and vicious and cold; and you know in that second that you’ll never meet someone as deadly as—”
“Please stop.” Bram realized he was panting.
“We’ve been friends a long time, Bram. Do you really think I’ve forgotten?”
“I didn’t think you’d noticed.” No one else ever had—especially Ghleanna.
“Ghleanna is like the rest of her kin. Wonderful, but dense as thick marble.”
“That’s lovely, Rhiannon.”
“I adore them all but you need to be more direct with them when you want something.”
“She doesn’t know I exist. She never has.”
“Because you aren’t direct with her. You’re direct with everyone else, but once Ghleanna comes around you’re suddenly a shy schoolboy.”
“So? I should be like Feoras the Fighter instead?”
Rhiannon winced. “Heard about that, did you?”
“Everyone’s heard about it because the bastard’s told everyone.”
“That annoying little rodent. I should have his veins removed.” When Bram didn’t say anything, Rhiannon noted, “No calls for mercy, peacemaker?”
“Not this time, no. And stop looking at me like that. I never like cruelty from anyone. So it’s not as if I’m being particularly vicious here.”
“It’s endearing that you think not calling for mercy is vicious.” Rhiannon waved all that away with her claw. “Look, when it comes to males, Ghleanna the Black doesn’t know what she wants. So you’ll have to show her.”
“Show her?”
“It’s the perfect time. She’s absolutely ripe for the plucking.”
Bram blinked. “What?”
“Vulnerable. That’s the word. So it’s the perfect time for a good, worthy dragon to swoop in and get her.”
“Rhiannon!”
“What? I’m only trying to help.”
“That’s not helpful. That’s sneaky and deceitful.”
She gave a soft snort. “Two words you’re well acquainted with.”
“Only when we’re discussing politics. Ghleanna is not politics. She’s . . . she’s . . .”
“Scarred? Perfectly, perfectly scarred?”
“Stop, Rhiannon.”
“So many scars,” the viper whispered in Bram’s ear. “All from the different weapons of those trying to kill her. She has a scar here”—her tail drew a long diagonal line across Bram’s back—“from hip to shoulder where an ogre from the Dark Hills tried to cut her in half. He didn’t succeed, though. And Ghleanna slaughtered their entire army. And when the healers sewed her up”—Rhiannon went on—“she insisted on being awake so that she’d fully understand that even a moment of being unaware had drastic consequences.”
She pulled back slightly. “Why, Bram, you’re shaking.”
Because he was desperately trying to control his cock. It wouldn’t do to get hard in front of his queen. No matter what the vision of Ghleanna getting her battle wounds tended did to him.
“You’re cruel, Rhiannon. You were cruel when we were young—and you’re cruel now.”
“My mother was cruel, Lord Bram. I’m merely honest.” She kissed his snout. “And don’t ever say I’m not a good friend. I’m the best friend a dragon like you could hope for.”
He turned slightly, both of them very close to each other, and smiled. “Best friend, my ass.”
She laughed until that black snout pushed between them, forcing them apart, pitch black smoke streaming from the nostrils.
“Oh, hello, my love,” Rhiannon said to her consort. “I was just giving Bram here a pep talk before he goes to face those difficult Sand Dragons. Wasn’t I, Bram?”
“Uh . . . yes. She was.”
“Now go with my blessing. And good luck to you.”
Please don’t hug me. Please don’t hug me.
But she did.
Ghleanna waited outside the Queen’s Privy Chamber, not surprised when she heard her brother’s roar and the silver-haired royal slid-stumbled into the alcove, shoved there, no doubt by her intolerant kin.
“What were you thinking?” Ghleanna asked Bram without rancor. “Hugging her like that?”
“I didn’t hug her. She hugged me!”
“Uh-huh.”
A squeal came from the chamber and Rhiannon called out, “Bercelak! Put me down, you low-born bastard!” Although she didn’t sound nearly as angry as she wanted to.
“We better go,” Ghleanna offered, heading down the alcove.
“Yes, but—”
“No, Bercelak!” the queen cried out. “Not the collar! Not the chain! You bastard!”
“Stand there any longer, royal, and you’ll get a visual you’ll not forget for a very long while.”
Bram rushed up behind her, his eyes focused on the ground, his silver scales nearly glowing from embarrassment.
“That was . . . awkward.”
“Get used to it. Them two like to play their games.” Ghleanna shrugged. “And who are we to stop them? If it makes them happy.”
“I don’t mind what they do together. I just hate it when they involve the rest of us.”
“Then you shouldn’t be hugging the queen.”
“I didn’t hug the bloody queen!”
“If you want to believe that.”
Once out of the court, they headed to one of the exits that would lead them from Devenallt Mountain, the long-time Southland Dragon power stronghold and home to their reigning monarch.
“Look,” Ghleanna continued, “all I’m saying is that you’re my responsibility until this gets done. So perhaps you could not get me and yourself killed in the process. But especially me. I’m the most important.”
“I’ll do my best and yes, you heard sarcasm.”
Ghleanna stopped and faced the royal she was tasked with protecting. He was taller than she, but so were her brothers, and she could take most of them in a fight.
