Page 59 of Wickedly Ever After (A Fairy Tale Romp, #1)

Hector

So many spells are subject to the magic of truelove’s kiss, it’s a marvel lip balm companies haven’t turned it into a slogan.

A Thousand Years of Wickedness: A Memoir

Hector West

There were many things Hector didn’t know about good magic.

He’d concede his ignorance gladly most of the time.

But then again, most of the time he wasn’t riding between the backplate scales of a large, grumpy mother dragon, on his way to transform a beautiful prince back into a charming reptile, assuming Amber could find him.

Wisely, Ida hadn’t said anything about that to Alistair’s parents.

If she had, Hector might have been reporting back to the capital city alone, blaming himself for the dragons turning her into dinner.

Ida flew opposite him, perched precariously on the Flamelord’s back.

Although wounded, Adair wouldn’t be left out of trying to save his son from becoming a hideous human for the rest of his life.

Hector had reservations about having Ida ride him, but the princess was having enough trouble flying without putting a person on her back.

She flapped in Morga’s draft, her large brown eyes dilated with fright.

Morga glanced over her shoulder at her daughter-in-law. “Do you need to rest again?”

“I’m fine,” Amber said, then dropped a foot because talking and flying at the same time was a feat her brain hadn’t mastered yet. She flapped harder than ever.

“Set down on the next crag,” Adair roared, also glancing back with worry written on his scaly face.

Hector smiled grimly. Something about watching the girl struggle with her new wings and her coordination must be reminding the dragons of their early days parenting Alistair.

Or maybe it was simply what Hector told them: if this worked out, they’d get an actual dragon for a daughter-in-law, not a human in dragon skin.

He’d felt it prudent to ignore the frightening possibility that Amber already wasn’t human enough to give a truelove’s kiss.

Ida had been deeply concerned on that point.

Had he said that, Ida would’ve been headed back to the capital alone to report their failure, and he wouldn’t have blamed the dragons one bit for turning him into dinner.

***

He and Ida had consulted for most of the morning, leaving the lovely breakfast the gnomes had cooked largely uneaten.

“Handsome prince,” he said, feeling hopeful. “Well, Alistair is a prince, and he’s considered quite handsome. So if she kisses him, he could resume his dragon form after all.”

Ida shook her head. “You are looking for a loophole, Hector, and I don’t leave those.

If a kiss makes a man into a prince, you’d better believe you’ll get what I ordered.

I ordered a handsome man , the way Alistair appears in his human form but truly human.

And he’ll stay that way for at least six weeks.

I wanted to give Amber time to say her farewells, and then there’s the media. They’ll want interviews.”

“Wait a minute,” Tinbit spluttered. “ All magic has loopholes. They’re built-in for curse breaking.”

“Wicked magic has them, although, I admit, I’ve been breaking Hector’s magic long enough to know he doesn’t leave many.” Ida glanced thoughtfully at him.

He squirmed uncomfortably.

Hari, sitting close to Tinbit and holding his hand, asked, “Well, what about that?”

“What about what?” Tinbit asked.

“The loophole in Hector’s spell? What is it?”

Tinbit grunted. “Probably the usual. A kiss from a handsome prince can break the curse. I don’t suppose Prince Archie would be up for kissing a dragon’s scaly bonce, though.”

“That’s not the loophole I left. I didn’t want the princess ever becoming human again, not when she is mated to the future Flamelord.”

“Well, what is it?” Ida asked.

He told her.

She hadn’t talked to him since.

He’d wanted the impossible, and a dragon surrendering a firstborn child was about as impossible as it got, especially as it looked like Amber might be doomed to spend the rest of her life with a mate who couldn’t even wake up, let alone be a Flamelord.

***

Adair banked sharply. Hector saw Ida clutch hard at the Flamelord’s neckplates as he descended to a ledge with barely enough room for all three dragons to rest in reasonable comfort. Morga landed next, and Amber crashed between them. The two dragons kept her from spilling over the edge.

“I’m sorry,” she panted, stepping all over Adair’s feet and leaving bloody claw prints.

“Quite all right,” Adair said with a soft grunt of pain. “Next time you turn a human into a dragon, Hector, give them muscles to obey their instincts.”

“My shoulders feel like they’re separating. I don’t know if I can keep flying.” Amber started crying.

“There, there.” Morga bit Amber affectionately on the neck. “It’s not much farther.” She’d been saying it at every resting ledge to keep Amber going.

Amber leaned into the bite and even let Morga shake the nape of her neck a few times.

Mothers-in-law were easily the biggest force in a young mated female’s life, and Morga’s affection and Amber’s willingness to accept it were what Hector had hoped for.

She was part of the family now. Of course, it also meant that if Alistair was stuck in an enchanted sleep for the rest of his life, they would undoubtably all eat Hector together.

“Do you have a feel for where he is yet?” Ida asked Amber.

She nodded wearily. “Yes. It’s like a line from me to him. I would follow it until I fell from the sky. I can’t tell if it’s three miles or thirty, only that it’s closer than before.” She flopped down on the ledge. “I’m so tired.”

Morga stretched her left wing over Amber. “I know, dear. Adair, let her draft behind you. I’ll be on the side in case she falters.”

Adair launched himself off the rock with Ida clinging on for dear life.

“Now, watch me,” Morga said. “Let the thermals lift you. It will help. Even fit dragons get tired flying long distances. I’ll show you.”

Hector braced himself, but the fall into space sent his gut churning. Before he vomited with the dizziness, Morga rose, swirling in circles as the warm wind from the valleys carried her upward.

Amber launched herself. She flapped helplessly for a moment while Morga observed. Just when Hector thought she’d need to go after the girl and was preparing his stomach for the drop, Amber quit flapping and spread her wings. Slowly, inevitably, the current carried her upward.

“I must admit,” Morga said, “she makes a good dragon. Once I teach her how to prepare a proper nest cave and give her lessons on fighting and hunting for her young, she’ll fit right in. She has the fire for it.” She swept after Amber as the girl set off more confidently into the mountains.

***

They reached the cave around sunset.

Amber veered suddenly south with a cry like a strangled scream and plunged toward a snowcapped peak lit with the last rays of the setting sun.

A cunning place, it was accessible only from a narrow ledge.

Amber landed. Adair tried and was forced to flap backward when he couldn’t find room to stand.

Morga landed and immediately condensed herself as Hector slid off her rapidly shifting mass.

The cave entrance was far too small for a dragon to enter, but Amber clawed plaintively at the doorway. “Alistair!”

“He can’t hear you. He’s in an enchanted sleep,” Ida said as Adair made another attempt and managed to shift down to his human self. She slid from his shoulders and landed on her knees. “Ouch!”

Hector helped her up. “How in blazes did you get him in there?”

She pushed his hand away. “He flew here, transformed, and walked in of course. You must remember I intended for a human-sized princess to rescue him. Oh, my back.” She stretched with a grimace.

Hector eyed the slit in the rock with deep misgivings. “How far back in the cave is he?”

Ida brushed herself down. “I don’t know, Hector.

He walked in. At some point he lay down and became a dragon in an enchanted sleep.

We must find him, animate him, and walk him to the door so she can kiss him.

” She sounded confident, but he could see the way she bit the corner of her lip when she didn’t think he was looking.

He’d simply have to put a good face on things. With a calm smile, he patted Amber on the nose. “Don’t worry, we’ll get him out in a few minutes.” If they didn’t, hiding in the back of a cave with a dragon in an enchanted sleep might not be a bad idea.

He slipped through the crack. Ida followed him.

Inside it was dark beyond all reckoning.

Amber’s nostrils jammed the doorway immediately after they entered, blocking out the thin light of the setting sun.

Hector lit his staff, and a few frightened bats took off and sailed around the cave in a panic when they found a dragon outside their door. But there was no dragon inside.

Ida’s face withered in the light. “He should be here. It’s nice and roomy, the logical place for him to lie down.”

“No. He’s a young dragon in dragon country,” Hector said. “He wouldn’t lie in state where anything could come and eat him. He’d look for a good place to hide. Let’s go farther in.”

Two side caves parted ways at the back of the gallery, one with a low ceiling. Ida immediately rejected it. “I don’t do well with tight places. I’ll take the other if you can explore this one. If you find him, call me.”

Hector stooped into the tunnel, ducking to get past the low overhang.

He didn’t state the obvious—if Alistair had reverted to his dragon shape in the tight tunnel, they couldn’t walk him out.

But how much more transfiguring could an enchanted, sleeping dragon stand?

How much more could he take? He’d used so much necomancy on the transformation of Amber.

Most of his greenhouse was probably dead because of it, possibly every plant he owned.

It might take a forest, and if he did that, Agatha would certainly take him to task for it.

He didn’t know what else of his own that he could sacrifice to transform Alistair, even if only for the moments it would take to get him to the door.

His hope sank into his boots when he came out through the narrow space and saw the dragon.

Alistair lay wedged comfortably under a ledge, cocooned in rock.

“Ida?” he called, trying not to panic. “He’s in here.” He found a flat rock and sat down gingerly. As far as he was concerned, dragons were never meant to be ridden.

Ida joined him quickly—she evidently hadn’t gone far down the other tunnel. “It was a dead end,” she explained. “I was already on my way back.” Then she saw Alistair. “Oh my. How did he do that?”

“Shapeshifting,” Hector said. “Parts of him are compressed, others inflated. It’s so no one can drag him out.”

“Oh.” She sat on the rock next to him.

“Can you do anything to reverse your spell?” he asked. “Anything at all?”

Ida bit her lip. “No. Only a kiss from the princess will break the enchantment and make him a prince.”

“I can’t transform him,” Hector said. “I used a lot of magic on Amber, and there’s only so much death I can use before there’s an inquiry.”

“Well, I’m about at max myself,” she said. “I created a lot of life last night to bring Alistair here and make the enchantment to turn him into a man.”

“Life?”

Ida touched Alistair’s face. “Your magic makes you pay in death. I pay in life. When I make magic, trees fruit, grains swell, and animals give birth. Why do you think we do Happily-Ever-After in the spring? I can get away with it and not risk upsetting the balance. If I use too much vivomancy, too many twins are conceived and sometimes the animals can’t give birth.

We’ve already seen the crops are out of season.

And I’ve upset the balance more with what I’ve done here.

I probably shouldn’t have done it, but I thought it would fix everything. ”

“Regardless, one of us has to either get him out of here or get the princess in here. Short of flying in a team of goblins to open up this tunnel and the entrance, I don’t see a way to do the second.”

“How feasible would that be?”

“First, I’d need to convince the goblins it’s in their best interest to help the dragons. Then they’d have to vote on it. Then I’d need to go to the dragons and present the demands the goblins want in exchange for their help and—”

Ida held up her hand. “Stop. I know how dangerous that would be.”

Hector gnawed his knuckle. “What about waking him? If we could do that—”

“He would still be trapped here, wouldn’t he?”

“I don’t think so. He’s still a dragon. He might well be able to shapeshift and make his way out.”

Ida considered. “Break half the spell. I’ve never even considered such a thing. But I couldn’t wake him, not entirely. The best I might be able to do would be no better than sleepwalking.”

“If you can do it, even for a few minutes, I think I can transform Alistair enough to help him hold his shape, at least long enough to get him out the door.” But at what cost? He shivered.

Ida closed her eyes. “If I use the eagles or ravens here for magic, perhaps I could do it. But I feel terrible. It’s not nesting time here yet, is it? The chicks might starve.”

He winced. “We don’t have a lot of choice.”

“No, I don’t suppose we do. But what will you do? You have to kill someone long enough to get Alistair to the princess. Who?” She blanched. “Not a dragon…”

“No. I don’t need a dragon’s death for this. I know what I’m going to do.” He couldn’t bring himself to meet her eyes. Please, let her think it’s the pony.

Tinbit wouldn’t be harmed. At least not irreparably.