Dragons Realm Read Free

fam­ily, wealthy and re­spec­ted. She is eager to serve the Realm.”
    Dante listened, but he kept his eyes aver­ted, his head cocked slightly to the side.
    He didn’t look at any of them .
    He simply nod­ded after each in­tro­duc­tion, and then, without say­ing a word, he si­lently turned on his heels and strolled to the castle doors.
    The dis­missal— the ab­so­lute dis­reg­ard and own­er­ship —was as glar­ing as his si­lence and far more fore­bod­ing.
    Both gave Mina the chills.
    She watched as he walked away, both si­lent and proud, without both­er­ing to look back or even dis­miss the gov­erness, and some­thing in­side of her re­coiled.
    Mina didn’t know what she had ex­pec­ted, what she had hoped would hap­pen the first time she laid eyes on a dragon, but this wasn’t it: Per­haps she had ex­pec­ted an in­ter­rog­a­tion or a sharp, con­des­cend­ing diatribe, out­lining ex­actly what was ex­pec­ted of each girl, what would and would not be tol­er­ated. Per­haps she had ex­pec­ted the dragon to snarl when he spoke or to ra­di­ate cruelty with his eyes, to re­gard them with hos­til­ity or dis­dain, even vul­gar in­nu­endo—after all, they were his to do with as he pleased—but this, this cas­ual dis­reg­ard and quiet dis­missal, it was truly bey­ond the pale. After six long years of ser­vitude—liv­ing, work­ing, and train­ing in ut­ter des­ol­a­tion at the Keep—after nearly a dec­ade as noth­ing more than a ward of the king­dom, Mina had ex­pec­ted some­thing more.
    Any­thing.
    More .
    Some­how, Mina had at least ex­pec­ted to be ac­know­ledged as alive.
    Just then, Dante turned around in the door­way, and his severe eyes met hers . It was as if he had heard her thoughts—was that even pos­sible?
    “Mina…” His voice was hardly more than a whis­per. “There are two horses saddled in the court­yard, a black stal­lion and a white geld­ing. The stal­lion is my per­sonal steed; the geld­ing is now yours. Take your mount.” His voice was as en­chant­ing as the night sky and just as dark. He didn’t await a reply. He simply sauntered out the doors.
    Mina’s stom­ach turned over in sud­den waves of nausea, and she locked her gaze on Ta­tiana’s—the girl’s face was pos­it­ively ashen—be­fore turn­ing her at­ten­tion to Pralina. “Gov­erness?”
    Pralina scowled. “Go, girl.”
    Mina winced. She looked down at her at­tire—she was wear­ing a calf-length, flow­ing tu­nic of em­er­ald green and opal white over a tight-fit­ting un­der­gar­ment that hugged her hips, thighs, and legs. “Should I not change first?” Dearest god­dess of light , what did Dante want with her? Had he truly over­heard her private thoughts? And if so, what then? Or had he ac­tu­ally over­heard her prior in­solence with Pralina be­fore he entered the room? Was he go­ing to take her into the woods and dis­pose of her?
    Or worse?
    “I…I don’t un­der­stand.”
    Pralina took a men­acing step for­ward, her fri­gid body draw­ing so close to Mina’s that their noses al­most touched. “Which part of this is giv­ing you pause? Your lord has given you a com­mand. Go .”
    Mina swal­lowed her ap­pre­hen­sion and nod­ded. This was what she had wanted, right? To be ac­know­ledged as alive? Sud­denly, the idea seemed ut­terly pre­pos­ter­ous: Dante Dragona, the first­born son of King De­mitri and Queen Kalani, was a dragon, a su­per­nat­ural be­ing with un­told power, no mat­ter how hu­man he seemed. The last thing Mina wanted was to be alone with him.
    She clutched the leather pouch around her neck, an am­u­let given to her by her mother be­fore she was taken to the Keep: It con­tained a lock of her mother’s hair, a like­ness of her sis­ter, Raylea, drawn by her father on an aged piece of parch­ment, and the petals of a tulip, one Mina had grown as a child in the