Page 21 of Dragon Lord
The front of her shirt was wet.
Draknart swallowed a groan.“I best clean up myself.”
He strode to the lake and walked in, ducked under the water, and held his breath, swimming far and fast.
Don’t think about Einin.
Think about Fae Land.
In the cold water, little by little, his mind settled.He had to have the curse removed.That was the whole purpose of their journey.
As the faerie circle has been destroyed, could it also be rebuilt?
He supposed he could put the stones back together.But what about the magic of the place?Would Belinus himself be needed for the opening of the portal?Were the circle whole again, would the god come?
Draknart surfaced in the middle of the lake without any answers.And he didn’t gain any sudden insight while he swam back to shore, either.He walked out onto the sand as frustrated as when he’d walked in, shook the water out of his hair, then returned to Einin.
She offered him a hind leg of rabbit on the tip of her sword.He shook his head.He was tired of bite-sized meals.
She kept her gaze on him as she ate a lean strip of roasted meat.“Do you not eat when you’re a man?”
He ran his tongue over his incisors.“I dislike the dull teeth and lack of claws.Hunting and eating with them isn’t worth the bother.”
She ate half the rabbit and left the other half for morning.
“Thank you for my dinner,” she said, almost pleasantly.Then her gaze hardened, sharpened as she added, “When you turn into dragon at dawn… Donotput me in your mouth while I’m sleeping.Not even just to taste me.”
He grunted.
She would not let it be.“How would you feel if someone put you in their mouth while you slept?”
For the love of dragonkind…Her words heated Draknart’s body and had him hardening all over.“I would not mind.”
“I do.”She fixed him with a glare, her hand moving to the pommel of her sword.
Chapter7
Draknart grumbled with displeasure.“Aye.I will not taste you again.”He couldn’t resist adding, “I give you my word as a dragon.”
Einin gave a brief nod, then curled up next to the fire and closed her eyes.
He watched her for a while—soft cheeks, graceful neck, full lips, and lovely hips, those long legs, encased in nothing but britches.The longer he watched her, the hotter the fire felt.Since dragons, in general, weren’t known for their self-restraint, he stood and strode into the forest.
He wasn’t tired; he’d woken up from a long slumber mere days ago.He wasn’t hungry for meat; the deer herd he’d eaten had filled him up.He stalked through the forest for a while, hoping he might come across a bear he could wrestle for entertainment, but the bears stayed out of his way.The predators in the area had scented the dragon, and none would come near.At least, that meant Einin had nothing to fear, sleeping by the fire.
Draknart strode toward the faerie circle.He could not give up just yet.The gate was the key.
The sight of the toppled stones filled him with fury anew.If he ever got his hands on the men who’d done the destruction… For the first time, he thought smoke might come out of his ears instead of his nostrils.
If anger could rebuild the gate, it would have been standing already.But it couldn’t, so Draknart was going to have to do it the hard way.
He stomped to the nearest boulder and heaved until he righted it.Even if the circle never worked again… Mayhap he was sentimental, but he’d seen those stones erected.The men and women had been coarser and at the same time more refined than the ones in the villages now.They had respected the old gods and followed the old ways.There had been something sacred in their creating of the stone circle, so Draknart had watched them from the shadows and hadn’t eaten a single one.
Even the old gods had come to the circle, their curiosity aroused.The clearing had been a holy glen of theirs to begin with.They were so pleased with the humans’ gift, they made the stone circle into a gate.
Draknart lifted and heaved boulders that had taken ropes and oxen to raise back in the day.He put his shoulder into the work, uncaring of cuts and scrapes.Only when the circle stood once again, the sky lightening with the first rays of the sun, did he limp back to Einin.
By the time she sleepily blinked her eyes open, he was once again a dragon.
