Page 99 of On Wings of Blood

“Fine,” he said.

“What?”

“I said ‘fine.’ I’ll take the thing. Where is it?” He looked around as if I might have brought the fluffin with me.

“I... It’s back in the First Year dormitory,” I stuttered. “In Florence Shen’s room. She stitched it up last night. But now he has a fever and it’s getting higher. She doesn’t think he’s going to make it.”

“Is it a he or an it?” Blake asked, looking amused again.

“It’s a he. A male pup.”

“Next you’ll tell me you’ve named the thing.” He shook his head.

“I haven’t. But feel free. Consider it your reward for helping,” I muttered.

“I’ll come by the dormitory in one hour to collect it. I’ll bring a basket to carry it in.”

“Really?” I stared at him in disbelief. I tried to collect myself. “And you’ll talk to your sister? I’m worried about her. Someone could get hurt. What if it had been a child?”

“Aenia wouldn’t do that,” he snapped, with surprising ferocity. “She’d never hurt a child. I said I’ll talk to her.”

I nodded. “Fine.”

He spread his feet. “Well? What are you waiting for? That’s what you came for. Go.”

I shook my head at him in disbelief. What an arrogant self-important asshole. But I didn’t dare say that aloud. If he wanted the entire Dragon Court to himself, he could have it.

I turned my back on him without another word and marched out of the courtyard, through the surrounding cloisters, and back into the hall leading to a row of classrooms. I’d get to the library another way.

But when I reached the empty hallway, I had a change of heart. I stopped, then turned around.

Staying close to the wall, I moved back towards the Dragon Court as quietly as I could.

Blake was still standing there. He glanced around, checking to make sure he was alone.

For a moment, his eyes scanned the spot where I stood, behind a pillar in the cloister and I thought he was going to call me out again. But his eyes moved past. He hadn’t seen me.

He walked towards the red dragon and then past its huge flank. I couldn’t see him for a moment. I stayed where I was, waiting for him to come back.

A moment passed. Then another.

I shifted my position, moving to a different pillar so I’d have a better view.

But there was no one there.

He must have gone behind it. I moved along the row of arched open windows carefully, expecting to see Blake standing in the grove of trees looking down at the sea at any moment.

The grove was empty.

There was no other way out of the Dragon Court besides the way I’d come and the walkway directly across from me, both of which I’d had a clear view of.

He’d disappeared.

CHAPTER 20 - BLAKE

I’d had a fluffin as a child, but it hadn’t been stuffed. It had been real. A snuffling little thing with a tail bigger than its entire body. Father had brought it back from a trip to a dwarven city. I must have been no more than eight years old.

I’d loved the creature. Taken it everywhere with me.

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