by Jade White
The traveler started laughing. “I don’t fancy anything King Athalos does. I only come to see what the miserable king is up to this time. If you are a dragon, why would I risk the prophecy where it would free everyone from King Athalos and Lord Crewe’s grasps?”
I shook my head. “Take it as a warning then and keep your word.”
“You two best be getting back or your father will send a search party after you,” Marvin pointed out.
I looked up at the clock. He was right. The ceremony would begin soon. Rowan and I had to make it back before then or else our father would search us down.
The traveler didn't asked any more questions, which was good. He also didn’t put in any of his own opinions, either. For a slight amount of time, we got a break from him. I wasn’t sure what to think of the traveler, but Marvin kept telling Rowan and I both that he was trustworthy. He had known him for years and never gave up a secret.
I was hoping Marvin was right because our lives were on the line on this secret. I knew, however, that Marvin would come through with bringing us the pendants. Soon enough, we wouldn’t just have our brides, but also we would visit Maelyss to hone our skills.
Marvin looked at me one last time before I reached the door.
“I hate to say this, Prince Merek, but you might want to put your riding gloves on,” said as he motioned to my left hand.
I looked down at the scales that seemed to be appearing.
Rowan looked down at his arm as he was itching. Glittery transparent scales seemed to be falling out of his sleeve.
“We are dragons,” I whispered.
“This isn’t going to be good! What if we turn into a full dragon at the ceremony?” Rowan asked.
The traveler seemed amused by this. “I guess karma did seem to bite King Athalos on the behind. It does tickle my fancy seeing the oldest and youngest princes aren’t his at all.”
I glared at him and then stared back at my brother. “I don’t know. We have to think of some reason why we can’t really face the kingdom in a long drawn-out ceremony.”
“We could try to tell ourselves we are humans. Do you think that would work?” Rowan asked.
I let out a groan. When I did, wisps of smoke exited from my nose and mouth.
“This isn’t going to end good at all,” Rowan said as wisps of smoke were beginning to exit his mouth and nose as well.
Although his eyes were dark and mine were whitish-blue, we both seemed to having glowing eyes.
“I thought you said we didn’t show signs of being a dragon according to the book you read.”
“I lied. I didn’t want anyone to know that we were dragons,” Rowan admitted.
“You could have shared this with me!” I said, unimpressed.
“How are we going to go back to the castle when we both will be killed?”
“Worse than that, who is going to marry a dragon?”
“You know what they say, boys? Dragons make the best lovers around! Ask anyone who has been with a dragon. It looks like your mother has been at least twice,” the traveler pointed out.
“Stay out of it!” Rowan and I said at the same time.
“We can’t return looking like this, so how are we going to go back there?” Rowan asked.
“I am thinking!”
“Think harder! My back itches and I think I am growing wings.”
“Boys! I hate to break this up, but if you are going to turn into dragons before my eyes, you are going to have to hide somewhere. The lunch crowd will be coming soon enough and this place will be filled with locals,” Marvin pointed out.
I looked horrified as the back of Rowan’s shirt began to lift.
“We are both shape-shifting into dragons. Marvin is right. We have to figure out something fast or go into hiding. Since we don’t know how to correct it, we will have to send a message that we left early. Perhaps our father will believe it and leave us alone, since there is no way we can be seen like this. We will beheaded immediately.”
“This is incredibly painful. I feel as if I am shedding my skin as a human and outgrowing it,” Rowan said as he began cringing. His face began to reform and there was a long snout and scaled face. “This is not happening!” he mumbled.
Marvin looked at me. “Go upstairs and I am sure, since you have paid me quite well, I will think of something to cover for the both
of you. Just keep out of sight.”
“How do we know if we are going to grow into a huge dragon like Maelyss?”
The traveler shook his head. “You are just beginning to shape-shift. I doubt you will become that big,” he said as he sighed.
“Run to the room. I see your father’s men coming down the hill.”
Rowan and I stayed in the attic where Marvin would often hide me when I stayed at the inn.
Wisps of smoke seemed to continue to escape out of our nostrils. Our hands were no longer in the shape of humans, but we were full-fledged dragons trying to stay quiet in our room. This had never happened before and with King Athalos trying to prove the prophecy was real, this wasn’t helping.
I wasn’t sure what Marvin had in mind to cover for us, but I was hoping it worked. Staying incredibly silent in the attic only made me feel as if we were prisoners. Why didn’t our mother tell us that we were shape-shifters before this?
*
Somewhere in the time that we were in the attic, both Rowan and I had fallen asleep. It didn’t surprise me when we woke up that the traveler was nowhere to be found, but we were no longer in the town either. We were in “a town” but not the town that was part of the kingdom. I was sure Marvin had worked his magic.
A note was pinned to us as we seemed to once again be humans.
“I took the honors to help you out. You are at the inn in the village where the mail order bride agency is. I got you to half the journey. As promised, in your bag is your box with the pendants.”
“At least Marvin got us this far. We are at least out of the kingdom in which we were in danger of getting killed,” Rowan said looking down at the note that was pinned to him as well.
“He might have got us out of there, but we are still going to have to face King Athalos as well. You seem to forget that we will have to return sometime,” I pointed out.
“For now, we are humans and we can at least pick out brides.”
Going downstairs seemed to be different than the inn that Marvin owned and ran. Exotic women seemed to accompany the place.
“I see that you two are finally awake. How can I help you?” asked a woman in a long tight fitting dress that was tied under her bosom.
“We are looking for this address,” I said as I reached into my pocket and gave her the card.
“Oh, you must be Merek. We have your mail-order bride waiting. We have trained her to be quite obedient and she loves to please people.”
“Trained her? What is this place?” Rowan asked as the woman disappeared and came back with a young woman in her early twenties. Her blond hair seemed to be almost snow white. Her eyes were jade green. She seemed to be the woman of my dreams.
“I understand you are now my husband,” she said as she bowed at me with a thick accent.
“What is your name?” I asked.
“Ryia,” she whispered.
“Princess Ryia, you are to be Queen when we return to the kingdom.”
“I understand this perfectly.”
“Good, then we should start to leave.”
“How do I sign up for one of these girls? That red head makes my blood boil!” my brother said as smoke began to come out of his nose. His eyes seemed to flash with a sudden new desire within him that had to be met.
“We don’t often get requests from dragons. You two will be the first in a very long time. I thought you would be humans since you come from the kingdom that hates dragons.”
Ryia seemed to shy away as she looked into my eyes and then looked away.
“Yes, well, things don’t always seem to be the way they app
ear,” I replied.
“Ryia, go gather your belongings. You have a long journey ahead of you.”
She nodded without a word and disappeared. When she returned, she had a sack that was like our traveling sack.
The red headed girl seemed to take a liking to my brother, but I was paying more attention to Ryia as she was now my bride.
Every time her eyes caught mine, I felt as if my soul was waking up. I had never felt this strange feeling before. I also knew that there was a lot to learn for the both of us and I wasn’t sure where it would go from there.
At the moment, it was an agreement that she was my bride. I didn’t know her and it seemed foreign to show affection so suddenly to a stranger.
As we exited the streets, I saw my horse in the stable with Rowan’s horse. I was sure Marvin seemed to work his magic to get us here, since it would have been a two-week trip, otherwise. Our packs were filled with everything including food that we needed to get to the dragon realm.
When the voyage began, I sensed that something was going terribly wrong with my new bride.
“How long is it going to take to get to the castle?” she asked aggravated.
“It is a long trip. Why do you ask?”
“I no longer like traveling. We seemed to be riding on a horse through who knows where!”
“Then I shouldn’t tell you that we will be making camp in the middle of the forest?”
I could feel my arms itch once again, and I was trying hard not to scratch at them. I didn’t want to turn into a dragon riding my horse while holding my new bride.
“You are joking! I thought I would be staying in a real house. Why is it that people think they can buy brides and treat them like this?”
I wasn’t sure where they found Ryia, but her attitude seemed to be much different than the one that was on the paper I picked out.
“I have been dreading this travel as well, Ryia.”
She groaned. “How could you say that? You aren’t the one that is suddenly married to a dragon.”
“It could be worse.”
“I would like to know how it could possibly be worse than this! There is no way anything can be worse than being married to a dragon.”
I didn’t dare tell her the rest of the story of how our father was most likely hunting us. I thought I would save that tidbit until later, when she seemed to warm up to me.
“When I joined the agency as a mail order bride, I thought I would be married to an aristocrat or a prince. I never imagined that I would be married to a dragon at all.”
“You act like this is the worst possible thing you have ever done in your life! Why did you even become a mail order bride?”
“I didn’t become a mail order bride by choice. I needed the money for my family. Often the agency comes through and takes the good looking girls and sells them off to poor pitiful men like you, who can’t find a traditional bride.”
“Do you know who I am?”
“You are my husband, I know that!”
“I am Prince Merek. I am the son to King Athalos.”
Ryia rolled her eyes as she looked over her shoulder at me.
“Please, tell me another one. King Athalos hates dragons and you can’t be in any way Prince Merek. The arrogant bastard would be in my face already ordering me to do things.”
“Do you wish for me to order you around?”
She looked at me with one eyebrow raised. “Do you think I really would listen to you? Women shouldn’t be ordered by their husband!”
“I thought your profile stated you were very obedient and always willing to please someone.”
“That was before I ended up married to a dragon!”
“You haven’t even given me a chance. You just seem to dread the idea before you even get to know me,” I mumbled as I looked at her.
“I am sure you would think the same thing as well, if you just happened to get stuck with marrying a dragon.”
I sighed. “What is it going to take for you to at least give me a fair chance?”
“Ha! That is up to you! Oh, I guess for you not to eat me! This is the worse luck I have ever had in my life. I get stuck with a dragon as a husband.”
“They do say dragons make the best lovers,” I tried to point out.
She slapped me. “Save it scale boy! No way are we having sex.”
I glanced back at my brother who had to turn around on his horse and start laughing.
“You know, it is up to you if you want to go on this venture. I can always leave you somewhere and you can find your way back.”
“Are you serious? You are willing to leave me out in the middle of nowhere? You cannot be serious! First I am married to a
dragon and a beast for a husband, and now you are willing to abandon me in the middle of nowhere?”
“I think you are making it obvious that you don’t want to be here. We can always turn around and take you back to the agency. It is up to you.”
Neither of these options seemed to please her. She seemed terribly angered by the fact Rowan and I were dragons. In her eyes, we had tricked her. I hated to see what would happen if we mentioned our lives were on the line and we were going to be hunted soon enough.
“Can you at least pretend to be a wife who would like to accompany me on this journey?”
“Why would I want to do something like that?” Ryia asked.
I tried hard not to groan, since wisps of smoke kept escaping from my nostrils each time I got mad.
It seemed as if this mail order bride wasn’t working out at all for me.
“It would make the trip a bit more pleasurable if we could get along.”
“How much further do we have until we make camp?” Ryia asked annoyed.
“We will make camp once the sun starts setting.”
Ryia seemed to show her displeasure with this idea. “My legs are getting tired and my body aches from riding this horse all day. Are we in a rush that I don’t know about?”
“Yes, we are in a bit of a rush. We will keep traveling until the sun sets.”
That was how my trip began as I seemed to be partnered with a
mail order bride who could not stand the looks of me.
By the time we made camp nothing seemed to have changed between the two of us. She tried hard to stay away from me and I was trying to debate in my head if I should come up with an excuse why I didn’t bring back my bride, and abandon her here in the middle of nowhere.
She would have been kicking and screaming the whole way to the dragon realm.
I had dreaded marriage completely since everyone had warned me about the day I would meet someone a lot like Ryia and she would make me regret even thinking about getting married.
I glanced over at her. She had been the reason why I dreaded marriage and she was a fine example of it. Now she was my wife and I wasn’t sure what to do with her.
She seemed as if she was regretting the whole thing as well, since she kept telling me about her mistake. She didn’t try to start a conversation with me unless she wanted to point out she hated this whole situation.
Unlike my bride, Rowan was having better luck and I didn’t seem to see him much that night as I sat next to the fire. I was alone and thinking. All I wanted to do was get to the dragon realm fast so we could harness our inner dragon before anyone else noticed what we were.
Ryia began to once again complain.
I looked up at her. “If you are in that much pain being here why don’t you just leave and run away? Neither one of us will have to see each other again. I didn’t mean to destroy your life by marrying you. I was actually hoping for a wife who would someday be my equal.”
“Good, I just might take your idea and run as far as I can away from you. Don’t send search parties out to look for me either.”
It didn’t surprise me that she had said this, since she refused to look at me from the other side of the fire. It was as if I was a hideous beast and her eyes would burn if she looked at me.
“Sun will set in two hours. I hope you know how to make your own camp.”
She glared at me. “See what type of beast you are! I am in the middle of nowhere and you are going to hand me my pack and tell me to leave? I don’t even have a horse!”