A Pet for the Dragons

19.

Surprise update!

ZORGE

I was glad to have gotten Arika to myself for a few hours before leaving for my patrolling shift. It was even better because Ivret was busy preparing charms for the rigs for me to take on my patrolling duty.

Arika was all mine for now, and no one could interrupt us... or that's what I thought. I was keenly aware of Rardrox following us as I took her to the kitchen. Arika seemed unaware of him, which was a good thing, but I was annoyed.

I shut the kitchen door as soon as we entered, hoping it'd sent the message to Radrox, but who was I kidding? We were brothers. Our stubborn genes were quite strong. I'd also sensed his eagerness for her, which annoyed me even more. It meant double the competition, but I was willing to do anything to outsmart them and ensure she stayed with me the most.

For the moment, I focused on Arika. I was excited about our agreement. It wasn't an agreement yet, but I was glad we discussed this because it was constantly eating me away.

I waited as Arika looked around all the meat in the kitchen, deciding what she wanted to eat. Meanwhile, I tried to tune into her emotions to see how she felt about all this, but all I got was a solid wall surrounding her. This was another thing constantly eating me away.

Ever since I found her, I'd been trying to sense her emotions, to get into her head, but for some reason, the more she stayed in the castle, the more closed off she got. Earlier, I was still able to sense some of her emotions lightly and even get an idea of her nightmares, but now, everything was completely shielded.

As I stared at her, I wondered if she was doing this deliberately. Maybe this was her strength—a shield. It was unheard of, but it could very well be. At the same time, I wasn't sure if each human was blessed with unique powers like us dragons.

I needed to dig into this matter, but from what I could gather from her time here, I was sure she had something that shielded her. Even Ivret had trouble tapping into her energy to heal her. Forget about healing; he couldn't even access her energy in the first place. And Ivret was a Silge* level Healer— the highest level a healer could be. Ivret had been a healer for the Cardinal House and served Princess Mavie for years... yet he couldn't diagnose a mere human.

There was something different about her for sure.

"What is that?" She asked, pointing to a fresh kill. I'd been stripping that fur off the meat.

"White bear meat," I told her.

"You mean polar bear?" she asked. I shrugged and moved to the meat. I looked around for the fattiest part of the meat. She'd love to have that.

"You can try this. It's fresh and great, but the organs are the best bit about white bears, especially the liver," I offered, pointing to the juicy red liver I had hung on the wall to dry off. A sickly look took over her face as she stared at it.

"No, not the liver. That's enough vitamin A to kill me. No thanks," She told me, and I frowned.

"You humans are really fragile. The liver is the best part of the white bear. It has all the strength. I'm going to hide it before Ivret finds out. He's greedy with livers," I told her, but she shook her head.

"Do you have something that won't kill me?" She asked. "Do you have any fruits here?"

"Fruits, let me see," I muttered, going to the pantry to look at our stock.

I recalled some lizardcerts lying around. I had gotten them the last time I went to Cerdosa, a long time ago. They might have turned sour. Ivret had whined about them to me a couple of times because that fruit gave him rash—one of the reasons why it was my favourite.