Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 120974 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 605(@200wpm)___ 484(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 120974 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 605(@200wpm)___ 484(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
“It costs what I say it costs!” she insists. “Now are you going to pay or am I calling the Constable?”
“Fine—we’ll give you the dress, but Irena gets to keep her hairpins,” he says.
“What?” I’m shocked all over again. I stare up at him. “What are you talking about? I can’t take off my dress!”
“You can and you will,” he says firmly. “You’ve got another dress on under it, don’t you?”
“I have a shift!” I protest. “And some undergarments—I can’t be seen in public like that!”
“You’ll have to be.” Ruthlessly, he pulls off my cloak and lets it drop to the floor. Then he turns me around and begins unbuttoning the myriad tiny mother-of-pearl buttons that go down the back of my dress.
“Hey—stop it!” I cry, but before I know it, he’s stripping the dress down and forcing me to step out of it. I’m left shivering in my thin white shift which barely covers my breasts and only comes down to my knees.
“Here.” Valen shoves the bundle of silver-green fabric at Maud, who takes it, stroking the embroidered silk greedily.
“All right,” she says, not looking up from her new treasure. “You can go.”
“But I can’t—” I begin to say.
“We need a back way out,” Valen interrupts, speaking to Maud. “So my lady won’t be exposed to the eyes of your other guests,” he adds, nodding at me.
“This way.”
She jerks her head and leads us through a door in the far end of the room I hadn’t noticed earlier. It leads down a long, dark hallway with another thick wooden door at the end. Maud opens it, revealing the back of the inn where there are several rickety-looking smaller buildings. Looming behind them are the tall, foreboding trees of Thornmere Forest. In the gathering dusk, they look like the shadows of monsters.
“Out you go,” she snaps. “And don’t come back! We don’t want no more of your lies around here.”
Valen takes my arm and pulls me outside and she slams the door behind us.
24
IRENA
We’re shut out of the inn with no food and barely any clothes. Also, the night is coming on and now we have no place to sleep. What are we going to do?
I look up at Valen, who’s surveying the back area of the inn.
“Why did you do that? Why did you give her my dress?”
“To avoid getting thrown into debtor’s prison—I thought that was clear,” he says mildly, as though our predicament and my near-nudity is of no importance.
“But…but you didn’t have to go along with her!” I protest. “You can turn into a huge, monstrous dragon! Why didn’t you do that instead of stripping me naked?”
He gives a short, barking laugh.
“First of all, you’re not naked. You have your cloak, don’t you?” He frowns. “Where is your cloak?”
My cloak! I look around desperately, but then I remember him pulling it off me and dropping it to the floor.
“I must have left it in our room!” I exclaim. “I have to go back for it!”
But when I tug on the door’s wooden handle, I find that it’s locked. Though I pull with all my might, it won’t budge. I turn back to Valen.
“You have to go get it for me!”
He shakes his head.
“I don’t think so, sweetheart. You told everyone in that common room you’re a witch. I don’t care to be classed as your familiar.”
“But you don’t have to be afraid of them! You could just—”
“Just what?” he demands, narrowing his eyes. “Just shift into my Drake form and threaten them until they bring out your cloak? I can’t talk when I’m a Drake—I can only roar and breathe fire. Should I burn the whole inn down and kill everyone inside because one pretty, spoiled little princess lost her dress and cloak?”
I stiffen at once and glare up at him.
“I wasn’t saying you should kill everyone! I just meant you don’t have to be afraid of them.”
“I’m not afraid, Princess,” he growls. “I’m just wary of making every man, woman, and child in the whole fucking town want to pick up their pitchforks and come hunting for us. Also, a Drake doesn’t kill unless he’s threatened with death himself. Those people weren’t really threatening to kill us.”
“They threatened to throw us in debtor’s prison,” I point out, but I’m aware it’s a weak argument.
He shakes his head.
“And if they had, then I would have Shifted to burn our way out. But they let us go.”
“Your people aren’t so picky about not killing my people!” I snap at him. “If it wasn’t for the invisible magic net over our entire kingdom keeping the Dragons out, we’d be wiped from the Earth by now!”
“Invisible magic net?” To my surprise, Valen throws back his head and laughs—a deep, rumbling chuckle that I swear rattles my bones. “What are you talking about?” he demands.