”

“No, I mean what’s your plan in the long run, Cupcake?”

“I … I don’t exactly know yet.”

“Don’t dragons grow really big, like really really fucking big?”

“I suppose so,” I say, peering down at Blaze.

“What does Thorne say?” Fly says a little bitterly.

“He thinks I should hand him in. He thinks I’m going to be in big trouble when they find out I have a dragon and haven’t told them about it.”

“Obviously.” He gazes at the sleeping dragon. “I wonder what they’ll do with him.”

“I don’t know,” I stroke Blaze’s head. “But I don’t think it will be good,” I say, thinking of my sister.