‘…and I need your insight into which of the squads is themostexperienced and steady—who has the maturity to have her near and treat her as a sister, or an ally, not a target for their lust—or rage?’
Kgosi snorted as I reached him outside, turning his great body to follow me back to the stables. I was walking so fast I almost ran.
‘Are human men capable of denying themselves lust for the flesh?’
I eyed him from the side. Kgosi was well past mating age—generally dragons began the search for a mate at around a century. Yet my dragon had remained alone for over two hundred years.
“I suppose you’re right,” I muttered as I trotted next to him. “I doubt I could have remained unattached for this long without you. But that only begs the question, how do I ask hundreds of men to keep their eyes down and hands at their sides when they don’t have dragons who’ve vowed celibacy?”
Kgosi snorted.‘I’m not avowed to remain unmated.’
I blinked and stopped. “But, years ago you said—”
‘I said that the Creator has never revealed a mate for my future, and so until He does, I will remain unattached.’
I frowned. “Kgosi, you told me Icouldn’tmarry.”It had been a blow to me in those early years. The death of a dream—though an ill-fated one. We humans couldn’t expect fated matebonds the way dragons did. We usually chose our mates as best we could. Spoke vows and built marriages and families. But Furyknights rarely married, and those who did faced a life-long battle for their loyalty and time. Most women weren’t happy to take a husband they could see only in the short hours between his shifts—when he was already exhausted—and going weeks or months with no contact at all when he was training or fighting elsewhere. Not to mention, sharing his heart with his dragon to whom hewasDivinely bonded, and who was in his head, and nevernotpresent in some way.
Kgosi didn’t meet my eye, but he snorted smoke from his nose.‘I told you that we shared a destiny.’
“And you saidyourswas to remain alone!”
If Kgosi were a human, he would have shrugged.‘If the Creator has not revealed a path, I will not assume to walk it.’
I was stunned. My already overloaded mind spinning. But I didn’t have time to hash this out with him now. And chances were, he was only challenging these preconceptions of mine to keep me thinking and open-minded. He’d done it countless times before—making me question assumptions and look at the world in new ways.
“Well, regardless, it doesn’t matter. I have no time or energy left for a wife anyway,” I muttered, though that pinch was back in my chest that I hadn’t felt in ten years. “If there was a woman for me, she has long married elsewhere,” I muttered. “Besides, with a female Flameborne and war on the horizon, taking a wife now would befoolish.”
‘Only a fool would tell God what He cannot do,’Kgosi growled.
I shot him a look from the side—but before I could come up with a suitably cutting response, a dragon’s shriek rose from the stables.
Kgosi’s head snapped up and he snorted again—smoke and steam erupting from his nostrils. I went still, listening—then frowned when I heard the low, rumbling hum of an agitated crowd.
‘The girls,’was all Kgosi sent, then flowed forward in that impossibly quick serpentine of which the dragons were capable but rarely demonstrated outside of mortal risk.
“Kgosi! Wait!”
But my dragon was gone. Whipping into the stable building, he disappeared from sight in seconds.
I tore after him, through the eastern doors into the oddly almost-empty center aisle, around the corner and down the north wing towards the main entrance, only to find my dragon, head low and wings high,roaringat a milling, noisy crowd that had gathered outside Akhane’s stable.
7. Protect at All Costs
~ BREN ~
I stood in the shadow of the stable below the windows on the external wall which were so high only Akhane could see out of them. I couldn’t even reach to pull myself out of them and escape.
Akhane paced the stable in front of me, ears flattened back against her spiny skull, her wings high and fluttering agitatedly as she hissed and snaked her neck whenever one of the men drew too near. Which happened a lot as the crowd outside grew, pressing those already in the doorway closer.
I could feel her panic rising and I didn’t know what to do.
There was acrowdof men outside the stable. My heart raced so fast I could barely breathe.
It had all started innocently enough—the stableboy that the Commander ordered to help us brought the cot for me. His name was Benji. He was skinny, nervous, and reminded me of neighbor boys back on the farm: Cocky, adventurous, and often running full-tilt into every situation, heedless of the feelings of others.
Benji chattered as he set up the cot for me, telling me about the stable and the dragons—he announced proudly that he’d already been working here fortwo months,so he knew everything now.
But when he brought blankets he also left the stable door open behind him. And every time someone passed, they looked in, their gazes curious and sometimes cold.
