Page 4 of Rejected By Dragons

The fire behind my ribs is so hot I can hardly stand it, but it's trapped inside. Useless as always.

"Maybe we could cut her open," Jasmine's friend Bianca suggests. I catch a glimpse of her over Jasmine's shoulder. Her teeth are showing, and my pulse rate spikes even higher. "See if there's really a dragon in there or not."

"Guys," Fury chides from over to the side. There's no heat to his warning, though.

A different kind of anger bubbles up within me. A colder one.

The crown prince of the Air Kingdom can barely muster the interest to stop his girlfriend from flaying me open.

As if to remind me exactly how close she is to doing that and more, Jasmine shoves me harder into the wall. She traces her claw down my throat, and I can't breathe.

"One day, Zephyr will step down," she reminds me. "Fury will be king, and I'll be his queen. You think you've had it bad this past decade?"

"Um, I wouldn't exactly call this a picnic," I manage, but my voice is strangled.

She digs her nail in, drawing blood just above my collar, and I suck in a ragged breath.

Quieter, even more darkly, she hisses, "King Zephyr may have forbidden any harm coming to you. But his protection won't last forever."

His protection. I just barely keep in my snort.

The king outlaws any citizen of the realm from doing any irreparable damage to another. The fact that murdering me is off the menu is a happy side-effect, at least from my perspective. But I'm well aware that that's all it is. King Zephyr isn't looking out for the welfare of his most downtrodden, vulnerable subjects. He's just trying to keep temperamental dragons from killing each other off and reducing our numbers.

If I got hurt, he wouldn't care.

No one would. Except...

Well.

Jasmine draws her claw farther down my sternum. The fabric of my shirt splits open, and tears well up in my eyes. Maybe she'll keep going. Maybe she'll shred the thing and leave me naked here in an alley, blood welling up from the line she's carved into my skin.

It wouldn't be the first time.

Today, she stops an inch away from the center of my bra, leaving me some scrap of dignity, but her point is made. My shirt is ruined.

And my place at the very bottom of the food chain has been established yet again.

She flicks her nail against my cheek, and I feel droplets of my own blood spattering from the impact. "Run home to Mommy, welp." One corner of her mouth draws up into a twisted, cruel smile. "Oh, wait, that's right. You don't have one."

My chest wants to cave in. My vision blurs.

Somehow, I keep it together as she takes a step back. Every part of me is shaking.

"Come on." Jasmine reinserts herself by Fury's side, and he curls a possessive arm around her. "Let's go." She glances at me in disgust. "Something here reeks."

"Sure thing, babe." He leans down and kisses her, clearly proud of her cruelty.

I want to be sick.

I stand dead still, glued to the wall as the gaggle of them saunters away. It's pathetic, standing here after they've had their fun tormenting me. My eyes and heart both burn.

What am I supposed to do, though?

And shouldn't I be used to this by now?

Fury, Jasmine and their band of sycophants have been torturing me since the moment I set foot in this town. It's fun for them, I guess. They get to assert their dominance and work some sadism out of their systems. I'm easy pickings. An outcast. Defective.

I swab at my face.

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