Page 20 of Bound to the Orc Warlord

Idespisefailing.

If the dragon hadn’t shown up, she’d still be floating up there, out of my reach.

“It’s too dangerous. We need to move, to keep ahead of the sluagh. Besides which, there’s no one to teach you.”

“There’s him. Draconisreverrer… veverrr…” Her voice trails off into a mumble as she points to the dragon. “Sorry, could you repeat your full name?”

“Drakonisrevener.”

“Do you have a nickname? Something shorter that friends call you?”

“All of my friends are dragons, who can easily say my name.”

“That’s not true.” Ashley smiles like the sun breaking through clouds. “You’remyfriend.”

“I hadn’t thought of this. Now that I’ve left home for my wander years, all the inferior fae will want me for their friend.” He rears up on his back legs and beats his wings, whipping dried leaves from the ground into a mini-tornado. His head bobs up and down, his crest held high.

“Inferior?” A growl rumbles in my chest. Damned dragons, thinking they rule all of Alarria, instead of only their territory in the Dular Mountains.

Midnight snorts a laugh. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, youngling.”

“I will be mighty!”

“Yeah, yeah,” the unicorn says. “Get back to me in a couple of centuries when you’ve got some growth on you.”

Drakonisrevener gives an angry hiss and spreads his wings wide.

“Hey, okay.” My bride pats at the air with her palms. “Everybody chill.”

I frown at her. “The morning is not that cold.”

She laughs, and the high, sweet sound sweeps through me, brushing away much of my ire. “It’s a saying. What I mean is… let’s find a compromise.”

“There can be no compromise,” I say. “We must travel.”

“There’s got to besomething.” Her green eyes beseech me.

“We can try small things,” the dragon says. “Control exercises.”

“Yes!” My bride beams at me, her face as bright as the sun, her floating hair a corona of flames.

I’m used to command, used to enforcing my will on unruly orcs, yet I cannot deny her this. I give a sharp nod.

I place Ashley in the saddle facing forward, and she grips the pommel to keep herself in place instead of floating upward like that first time. Not that the pants she now wears would allow for a sight of her lovely buttocks bound in that damnable scrap of pink fabric.

When I mount behind her, I secure her to me with the rope. Which doesn’t stop me from wrapping an arm around her to hold her close.

Midnight offers an amused snort when the dragon flies up to perch on her withers, facing us, his talons gripping her silky mane.

His long neck snakes back until he looks at her. “It’s an honor to serve a dragon.”

“It’s an honor to ride a unicorn,” she says and takes off at a fast trot that makes him flare his wings to catch his balance.

“So about a nickname,” Ashley says. “Can I call you Drake?”

“It’s a special friend name?” He cocks his head to the side to watch her with one amber eye.

She nods. “A special friend name.”

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