“We’ve been in negotiations,” I tell her. “I want to come hang out with you guys, but Dragix isn’t the biggest fan of the Braxians.”
Understatement of the century.
“That’s why I’m here,” she says. “We need your help.”
“I’m listening.”
Dragix is silent beside me, a huge blue-and-green guard dog, as Ivy paces on the riverbank across from us.
“Okay, so you know those purple bastards who bought us and loaded us onto their ship?”
“How could I forget?”
“Yeah. Well. We’re pretty sure they’re coming back.”
My chest tightens as my mouth drops open, and just like that, I’m standing in front of hundreds of leering aliens while they negotiate how much I’m worth.
Then I’m forced to walk toward a ship, forced to watch as one of the other women falls to her knees and a purple alien kicks her in the ribs so hard that I can hear the crack.
“Breathe,” Dragix orders, his voice sharp as a blade. “Good. Again.”
Ivy pauses while I get ahold of myself.
Dragix moves closer to me. “I do not like this. I do not like the scent of your terror. We will go now.”
“I need to listen to what they have to say, Dragix. I’m fine. Just give me a moment.”
When I’ve pushed away the oncoming panic attack, I turn back to Ivy. She tilts her head sympathetically. They’re not here. They can’t hurt me. Can’t steal us away. At least not right now.
I clear my throat. “What makes you think they’re coming back?”
“The ship we were in. The one that crash-landed. Have you been inside?”
“No,” I admit, feeling like a coward. Dragix narrows his eyes at me as if reading my mind.
“There’s a light that flashes every so often. At least, when we landed here, it was every so often. Now it’s flashing faster and faster each time we check it out. We’re pretty sure that it’s some kind of GPS signal. If I were an alien slaver and my people crashed a ship holding cargo I’d paid for, I’d come check it out. See if there were any survivors, anything to salvage, any products to recover.”
I want to slam my hands over my ears. I want to tell her to go, to leave me alone, and I want to return to my mountain with Dragix.
His mountain. These women have been looking for me.
I shiver at the thought of the cruel aliens with the electric weapons that they used to herd us like cattle.
“You really think they’re coming back?”
Ivy nods. “I think we should hope for the best but prepare for the worst.”
I blow out a breath. I’ve lived that way for years. Why should this planet be any different?
Dragix moves even closer, nuzzling at me.
“You will be okay, little two-leg. I will keep you safe.”
I smile at him, and then he glares at Ivy, obviously pissed that she upset me.
“It’s not her fault, Dragix. She’s just telling me the truth.”
He snorts, and I stroke my hand down his nose.
Ivy clears her throat. “So what do you say?” she asks. “We’re outgunned and likely to be outnumbered.”
“I want to help,” I say. I chew on my lip, and Dragix goes still beside me.
“You will not leave me to put yourself in danger,” he says. “I forbid it.”
I ignore that. “We need to discuss this,” I say to Ivy, and she nods, her dark-red hair spilling over her shoulders. “But you can count on my help, even if Dragix doesn’t quite feel up to the task.”
Dragix tilts his head at my poor attempt at reverse psychology. “Mind games mean nothing to me,” he tells me, and I choose to ignore that too.
He’s not pleased at my silence. “We will go now,” he says, his voice harsh. He reaches out and pulls me close, my clothes already clutched in the claws of his other foot. I roll my eyes, but it’s evident that the dragon has used the last of his tolerance.
Not that he had a lot of it to begin with.
I don’t argue, making sure the towel is wrapped around me fully as I sit down. Dragix extends his wings, and the color drains from Ivy’s face.
“We’ll talk about this,” I tell her. “Tell everyone I’ll come see them as soon as I can.”
Dragix snarls and shoots into the sky.
Dragix
I don’t speak as we fly back to my lair. And I can tell from Charlie’s silence that she’s disappointed in me. I swoop down and catch an udazin as it bolts across a clearing, biting down with a satisfying crunch. Charlie doesn’t even wrinkle her nose when I glance down at her.
Instead, her mind is clearly elsewhere, her expression thoughtful.
Why would she want to join the other females when she would be in such danger? I scented her horror, her terror, as the other two-leg told her of these things. The reek of her fear was an affront to my nose.
Her voice sounds in my head. “Humans can’t be owned, Dragix. I’m not a pet.”
I snarl at that. For some reason, when Charlie is disappointed in me, it makes me want to growl. To growl and then beg for her forgiveness.
I narrow my eyes at that. Perhaps this is the problem. I have spent too much time with the little two-leg. She was not even a thought when I was born. And she will be dust in the ground before I am dead.
The thought makes me roar, and Charlie glances up at me. She says nothing, and I don’t attempt to explain myself.
I have spent too much time in my two-leg form. In that form, I become someone different. Someone who is more likely to give in to the whims of the female two-leg. Earlier today, when I lay on my rock, my mind clear, I remembered. I remembered why I must spend more time in this form.
My people
