Page 62 of The Monster at the End of This Molt

"You make it sound so easy," Robin said. "Do you think our littlest will stay behind the rest?"

I tucked him to my chest and rested my chin on top of his head. "No. She'll catch up."

"You think she's a she?"

"Yep."

"Whatcha gonna name her?"

"We'll have to wait and see." The boys had already finished their meals and were trying to find a way down from the table. They reminded me of their namesakes because they were so small. "Let's see how easily they learn this latrine business."

"You go ahead," he said. "I'll see if our little girl is still taking on slick, and then I'll join you."

I set the boys on the floor, and they immediately went to the front door. I could already tell Boober's personality was more snarky than scared. He looked up at me like he knew exactly where the door led, and it was my job to open it for him.

He was right. I would be their humble and adoring servant if they let me. I opened the door. They raced across the dark porch and leaped into the sunlight. The drop-off was only two feet or so, but no one hesitated.

"If your brother jumped off a bridge, you'd follow him. Got it." I laughed and followed, too. The moment I stepped into the sunlight and saw where they were running, my heart stopped in my chest. A small dragon leaned toward them, snout down to the ground in front of their wings.

Not a dragon. A dragonet. I recognized the surge of pride and happiness through my bond with Kermit. I put my hand up to shield the sunlight from my eyes, and the green of his scales was much easier to see. He dropped down on all fours and spread out in the long grass, letting our boys walk all over him.

"Missing. Where?"

At a poker party, Mac had told me the story of Rapture the dragonet's infatuation with Opal before she was even born. Kobold and dragonet were still great friends, though Opal had a much closer bond with her dragon sibling.

"You sly devil," I said to Kermit. "Are you leaving me for our daughter?"

"Missing," he insisted, nosing each boy in turn."Where?"

"She hasn't hatched yet. You'll see her soon enough."

That satisfied him. He rolled onto his back and raised his wings to form a makeshift playpen for our curious boys.

"Kermit!" Robin caught on faster than I did. "What are you doing?"

"Family. Play. Fun."

"Are they playing?" Robin figured it out before I tried to translate Kermit's strange snippets of feelings and images into words. I didn't know if any of my guesses were right. I figured if none of the mental images looked like food or fight, our boys were safe with him.

"They'll sleep well, I hope. How is she?"

"Still absorbing slick." He shrugged. "Alma says it happens. It could be tomorrow, or it could be a week from tomorrow." Robin pointed at Kermit, who rolled over and deposited our boys in the grass. They landed on their feet and started running toward us, but Kermit squeaked and pointed their wing to the makeshift latrine I'd dug earlier in the week. The boys understood him and dashed toward the latrine, instead.

With a surge of satisfaction through our bond, Kermit leaped into the air. Once he had enough height to clear the houses, he turned toward the dragonet barn.

"Dragonets are smarter than we give them credit," I said. Kermit had been interested in my work around the house to get it ready for our hatchlings. Through our bond, he must have been tagging along more often than I knew, and he was better at reading my mind than I was at reading his.

"Mac's been trying to tell us that for years," Robin said. "Is it just me, or is this too easy?"

I laughed and pulled him closer to me. "Kobolds are easier than humans in some ways," I reminded him, "and harder in others."

"Ugh. Magic. I swear to the gods, if our little girl takes after Clementine with her haphazard spell casting?—"

"She won't. She has me." He glanced up at me, and I couldn't resist a smug grin. "Clementine would be a better spell caster, too, if she took a class or two with me."

"I bet you twenty U.S. dollars Clem will refuse to take a class with you."

"You're on." I'd never been a gambler, but the silly bets Robin and his family placed on everything had made an impression. Besides, I had already taught Clementine a magic suppression spell while she waited for her dad to finish grading papers one afternoon. Convincing her to spend an hour learning more spells would be easy-peasy, unless someone else bribed her first.

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