Page 27 of Wings of Frost and Fury
“I’m… human,” he says thickly.
“Only for about six hours. Perhaps a bit less, perhaps more. We’ll see. I hope your friend has made himself comfortable—he’s going to be stuck in the stable for quite some time. I’m really quite angry with him about my horse Verda. She and I were friends for years. When someone hurts a friend of mine, they suffer for it.”
I try to keep my voice level and cold, but it breaks on the word “suffer.”
“I am sorry for that,” Ashvelon says. “I didn’t know what he was planning to do, or I would have tried to stop him.”
“Thank you.” I nod. “I did notice that you hissed at him after he did it, as if you were angry at his cruelty. That’s what made me like you, right from the start. I know that dragons have to eat, but…”
Fuck, I can’t talk about this anymore, or I’ll start sobbing.
I rise from the casting circle, collect my spell supplies, and tuck them back into my bag. Sobs keep rising in my throat, collecting into a horrible lump of unvoiced grief. After slinging the bag across my body and settling it against my hip, I raise my hands and blast a hole in the stable wall. I feel the jolt of energy as the act punches an opening in the magical seal as well. The rest of the stable is still shielded, and the central barrier is intact, so I’m not concerned about one small aperture.
I stalk outside, leaving the dragon alone for a moment to cope with his new form, while I attempt to grapple with my shattered heart.
Clamping my hand to my mouth, fighting the tears, I walk blindly to the nearest tree and prop my shoulder against it, withmy back toward the stable. My grief over Verda, sublimated while I dealt with the dragons, hits me like a blow to the stomach. I bend over, smothering a whimper of pain.
I loved her. She was mine. My only companion. She couldn’t speak, and yet she managed to express so much. Crotchety though she was, especially during her heat, that mare knew how much I needed her. She loved me with an indulgent, annoyed kind of fondness.
Words cannot express how much I want to kill the other dragon, the older one with the lighter gray scales and the scarred wings—the one who ate her. He is a creature of fury and savagery, an instrument of death. Maybe I should go into the other half of the stable and end him. But that would be an act of enmity. It might confirm to the dragons that I’m a killer like my father. That’s the last thing I want.
I’d like to help the surviving dragons and mitigate the harm my father did. But I’m not quite sure how to do that, not with my heart aching this badly.
A shuffling noise startles me, and I spin around to see Ashvelon crawling out of the stable. Apparently he felt compelled to follow me before he even figured out how to walk.
The sight of a handsome, naked man crawling toward me on hands and knees is enough to startle me out of my grief for the moment. I welcome the mercy of the distraction.
“You didn’t have to follow me,” I tell him. “I would have come back to help you.”
“You seemed distressed.”
He has just been thrust into a brand-new body. He should be completely and rightfully absorbed with himself at the moment, and yet he’s concerned aboutme.
“You don’t even know me,” I whisper.
I’m not sure Ashvelon hears the words. He pauses in his slow progress, running his hand over the grass. His fingers closeon a small blue flower. “Exquisite,” he murmurs. “The whole world feels so different.”
To my surprise, he drops face-down into the grass and spreads his limbs wide. I can’t help releasing a tiny laugh at the sight of him. He’s so intense about what he’s experiencing. He inhales the grass and the fragrance of the meadow flowers like they’re his last breath.
He lifts his head to look up at me, joy flooding his expression. “I can feel everything. Smell everything. Taste—” He takes a mouthful of the fresh green grass.
His face changes instantly. He tries to spit out the grass, then attempts to pluck the pieces off his tongue. “Why do horses eat this?”
“Because it tastes good to them. You’re not a horse, silly. You’re a human.”
“But I have seen humans eat leaves.”
“Some kinds of leaves, yes. Don’t dragons eat vegetables?”
“Tubers, mushrooms, cresslily stalks, seaweed. Those taste much better thangrass.” He pushes more of it out of his mouth with his tongue.
“Come on.” I hold out my hand. “I can provide you with something to eat. I promise it will taste far sweeter.”
There’s a potential innuendo in that promise, but I tell myself I only intend to feed him actual food. I’m not planning to let him feast on me.
With my help, Ashvelon struggles to his feet. He leans on me heavily as he shuffles one foot forward, then the other.
I underestimated how good it would feel to have his tall, warm, naked body pressed against me, to have his strong left arm draped across my shoulders and his right hand clasping my waist. There’s a ticklish heat tracing between my legs, a flush of arousal all over my skin. To distract myself, I focus on the bloodstain in the meadow, but it hurts too much to look at it for long. I suck in a harsh breath and turn my gaze away.
