Page 72 of The Dragon Warlord

“Oh, sorry. Am I interrupting something?”

We pull away abruptly, only just noticing how close we are, as if we’re doing something wrong even though the closeness of an alpha and his omega is supposed to be as natural as breathing.

“No. Nothing,” Tristan says. “Come in, Ikara.”

“Sorry, it’s just … do you two know that your pants have been singed off?”

Right, we must look a sight. I hop off the table so that I can face my sister. She doesn’t look like someone who’s been told no by Father.

Tristan shakes his head. “Someone decided to play with fire. What did your father say?”

“Oh, Gods. He said no, of course.” She smiles. “So, we’ll have to go just the three of us.”

“What? Ikara, you’ve lost your mind,” I tell her.

Tristan’s hand finds its way to my jacket and fiddles with the scales there. He’s still leaning toward the more animalistic manifestation of his dragon side. “My omega has a point. You may have lost your mind. If your father doesn’t want the dragon—providing there actually is one—then he has spoken. I hate to be the one to remind you of this, but we couldn’t fight one beast, your mother did that for us. How do we fight a horde?”

“I don’t know yet, but I know you’ll figure it out.”

The Warlord growls. Not at her; at me. It’s a low guttural rumble in his chest. I’m not doing anything. Reaching out to him, through our bond, I sense that feeling of missing I felt before. Like I’m far away even though I’m right here.

I take a step backward and press myself against him. Perhaps he’s realized we aren’t fully dressed. His hand finds mine and he squeezes. He calms down.

“How would we even get there, Ikara?”

“I can get us there,” is all she says not giving anything away.

“Then what?”

Is he actually considering this or just humoring her?

“I will provide a distraction long enough for us to slip in and get the ice dragon. Then we leave.”

Tristan laughs. “And what do we do with this dragon once we have them? Your father just might notice us dragging an ice dragon along behind us into The Tower.”

“We’ll have a little forgiveness to beg of him, yes, but that’s why I took this.” From under her robes, she produces a plain collar. A collar gets its color when the dragon has it around their neck and it reflects the color of their scales. “He’s going to live here as one of us.”

“You can use that?” he says, doubtfully because we all know it’s wizard’s magic that locks a collar around someone’s neck.

“Well, no. I’ll get Rayne to do it. He’ll do it for me.”

He’s a bit of a sucker for her. He might.

“What about the part where—if we somehow survive a horde of Beasts—he skins me alive? That’s literal, Ikara.”

“You worry too much, Warlord,” she says. “C’mon. We leave tonight. We’ll return by morning.”

“Tonight? No. Absolutely not. My omega and I need sleep. We’re going to have a nice dinner and retire for the evening. You need to stow all this nonsense about ice dragons and beasts.”

“But—”

“No.” The Warlord isn’t budging.

Her face falls. The stone visage she’s worn since her mother died, returns. “Very well, Warlord.”

Ikara spins and races away. The Warlord snarls and claws at the metal figurines he had laid out on his map, sending them flying. Theytink, tink, tinkagainst the stone as they collide with the floor.

My blood heats and boils over such that I’m forced to undo my jacket in an attempt to cool myself down. Most of my clothing didn’t survive the fire. Only some of my pants, which thankfully cover the important bits.