And, as if the gods themselves had willed it, “Hey, Da! Look what I found!” One of Addolgar’s younger sons raised his arm. “A bucket of gold!” Then, for some unfathomable reason, the silver dragon laughed hysterically. For a good long while, too.

Addolgar let out a pained sigh. “I want you, lad, to be who you are. But then you need to have the guts to stand behind that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look at me brother. Bercelak. He is a mean, heartless, ruthless bastard of a dragon. He’s been loathed for centuries by nearly everyone except his own kin and Rhiannon. But you don’t hear him whining about it. He just accepts who he is and goes on about his day . . . being a mean, heartless, ruthless bastard of a dragon. So, you want to ask your questions. Then ask your questions. You want to be nosy and a pain in the ass. Then be nosy and a pain in the ass. But don’t whine about it. Just do it. Stop taking everything so damn personally. With that,” he said, pointing a talon at him, “you’re just like your mum, you know? She used to take everything so damn personally. Let everybody get her so bloody upset because they accused her of being a murdering viper or a whore like our father.”

“Well, that does seem a tad rude—”

“See?” Addolgar said, exasperated. “Just like her! You can’t let the petty shit stop you from being who you are. And getting what you want.” He swept his forearm in a half circle, taking in the carnage around them. “Look at all this, boy. You found there was trouble and you moved. You saw what was happening and you dealt with it. Then you sent for us . . . so we can set these humans straight. You know what that is . . . ?”

“No.”

“That’s smart, you little bastard. Smart. You think. That’s good! Just like your dad, you are.”

“I thought I was just like me mum.”

“Shut it. And there’s nothing wrong with being like your dad. Tell ya this . . . your dad was smart enough to get your mum. And she didn’t make it easy.”

“Cadwaladr females never make it easy.”

“They don’t. And your dad loved her even after she used two swords to cut off the head of the bastard she used to be with. He deserved it, but still . . . takes a brave dragon willing to risk being the next notch on her pummel.”

Addolgar put his forearm around Celyn’s shoulders. “All I’m saying is, if your future is being more than just the charming Cadwaladr . . . embrace it. That’s the thing about Cadwaladrs. We are who we are. And we don’t back down from that. You shouldn’t either. Even if who you are is kind of an annoying, never-shuts-up git.”

Celyn smiled. “Thanks, Uncle Addolgar.”

“Any time. Now . . . let’s go wipe that Baron Roscommon and his city from the bloody map, shall we?”

“No, no,” Elina heard the dragon saying to his uncle as they walked back toward the rest of the group.

“What do you mean, no?” Addolgar asked.

“We’re not going to wipe out the city.”

“We’re not?”

“We would,” Elina volunteered.

The dolt turned those dark eyes on her. “No one asked you.”

“But—” Elina began, but the dragon turned away from her and then, suddenly, she was battling that damn tail of his. It kept reaching around and slapping her ass while the dragon continued his conversation with his uncle.

Elina grabbed one of the arrows she’d been given and tried to stab at the tail, but it moved too fast. Amazing, since the dragon never stopped his conversation with his uncle. It was as if the tail had a life of its own.

The tail suddenly reared up like a snake, the tip pointing right between her eyes. Now on her knees, Elina tightened her grip on the arrow she held and pulled it back for one last attempt to stop the damn thing.

“Are you done?” the dragon asked her.

“Your tail is trying to kill me. Have you no control over it?”

“Of course I do.”

“So you are trying to kill me?”

“Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not about to disappoint my queen simply to get you to stop bothering me.”

“It moves like snake.”

“It moves as I tell it to move. It’s my tail. And you can stop trying to stare it down. Everyone just thinks you’re a mad cow at this point.”

Elina looked up and realized that the dragon’s kin were watching her closely.

Clearing her throat, she lowered the arrow. “I did what I had to,” she told them.

The dragons moved away without saying anything, and Celyn leaned his forearms against the rocky ground next to where she sat.

“We’re going back to the city to deal with Roscommon. You’ll wait here until I come for you.”

“No.”

“You want to go on ahead?”

“No. I come with.”

“That’ll be dangerous.”

“Again you suggest I am weak,” she snapped.

“I did not! But I’m supposed to be protecting you.”

“Yet I protect you. My arrows helped, did they not?” He let out a sigh. “They did.”

“Then I come. I want to see how decadent Southlanders handle such a problem.”

“Unlike your tribes that would—”

“Attack the city full force, capture the older boys and young men to hold until they were old enough for marriage, and wipe everything else from the land until there was nothing but ashes and the tears of the dying.”