Free Reawakening by Amy Rae Durreson

Hirah.”
    “This was an ocean then,” Tarn said, remembering the glitter of the sea from above. “It had its own protectors.” Where had the merfolk gone when the sea dried up?
    Barrett closed his hand on Tarn’s wrist, and tugged at him gently. “Come back to the fire.”
    “I cannot,” Tarn said and considered his options. Barrett was sweet and scholarly, no physical threat, but he did not wish to hurt him. Could he be cruel? It was an open secret that Barrett was in love with Dit, just waiting for him to still his restless feet. Jealousy might drive him away.
    He couldn’t lower himself that far, though. A good man didn’t deserve that. Instead, he leaned forward and kissed Barrett lightly, gathering strength from the warm startled lips under his. “Go to your lover, and give each other comfort. This battle is mine.”
    “Tarn….”
    “You belong to the hoard of Tarn Amel, every one of you, and I am keeper of the hoard. I will keep you safe.”
    Barrett’s eyes went wide, but he didn’t try to stop Tarn this time, merely watched him back away and unlace the canvas between the wagons.
    As soon as Tarn crawled out, the wind caught him, shoving him off-balance. The world glowed as red as blood as the sand tore at his face and clothes. Not even trying to stand, he crawled forward, counting each time he moved his hands, trying to get enough distance from the caravan to change form without crushing them. He counted three thousand lurches forward before he dared stop.
    The air was full of roaring, sand rasping against sand, but he could hear the screams clearly through it. It sickened him, but he couldn’t help Alagard right now. His human hoard must come first.
    The transformation came slowly, fighting against the wind as he held himself together by sheer will. His human form caught fire in slow flares and then dissolved into flame, spreading and burning through the whirling sand in one great and fearsome conflagration until his true form coalesced, air and fire contained by stone-hard scales.
    He roared at the storm as it bore down on him again. Now he could feel the malice in it, and the great tortured despair of Alagard. The spirit was in the wind, his power driving it, but he was not in control. In this form the dragon could feel every moment of defiance, every desperate lunge for freedom.
    He pulled his attention away with fierce determination. Humans first, desert next.
    The outline of the caravan barely showed through the scarlet haze. The dragon moved carefully, shifting his body round so the greater bulk of him was between them and the wind. Carefully, he curled his tail around the leeward side.
    The sand was heavy on the top canvas, layered and clinging. Now that he had blocked the wind from them, he could see more clearly, and so he drew breath and blew across the canvas, making it surge and ripple.
    The sand shifted away, caught on the roiling wind, and he whipped his neck round to seal the circle, spreading his wing to roof the little ring of wagons.
    Already the sand was piling against his side, scouring off two thousand years of dust and dirt. The last traces of the forest went slapping into the wind, and then the thick crusts of lichen and fungus that had covered him were scrubbed away.
    It was a pleasant itch for now, though he knew it would not stay that way.
    The wind came back full force, hurling sand and fury at his flanks. Grimly, the dragon tightened his coil, sealing off the caravan from the full fury of the storm.
    Then, because he did not want to endure this alone, he snaked his head between the canvas walls, curling his neck over the caravans that were almost as large as his head, pressing up the canvas until it strained against his spines, and peered into the central circle. Under the shelter of his wing, it was so dark and stifling that the only light was the dim flicker of the central fire.
    As he shoved forward, he heard screams and cries of alarm. In the darkness, it was hard to