I am Dragon (Dragon Fires Rising Book 2) by Marc Secchia (famous ebook reader TXT) 📕

intimacy. We’re taught it’s not the warrior way, that males exist to serve us with their gifts and talents. Emotion is excess. Yet I have seen how you are with Princess Azania. I saw her as competition. Can I be honest with you?

He purred encouragement.

As she spoke, her voice took on more of that exotic, lyrical quality which had kept him spellbound from the very first. Dragon, when I said I chose you, I think I meant a male in the image in my mind. I became confused. Seeing you here amongst our kind … I would still choose you in a heartbeat, but not with the arrogance I showed before. I am sorry I put you down, treating you as the lesser creature. You see, I feel a very great weight of expectation upon me as the daughter of Charielle, one expected to lead the Isles Dragonesses one day, and I bowed to that pressure. Tradition. Values and conduct. I’m not sure the Dragonesses know what to make of you – a male who cannot be cowed, who has artistic gifts, yet prefers a totally different way of … being.

The Dragon Rider question has thrown us all into a tailspin. That is what I was dealing with when I dismissed you so harshly, and unfairly. I demanded you be normal according to my norms. That was wrong. Perhaps it is us who are not normal.

Working that out would be hard. Her tone said she understood nuance, another matter upon which he had concluded she fell short. Had he entirely misjudged her hearts’ fires?

Carefully, he said, We’re different. Neither way is right or wrong, Aria. A warrior’s skills are not honed overnight. Nor is any relationship.

Am I too much – those razor wings? Can you be you, and not be sliced apart?

He reflected aloud, I find Azerim’s whole family dynamic very hard. They’re so close. So perfect. I never had that. Neither did Azania, nor you, I’ve come to realise.

The Cobalt Dragoness sighed, I’m trying to say something, but it’s not coming out very well.

What’s that?

I – she drew her gorgeously patterned wings over her eyes, as if she could neither bear to see his reaction, nor hear his words – I don’t just like you, Dragon. I … something-other … you.

Chapter 38: New Beginnings

DRAGON FOUND HIS VOICE in an incredulous snort, You something-other me? Aria!

A lot! she insisted, but did not come out of hiding.

He plucked playfully at the silky edges of her butterfly-like wings. You are something else. Something and someone special. I sense you might be referring to a something-other in which our feelings … wing together, as one.

Her eye peeked out of the wing folds for a second. You something-other me, too?

I rather think so. Although, I would perhaps have put all that something and a lot of other into different words. If we are talking about the same something other, and not another something. Now, will you come out?

No.

No?

I’m too shy.

He burst out laughing. Forgive me, but here’s a side of you I never quite imagined.

It’s just – in this culture, the female always makes the something-other-ish declaration first, do you see? But I want to honour you and your ways.

Dragon eyed the fierce warrior with consternation, rising respect and no little indecision. She truly was trying! Words led to direct, uncompromising action in her worldview. There was no wastage of sentiment – which meant, by extension, that she was not playing the tease here. She knew what she wanted, but a pause to rethink what it meant to him was precious beyond measure.

Perhaps she only needed help framing her response.

Unfurling his wing, he caressed the length of her back with the sensitive tip. Something-other like this?

The fires of her half-hidden gaze whitened. Umm …

And this? With his forepaw, he cupped her chin, and stroked the pulse of her neck, before circling the scales beside her eye with his thumb. I something-other you, Ariamyrielle Seaspray.

She shivered at his touch. I … oh, Dragon!

There might be details and complications to work out, he whispered, but you need to understand, in every part of your being, how deeply I care for you. You are worth caring for, Aria. You deserve every breath we share.

The Dragoness made that same keening sound she had made when faced with the possibility of her kin attacking a brash male and ending him there and then. Her wings folded back a little, framing her slim, elegant muzzle.

He said, I’m not one for the standard storyline, razor wings. I never have been. Maybe it’s to do with the strangeness of my birth and heritage, maybe to do with the way I grew up. We are good for one another, better together than apart. I don’t apologise for not following the standard script. I was fireless, yet I kidnapped the first Princess to be kidnapped in over thirty years. I value Human companionship, honouring a Dragon Rider. I breathe white fires and thrill to the presence of the ocean. I don’t know whether, one day, I will feel the need to migrate with my kind. Do you think you’ll be able to put up with all that?

Putting up with you is awfully hard, Dragon, she smiled, lying through her fangs.

I thought so. That’s why you’re allowing this big, bold male to trap you against this boulder and whisper sweet somethings into your ears.

I’m fighting talon and fang here, but I just can’t seem to escape.

Actually, her hearts were thrashing as if she were in the throes of mortal combat. He did not point out the obvious, however. Not when she seemed to be exploring a new freedom of being in her own right, a way of romancing a male that had to be entirely alien to her