A Turn of Tides (A Shade of Vampire #13)(38)

I would rather have done it myself.

He tipped bucket after bucket over me, until my dress was soaked and the dried blood had disappeared.

He placed the bucket on the floor.

I was afraid to even speak a word lest I shatter their illusion and place myself in danger.

But it was hard to keep up the impression of being somebody else when I had no idea who that person was.

I looked as steadily as I could back at the man, my lips sealed.

The other dragons approached closer now that I’d finished my bucket bath.

They continued to eye me curiously.

One option was to just wait for them to offer up information, and in the meantime, pretend that I knew what I was doing.

But they were standing so still, just staring at me, I realized that they were expecting me to do something.

If I ever needed courage and confidence in myself, it was then.

And those were two things I didn’t possess as I stood there in that clearing, surrounded by the most formidable beasts I’d ever laid eyes on.

Speaking could either save my life, or be my downfall.

I had no idea which one it was.

But it felt like remaining silent wasn’t an option any more.

I was going to have to take the risk.

The only flicker of confidence I had was the feeling that they weren’t entirely sure what to expect from me either.

They were clearly superstitious creatures, and for whatever strange reason, they’d labeled me as some sort of auspicious sign.

It struck me that perhaps they themselves didn’t know what to expect of me.

Hell, I’d just dropped through the roof of their cave, it wasn’t like they’d been expecting me.

By some fluke, I’d just fallen in at the right minute.

Under any other circumstances, God knew what they might have done with me.

I had to be confident and fill the shoes of this role.

If I didn’t, they’d be more likely to suspect me to be the phony that I was.

Hiking up the hem of my dress so I could walk forward, I approached the nearest dragon to me and reached for his right hand.

I pressed my palm flat against his, assuming a look of concentration as though I had any semblance of an idea of what the hell I was doing.

Then I looked up at the dragon.

“I’d like a tour of the kingdom.” I found myself assuming a posh British accent, and I had no idea why.

Perhaps I thought I sounded more otherworldly—and less like myself, Rose Novak, the weak human girl—if I did.

The dragon who’d previously been leading the chanting nodded.

“Charis,” he said, eyeing the man I’d just touched palms with.

“You heard her.

See to it that the human has what she asks for and is content.

We don’t want to displease her.” Casting one last glance at me, the leader beckoned to the other men and they all launched off into the air, leaving Charis and me alone.

As Charis transformed back into a dragon and reached out his giant hand for me to climb onto, I found myself wondering what other requests I might get away with.

He was about to close his scratchy fingers around me when I patted his thick wrist.

His scales were so tough they were like armor, and he didn’t even sense it.

I had to speak.

“I’d rather travel on your back than in your palm,” I said, forcing confidence into my voice.

There was no hesitation on his part as he raised me onto his shoulders.

Slotting both my feet carefully into his sharp scales, I clung to the back of his neck as he launched into the air.

My heart hammered in my chest as he climbed higher and higher, until eventually the well beneath us was just a speck—and the gorgeous, lush landscape was visible.

I strained my eyes and saw far in the distance, a range of mountains emitting steam.

Volcanoes? All this greenery certainly wasn’t the landscape I would have imagined dragons living on.

I would have expected a scorched realm, devoid of any signs of life.

Perhaps the dragons saved their fire for attacks on enemies.

It was clear to me now where the dragons made their homes—there were no buildings, just caves bored into hills and mountains, similar to the one I’d fallen into.

There were sparkling lakes in between the valleys, and acres of lush flowers.

But I wasn’t taking in many of the details Charis was pointing out to me as we flew.

My mind was whirring as to how I was going to use this advantage I’d stumbled into before it was too late.

I didn’t know if they’d figure out that there was nothing auspicious about me, but I had to get out of here before they did.

I thought suddenly of Bella.

“And where do you keep your enemies?” I asked, after he’d paused for a breath.

He slowed and began flying in the opposite direction.

He nodded toward what looked like a giant pit dug out in the center of a valley.

Reaching it, he hovered directly over it.

I found myself staring down into a giant dirt pit.

Its walls were steep, and high—it was dug perhaps a few hundred feet into the ground, too high for any ogre to climb out from, and there were no notches in the walls.

There was a group of perhaps fifty ogres in there now.

I wondered if they’d all been from the fresh catch today.