Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 54811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
He pauses and tilts his head a dozen feet above me, and I have no choice but to crane my neck to look up at him. “So are you.”
“Exactly.” I point my finger at his face. “That’s, like, what in dragon years? Five?”
“Dragons mature infinitely faster than humans.” A giant glob of saliva drips off his fang and lands on my shoulder.
Gross.
“Really proving your point there.” I run my fingers over my arm in an attempt to shove the goop off me. “Look, I’m self-aware enough to know I need a dragon who will keep me in check, and a guy who’s only seen as many summers as I have isn’t a responsible choice.”
“Responsible or not, you are my rider.” He lowers his head and inhales, lifting my hair.
“I’m not.” One very weird sniffing session later, he raises his ginormous head.
“You are,” he insists.
“Am not.” I shake my head.
“Are too.” He narrows his eyes.
“See? Look at us. You’re mentally five years old.” I throw my hands out at my sides.
“If I’m five, then you’re four.”
A reluctant smile tugs at my mouth. He’s got me there. “Precisely why you’d be better off with someone like Rhiannon Matthias or Sawyer Henrick. They’d be more responsible choices for you.” They wouldn’t appreciate his sense of humor, but not everyone is as comedically evolved as I am. Then again, not everyone grew up in a house where they had to learn to cut the tension between their parents.
“Have I misjudged you, Ridoc Gamlyn?” he asks, his head rearing back like he’s the one who’s offended when I’m the one covered in water and spit.
My mouth opens, then slowly closes, because if he’s talking to me, that means he’s already seen my thoughts, my memories, seen me. “Probably not.”
“Perhaps I have.” He huffs a blast of steam down on me. Now I’m wet and sticky. Awesome. “Perhaps we do not share a kinship in being underestimated by those around us.”
My eyebrows rise. Well…hold on, because yes.
“Perhaps I should have listened to my elders when they suggested I choose a more balanced rider instead of one who matched me in energy and mischief.”
Did he just admit to making a mistake—
Wait. Mischief? Now that has my full attention. Is that what splashing me was all about? I absolutely need a dragon less impulsive than I am, which browns are by nature, but I could be down for a partner who doesn’t immediately see me as a project in need of fixing or mentoring. “Are dragons even capable of mischief?”
“Now you’ll never know. Pity,” he says with a haughty tone of sarcasm, then retreats a step. Suddenly I feel like I’ve completely, irrevocably fucked this up, because he’s doing exactly what I would in the same situation, which means we’re alike. Like, really alike.
Am I meeting the dragon version of…me?
“You seek a dragon to keep you in check, while I seek a rider capable of sharpening my edges instead of blunting them like my elders. Too bad.” He turns in the open space of the creek and begins to walk away, and my jaw drops at the challenge he cleverly disguised as an insult.
A pit opens in my stomach at the realization that he is my dragon. No matter what I thought I wanted, what I thought I needed, Aotrom is him. And I’m most definitely messing this up.
“Wait!” I shout, but of course he doesn’t, because he’s a dragon, and I just rejected him in what might be my most responsible yet biggest mistake ever. “Aotrom!”
“Aotrom,” he corrects, giving the first o in his name its own syllable while softening the sound of the second as he saunters to the west, his wings tucked against his body. His massive swordtail swings in my direction. “Your attempt at pronunciation is embarrassing.”
Seriously?
“How am I supposed to know the pronunciation? You’ve never bonded before, and I don’t speak dragon— Shit!” His tail splices through the air in front of me, and I drop to the ground, catching myself with my hands. My palm stings, and the giant brown tail swings so close to my head, I feel it ruffle my hair. What the fuck is wrong with him? Is he trying to kill me? “Are all twenty-year-old dragons assholes?”
“Are all twenty-year-old humans humorless blockheads?” He swings his tail again.
“Whoa! Watch that tail!” I press myself so far into the grass that I may as well start chewing on it like a cow. The tip of his tail swooshes overhead. “And who are you calling humorless?” Of all the things he could call me, that’s somehow…offensive. I hop to my feet as his tail swings upward and start running after him.
“You.” He doubles down.
What a dick.
“I have a fucking fantastic sense of humor, I’ll have you know!” I shout between breaths as I race to catch up with him, my boots pounding the fallen leaves beneath my feet.