Page 7 of The Wild Prince’s Favorite (The Dragon Empire Saga #3)

Without warning, it slowly lifted its paw that was holding her against the mountain, which meant Alezya wasn’t its prisoner anymore, but also that she was now losing all ground to support herself on.

When she realized her imminent fall, her reflexes took over: she grabbed the dragon’s scales in front of her, leaned forward, and pushed herself toward the platform.

It was the messiest jump of her life, and without relief, she landed brutally on some solid, lean platform.

Thankfully, her fall was completely harmless due to the thick layer of snow.

There, Alezya spun herself to face the dragon again, her instincts telling her not to turn her back to it.

It hadn’t moved. For some reason, the orange dragon had just seen her jump out of its grasp without reacting, still watching her with that paw hanging in the air just inches away from her.

Alezya slowly stepped back into the entrance, watching for any sudden movement, but it didn’t come.

The dragon just stared at her, its expression indecipherable.

She heard it growl when her body reached the safe shadows of the tunnel, and it leaned its head farther.

Worried it might change its mind, Alezya retreated farther into the tunnel, where it was so narrow and far from the opening the dragon couldn’t reach.

She heard it growl again, a bit louder this time.

Alezya shivered and turned around, running away from that opening. She heard another furious growl, but she was already far away.

It took her a couple more minutes to stop running, and she actually fell on her knees, all strength leaving her body.

“...What was that?” she mumbled to herself.

She had no idea what had just happened.

For the dragon to have let her go made no sense at all. That thing had her in its clutches and it didn’t attack? What in the world?

Alezya felt like she had dreamt the last few minutes. It felt so surreal, how close she had been to that dragon and survived. Something was odd in that new creature’s attitude. The fact that there was another dragon was already weird enough, but for it to spare a human...?

She didn’t believe for a second that her begging had worked, or that this beast could be capable of pity. Perhaps it was smarter than they thought, but then why spare a clanswoman instead of having a meal...?

She took some long, deep breaths to calm herself down, and unloaded the basket of flowers from her bag.

Sadly, it had been partially crushed by the dragon’s claw.

Her basket she had spent ages weaving was badly damaged, and she had lost about a third of the flowers she had struggled to gather. .. Well, so be it.

She wasn’t going to go out there anytime soon, not after this. Right now, all she wanted was to see Lumie again and hug her.

That was all she needed.

Tired, slightly shaking, but glad to have survived, Alezya walked back into the tunnels leading to her clan’s living caves.

The few people she crossed paths with gave her confused glances: her appearance wasn’t usual.

The clothing on her shoulder that had hit the rocks had ripped, and had a visible bruise, with even a bit of her skin grazed.

Her hair had become a mess, she had snow covering a lot of her clothes, and her lower lip was bleeding from how much she’d bit her dry skin.

From the pain on her right cheekbone, she could guess another bruise was there.

However, Alezya couldn’t even feel mad, she was just so relieved to have survived her encounter with the dragon, her pain was nothing compared to the death she had foreseen just minutes earlier.

Still in a daze of disbelief over what she had lived through, she let her instincts take over and guide her body back to her cousin’s home, another cave, to get Lumie back.

She heard the cries of her nephew long before she arrived. The baby was screaming his lungs out and had cleared all the nearby tunnels. Her cousin was walking in circles, nervously trying to calm him down until she spotted her.

“Alezya! Finally! What took you so long?”

Alezya answered with a glare, fed up with this errand already, but her cousin didn’t even seem to notice. Instead, she almost jumped to grab the basket, immediately showing disappointment over the content.

“...That’s all you could get?”

“I had more,” Alezya retorted angrily. “I had a basket full, but that was before I almost got killed by a dragon!”

Her cousin’s expression immediately sank.

“...What? The dragon spotted you?”

It did more than spot her, but Alezya didn’t feel like correcting Zenia.

“Yes. And it wasn’t the usual black dragon, it was another one. ...An orange dragon.”

“Orange?” Her cousin frowned. “...There’s never been word of an orange dragon. There used to be a silver and a yellow one a while ago, but orange?”

“I don’t care whether you believe me or not, the spotters will have seen it too. Where is Lumie?”

“At the back,” her cousin simply pointed behind her.

Alezya walked over quickly, inviting herself into her cousin’s living space. It was much more spacious than the hole she and Lumie had to hide in, at least ten times bigger. Her cousin had a large living space, a pretty kitchen, and even a full area for her baby.

She found Lumie there, sleeping in a large basket on a fur bed.

Alezya immediately relaxed at the sight of her daughter, safe, sound, and peacefully asleep.

She leaned over her, finding relief in the soothing sight of the baby girl’s sleeping face.

Lumie had no idea of the troubles her mom had gone through, and that was alright.

Alezya carefully lifted her to not wake her up. The baby made a grouchy sound, but immediately grabbed her clothing, and went back to sleep on her shoulder. Alezya put a kiss between her white curls.

“Good girl, my Lumie.”

She carried her back to the exit, where her cousin was still lamenting over the flowers.

“I hope that’s going to be enough,” she purposely said aloud.

“I hope for you,” Alezya coldly retorted, “because I’m not going back to fetch more.”

“This is about my son’s life!” Zenia exclaimed.

“And I’m the one who risked mine to save him. Next time, if you care so much, you or your husband go and face a dragon yourselves. You’re welcome, by the way, Zenia.”

Without adding another word, she walked out of there, carrying Lumie.

She was more than fed up with her cousin’s hypocrisy.

Even if she knew she had done this more for her nephew than for her cousin, Alezya was pissed at her lack of gratitude.

Zenia was like everybody else in this clan: they only cared as long as they found a use for her.

She walked away, carrying Lumie and glad she was done with this. At least her conscience was clear. There was enough to make medicine for her cousin’s child, the rest would depend on the Healer’s skills.

She walked all the way back to her cave, carrying Lumie, feeling tired, but relieved. This time, she kept the large opening tightly closed.

Just thinking about her encounter with the dragon was enough to make her shudder all over again.

While putting Lumie in her little basket and taking off her clothes, she kept replaying the scene in her head.

None of it made sense. The dragons had never spared one of their fighters, despite facing them at the front almost every single day.

The fact that this dragon was orange too. .. A new dragon?

It had been a while since she had spotted one other than the black dragon.

There used to be two more, a silver and a yellow one, fighting their people when she was younger, but now, it was only the legendary black dragon left…

or so she’d thought. She didn’t dare glance out to check often enough, maybe that orange dragon had been around longer than she thought?

It couldn’t be good. She hoped Zenia would mention it to her husband.

As much as she disliked him, their clan’s safety was still tied to hers.

Alezya hated relying on anyone else, but this was too important to ignore.

Alezya knew all too well she and Lumie would have a hard time without a clan.

If they were ever chased off this mountain, they’d literally have nowhere to go.

She couldn’t think of a place to establish herself, it would take days to gather everything necessary for their survival, and all the resources were already fought over by the different clans.

She just couldn’t afford to leave, or she would have done so long ago.

Alezya carefully began washing herself, taking care of her injuries as she discovered them. Most were caused by her climb up the mountain more than the dragon though. A lot of grazed skin and bruises, mostly.

She took from her own batch of medicinal herbs, those she knew how to use, to treat herself preemptively.

It was the way of the Northern clans to consume medicine before they got sick.

They believed that no herb was wasted if it could prevent one from falling sick and needing twice more later.

She knew herbs to prevent infections, to strengthen one’s body before the cold months, and even ones to eat before meals to prevent stomach aches while eating hazardous foods.

Alezya had learned mostly by experimenting herself or secretly spying on the clan’s Herbalist. She even collected herbs whose uses were still unknown, hoping to find new medicines by herself, and carefully recorded any new species she found.

She had even made her own mortars and pestles, two out of stone and one out of wood.

What was once a young girl’s hobby had become an important survival tool for her.