“Are you asking me?” she ventured. She thought he’d been looking at her before but suddenly all the power of his cat-shaped pupils focused on her, and she could barely breathe.
“You?” His brow ridges raised in surprise. “Ah yes, what do I do with you? Despite what Her Majesty thinks, I’m not going to drain you to a husk, leaving your ghost to walk these frosty peaks. So...” He sat back on his haunches and tapped a claw thoughtfully on his chin. “What to do with you.”
“Are you going to eat me?” There were tales that he’d done just that, taken young maidens and leaving little but their gnawed bones to be frozen in winter and found in spring.
He chuckled. “Eat you?” Then his chuckle turned into a full-blown laugh. He rolled back away from her, his roars of laughter rising to the open sky. “Why in the world would I eat you? Have you seen yourself?”
She shook her head.
“You’re nothing but skin and bones. You make that icicle of a queen look substantial.” His laugh quieted down. “No, I won’t eat you. But...she expects you dead, so I guess I’d better kill you. Can’t have her thinking I’m not a loyal ally, now, can we?”
Loyal ally. Her brain felt like it was still frozen solid, but it was beginning to thaw. He was bound to the queen by his word. If he betrayed whatever vow he’d sworn, he’d break all of magic’s laws of vassalage. The laws of Underhill were tricky. If you violated them you could unleash karmic repercussions. But that could work both ways.
Siobhan sat up. She was weak, so weak, from the hibernieth. Her head ached from the blinding winter’s sun and her stomach was so empty it didn’t even remember the need to eat. But she forced herself to stand. “My Lord Atavantador.” She swept into a low bow and back up, before her dizziness forced her back to the ground. Her vision went black, then the dragon swam back into bright color. She dropped to one knee.
She summoned all of the magic she could. A warm light rose from her skin, encasing her in its glow. It flowed into her mouth and out into her vow. “I swear, in thanks for your rescuing me from the Winter Queen, that I will serve you loyally from this day forward.”
She pushed everything she had into the vow, all her magic, all her will. Every drop of energy she had left she pushed into this last ditch effort of survival. The glow swelled around her, flowing out to the dragon. He scrambled back, trying to evade the vow, but it was too late. The bond latched onto him and was sealed.
“Now, dragon, I’ve sworn my loyalty to you. I am your vassal.”
“Damn you! What have you done? You stupid, stupid girl.”
She couldn’t stay up on her knee any longer. She dropped back to sit on the ground and the glow broke, but she could feel it tethering her to him. Then he blinked and the tether was chopped off as if by an ax.
“You think you can tie me to you?”
The pale blue color of his chest heated to an intense shade of blue. Siobhan braced herself for the incoming blast.
“You can’t kill me—you saved me. You’re responsible for my life.”
The confusion that passed over his face was almost comical. Then he laughed. “You are far more clever than I would have thought.” The bright blue on his chest faded away. “I don’t owe you a thing, and despite your little attempt at tying me to you, it won’t work. I’m far too powerful to be pulled in to a vow of protection by your little game. But you do amuse me. I’ll tell you what. I’ll keep you around for a while. I never swore to her bitchiness that I would kill you, so I have leeway. And she did give you to me to do with as I wish. In fact, one might say you owe me for not killing you. I think I’ll let you live.”
Relief rushed through her and she sagged into the dirt. “You’re not killing me?”
“Not today.” He leaned in, his head coming dangerously close. “But, girl, while I am not tied to you, your vow to me still stands. You have just tied yourself—life, labor and all—to the last ice dragon in Underhill. Best of luck to you.” He rose, reached out with his front claw and opened his massive fist, and scooped her and the bag of gold back up. “And, girl, take care to stay on my good side or I’ll eat you, laws of magic be damned.” His wings unfurled and Siobhan could do nothing but hang on as the ground below her disappeared into the distance.
Chapter Three
Doyle flew high above the abandoned underground palace of Cairngloss, cradling his new charge to his chest. As he flew he checked out the landscape, making sure all was well, before he brought his new charge into his lair. It didn’t pay to not be careful. He’d learned that the hard way.
The massive front doors of Cairngloss were built into the side of the mountain, but the entrance he used was on the other side of the mountain, well hidden from view. No one would find it from the outside. And no one would think that a dragon of his size and stature would be able to fit into the crevice. But no one in Underhill really knew any dragon secrets.
And he, and his brethren, intended to keep it that way.
On what he thought of as his side of the mountain, was a steep ravine that dropped far below the main entrance’s ground level. He landed on the ledge, opened his claw, and carefully deposited the damp bundle of village girl on the cliff side. His gold tumbled to the ground with her and he nudged it aside.
“Hey, girl.” He prodded her with the rounded side of his claw. “Wake up. We’re here.” But there was no response.
He bent his head and took a closer look, opening his second sight and looking deeply inside. The elvatian lass had been pulled out of hibernieth and forced to function without food or water. She’d pulled on the last of her stores to make that ridiculous pledge to manipulate him into taking her in, and now she was near death.
She still carried the dregs of the ice queen’s spell—the tips of her fingers burned with frostbite and her skin was blue and cold.
He sighed. What in all the lands of ice was he going to do with a near frozen village girl? Likely she was uneducated and he could see she had little magic. He checked her again. No, she was definitely unconscious. He had a choice—he could leave her somewhere to die of exposure, knowing she likely would never wake up again from this state. Or—he could take her in and nurse her back to health.
Despite what she thought, the rules of magic didn’t force him to take in every stray who pledged fealty to him. He smiled down at her. Actually, he thought she might even know that. She was just a feisty lass who refused to die.
He looked down at her near frozen body lying in a vulnerable heap on the stone, and made his decision. He respected her fighting until the end, for whatever cause. And, after seeing how Maeve was so pissed at her and whoever hadn’t shown up to rescue her, he had to know more of the story before even considering killing her. There might be an advantage in it for him.
And it wouldn’t hurt to have someone to talk to on a daily basis. How long had it been since he’d lived with anyone? The years stretched back to long before his tenure here in Cairngloss and he experienced a twinge of sorrow at the memories that came rushing in. He pushed it aside. Yes, a little conversation and a diversion from the ghosts of his memories might be a good thing.
It wouldn’t be easy. He still needed to stay on Maeve’s good side, and the queen thought he was going to kill the girl, but anyone this plucky deserved a chance.