Page 12 of The Gold Dragon Prince
Selle laughed. “You’re an arrogant dragon,” he said. “And if there’s one thing I’ve learned from my books and from the dragons I’ve known, which, admittedly, are very few, it is that dragons think very highly of themselves.”
“Well, we are the grandest creatures in my mother’s magical kingdom,” I said with a shrug.
Selle’s face lit with interest. “I should like to meet your mother,” he said. “I’m fascinated by the idea of the queen of the magical realm.”
I laughed wryly, sending Selle a cautious smirk. “You might not say that if you knew how overwhelming my mother can be.”
“But isn’t she good?” Selle asked, his curiosity making me randy, which reminded me we needed to be gone to my lair so I could finish the breeding process. “Everyone I’ve met at the pavilion, Billi and Maeve and Gandy and the others, all sing her praises like she’s the Goddess herself.”
I arched one eyebrow at Selle but kept my mouth shut.
Selle gasped, his eyes going wide. “Is Queen Gaia the Goddess? As intheGoddess?”
I leaned closer to him. “Nobody knows for certain, not even me,” I whispered as dramatically as possible. I stoodstraight and changed my tone entirely to say, “Now, climb onto my back. We’re going home.”
Selle blinked at me, adjusting his glasses. “None of those words make a lick of sense. And shouldn’t we get dressed again before going anywhere?”
“There’s no need,” I said, turning my back to him then nodding over my shoulder for him to climb on.
Selle sent me a wary look, then threw his arms around my shoulders and hopped up so I could piggyback him.
Of course, I had no intention of piggybacking anyone or anything. I moved to the window and put my foot up on the bottom, grabbing the sides, ready to launch into the sky. I intended todragonbackmy beloved mate.
“Great giddy ghosts!” Selle shouted, gripping me extra tight. “You’re jumping out the window!”
I laughed at the obviousness of his statement, then pushed off into the sky.
Selle screamed, then screamed even louder as my body quickly transformed from human to dragon form. I had enough control of the transformation to make certain that my beloved ended up in just the right spot with his arms wrapped around my neck and his legs straddling the points where my wings extended from my elongated body. I flapped those wings a bit, taking us higher into the night sky as I zoomed forward over the forest surrounding the castle, the lake, and the pavilion.
Selle shouted again, but his cry sounded far more excited and giddier as I made a quick loop around the lake, mostly to show off. A few of the night’s ball guests were outside the perimeter of the pavilion. They looked up and pointed, talking excitedly to each other or applauding. Seeing one of us dragons flying pastwasn’t uncommon in our kingdom, but spotting one of us with a naked omega on our backs was.
Perhaps I should have allowed Selle to dress after all.
There was no time to correct that miscalculation, and in my dragon form I didn’t have much magic to spare for something as trivial as popping clothes onto my omega. I beat my wings, taking us higher into the starry, moonlit sky. Even though it was night, the light of the moon cast a beautiful, silver glow over the forest below. The gems that hung from the trees glittered like phosphorescent creatures, and I was certain Selle would note the various colored paths through the trees, where they were visible, that led to the lairs of my dragon kin.
I had no need to follow the gold-tinted path. I knew precisely where my lair was located. But as it was the first time Selle had flown on a dragon, I wanted to give him a treat.
Instead of flying straight toward the northern valley and the river that crossed through my property, I soared off to the east, toward the sea, where Argus had his lair. Argus was the ruler of the sea, after all, when he wasn’t a spy in King Freslik’s court. Selle laughed and squeezed me as we shot out over the silver-tipped waves. From our height, with the full moon and glittering stars shedding their light, we could see the forms of great whales and sea beasts swimming just under the surface below.
“Enjoying your tour of the magical kingdom?” I asked him, mostly through our bond, since the speed with which we soared made it difficult for my voice to be heard.
“Yes, yes!” Selle shouted. I could feel the intensity of his heartbeat through our bond and against my scales as he clung to me.
I wheeled around, taking us back toward land and therolling hills and meadows where Emmerich had his lair. It was harder to see how beautiful all the greenery of Emmerich’s home away from the castle was at night, so I continued on to somewhere that would be more familiar to my darling, Rufus and Tovey’s house.
“I’ve been here,” Selle called out, lifting from my back a little to wave down at Rufus’s lair, as if his brother and the eggs could see him.
“We can visit them some other time,” I said. The heat of Selle’s body against mine and the pulse of life eager and waiting to happen urged me to get my mate home as quickly as possible so I could complete the breeding.
I swung around and headed for the north at last. Our tour of the kingdom had taken us far off track, so I zoomed ahead with as much speed as I could muster, flying over hills and valleys and the path that wound from the mountain to the plain, where several of the villages of my mother’s kingdom were located.
“What’s that?” Selle shouted, leaning slightly to the side.
I turned to see what he might be looking at, and when he risked letting go of me long enough to point, I spotted them.
There, in the valley far, far below, plodding along in a line, were about thirty ogres. They were difficult to see and I might not have noticed them at all, but for the torches a few of them carried. From the sky, their shapes looked like great, lumbering rocks, another reason I knew they were ogres.
“They’re ogres,” I said, tension making my dragon body ache like a bowstring ready to snap.
