Dragon

Chapter 22

Jaimin paused in the tunnel entrance leading towards the twin chambers he now shared with Maay. He shook himself, once more attempting to shed the dripping slush of mud and snow clinging to his fur. She'd only grumble if he arrived sodden and dirty.

Bits flew off to splatter against the rock. He stared at the mess in distaste. Being unable to fly grated all the more with each passing week.

He hadn't minded at first. Now that winter had finally settled in, provisions were no longer easy to come by and there was an ever-pressing need for him to hunt. Every dragon had to bring down their own meal. On top of being forced to creep along the ground like some common animal, he had to hunt for two.

Maay had helped him in the tracking to begin with and had even taken down a number of their prey. But now she'd passed the normal twenty sunrises eight days ago, she could no longer risk leaving the lair. Not when she might lay at any moment.

Any time. Even when he left to hunt, the thought of her doing so all alone plagued him. Distracting him. What if she'd laid already? Putting aside all thoughts of getting clean, he trotted along the tunnel.

"You know, for a prospective sire, you don't seem overly content."

Jaimin swung round at the sound of Teero's voice, growling when he came face-to-face with the bone-white dragon. Why hadn't he sensed the elder's cloying musk sooner? He sniffed the air. Beyond the cloak of his own wet fur, he picked up the scent of another masking that of the older dragon, mingled with the unmistakable aroma of dragonfire soot. "You've mated?" That blast from on high he'd seen earlier while tracking down that deer, it had been him? "Which female?" He didn't think any of them would pick Teero.

"Dorable." His slimy grin widened. "I've always had a penchant for grasslanders."

Grasslanders? He preferred the stocky, short-winged females rather than the hearty creatures that were those of the mountain stock? Why grasslanders could barely fly the length of their territory. Even the lithe tropics were better in the air. Quicker too. "Then why were you so vehement about catching Maay?"

He shrugged, wingtips bobbing. "Must've been the scaled in me."

"The sca–" Heat flared in his chest. The scaled in him? He tamped down his anger. "I've seen your records. You're barely an eighth!"

"Yet it was you, a male whose bloodline is so pure that I wouldn't have been surprised to hear you've mated your own sister to keep it that way, who actually took the little half-wing."

Jaimin growled. Teero dared to choose now, when he'd no dragonfire, to taunt him? "Aren't you meant to be with your mate?"

Teero chuckled. "I was. Didn't you see it?" The smile became lopsided and, eerily, a little on the pleasant side. "A good proper Flight. Nice and long as it should be. Reckon she'll lay a dozen eggs." A glint of malice slid across his face. "Speaking of which ... has Maayin laid her egg yet?"

A dozen eggs in one mating. He crushed the thought, its residue leaving a bitter aftertaste. It wasn't Maay's fault her kind laid small clutches. "No," he growled, turning his back on the pale dragon. He would not allow the elder the satisfaction of taunting him.

"Really? I suppose that's probably for the best. After all, unlike mine, you can't be entirely sure that it's yours."

Jaimin froze, the heat in chest rising anew. "Come again?" He must have heard wrong. Surely even Teero wouldn't suggest another had sired his as yet unlaid hatchling.