“You ain’t going out there.”
“Then why did you call me here?”
“To tell me what you been up to so I can handle that Gold.”
Her lips pursed a bit, and she stared at him. He knew that expression better than any other. She wouldn’t tell him anything now because she wanted to be the one to talk to that giant lizard standing outside their gates. The Beast believed herself a politician. She didn’t understand that was the work of men. She handled correspondence and such well enough—especially since she was one of the few of them who could read and write really well—but it was up to the men to manage these things face to face, over a keg of ale with a wench or two for entertainment. Dagmar simply failed to learn this, and he worried what would happen when she found a worthy husband who wouldn’t allow any of the nonsense Sigmar let her get away with.
Knowing well there was no point in fighting her when she got that particular expression on her face, Sigmar relented the smallest bit. “You’ll wait behind the guards until you’re asked for. Understand?”
“If we absolutely must waste time …”
“We must.” He glanced down at the canine that never left her side. Canute, she’d named him. Strange how he could remember the dog’s name … “And you’d best find a safe place for him. He’ll look like a tasty morsel to that thing outside.”
“Yes, Father.”
“And don’t annoy me anymore today.”
“I won’t, Father.”
And they both knew she was lying.
Chapter 3
Dagmar glanced down at her gown again and checked to make sure her head scarf was on properly before readjusting the spectacles balanced on her nose.
A dragon. A real dragon here, at her father’s fortress and she was about to meet him. Not even another Northlander, but a Southland dragon. A scholar, a teacher, an intellectual.
Reason help her, but Dagmar realized she was so excited about this, she was almost … dare she say … giddy?
She wondered how old this dragon was. He could be six or seven hundred years old! Because of course the mightiest queen of Dark Plains would only send the most learned of scholars, the most experienced of delegates to represent her in the halls of The Reinholdt.
Dagmar cringed when she heard her father speak to the dragon.
“I be Sigmar,” he told the dragon, and Dagmar barely stopped herself from yelling over the gates a more proper and dignified greeting.
“So you asked for me, Reinholdt?”
What a voice! Deep and low, and it lightly rattled the windows from its timbre alone, because he did not yell. He sounded calm and quite … respectable.
“No. I asked for your Annwyl,” her father practically snapped back.
Dagmar began to tap her fist against her leg.
“Well,” the dragon replied smoothly, “she’s indisposed at the moment, so she sent me as her emissary.”
“A dragon emissary for a human?”
Dagmar gritted her teeth in frustration. What exactly was the old bastard doing? Why was he asking rude questions? Questions that could be asked and answered over dinner when the dragon was more relaxed. She knew for a fact that one of the local herders had cows grazing in the east fields—enough to feed a dragon, she was sure.
Honestly, was this her father’s idea of good politics? No wonder she had to fight so hard to prevent war between the Reinholdts and the surrounding fiefdoms. Because her kinsmen were rude idiots!
“Again, Reinholdt, you wanted to see me or someone from Dark Plains?” the dragon pushed. It was obvious his patience was running out. Well, obvious to anyone with sense.
“Nay. Not me, dragon. The Beast made that request.”
The Beast? Her father was introducing her as The Beast?
If she thought she could get away with killing them all and razing the land they all stood upon—she’d do it in less than a heartbeat.
“And may I meet The Beast?” the dragon countered.
Dagmar stepped forward, but Valdís grabbed the back of her dress and held her in place.
“Off!” she ordered.
“You’ll wait,” he snarled.
“You sure about that, dragon?” her father asked, and she knew now he was toying with the creature. And he had the nerve to wonder where she got her attitude from.
“Yes,” the dragon grumbled. “I am.”
Her father must have motioned for her, because her brother released her gown and the soldiers protecting the front of the fortress moved out of her way. Dagmar walked outside, across the courtyard, and through the main gates. Her father’s guards formed two lines, allowing her to pass. Dagmar walked up to the magnificent being. He glinted gold in the dull light of the two suns, each scale shiny and bright. He was like a bit of a sun himself, bringing a small amount of light to her world. His wings stretched out from his body. They, too, were covered in scales, but the wings seemed somehow weightless and fine, like the most exquisite metal ever created. The tip of each wing had a sharp, gold talon, and there were gold talons on each claw. Two bright white horns sat atop his head and long, shiny gold hair fell across his back and down his body, brushing gently against the ground. Beautiful gold eyes focused on her as soon as she stepped closer to him.
She’d had her greeting all ready for him. The words—a proper greeting for so important a diplomat—on her lips, but she couldn’t speak. Not once she saw him.
In all her thirty years nothing so beautiful had ever crossed her path.
When Dagmar feared she’d embarrass herself by her silence, she finally found her voice and opened her mouth to speak. But the words stopped in her throat again.
Only this time they stopped … because he was laughing. At her.
It wasn’t mere laughter either. Not a muffled sound behind his claw. Nor a brief snort of disbelief. These were things she experienced on a daily basis and had grown quite used to. No.
This overgrown … child was rolling around on the ground like he’d never seen anything more amusing than she. Massive dragon legs and arms flailed while his guffaws echoed over the courtyard and around the countryside.
Some scaly lizard was laughing at her! The only daughter of The Reinholdt! And he was having this moment on Reinholdt land, no less!
Any awe and admiration Dagmar had were wiped clean in that moment, and she felt that distinct coldness she hid so well from outsiders. It swept through her like ice from an avalanche. The men behind her began to murmur amongst themselves, feet shuffled, and her father cleared his throat. A few times. It wasn’t the dragon that made them uncomfortable. Not directly anyway.
Dagmar waited until his laughter turned into chuckles. “Are you done?” she asked, keeping her voice even.
“Sorry, uh … Beast.” It snorted out another laugh.
“Dagmar will do. Dagmar Reinholdt. Thirteenth child of The Reinholdt and his only daughter. I asked your queen here,” she continued, “because I have news that may save her life and the lives of her unborn whelps.”
The dragon’s expression of humor quickly changed to a scowl. Apparently it did not appreciate the term she’d used, but she was past caring. All her dreams of building an allegiance with the Blood Queen faded as soon as that woman sent this idiot to represent her. No, Dagmar would have to find other allegiances for her father. The Blood Queen of Dark Plains simply would not do.
“Tell me, sweet Dagmar,” it sneered, rolling back to its belly and lifting its head a bit. “And I’ll tell her.”
Dagmar remained silent for one very long moment, then answered simply, “No.”
The dragon blinked in surprise and abruptly pushed itself up a bit so that its snout was barely inches from her nose. Its gold eyes were locked on hers, and she wondered how she ever saw them as pretty. They were as ugly as the rest of the dragon. Ugly and mocking and absolutely useless.
“What do you mean, no?” it demanded.
“I mean, you’ve insulted me. You’ve insulted my kinsmen. And you’ve insulted The Reinholdt. So you can return to your bitch queen and you can watch her die.”
Confident she’d made her point, Dagmar Reinholdt turned on her heel and walked away from it. But she did stop a few feet away and glanced over her shoulder.
“Now that, dragon”—she happily sneered back, mocking the creature’s tone—“that’s funny.”
Without another word, she returned to her father’s fortress. But before she disappeared into its mighty embrace, she heard her father ask, “You are a bit of a dumb bastard, aren’t ya, dragon?”
And it was times like these when she truly did appreciate her father’s coarseness.
A woman! The Beast was a woman! Why didn’t anyone tell him that? Why did everyone keep claiming he was a man? If Gwenvael had known, he would have handled the whole thing quite differently.
But he hadn’t known and his first reaction at seeing her … well, it had not been his finest moment. Even he’d admit that. Yet how was that his fault when everyone kept telling him that The Beast was some mighty giant warrior spit up from one of hell’s many pits?
Pacing restlessly in the abandoned cave he found high in the Mountains of Sorrow—a rather fitting name at the moment—Gwenvael tore at his mind trying to figure out how to fix this.
His first thought, naturally, was to seduce the woman. She had that look of a spinster, didn’t she? A bitter, unhappy virgin who didn’t trust men enough to allow them in her bed. In the past, he’d had great success with women like that. And yet …
He sighed, rubbed his eyes.
And yet this one didn’t seem like that at all, did she?
She was plain, that was true enough. But not hideous. He didn’t feel the need to scream and run away at first sight of her. And she had those eyes—steel grey and cold as the top of this mountain. Eyes like hers could go a long way if managed correctly, but she wore a drab, grey dress that did nothing for her. No adornments on it, no low-cut bodice, teasing of her bosom. Nor was there a painfully high and prim collar up to her chin so that one demanded to know what she was hiding. The girdle was a boring brown leather, when a silver weave would have been much nicer. The eating dagger she had tucked into it was nice enough, but so? The boots on her small feet were grey fur as well. And she wore that head scarf tied over her hair as if she were about to go off and scrub a kitchen.
No, it wasn’t looks that had gained her a name like The Beast. She wasn’t ugly, but she wasn’t such a gorgeous animal that men were devoured in her bed.
Nor was she a raving lunatic, which one would think a woman named The Beast by Northmen would be.
The coldness in those eyes ran through her entire body. Without a thought to what a powerful dragon could do if angered, she’d kept the information about Annwyl to herself. To be honest, Gwenvael wasn’t even sure the Reinholdt men knew what she held.
The Reinholdt himself seemed to be completely clueless unless he had a war ax in his hands. Surprisingly short for a Northlander, The Reinholdt made up for it with width—his shoulders and chest disturbingly large, his muscles near busting from his clothes. Yet beyond his appearance, the stumpy Northlander reminded Gwenvael a bit of his own father, Bercelak the Great. His father was never as happy as when he was killing someone or something in battle—politics absolutely bored the older Black dragon.