Page 15 of Draco

“Did you drop something back there?” I asked, still nervous about the noise.

“Yep. But it’s fine. Make sure you drink all the water.” He placed the pills in my hand and handed me the water. I swallowed them without even double-checking they were what he said they were. Taking the water, I drank it all down a gulp at a time. His eyes focused on my throat, and my mind shifted to swallowing him again.

I almost choked, and he stepped forward as if to intervene, but I held up a hand. “I’m okay.”

He halted, and I finished up the last bit of water. With the ice pack in his hand, he knelt at my feet and worked my boot off. I could see my ankle swelling, and he quickly peeled my sock off, then wound the towel-wrapped ice pack around the swelling.

“I’m sorry you got hurt.” His eyes met mine.

“It was my own fault.” Sure, I’d blamed him, but I was running through the woods like an idiot, hellbent on escape. But what was my end plan? “I was being stupid, running from you like that.”

I’d do it again the second my ankle felt better, but I knew it was useless. How the hell could I run from a damned dragon? I didn’t stand a chance. Of course, that didn’t mean I wouldn’t try. I’d be more clever this time. I’d find a place he couldn’t follow me or something. I’d figure out how to get away. Because I’d still rather die alone and injured in the woods than die a slow death at the hands of my father. Eventually, his controlling ways would destroy me, I was just sure it would, bit by bit, minute by minute, a continuous mental beat down that would end me inside until I was a mere shell of a human being, a husk, a nothing.

I couldn’t live like that, knowing my fate every second of every day. I wouldn’t.

“So why do you do it?” I asked, and he glanced at me as if coming out of deep thought.

“I like protecting people.” He sat back, relaxing on the floor with a cat-like grace that surprised me.

“How does the dragon thing happen?” I knew nothing about dragons at all. I was never a fantasy nerd, and the books I chose to read never had dragons. I liked murder mysteries, not dragons.

He seemed amused at my question. “Well, sometimes, when two people love each other very much, and one is a dragon, or they’re both dragons, they can have little baby dragons.”

I rolled my eyes. “Thanks. So you’re just… born like anyone else?”

He nodded.

“From dragon parents?”

“Orparent. It only takes one to make more dragons.” He stood up and moved to a seat near me and sat, knees apart, leaned forward, elbows on his knees.

“Do you… do it as dragons or humans? Does it matter?” Curious, I pushed forward.

He chuckled. “You’re weirdly interested in this. If both are dragons, they can mate as dragons. But a human and dragon in dragon form union doesn’t happen, if that’s what you’re asking.”

I had been asking that, just out of morbid curiosity, not interest in any such thing. “Thank you for answering my questions.”

“No problem.”

I scanned the room. “So why are we here?” I asked before looking at him again.

He sat back in his chair, those great blue eyes locking on me. “Are you having an existential crisis? Are we talking philosophy here? What kind of conversation are you hoping to have?”

I giggled. I couldn’t help myself. His easy amusement surprised me and his answer doubly so. “I mean here.” I gestured to our surroundings. “This place. Why haven’t you taken me back to my father?”

“It’s not safe. The guys looking to kill you belong to a dangerous organization called DoubleTap.”

I laughed. “What an awful name for a gang of assassins. I know what it means, but it sounds more like they have a drinking problem than that they’re dangerous criminals I need to take seriously.”

His eyes narrowed a bit, but not before I saw the amusement there and knew he agreed with me, silently at least. “They are a serious threat. They’ll kill you like it’s nothing but business.”

I shrugged. “Maybe to them it is just business. Killing is only taboo because we’ve made it taboo.”

He nodded, clearly paying attention to me. And I realized I liked that he listened to me. That he paid attention. That he really seemed to be hearing me, not just patiently waiting for me to stop talking so he could have a turn or at the very least, not be bored anymore.

“But taboos in culture change. Look at things like promiscuity. It used to be a crime punishable by death to have sex before marriage. In some places, it still is punishable by death. But here it’s a lot more normal. It’s not really a crime anymore. Time shifts all things.” I understood it, but of course, I didn’t agree it was okay to take lives. But I did see how it could be business. “After all, soldiers take life. And they’re hailed as heroes, not criminals because we dehumanize the people they kill. We justify it.”

“You do have a point, but I don’t agree with killing innocents.”

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