Page 9 of Dragon Slayer

3

AS LONG AS YOU’LL HAVE ME

“Mia?Mia.”

“What? Oh.” She gave herself a mental shake. She was standing in the center of the outdoor arena, sun beating down hot on her face and neck, vision gone blurry behind the lenses of her sunglasses. She was in the middle of teaching a lesson, and she’d spaced out. Again.

Her student, Monica, had pulled her horse up to a halt right in front of Mia, and was currently staring at her with obvious concern, brows drawn together beneath the brim of her helmet. “Mia, are you okay?”

“Yeah. I’m–” The ground tilted dangerously beneath her, and she braced a hand against the horse’s – poor, sweet Gephardt – shoulder to keep her balance. “Fine,” she said. But she wasn’t. Black spots crowded the edges of her vision, and a prickling cold erupted beneath her skin.

Gephardt nudged her shoulder.

“It’s really hot out here,” Monica said. “Maybe you should go sit in the shade a second. Get some water.”

Mia closed her eyes. Monica was right, but Mia hated the fact that she had to be coddled and sent to sip cold drinks like a novice who didn’t know her own body’s limits.

Her head swam, and she managed a nod. “Yeah. Maybe. Okay. I’m sorry–”

“It’s fine,” Monica assured. “Geppie needs a walk break anyway.”

When Mia managed to tip her head back and crack her eyes open, Monica gave her a reassuring smile.

Ugh.

“Alright,” she said, and stepped back from Gephardt’s solid shoulder; managed to walk over to the edge of the arena and the pop-up canopy tent they kept there for just such a purpose. Javier had filled the cooler there with fresh ice and the usual array of drinks: water, Gatorade, Coke, orange juice. Mia sat down in one of the camp chairs and made herself down half a blue Gatorade, stomach churning afterward.

In the arena, Monica let out Gephardt’s reins and the bay stretched his neck gladly, long walking strides eating up the distance across the sand.

Mia was in serious danger of passing out.

Last night, she’d spent half an hour staring at the place on the rug where Val had knelt in front of her, willing him to return. He hadn’t, and so she’d spent those thirty minutes replaying his growl – that’s what it had been: a growl. There was no other word for it. And then, after, his utterly crestfallen expression. The heavy sadness that had pressed lines into his smooth face.

This was getting so out of hand; she could no longer pretend that he was imaginary: this was a flat-out, off the charts hallucination.

But.

But…

She’d tugged the hardback copy ofDraculainto her lap, opened it to the first page, and started reading. She’d read it a number of times, gaining some new insight on each read, coming away from the classic with a tweaked interpretation.

She’d read in fits and starts last night, skipping passages and whole pages. Finally, halfway through, she’d pulled out her phone and Googled Dracula. The usual nonsense results popped up: the count in his high collar, black-and-white movie stills, dozens of variations, plus fanart and fanfiction.

She’d refined her search toreal Dracula. That had yielded a very different result.

Romanian prince born in 1431. Prince of Wallachia. Dubbed “The Impaler” thanks to his penchant for impaling victims on wooden stakes.

There were paintings.

Vlad had indeed had two brothers, one older and one younger. Mircea…

And Radu.

She’d stood up, left her phone on the floor, and gone straight to bed. She’d stared up at the ceiling in the dark and given herself a stern talking-to. It was time to drop this stupid shit. She needed a vacation, or to go on a date. Or, what was most likely to happen, to stop reading so damn many books about made-up stuff and focus instead on qualifying for regionals. The spring show season was melting into summer, and she had a long way to go.

Val was someone she’d conjured for her own amusement, because she clearly wasn’t keeping busy enough.

(A tiny voice whispered:Val might be a new tumor playing kickball with your brain.)

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