Page 10 of Wickedly Ever After
“Very nice. What do you call this one?” he asked, gesturing to the sculpture.
“The Quintessence of Being,” Alistair said. With a broad slap of his large hand, he carved off a substantial chunk of semi-soft lava. It shuddered in the air and fell from the pedestal as a pyroclastic cloud. “I know why you’re here, and you’re wasting your time. I won’t do it. Find another dragon. There must be any number of hotshots who want the notoriety.”
“Notoriety is not the point,” Hector said. “Alistair, you are the prince. Every Flamelord for the last thousand years starts his reign by kidnapping a princess. Your father did. Your grandfather did. Your great-grandfather—”
“And my great-great-great-grandfather did, yes, I know. You sound like Dad. But it’s not for me. I don’t want to be the Flamelord. I’m an artist. And I don’t want to take an innocent girl, trap her in a cave, and fight some stupid prince when I wanted nothing to do with it in the first place.”
“It’s not like that at all, not now,” Hector said, seriously disturbed. “It’s not a real fight—no magical weapons allowed. And your scales will turn any blade that isn’t enchanted.”
“Dad got wounded.”
“That was a…misunderstanding.” It wouldn’t be happening again. A stint in his dungeon had taught that royal fool a lesson.
“Well, if dragons aren’t supposed to be wounded and it happened anyway, what makes you think the princess actually wants to be shut up in a cave and kept as a prisoner until she’s rescued? What if she wanted to rescue herself? What if she didn’t want to be a princess at all? Have you ever thought about that?”
“Frankly, no,” he said. “That’s not my department. But I can assure you that the princess doesnotwant to rescue herself and shedoeswant to be a princess. It’s all included in the spell.”
Alistair snorted sparks. “Yeah, right. Because you say so, it has to be true.”
“Fine. Don’t fight the prince. Leave the princess in the cave and come right home. I’ll find some way of making it work—an illusion of some kind, perhaps. But you can’t overturn centuries’ worth of tradition because of human feelings.”
“Maybe they are dragon feelings. Did you ever consider that?”
Hector’s lips trembled, curled.Oh no. No, no, no, no.He laughed.
Alistair caught him full in the face with a blast of ultra-hot dragon fire and roasted him like a marshmallow.
***
Adair was incensed. He stormed off to Alistair’s room, promising to ground him for the rest of his life.
Morga bandaged Hector tenderly, apologizing until she literally turned blue in the face.
Pocket, bless his kind heart, wrapped Hector carefully in blankets, tucked him in the basket, and ran all the way home with him.
Tinbit, all concern and very little sarcasm, made Pocket tellhim what happened about ten times while he undressed Hector and hissed with sympathy over the crispy bits while Hector tried to assure him he’d gotten worse in his lifetime, which he had, but a very long time ago, back when the dragons were wild, ungoverned, and particularly suspicious of wicked witches, who compelled them to fight in the wars. What was wrong with kids these days? No respect and irresponsible to boot. But he would have handled it better if he hadn’t been laughing.
Hector glanced again at the unfinished letter lying on his bathtub writing table.
He crumpled it up and grabbed a fresh sheet of paper.
If Ida wanted war with him, he’d give her one.
5
Ida
Hector,
That was uncalled for. I meant no harm with my laughing charm, and if you found a way to get yourself barbecued as a result, it’s not my fault. If you want to stop our correspondence, I can assure you, it won’t bother me to take you off my mailing list.
I hope you got second-degree burns.
Ida North
A teardrop splashed onto the creamy white paper Ida was writing on and blurred the ink. A tiny little laughing charm, that’s all it was. His retaliation was unconscionable, and if she hadn’t been so angry, she would’ve summoned him up and yelled at him face to face in the crystal ball. But her face was puffy from crying all night, and she’d never let him see he’d made her cry. Never. That ass of a man! Now she was crying again.
A timid knock on the door made her wipe her eyes hastily. “Come in, Hari.”
