Free The Dragons' Chosen by Gwen Dandridge Page A

“Oh no, My Lady, allow me. It isn’t right that you should haul water and chop wood.”
    “I have it already. And don’t call me ‘My Lady.’ I’m not your lady.” In the heat of their discussion, the bucket dropped and the water poured upon the ground. I was grateful it wasn’t the axe that fell.
    Douglas picked up the bucket, still trying to redeem himself in her eyes. “My Lady, er, Chris. Let me do this for you. Allow it as a favor to me.”
    Chris glared at him. “I don’t need some muscled male to carry firewood or water, thank you very much! Now, since you’ve been so helpful, I have to go all the way back to the stream again.” Chris angrily yanked the bucket away from him.
    At that point I interceded, and Douglas retreated with his gentle feelings hurt. Douglas and Lawrence both were sweet on Chris. All of us noticed but Chris. She was friendly with the men, winking and grinning with everyone except the captain, though she could go from joking to combative with the blink of her eye. The men were fascinated by her. Her cinnamon hair was often loose, pushed casually behind her ears, her face bare of embellishment apart from those strange eyepieces. There was a power to her, a sureness that came not from rank but from within. She backed down from none, holding her own in ways that I had never imagined. She took their teasing and teased back. Once she even sparred with Charles, flipping him to the ground right before she herself was felled by a quick move that sent her buttocks over teakettle. She got up and shook his hand, saying, “Good job.” And that was that.
    It was all beyond me. I sat quietly with my embroidery, but drawn to that easy way she had with them. Even though the men accepted me, I was still a princess. They and I knew it. It kept a certain formality in our relationship.
    Later that night in my tent, I withdrew the “dragon book,” as I had started to think of it. It fell open to five pages that were stuck together. Chris and I worked through the water-stained writing.
    “What do you think this means?” Chris fingered one of the paragraphs. “It looks like the journal of one of the first princesses.”
    I fear this meeting above all things. What if I am not to his taste?
    I frowned. This didn’t make sense. One thing I hadn’t worried about was that a dragon might not find me flavorful.
    Chris verbalized my thoughts. “What if the dragons want you for some other purpose?”
    “Perhaps, but what possible use could I be for a dragon?”
    The rest of the text was so faded and blurry we couldn’t make it out. I put it aside, planning on dedicating time to try to glean hints from it. Chris said she hoped reading the book would convince me to go home. But I knew that I couldn’t. Perhaps within this book was some aid, some secret that would help me survive. I remembered my father’s last words: “Even a pawn can topple a king.” And I was no one’s pawn.
    On the following morning, Lucinda had healed sufficiently to limp around with a stick for support. Chris ate her breakfast in silence, standing. After two long days of riding, she had little wish to sit. I wondered at her quiet mood, so unlike her normal self. She stirred the morning fire, not looking in my direction.
    “I have a paper due and I haven’t started writing it.” She pulled out the golden card. “I need to go back. I still don’t know if all this,” she waved her hand around, “is real or a dream. I truly can’t tell.”
    I held my breath; I couldn’t bear for her to leave me. Not now, not when we were so close to the dragons.
    “I’ll be quick. It’s just for a few days, no longer.”
    “Of course,” I finally said. “This isn’t your world, it’s merely a dream anyway.” I bit my tongue. I couldn’t believe I had said something so cutting. My only excuse was that we would reach the dragons in under a fortnight so my hold on my emotions was slipping.
    Chris looked at me then. “No, I’m not