A Destiny of Dragons (Tales From Verania #2)(142)

“I need them,” I admitted. “The others. Maybe not Ruv, but then I don’t know him. He’s… not a part of us. And I don’t know that he will be.” I didn’t think that was any slight against him. It just didn’t seem like he fit. I thought maybe he needed to find his own path, if he ever decided to break away from Vadoma. But that didn’t seem likely.

Zero mumbled something that I couldn’t quite make out.

“What was that?”

He sighed the weary sigh of the put-upon. “I said, Kevin seems all right. And the unicorn. And maybe the giant.”

“Have you… ever met another dragon before? You didn’t seem surprised to see him.”

“Aside from the star dragon? No. I don’t think so.”

I frowned. “What about your parents?”

He chuckled bitterly. “How can you not know anything about dragons when you travel with one? Ask your Kevin. He should tell you.”

He had a point, though I wasn’t going to let him know that. “What do you think about the knight?”

Zero huffed. “He’s full of himself.”

“Yeah,” I said fondly. “But he’s pretty awesome.”

“You love him, huh?”

“I do.”

He opened and closed his mouth a few times, and I was sure he wasn’t going to say what he wanted. But then he blurted, “What’s it like? Being in love?” Then he groaned and turned his head to the side, curling his face against his serpentine body, hiding himself away.

I blinked at him. “Um.”

“Forget it! I don’t know why I asked that.” His voice was muffled. “I don’t care about stuff like that—”

“It’s pretty great, if I’m being honest.”

“It is?” he asked, unfurling himself, eyes wide. He moved closer until I could feel his breath on my arms. “Like, okay. Just… what’s great about it? You should tell me. Not that I care about that at all. Or anything.”

I tried to keep the smile from my face. I didn’t know how well I succeeded. It would be just my luck that my fourteen-year-old emo snake dragon was also a closet romantic. It seemed par for the course. Yeah, he fit. Somehow, he fit. “Well. I guess it’s… it’s the moment, you know, when you wake up first in the morning. You open your eyes and your thoughts are muddled. You’re still partly asleep and you’re warm and don’t want to move, but you know you have to get up anyway. So you stretch and it feels good, but your arm hits something next to you and you look over and… there he is. Still asleep. And it’s the first clear thought you have, and you think, Hello. Hello there. Hi. I’m so glad you’re here. I’m so glad you’re next to me. And then for some reason, he must feel you watching him, because he wakes up too, you know? And he’s blinking and looks all soft and beautiful and then he sees you and he smiles. Like all it takes for him to be the happiest he’s ever been is to see you there. Next to him. That’s… that’s what’s so great about it. That’s what it feels like.”

Zero was quiet for a long time. I let us sit there, next to his trees, lost in our thoughts. Me thinking that that’s something Vadoma could never understand. The love I had for Ryan. She could never know what it meant to me. What he meant to me. I felt sorry for Ruv, sure. But I would never give up something I’d worked so hard for. Vadoma wouldn’t win. Not in that respect.

Then Zero sighed and sounded just like any other fourteen-year-old I’d ever known. It was really rather startling. “That’s so cute,” he squealed. “Oh my gods, I want that. That’s what I want. Like, forever.”

I laughed. “What about your plants? The trees?”

“I can do both! I could. I know I could. You gotta believe me!” But then, amazingly, his eyes began to fill with tears. “But—but….”

“Oh no,” I groaned. “Don’t cry. Please don’t cry. I am absolutely terrible when other people cry. I get so damn awkward that—”

“But no one will ever love me!” he wailed, throwing his head back and twisting his massive body until he lay on his back. “I’m going to be alone forever!”

“Oh,” I said. “Noooo. Noooo, of course not.” I leaned forward and patted the side of his head clumsily. “There, there. Oh, you. You’re just… swell.”

“Swell? I’m swell? I don’t want to be swell! I want to be in love!”

“O… kay. Uh. It’ll happen. When it happens? To you. It’s like, um. Your plants here. They. Grow. Like love does?”

“Wow! Thank you so much for the sound advice! Gosh, what would I have done without you!”

“Oh my gods.”

“Not that it matters, anyway,” he grumbled. “S’not like anything is gonna happen.”

“Oh. Come on, you. You got this. Why would you say that?”

“Have you seen me? I scare everyone.”

“Oh,” I said. “Noooo. Of course not. That’s not—noooo.”

He hissed at me, hood unfurling partially, spikes rattling.

I squeaked, “Kill it with fire!” Then, “I mean, wow. You’re—if only I was, like, seven years younger. And single. And a dragon. And into that.”