Page 58 of Blood of Wolves

When the apprentice moved to help him, Klemens took the harness into his own hands and did so instead. The Dead Guard, as a rule, did not entrust the safety of their master to others – which made this whole scenario that much more difficult, he realized, as Klemens finished cinching the belt and lifted his face, expression grave and penetrating.

“My lord,” he said, quietly, “you need not do this.”

Náli kicked his chin up. “I do, actually. The faster the siege at Aeres is lifted, the faster I can return to Naus and go down into the well. That’s what you all want, isn’t it? This is the most expedient way to reach that end,” he said, coldly, and stepped around him.

Only to be nearly bowled over by the little drake. By Valgrind. He had named the damn thing, after all.

“Manners,” Náli chided, holding up both hands.

Valgrind only warbled happily, licked his gloved palms, and then closed his eyes and shoved his face into them, asking to be petted.

Náli sighed – but scratched him up behind his horns in the way he liked. “You stupid thing,” he chided, and Valgrind made another happy noise in his throat.

“Finally,” Oliver’s voice called – from above. Náli craned to look around Valgrind and found him already mounted on Percy’s back, looking small and nearly fragile up there so high, like an infant perched on a warhorse.

It should have been a comical sight, but Náli found he couldn’t laugh. In patchwork armor, and a plumed helmet not unlike his own, Oliver looked easy and confident astride the beast, settled in his skin in a way he never had before.

He truly was a Drake, and all the old legends were true, apparently.

But that didn’t mean this would all work out so easily for Náli, who, magic or no, didn’t have his mind linked with that of a drake.

Valgrind nudged his shoulder, and even if he was a stupid baby, Náli wished he was riding the dragon who clearly liked him so much, rather than Percy’s stoic mate.

“Come on, Náli,” Oliver said. “Kat’s ready.”

Náli shot him a glare. “I refuse to call her that. You can’t name a dragon Kat.”

Oliver laughed, unbothered. “I already did.”

“No, because I forbid it.”

“This way, my lord,” Snorri said. “We’ve already saddled her.”

And so they had. She stood beside Percy, head ducked as she cleaned the sharp white claws of her foreleg with a blue tongue. Like Percy, she wore a saddle secured with girth and breastplate, and a strange, bitless bridle whose reins were secured down the length of her neck with straps and rings. She paused in her ministrations and lifted her head, cocked it warily as Náli approached. Her blue eyes were narrow, and questioning, and all at once Náli went from nervous to petrified. This wouldn’t work. She wouldn’t allow him to mount. Or, worse, she would roll over in the sky and dump him once they got up in the air.

But then she turned her head sharply to the side, and regarded Oliver a moment. Oliver stared at her in a speaking way, and goosebumps broke out beneath Náli’s clothes. He’d never been in the company of another magic-user, or if he had, it had been his own father, and he couldn’t remember the man. The hair prickled at his nape, and though he had no idea what was said, he could sense that communication passed between man and beast. When the drake turned back to him, it was with a softer gaze, and she lowered her head to snuffle at his chest, her breath cold when it struck the exposed skin of his neck. He suppressed a shudder.

Oliver said, “You may not be able to speak to her directly, but she doesn’t dislike you. She’s agreed to let you fly with her. I think she’ll listen to leg and rein commands.”

“You think,” Náli deadpanned, and reached up to stroke the pearl-slick scales of her face. She closed her eyes and leaned into the touch.

“I know she will,” Oliver corrected himself. “She knows that you’re a friend.”

“Oh. Well. So long as she knows that.”

“Náli,” Oliver said, drawing his gaze, his own serious when Náli finally met it. “It’s not too late to–”

“I dare you to say ‘back out of this.’ I’m notyou, your lordship. I’m no craven, soft Southerner who’s never–”

“My lord.”

Mattias’s voice. His tone low, but the words wrapping around Náli’s throat like a hand and choking off the rest of his ill-advised insult.

He turned, pulse a high drumbeat in his ears, and found his captain standing two paces behind him, Náli’s sheathed sword cradled in his arms like a babe.

Why weren’t you there when I woke?

Were you the one who carried me?

---