How to Drive a Dragon Crazy (Dragon Kin #6)(21)

He shrugged. “And a chance to say I’m sorry.”

“This Celyn shit? Again?”

“I promise, I’m not here for that. I swear,” he insisted when her eyes narrowed. “I just want to say I’m sorry and be done with it.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all. Talk to her for me?” He lowered his head a bit, fluttered his eyes. “Please?”

“Och. That was just appalling, Éibhear. Although you’re obviously not following in Gwenvael’s footsteps because he could have pulled that off!”

Brannie stomped back to Izzy’s side, her tail impaling fleeing ogres as she passed. She’d shifted when she’d gone to find Éibhear. Not for safety from the ogres but because she wanted to look him in the eyes when she spoke to him.

Once near Izzy, Brannie shifted to human and grabbed the clothes she’d left at her cousin’s feet, quickly pulling them on.

“Well?” Izzy demanded before Brannie even got her leggings on.

Brannie glanced up, her lips slowly curling into a smile.

“What?”

Grabbing her chain-mail shirt, Brannie stood tall, slipping her arms inside the protective garment. “His orders are to get you home. And, as Mì-runach, he’s committed to that. There’ll be no deterring him.”

“Why are you smiling?”

She pulled the shirt over her head and down her torso. “He also would like to take this opportunity to apologize.”

Confused, Izzy asked, “Apologize? For what?” When Brannie’s smile only grew . . . “Good gods! That was ages ago. Ages!”

Brannie, now dressed, retrieved her weapons. Laughing, she said, “I know. But for some reason he feels the need to say it.”

“After all this time?”

“No matter his royal lineage, cousin, Éibhear the Contemptible is still a Cadwaladr male in his heart . . . his soul.”

“Which means what?” Izzy turned and used her long sword to impale an ogre that had been coming up behind her.

“It means that he won’t be satisfied until he gets what he wants.”

Wiping dark green blood from her face, she again faced her cousin. “To apologize? Can’t he just do that and go? I assure you I can make it to Garbhán Isle without his or his friends’ help.”

“Come, Izzy. You know better. You’ve lived among my brethren.” Brannie grabbed the blade from Izzy’s grasp and swiped it through the air. Izzy ducked, the blade missing her head by inches, but the ogre who’d been running up to them from the left was cut nearly in half from left hip to right shoulder. “You know the way of things, my cousin. An apology is only part of it. He seems to believe he wants forgiveness. That’s what I saw in his eyes.”

“And?”

She handed the blade back to Izzy. “And I say you give it to him.”

“And he’ll leave me be?”

“Oh, no.” Brannie giggled, sounding like a small child rather than the feared warrior dragon she’d grown into. “Ease is not something a Cadwaladr male understands or knows how to deal with . . . which is why you should give him as much ease and forgiveness as you can stomach.”

Izzy shook her head, her own smile blossoming. “You are a callous cow, Branwen the Awful. A cruel, callous cow . . . and I adore you like the suns.”

Branwen shrugged, black eyes twinkling, “And I you, cousin, for together we are a true blood-filled nightmare—which I find nothing but entertaining!”

Using his fist, Uther bashed ogres into flat green disks. It was fun and killed some time.

“There has to be an easier way for you to get women,” Aidan told Éibhear. Aidan was stepping on the ogres while Caswyn was swiping at them with his tail. But Éibhear was just standing there . . . waiting.

“What if she still says no?” Uther asked.

“We should just take her,” Caswyn offered.

Aidan stopped crushing ogres to ask, “Take Izzy the Dangerous?”

“We’re four dragons. She’s one human female. How much trouble can she be?”

Aidan smirked at Éibhear. “You’re a much better storyteller than I.”

Éibhear looked at Caswyn. “When Izzy was seventeen, she—with the slight help of her mother—killed Olgeir of the Olgeirsson Horde. When she was nineteen she fought against the Kyvich witches and lived to tell about it. When she was twenty-and-five, she survived in the Sovereign fighting pits and buried a dragon’s axe into the back of Overlord Thracius, one time ruler of the Irons.”

Caswyn blinked. “Oh.”

“And she’s been marked by Rhydderch Hael himself as his champion.”

“All right then.”

“So, just a thought,” Aidan added. “You may not want to piss her off.”

“You mean like Éibhear does?” Uther asked.

Insulted, Éibhear snapped, “I’m trying to be helpful.” And it only pissed him off more when they all laughed at him.

“Oy!” a voice yelled up at them and they all looked at the human female standing beneath them. She stood tall, a blade in each hand, and covered in ogre’s blood. She showed no fear—Dragonfear or otherwise—of standing before four giant dragons who could easily crush her. And, Uther had to admit, he could see what Éibhear found so intriguing about her. Although there was always something about a female with a sword, wasn’t there . . . ?