It didn't take long for Mason and Jayden to arrive with Konstantin in tow.
My mates squashed me between them in a hug and showered my face with kisses, making me giggle, then I made them put me down so I could greet our guest.
"Hi, Kon! Welcome back!" I waved and smiled at him. "Do you think I could meet your dragon? Please, Kon? I will be super respectful, I promise. Pretty please?"
"You are always that, Luna Posy," he laughed, "and yes. He would like to meet all of you, too. He'dneedto, anyway, before he'd accept you as his keepers."
"Keepers?"
"That's how dragons view their leaders as they're the ones who keep them in check."
"Do you want us as your keepers?" I asked him. "Or do you want us to try and find you another colony? We're happy so long as you're happy. We'd love for you to stay with us, but we want to do what's best for you."
"Then I'd like to stay, luna." He scratched the back of his neck and looked at the ground, then whispered, "If I'm not too much trouble."
Oh. My heart.
Smiling sadly, I held my arms out in invitation, and he hesitated only a second before he leaned down and hugged me gently.
"I'm surprised the alphas aren't growling at me," he murmured in my ear as he awkwardly patted my back.
"They see you as a pup. Don't try this next year, though."
Leaning back, I studied his face and winced at the deep well of sadness in his eyes.
Wasn't it enough that his colony was wiped out by the sickness and he'd had to survive as best he could for the past six years? Did he have to be captured and imprisoned by maniac humans, too?Andbe rejected by the dragons at the new colony?
Strength is what we gain from the madness we survive,Lark murmured.
That's pretty deep, wolfie.
I not make it up. It something Coal, Ranger's wolf, told me.
I need to get that printed on a t-shirt,I muttered.It could be our pack motto.
"So you want to meet Chime Karma right now?" Konstantin asked as he dropped his arms and stepped back.
"Yes, yes, yes!" I bounced up and down on my toes.
"You won't be scared, right?" He raised one eyebrow. "Heisa thunder dragon."
"No. Amazed, maybe, but not scared. I promise."
Cole hooked an arm around my waist and pulled me into his side when Konstantin's eyes turned white as his dragon ascended.
"That's not creepy or anything," Jayden muttered, and Ash giggled.
Then the most amazing creature stood before us unlike anything I'd ever seen or imagined. He didn't look like what I thought a dragon would - a lizardish thing with huge flapping wings and spikes. Instead, Chime Karma looked like a twelve-foot-long snake with four legs and clawed feet. His triangular head had a thick mane of fur that ran down his back and ended in a bushy tail, and long tufts of hair grew like mustaches on either side of his snout. He was all white - as white as lightning - except for his golden antlers and black nose, and I had never seen anything more breathtaking in my life.
"I am Chime Karma," a deep voice rumbled.
"Hello," Mason said formally. "I am Mason Price, one of the alphas of Five Fangs, and this is our luna, Posy Everleigh."
Cole, Jayden, and Ash also introduced themselves, then Chime Karma nodded his head.
"As with you and your wolves, what my boy knows, I know," he said, "but thank you for officially introducing yourselves."
"Oh, you're so handsome! I wish I had a better vocabulary because handsome doesn't do you justice," I whispered, clasping my hands under my chin. "My heart's beating so fast just looking at you!"