Smitten (14 page)

Once they were gone, Lynette sighed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have told them you weren’t home. When I saw you weren’t back, I panicked and worried that something had happened while you were both gone.”

“Don’t trouble yourself over it, Lynette. The wolves will always find a reason to fret. It’s what they’re paid to do, after all, and I wouldn’t have them any other way.” Max shot the girl a reassuring grin before adding, “Andrew is the alpha, but I suspect the other two would make fine candidates.”

Lynette delicately pursed her lips, uncertainty creasing her brow and squinting her eyes. “Okay, well… Anyway, do you two want something to eat or did you do your Indominus rex thing and run down fluffy creatures in the wilderness?”

Max shot her a look. “I have more grace than that terrible creature, thank you.”

“We’re starved,” Ēostre spoke for both of them. She stepped up, slid her arm around Max’s shoulders, and smiled at Lynette. “We would love a breakfast, thank you.”

They dined at the kitchen nook on an immense pile of eggs and bacon, chatted about his promise to visit Drakenstone Manor, and her plans to laze with her family for the day.

“Speaking of my family, I had wondered if you would take Astrid under your wing, so to speak.”

“For what purpose?”

“Her breath. She’s at the age, physically at least, when we’d expect her to use a breath weapon. And like her father, she’s…”

Max stared across the table at her with a deep furrow creasing his brow beneath his mussed auburn hair. He looked like a man freshly risen from bed despite wearing unwrinkled clothes from the previous day. “Saul will not teach her?”

“No, no, that isn’t it,” Ēostre clarified with haste. “Saul loves to instruct her and has taken great joy in teaching Astrid the finer points of using her dragon form. Yet another difference between him and his father.” She sighed and stirred her eggs around on the plate, spearing a chunk of thick, diced bacon with the fork. When she glanced up, Maximilian’s features were sympathetic.

“I see. It isn’t that he has not tried, but that they’re both inexperienced. Saul is a rather young father, after all.”

“He is,” Ēostre agreed. “I’m proud of what he’s done with her so far, and I’ve given what help I can, but… you taught Saul, Max. I was not the one to draw that potential from him. You did it, and I can never tell you how much I appreciate the kindness you showed my child.”

“Ēostre,” Max began after a heavy pause. He set the fork aside and wiped his mouth with a napkin, his plate glistening with bacon crumbs and a smattering of scrambled egg. “If Saul is agreeable, I will gladly help in whatever way he finds most appropriate.”

“Good, because he’s agreed already,” Ēostre said cheekily. “Chloe and I discussed it first then when I brought the topic to him, he pleaded with me to ask you.”

Max became speechless. His stare continued for the length of several heartbeats before the stunned dragon found his words. “He trusts me with Astrid?”

“He does.”

“Even after what happened?”

“Even after,” she confirmed with a smile. “Saul has never truly stopped adoring you, Maximilian. So please, worry no further about the dark times we’ve all put behind us, and know that you’re a part of our family now.”

Ēostre found it amusing that her son was very like Maximilian in some ways and had expressed his doubts personally about the great fire wyrm agreeing. Not that he ever distrusted the other dragon. According to Saul, Max had better things to do than to teach another dragon’s cub.

As an inner sense of accomplishment welled within her for a match well made, Ēostre raised her cup of sweet coffee for a sip. The fragrant aroma of vanilla washed over her, and once she finished the sweet latte, she rose from the table and mussed Max’s already messy hair.

“Thank you for the meal, Lynette. Max, we’ll speak later.”

Ēostre returned promptly to her apartment where she spent the next ten minutes seated on the edge of the bed with her new silver figurine balanced on her knee. It wasn’t small by any means, at least twelve inches high, but it was a perfect replica of her pre-Saul figure. Before she’d thickened at the waist and she’d grown her second pair of maternal horns. Then, she was a sleek figure with a svelte body, and he’d captured even the subtle nuances that made up her natural poise. The head was slightly canted, the eyes lively, the feathers chiseled from hundreds of diamonds.

Human beings would put a worth on it leading into the millions, but to Ēostre, its price was beyond measure.

As her fingers slid over the smooth silver back, she channeled her magic into three layers of defense to guard it, beginning with a single spell of protection to hide it from mortal eyes. Afterward, she wove a spell of limitation — no human could ever touch it without her express permission, if they could somehow see it, and if such a human were able to circumvent her powerful spell, they wouldn’t dare try to steal it. Instead, they would feel an intense, insatiable burning itch in the nether regions regardless of how much they scratched, rubbed, or bathed. And finally, if all other methods of deterrence failed, the thief would be rendered blind. That usually made people throw away their ill-gotten gains and stumble around until she discovered them in the hoard.

She touched the smooth nose of the dragoness sculpture again, smiling at the sight of it. Max cared. He had to, and soon, he’d know she felt the same way.

***

“When did you get here!?”

Astrid’s enthusiastic squeal startled Ēostre awake before the child bellyflopped onto her in bed. After breakfast with Max and a few routine errands, she’d snuck into her bedroom at the manor for an impromptu afternoon nap, deciding the rest was needed before she devoted time to family activities. So much for that idea.

Ēostre groggily rubbed her eyes and glanced at the clock. “Thirty minutes ago, give or take.”

She was then dragged from bed and treated to cookies and tea with her two favorite girls. Her son lumbered onto the veranda an hour later on the tail end of their chat about taking Astrid shopping for new clothes. He yawned, stole two of Ēostre’s cookies, and peered out over the swaying grass while devouring them both in a bite.

“I see where Astrid gets it from,” Chloe muttered.

“They never grow out of it,” Ēostre agreed. She shook her head.

Saul finally turned back to them. “I plan to take Astrid hunting this evening, Chloe.”

“Don’t make dinner. Check. Do you plan to bring anything home to me or will I be left here to starve and eat frozen chicken nuggets with Kraft macaroni again?”

A rush of color overtook Saul’s cheeks, and Ēostre grinned at her son’s embarrassment. “That won’t happen again. We were a little carried away that time.”

They ended up dragging Ēostre along. The adults trailed behind Astrid in their dragon forms, allowing her to take the lead through the wooded wilderness to the rear of Drakenstone Manor. The trees grew thick, untamed by Leiv’s landscaping, but the deer were plentiful and oblivious the predators stalking them.

Saul’s family owned all of the surrounding area near their home, leading up and past the mountains. Everything for miles had been claimed as part of the Drakenstone Estate, and some years ago, he’d even had it declared a forest preserve by the state. With high, twelve-foot privacy fences marking the perimeter, it wasn’t worth it for human hunters to poach on the property.

He’d left much of it unchanged since Ēostre’s last awakening, claiming he appreciated the untamed wilderness of it all. She smiled as she picked her way across the leaf-littered forest floor, silent but deadly despite her draconic form. Her son surpassed her in size, and the realization of how much her wee cub had grown over the centuries made Ēostre’s heart swell.

He is a wonderful dragon and an even better man,
she realized.
I raised him well. I truly did. And now he has a child he loves and nurtures with all of his heart. I couldn’t ask for more.

Ahead of them, Astrid balked on the trail. The scent of the herd was all around them, but she hesitated and lingered, uncertain of herself. She hadn’t yet developed the sharp sense of smell that would come with age and second-guessed herself frequently while with her father.

At her size, she wasn’t yet too large to give the deer a good chase between the trees and abundant growth. Venison was a staple in the diet of most cubs, the next prey creature they learned to hunt after bunnies and foxes.

“Is she truly ready to take on a buck, Saul? What if it hurts her?”

Saul twisted around to stare at his mother. “I wasn’t yet half her size when you challenged me to take my first buck.”

“I suppose so…” She tried to think back and wondered at her decision. Had it been her idea? Fafnir’s? Probably the latter. He’d always urged and pushed Saul to mature before he was ready, too impatient to father him, and equally unwilling to allow him to be a child. “You were almost knocked out.” The memory of Saul’s injuries surfaced in her mind. The buck had slammed his hooves multiple times into Saul’s little body, the frenzied attack pummeling him before he caught the upper hand.

“Almost being the important distinction,” her son quipped. “But I remember at the end, I was the one to best him and Father was never prouder.”

“I can do it,” Astrid spoke up. She turned in a full circle, sniffing the air. After a moment she headed eastward through the trees. Ēostre couldn’t help but smile. She had caught the scent of the small group in that direction as well.

“Should—”

“Shh,” Saul hushed her before whispering, “Or I will send you home.”

Ēostre shot him a dirty look. Falling back, they allowed Astrid to continue alone, relying on their honed, adult senses to monitor her progress through the wood. If they moved any closer, their larger sizes and the noise made by their steps would alarm the herd of their presence. Astrid on the other hand, pressed her body low to the ground and snaked beneath branches, moving with light steps. Suddenly, she stopped.

Much like a cat, the cub crouched low to the ground and tensed. Her backside wriggled right before she leapt forward. The deer didn’t know what hit them, and the group scattered as Astrid’s strong legs propelled her into their midst like a high-velocity bullet. Her powerful jaws took the creature around the neck, puncturing the blood vessels and spilling hot blood over the grass, onto her golden hide, and down the buck’s tawny pelt.

“She needs to—”

Saul shushed her again. As he did, Astrid snapped her head to the side and broke her prey’s neck. It was perfect down to the final step.

Usually, she missed the mark, and either Ēostre or Saul had to help her. “A very clean kill, my sweet. The animal suffered little,” Saul encouraged her. He set one claw between her wings and mussed the downy fluff there affectionately. “Do you know what I think?”

“What?” she asked, wiping her mouth with the side of her forelimb.

“I think you’re bound to grow into a fine huntress one day.” Saul shot Ēostre a smug look over his shoulder. “And by this time next year, you’ll no longer need me to accompany you.”

Astrid perked up with pride. As part of her lesson, Saul tasked his daughter to haul her kill back to the manor by her own teeth. He refused to allow Ēostre to help, reminding her she once did the same to him.

“I know you’re old, Mother, but your memory seems to fail you the most whenever Astrid is involved,” he teased.

She huffed in irritation. “I’m not decrepit and senile, son. I simply seem to have a new perspective on training methods now.”

“You’re soft on her.” Saul wore a wounded expression. “If it were me, you’d have left me there to find my own way back, deer in tow.”

“The privilege of being a grandmother. One day you’ll understand.” Ēostre had to wonder about Astrid’s precocious, half-dragon development and whether she’d be setting out on her own in the next decade after all. “It may be sooner than you think.”

Saul grimaced. “Don’t remind me.”

“Mommy, look!” Astrid called at the moment they were within earshot of the back patio. Chloe was sprawled out on a lounge chair with a book in hand, but looked up at their approach.

“Did you catch that all by yourself?”

“I did! Isn’t he big?”

“He sure is, sweetie. Looks like six points on his antlers.”

“Seven,” Saul corrected her. “And she did it all on her own this time from the start to the finish.” He plucked the lifeless deer from the grass with his teeth and ambled off to handle the gross parts of meal preparation Chloe hadn’t yet grown accustomed to watching. Astrid trailed after him.

Ēostre abandoned her dragon form and slipped into the sundress she’d left behind on the adjacent chair.

“I’m still so jealous of how your boobs look at your age,” Chloe said.

“Are they supposed to look different?”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “I forget you dragons pick your looks and never really age like we do. Most women have to get boob jobs to keep a nice, firm rack like yours. Otherwise we start sagging.”

“You’re not sagging,” Ēostre pointed out.

“I guess I have Saul and Astrid to thank for that. Dad says I look exactly the same now as I did seventeen years ago.”

“You haven't changed since our first acquaintance. Neither has your friend Marcy. It will be interesting, I admit, to see what the future holds for you both.”