Last Dragon Standing (Dragon Kin #4)(32)

“You don’t understand.” Éibhear stepped closer. “My sister has a way about her…. Males become attached. Maniacally attached. After just one night with her. Sometimes just one hour. And that could be…bad. If my father has to get involved.”

“But I think they just went for a walk,” Vigholf said, looking torn between laughter and confusion.

“Right. Just walking. Maybe we could go look for them.”

“Look, lad,” Meinhard said, sounding tired, “I don’t see the problem here. They’re both adult dragons who went for a walk. And what happens on that walk is their business.”

“Right. I’m just a little concerned about inter-territorial relations.”

“You’re concerned about what?” Vigholf asked.

“Our alliance.”

“You think that’s at risk?”

“I know how this works. Something happens between them; Lord Ragnar becomes attached. Keita, however, does not. He pushes the issue.

Keita gets our father, brothers, and cousins to push back, and before anyone knows it…war.”

“From a walk?”

Meinhard waved Éibhear’s concerns away. “You’re assuming your sister wants Ragnar.”

“Well, now that a wager’s involved…” The words had slipped out before Éibhear could stop them, and he knew immediately he’d said too much. With a nod, “I’ll go look for Ren.”

He started to walk off, but both Lightnings were on either side of him, big arms looping around his neck, holding him in place.

“Now be a good lad,” Meinhard said, grinning. “And tell us all about this wager.”

Keita happily headed to one of the jewelry stalls. Gods, she loved jewelry!

“So why did you feel the need to handle the Bampour thing yourself?” Ragnar asked her.

“I was in town.” When he frowned at her reply, she held up a necklace. “What do you think?”

“I think it looks expensive.”

“A cheap one, I see.” She sighed, putting the necklace back.

“We call it thrifty in the Northlands.”

Disgusted by that word—no dragon should be cheap or “thrifty”—Keita asked, “So when you’re ready to mate, will you kidnap a female?”

“We don’t do that anymore.”

“Your father did it to me.”

“And he’s dead now. Times have changed.”

“Good.” She moved to another stall, this one filled with crystal jewelry. “Many of my female cousins will be in attendance at the feast, I’m sure, and I don’t need you and your kin trying to take off with them.” When the Northlander snorted, she stopped and faced him. “What’s so funny?”

“That you’d think we’d take off with a Cadwaladr female.”

“And why wouldn’t you?” When he raised a brow, she admitted, “All right, a few of them might be a wee bit…burly. But they have good hearts and are loyal to a fault.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“Look, not everyone can be as beautiful as me—and I refuse to be attached, so you best go for what you can get.”

“How is it possible for you to be this arrogant?” Keita laughed. “And I thought you’d met my family.” While she devoured a turkey leg he’d been forced to buy for her—she’d already been eating it when she pointed out that she had no coin on her—they made their way back to the rest of their travel party.

She continued to talk while they walked along, and Ragnar couldn’t help but watch her human body move. Her dress was loose around her—and new. He had no idea where she’d gotten it from, considering the last gown he’d seen her in had been the dirty one she was wearing when he’d rescued her. He decided not to ask, since he didn’t want to know, and instead focused on the fact that although she made sure to get a new dress, she was still barefoot. He simply didn’t know why. Nor did he know why he was so fascinated by her feet…and those legs…and whatever else she had under that dress.

Yet before Ragnar could really bring himself to worry about his obsession with the royal’s lack of footwear, he stopped and replayed in his head what she’d just told him moments before until he was forced to ask for clarification. “You tore out your cousin’s eye?”

“I didn’t tear it out.” She licked the juice from her turkey leg off the fingers of her free hand. “I yanked it out with the tip of my tail.” When his mouth dropped open, she quickly explained, “It was self-defense.”

“Isn’t that the same excuse you used about the guard dog you ate?”

“Perhaps. But with Elestren, it really was self-defense. She hit me with a warhammer. In the head and arm. And let me tell you, she put some force behind it.”

“Why? What did you do?”

Now her mouth dropped open. “I didn’t do anything.”

“Keita—”

“I didn’t! For once. Unless she’s still holding that time I called her a fat-ass against me. But that was years ago.” They began walking again. “Anyway, she came at me again with that bloody hammer after she’d already broken my forearm and bashed my head in, and I panicked and used my tail…which apparently one is not supposed to do during training.”