The Air Witch's Dragon

by Severine Wolfe

  “Do you mean that?” Sofia asked, fascinated.

  Ryluth put the cup he was drinking tea from down and gave her a questioning look.

  “Future queen?” She asked him and watched his face go blank as he obviously went over what he had been saying. His face paled and then he smiled shyly.

  “I had meant to ask you to be my mate in a much different setting,” he admitted. “However, I did not want to do so before we found a way to end this curse without you dying, and I still mean to do that.”

  She sat and stared at him, her lips firmly closed around the scream she wanted to let out. She seemed not to be aware she was bouncing on her seat.

  Ryluth looked closely at her. “It is my hope that when I do ask you to be my mate that you accept and promise to stay with me forever.”

  He could hear her making a sound behind her pursed lips, thinned out.

  “Do you think that might be a vague possibility at some point in the future.”

  He watched her settle and gather herself, and she sat up, regally, as his future queen would do and stared at him, still.

  “I might, at some point in the future, be inclined to consider such a request, if it were to come,” She said, face straight as if she were bestowing favor upon some courtier.

  Ryluth did laugh. He doubled over in his chair and laughed so hard, the chair turned over, then he rolled on the floor laughing. He heard Sofia begin to laugh as well. They were laughing just as hard as they had that night on the stairs up to their rooms. He loved having this with her. He loved that she seemed to understand him on a level even Lennalth didn’t and he had known that Drakkos his entire life.

  “We really need to check on the others, if what you say about Derno and Nei is true,” he winked at her and she rolled her eyes.

  They both walked down to the dining room, hand in hand, talking about the translation and the other things that needed to be done and entered the room to find both half-elves with their heads nearly in their plates and two very satisfied twin Dragons sitting amongst the rest, who were glaring at Groffur and Lei Yep.

  “Good Morning,” Sofia chirped, as if totally unaware of the tension swirling around the table. She nodded to him and they took their respective places, even though they’d both already eaten.

  “All is well this morning?” Ryluth followed Sofia’s lead and acted as if he noted nothing of the tension around the room.

  They got back some grumbling and mumbled responses, and it took quite a bit of control to keep a neutral expression on his face. He saw Sofia pouring some tea and he grabbed a pastry on a plate near his place setting.

  “I will be in my office working on some translation this morning,” he explained to the group present, with a special nod at Lennalth who was busy frowning at Miene so he didn’t catch it. “Anyone who feels they would have something to add to our work would be greatly appreciated.”

  “Why is the Librarian not doing this?” Sythe asked and Ryluth wondered why the Drakkos continued to come to the meals since he didn’t seem taken with any of the females, although, he did notice that Sythe always seated himself next to Kjersti Westgaard, the healer who was so quiet.

  “He gave us the material to find what we need and I have not heard from him since, even though I have asked for his guidance in Ancient Drakkos to help with some translations.” He explained while tearing apart the pastry in his hands, not hungry any longer for anything more than Sofia. He looked up and down the table at the frowns by everyone but Sofia, Groffur and Lei Yep.

  “Now, would anyone want to explain to me why the entire room appears to be so dour this morning, with the exception of Derno being here?” He teased the Dragon, who gave him a glare.

  “Groffur has already claimed a woman for his own,” Lennalth pulled his head out of his pout and looked away from Miene.

  Ryluth nodded sagely. “I see,” he said, not really seeing. “It would appear that my scheme of asking females to our world might work,” he stated and stared at Lennalth, hoping he, too, remember why they were doing this. “I don’t see how this is a problem or a cause for tension among us.”

  Lennalth glowered. “He is rubbing it in our faces that a female wants him.”

  Sitting up in his chair, Ryluth really looked at his friend and, yes, it appeared that Lennalth was truly pouting. He wanted to burst out laughing but knew the Dragon would not respond well to his mirth. He looked around the table. “And the rest of you feel the same way?”

  Avrae shook his head, the color of his brown hair reflecting the color of his scales when in his first form. “It would appear that the twins have claimed more females for themselves,” he stated calmly.

  He just sat and looked at the females and the Dragons in the hall. Sofia just shrugged in puzzlement as well. But she sat up, so he ceded the floor to her, and hoped she could draw out the cause of all of the tension amongst them.

  “So, you are all jealous of your brothers?” She asked plainly and looked each Dragon in the eye, a clear demand for answers in her expression. Ryluth nearly chuckled to see grown Drakkos squirm like a fledgling being punished for playing when they should have been learning.

  “They are merely jealous,” Cenan, said quietly.

  “You already have young,” Sythe hissed at the Dragon. “Taking two of the females when very few came is just avarice.”

  “Avarice?” Derno yelled, standing up and his chair falling down on the floor behind him. Cenan stood as well.

  “You are merely jealous that no female looks at you,” Cenan accused.

  “Jealous of what? You greedy bastard!” Sythe roared, and Ryluth could see that he was close to changing forms in front of the females. “You stole two of them in the dead of night!”

  “Hardly the dead of night when you consider they came to the village in the morning to see our young. We did not force them, they came of their own free will!” Well, now Derno was lit up.

  The entire room exploded into yelling, accusations and general immature behavior, except for Sofia, Kjersti and Ryluth, who sat watching their compatriots lose their minds. The yelling and accusations continued unabated until he heard a gentle clearing of a throat. It took several minutes for the chatter to die down, and another clearing of the throat for everyone to look down the table at Sofia who sat, calmly considering them all. Every male, every female looked at Sofia, and had the grace to blush, before quietly sitting down, after Derno retrieved his fallen seat.

  “Are you all finished?” Sofia asked quietly, looking down the table, her face serene, yet implacable. After receiving many nods and assurances that they were, indeed, done throwing a collective tantrum, she nodded and stood up, leaning down on the table with her hands holding on to the edge, with a tension on Ryluth easily recognized.

  “It is useless to argue amongst ourselves when the real trouble is the fact that the couple who does finish the mating will lose the female to appease your god,” she explained in a completely rational tone of voice. “Bickering profits us nothing, and will not break this curse.” She stood up then, her back straight and her head held high. “If you are not actively helping us, then I expect all of you, male and female, to be making sure that things are getting done around here.” She took a breath and relaxed a little. “It is my belief that part of the curse has something to do with the females accepting the males and a mating occurring and then her death, but I can’t find a way around it, not yet. I will be in Ryluth’s office if you need me.” She then turned and walked out of the dining room, with Ryluth running after her.

  He managed to catch up to her at the hallway leading to his office. “You were brilliant, Sofia,” he said, causing her to stop and turn around. “I’m incredibly proud of you.”

  She smiled up at him. “I have my moments,” she said and went up on her tip toes to give him a light kiss.

  “If you keep that up we will never get this work done,” he whispered against her mouth, still up against his. She giggled.

  “Then come
along, Task Master. Let us put our noses the grindstone again.”

  “The what?” He asked as he followed her blithely down the hallway.

  Chapter Twelve

  They had many more hands to help, with all of the tomes and papers being taken by different Dragons. Groffur was helping Sofia and Ryluth with their translations of the curse and the journal. The two males spent a lot of time on the journal, because Groffur was old enough to remember certain changes in vernacular language, which had occurred after Coalna’s death. The language had changed a lot due to the death of so many and the mourning that accompanied the loss of mates. Ryluth had never really given it much thought, as his world was as he’d always known it. None of the ones left over from that time talked much about it, and it was a lesson as fledglings grew up, and Ryluth had to admit, he had just accepted it as the way of things until he had seen Sofia.

  He looked over at her and Lei Yep going over the curse again and again, with Lei asking Groffur every now and again about a turn of phrase or the origins of a word. Sofia had told him that Lei was Chinese and they had a very long history on Earth and were the first to have a written language and knowledge of the heavens and time. Ryluth was thankful the witch was willing to help them. The woman’s Earth Magic was strong. She would be an asset to their world if she decided to stay, which Groffur had intimated she would do. Why had she chosen the old Dragon? When the ladies left the office to grab some refreshments he finally asked.

  “Groffur, she’s so young...” he began.

  The old Dragon nodded and gave an odd smile.

  “She has told me that her people almost worship wisdom and that she’s always been attracted to older males.” The old Dragon shrugged and looked wistful.

  “Have you...” Ryluth had to ask, and would admit, if pressed, to a prurient curiosity.

  Groffur nodded and grinned. Ryluth didn’t say a word, mulling it over in his mind.

  “She has agreed to be my mate if we can find a way to break the curse,” Groffur told him, and then frowned. “No female wants to die just as she’s found her mate, and no male wants to lose that precious treasure.”

  With no good logic to rebut that statement, Ryluth didn’t even attempt to argue the point. He looked up as the females walked back in with trays of food and drink.

  “Let’s take a break and fuel our bodies so we can continue,” he suggested and they all gathered around the small table where Sofia and Lei had placed the trays.

  They all chattered while they ate, on everything but what they were working on. There were questions about things that Ryluth had put off dealing with while the females were there and he found that with his mind occupied elsewhere, his decisions were quickly crystallized and he had called in for a Dragon to write down his decisions and disseminate that information to the rest of his world.

  He found that Sofia was sitting beside him, nodding at his decisions, never saying a word in front of anyone if she disagreed, but he could tell when she did when her left brow would slightly rise, only slightly, maybe he was the only one who noticed it. He made a mental note to ask her about it later, and found he had begun making a short list for them to talk about later that night.

  He found that he had been right, those years ago, thinking that she would make him a perfect queen for his world. She never disagreed with him in front of anyone, not even their ever-present guards. If she had questions, she held them until they were alone, and listened to his reasoning. He loved that they talked about things. Her declaration that morning gave him hope that she would stay. He looked over to where Groffur and Lei Yep sat, laughing at something the female had said, and he saw respect on both sides, but not, as yet, love. Love was built on respect, in his mind anyway. He respected Sofia to the ends of his toenails. She was beautiful, yes. He desired her, yes, But, at the very heart of his feelings for her was respect. This discovery made him determined to find a way to end the curse because, as Groffur said, no female wanted to die. No male wanted his female to die.

  With that heavy weight on his shoulders, he finally, partially understood the horror that Threlzin must have suffered upon finding his mate missing and unable to find her, as he should have been able to do through their mate bond. The weight sat there and would not be moved. For himself, for his Drakkos, he MUST find a way beyond this. He had been determined before, but now he had a resolve that had not quite been there before.

  He looked over to Sofia, who was smiling at something that Lei Yep said. She was so lovely. Her hair was down today, unfettered by bands, holders, ribbons. The thick, chestnut waves rolled down her back and shoulders, catching light and was so shiny. He had to strangle his desire to run his fingers through the silky depths here in front of everyone.

  “We should get back to work,” he said through a suddenly thick throat.

  Everyone murmured assent and they went back to where they had been working before, but for Ryluth, it wasn’t just determination, he had to solve this if any of them were to have a future at all.

  *****

  Sofia was so tired when evening came and they were breaking up for dinner. Ryluth was escorting her to her chambers so she could dress, but she told him she had little energy for the meal. He had laughed and said he should be the one claiming fatigue. She smiled up at him outside her bedroom door.

  “Do you think it would be rude if I slept through the meal?” She joked.

  He shook his head, smiling. “I think we’re both expected to show up and pretend to pay attention to all the intrigues.”

  She sighed. “Easy for you to say, you can just conjure clothing. I need to bathe. I smell like parchment and dust.”

  He sniffed her neck before kissing it lightly. “You smell perfect to me.”

  She laughed and slapped at his chest. “Go, dress for dinner whilst I do the same,” she told him. “Escort me down?” She turned back to question him as she opened her door.

  “Try and stop me,” he said, kissing her loose hand before heading down to his own chamber.

  Sofia sighed and ran a bath. She’d put her hair up and soaked for a few minutes and felt a little bit more energy as she got out and began to dry. She happened to spot a rejuvenation potion that Brigid had sent and nodded. She really was ready to go face down in her soup if she didn’t get something going in her head. She drank down the potion and went to get dressed, choosing a maxi type dress of a wrinkled cotton floral print. She chose a cream-colored light sweater to cover the spaghetti straps and slipped on some leather sandals that were so comfortable that Sofia was sure if they’d been around when she had lived on Earth the Church would have declared them a sin. Who knew the Germans could make anything comfortable?

  She sent up a request to bless Cassie as she slipped her feet into them, as she always did for telling her about them and taking her to the store to buy them. She had close to ten pair in different styles and wore them most of the time. Her feet never hurt.

  The knock on her door had her running to it. Ryluth! Her heart sang. However, when she opened the door, it wasn’t Ryluth. Her brow furled in confusion as she looked down the hall.

  “Are you here to take me down to dinner?” She asked the Drakkos at her door.

  “Yes, I am here to take you,” he said and breathed into her face.

  She took a stumbling step back and fell to the ground, completely unaware that she was being picked up and taken away.

  *****

  Ryluth used his time waiting for Sofia to finish her bath and dressing to listen to Lennalth and his long list of complaints about the female he was going crazy over.

  “Dammit, Ryluth! You, Groffur, even the damned Twins have slept with their females! Why can I not sleep with mine? I am going mad!”

  Ryluth had actually been thinking of all of the things he wanted to teach Sofia and not paying a wit of attention to his best friend until that moment.

  “What do you mean you haven’t slept with her? How do you know you are compatible in that way unless you do?”r />
  Lennalth rolled his eyes. “You have not heard a damned word I’ve said because your head is full of nothing but your blessed Sofia and the fact that you can have her whenever you feel like it,” Ryluth’s friend raged. “She refuses to tell me her feelings for me. She is so reserved it’s hard to drag two sentences out of her.” The male pulled at his hair, and the tufts of it stayed up, making him look ridiculous. “I am going mad and you cannot even listen to me.”

  Ryluth felt the sting of his friend’s accusation most keenly. He had been so wrapped up in Sofia and ending the curse that he truly had not given two thoughts for his friend. He turned to him, a wry frown on his face. “Would she even be receptive to your advances, Lennalth? Have you tried talking to her or did you just jab your tongue down her throat?”

  Lennalth’s head fell back and he growled, and Ryluth was almost sure he’d seen smoke come out of the male’s mouth. His friend was on the edge.

  “That would imply she’d even let me touch her,” he finally said. “I am quietly going out of my mind.”

  “Not so quietly,” Ryluth pointed out. “You were just raging to me.”

  Lennalth began pacing across the huge carpet before Ryluth’s fireplace. “Why did she come here if she doesn’t wish to take a mate?”

  That brought Ryluth’s head up. He had been clear with Cassie. All of the females who came must be open to the idea of mating a Dragon once they managed to break the curse. He sent an immediate message to her that he needed to speak to her about the Dutch illusionist. Miene Sweere may have come here under false pretenses, and that, Ryluth could not allow.

  “Avoid her at all costs, Lennalth, and she is to stay in her room until I speak with Cassie.”

  Lennalth stared at him, moth open. “You would put my mate under house arrest?” The question was a whisper of disbelief.

  “I have no other choice, my friend. All of the females who came here had to be open to the idea of taking a Dragon mate and staying with us, not leaving once they were impregnated and handed over the egg. I think we’ve had quite enough of that.”