The royal blinked. “You mean someone like you?”

She shrugged. “Sure. If you like, I can introduce you to a few of my cousins. I’m suggesting my cousins rather than my sisters because you don’t want to have to go through the gauntlet that is my brothers. It’s not fair to any dragon.” She raised her gaze, found the dragon staring at her, eyes narrowed a bit. “What? Are my cousins not good enough for you? Because they’re not of royal blood? Don’t be such a snob, Bram the Merciful.”

With a sigh, the dragon stood. “On that note, I guess I’ll go back to bed. Try to get some sleep.”

Ghleanna pulled a key from the top of her boot. “Here.” “What’s this?”

“I reserved the room across the hall for myself but you can use it. See if you can get some sleep in there.”

Bram took the key from her. “Are you sure?”

“We have a long day of walking tomorrow. Many of the nearby towns are too dangerous to fly over. Plus you didn’t get much sleep last night. So go,” she insisted. “It’s fine.”

“What about you?”

“Addolgar will be up soon enough to take my place.”

“But where will you sleep?”

She looked over her shoulder at him and said, “In the room with you. Unless you snore.”

And that’s when she saw it. When he was dragon, his scales just shined a bit more. But when he was human—his face turned red.

“Wh-What?” he stammered. “No. No. I don’t snore.”

“Then I don’t see a problem. Do you?”

“No, no. That’s fine. I’ll leave it unlocked. Good-night.” Then he went into the room and closed the door.

Grinning, Ghleanna went back to sharpening her weapons.

Bram entered the simple room and sighed in relief. Had she noticed his sudden panic? And lust? No. No. He doubted that. She didn’t notice. She never noticed anything about him, including his attempt not to be overeager about the pair of them sharing a room.

Nay. She hadn’t noticed a thing.

Bram stepped into the room and smiled. Quiet. Lovely, lovely quiet. Without bothering to remove his clothes, he fell face first on the bed and tried to push thoughts of Ghleanna from his mind.

Didn’t work, though. She was right there. Like always. Driving him mad.

And then there was Feoras. She hadn’t said his name but Bram knew whom she’d been speaking of. Feoras the Fighter. So named because he always fought to find a way not to have to do anything. Always looking for the easy way ‘round. The easy way to earn gold, move up the ranks, whatever. Honestly, his name should be Feoras the Jealous. He wanted to be where Ghleanna was but he didn’t want to work for it. Not like she had. The constant training; battles with humans as human so she could hone her skills; taking any dangerous, sure-not-to-survive assignment that came her way. No. Feoras wasn’t willing to do that. But he’d still wanted to be a Captain. A Dragonwarrior Captain who received all the best assignments, led the most important battles. When that didn’t pan out, he’d f**ked Ghleanna instead. Then ran around telling everyone. Including many of her soldiers in the Tenth Battalion, hoping to turn them against her. Ghleanna had been mortified and had disappeared for months.

But what she still didn’t know was that her troops had not taken kindly to what Feoras had done. They’d not taken kindly to it at all. And they’d gone after him like rabid dogs after a bone. Last Bram had heard, Feoras was still on the run, hiding out somewhere in the Creese Mountains. And Bram hadn’t said a word to Ghleanna about it, because he’d hoped that Feoras would be tracked down and killed in short order so that it wouldn’t matter. It wasn’t very merciful, but as he’d told Ghleanna—his mercy only stretched so far.

Then again, everyone learned that about him eventually.

Ghleanna finished sharpening the blades of her axes, her sword, and her knives. By the time she slid the last blade into her boot, the door to the bedroom her brothers slept in opened—followed by a nightmarish amount of snoring—and closed.

Yawning and rubbing his face with his hands, Addolgar dropped onto the stair right beneath Ghleanna. Unlike Bram, he’d never be able to sit next to her without his shoulders forcing her into the wall.

“Anything?” he asked around a yawn.

“Nope. Quiet.”

“Get some sleep. We have a few hours before the suns rise. I can take it from here.”

“You sure?”

“Aye. Go, sister. Because nothing is worse in the morning than you without enough sleep. Cranky cow that you are.”

“Thank you so much for that. The love of my kin simply overwhelms me.”

Addolgar motioned her away with a flick of his hand and Ghleanna walked up to the room she’d put the royal in.

“Oy,” her brother whispered. “What are you doing?”

“Sleeping with the royal. It’s just for a few hours.”

Her brother grinned. “Saucy wench.”

“I just mean I’m staying in the same room, you dirty bastard.” She pointed at the room her younger brothers slept in. “You can’t expect me to put up with that for the next few hours?”

“No, no. I really can’t.”

Ghleanna stepped inside and closed the door behind her. The royal slept fully clothed on his stomach, his long silver hair reaching down his back, his head resting on his crossed arms. And, except for his breathing, he was silent.