“Lead on,” she forced through gritted teeth. If she couldn’t keep a combative advantage, she’d keep her pride.
They walked into the shade of the gallery and penetrated the castle’s innards. Led through back halls and side passages, Arianna did not see another Dragon outside their group. But she could sense them, smell them, feel their magic rippling through the currents of the air. It was loud, like a hundred people speaking all at once. Her senses were constantly flaring with recognition of them, trying to understand and catalog every magical signature. Arianna could only assume that living on Nova brought the Dragons more success at filtering their senses than she was able to muster. She hoped it would prove a learned trait, otherwise the sensation would drive her mad long before she sized up this Petra she had come to meet.
The servants said nothing. They kept their eyes down and their lips pursed. For the most part, they even contained their curious glances. All except for one.
“Why does Cvareh’Ryu bring a Chimera into our home?” the woman from earlier asked Cain in Ryouk.
“The ends justify these means,” Cain replied vaguely. He clearly didn’t have much more of an explanation himself.
“She smells,” the woman whispered, but not quietly enough that Arianna couldn’t hear.
“She will be better once she’s washed.” They continued on as though Arianna was none the wiser to their discourse. She held her tongue, avoiding speaking in the Dragon’s language and giving up the game.
“All Chimera reek, rotten blood.”
“I know, Dawyn’Anh,” Cain conceded, as if heartbroken by the fact that he would have to endure her scent for another moment longer. “But our Ryu has spoken with the support of the Oji.”
That silenced the woman, though Arianna could still feel her radiant frustration. The mention of Cvareh put both the likes of Cain and this Dawyn woman into submission. Arianna failed to stifle a chuckle, earning a confused look from her companions that was abandoned when it became apparent she had no intent of elaborating on the source of her sudden amusement.
The idea of Cvareh scaring anyone into submission was laughable. She had put the Dragon in his place too many times to think of him as anything more than… than… Arianna paused, struggling to fill in the blank for an all-too-long second… than Cvareh.
They finally rounded into an airy room—yet another space constructed upon a foundation of impossibilities. Steam hung thick in the air, clouding around the aromatic scent of the wildflowers floating in the wading pool. An entire wall was made of rippled glass—or some kind of clear quartz, Arianna had yet to decipher which. She hoped it was the latter, because the former made her question what exactly the builders had been thinking using such large panes of glass to stand against such violent gusts.
One side of the pool was made up of the clear wall, giving the illusion that the water stopped mid-air. The tile surrounding it was set in a chevron pattern and glistened with moisture. A small stool sat out by a bucket full of steaming water and an array of tools that were either for washing or stripping off skin—she couldn’t tell which.
The entire group remained, two Dragons on either side of the door. Cain leaned against her only escape nonchalantly. The woman—Dawyn—approached her.
Arianna took a step away, avoiding her outstretched hands.
“I will help you.” She spoke in a rudimentary attempt at Fennish, a thick guttural accent over top.
“Help me with what?” Arianna knew exactly what she was implying. But she’d stall to underscore her sour opinion of the implication.
“Wash.”
“I think I’ve managed well enough on my own so far in life.”
Cain sighed. “Stop being so difficult. If we wanted you dead, you would be.”
“As if you could kill me.” She kept up her facade. The second she showed weakness would be the second they’d have her. Even if she was outnumbered, she wouldn’t act it. “I don’t particularly want an audience for my bath.”
Confusion marred Cain’s face.
Rusty cogs. Realization hit her with the grace of a steam engine. Dragons were not known for their modesty. Half of the people staring at her now were in what she considered various states of undress. They truly didn’t, and couldn’t, understand why she wouldn’t want guests during her ablutions.
Arianna had only been naked around two people: Eva and Florence. She had reached a level of comfort with her long-dead lover and still-living student that surpassed propriety and convention.
But this wasn’t Loom.
She had ventured above the clouds in pursuit of new opportunities, old truths, and scores still waiting to be settled. Arianna locked eyes with Cain as her hands began unclasping her harness. He didn’t even blink as the metal of her winch box and spools hit the tile floor with an echoing clang, chipping one of the ornate tiles. She started on the fastenings of her coat.
He acknowledged the silent challenge, amusement dancing with fascination in the deep gold of his eyes. She would show them all that she could rise to any occasion—on Loom, on Nova, in this world or the next. One by one, the scraps of her clothing fell and the heat of the room dotted her bare ashen skin with beads of moisture.
Cain’s eyes never left her face.
6. Yveun
The Dragon King oozed displeasure from his very pores.
He felt it seeping out of him, simmering hot, elevating the temperature of the room. He was alone, which was an unfamiliar sensation. Leona had been a figure at his side for decades and now it was as though the woman had never existed.
She’d had her faults, as they all did, but her loyalty was only matched by her ferocity. And, for the most part, she could manage to temper the fire that burned under her skin even when her frustrations struggled to get the better of her. It was a fire he’d stoked in all the right ways, until it burned white-hot and only for him. Nurturing Leona’s radical worship of him had been the rare duty that was also a delight.
Now, years of work had been lost in what seemed like a blink on his lifeline.
Yveun sheathed and unsheathed his claws, raking them against the wall of the room he’d been pacing like some lowly caged animal.
It was one of his secret habits. The Dono, the sky ruler, the overseer of the land below, chosen one of the Life-bringer, for all his sweeping palaces and grand rooms, preferred the comfort of a tiny space to think in. A space with only one way out. A space so confined that just the thought of being trapped within it set his heart to racing.