Page 83 of Dragon Rule (Age of Fire 5)

One more trip to make. She’d have to find time somehow to go north and tell Rayg’s mother that he still lived. Not only lived, but had grown into brilliant manhood.

But nevertheless, he was little more than a slave.

So when her brother asked her for a private chat in his baths after the feast, she happily accepted.

“It’s much reduced from SiDrakkon’s day. At one time his bath took up most of the upper level of this end of the Imperial Rock.”

“I’ve heard stories from the Firemaids about all the human women he kept.”

“Not my weakness,” the Copper said.

Thralls brought in stones heated in the cooking fires until they created an optical illusion of waves above them. The thralls dropped the stones into shallow pools of water, which instantly boiled and filled the bath with steam.

The heat raised her scale and the water beaded up on skin and scale, washing her delightfully clean from nose to tailtip. She felt as though a dwarf’s weight in dirt ran off her and into the sluices.

“You’ve never been in the Tyr’s bath before, have you?”

“It’s pleasant,” Wistala said. “Why doesn’t the Queen have her own?”

“The Queen, or Queen-Consort, can use this one whenever she likes,” the Copper said.

“I shall. Nilrasha never said how much flying would be involved in being Queen-Consort.”

“Her experiences predate the Grand Alliance,” the Copper said.

“Of course.”

“I think my Protectors are cheating me,” the Copper said.

Wistala sighed. She’d much rather brief him on the campaign to get the bandits off the oliban trade routes. Or new hatchlings. Or the promotions in the Firemaids, and who had taken what oaths.

No, he had to talk about the Protectorates—and how much gold was coming in.

She prepared her usual speech about how dragons should work out a system where they’re paid for the services they provide—keeping bandits off the roads and brigands out of the hills, and flying messages. The problem was the role of “Protector” wasn’t codified in Hypatian law.

Her brother had kept the costs, duties, and responsibilities of a Protector vague for a reason.

“Everyone takes a little bit off the tributes we are supposed to be given to keep scale healthy,” the Copper said.

Wistala was distracted by motion caught in the corner of her eye.

The Copper continued: “I think that the men—gaaagk!”

Wistala felt a hard jerk under her jaw. Strangulation—her vision blurred.

A winged shape, smaller than a griffaran, fluttered under her neck and she felt new pressure on her throat.

Her brother had managed to get a griff open—the one on the side where his eye was damaged tended to hang half open or move about on its own, adding to the lopsided look of his features.

He extended his wings and used them to deflect other fliers circling his throat with lengths of chain.

Wistala felt the pressure subside and took a desperate breath. Her brother pulled a length of chain away from her throat with his tail—he couldn’t reach his own but he could get at hers.

Wistala pulled back—hard—and heard a high, metallic ting! as a link parted. Now with the fighting blood running hot in her veins, she lunged and snapped at one of the fliers. She caught it across the back and shook it like a dog killing a rat, flinging it into a corner and going after another.

Leathery flaps covered her eyes. She whipped her neck up hard and heard a satisfying splat as she crushed it against the wet ceiling.

Blinking the sting of the creature’s blood from her eyes, she saw her brother still fighting the chains around his throat.

---