The Dragon Prince's Obsession

NINE

It was another day in my life as a captive, another day of hunger and confusion. Another day to wonder just what he wanted with me and if I could want anything with him.

"Stop creeping up on me," I muttered in sleep, stretching as I opened my eyes. Then I screeched in surprise to see him staring at me with something foreign in his devilish red eyes. I had just been dreaming about him and there he was, staring down at me with something undecipherable on his face.

"What are you doing!" I exclaimed, rolling away from him.

"Watching you," He answered as if it was perfectly normal to stare at people while they slept. It could be an everyday occurrence in the life of Mikhail Pendragon for all I knew.

An awful smell assailed my nostrils then. I flinched away from it, surprised at the pungency.

"You smell like witches." My nose wrinkled of their own accord at the distasteful smell.

"What do witches smell like?" I put the mouldy bed between us while he continued to scrutinize me with that same indescribable look in his eyes.

"Like dirt " I answered.

Witches had a peculiar smell to me just as their magic affected my senses, their odour left unpleasant chills on my skin. I rubbed a palm across my bicep, partly from the freezing air coming from a missing louvre, partly from the way he looked at me and partly from the stench that clung to him.

He shook out his hair. Sweat had it matted to his forehead and when he shook his head, droplets came flying at me.

"Funny, that is what humans smell like to me,” He said. It was then I realized he had both sweat and blood on him. Right. What other reason could he have to surround himself with witches?

"You went on a killing spree." He shrugged, scrubbing his hands across his face, the gesture exposing caked blood on the side of his left arm.

"You may say evil is predictable and what not but I have an obligation to deliver vengeance when I have been wronged. The earlier, the better."

Living among dragons made my sentiments much like theirs, to the point where my human friend, Missy, questioned if I was not a fool to follow the culture of people who were of a different kind than me. I embraced the ways of life of the Drakii as though they were mine. I understood vengeance but not the glory Mikhail attached to it.

"Very well. Now they know better than to hold you hostage.” He snorted at that.

"No, now they will seek out more proactive ways in which to clip my wings and I will enjoy making burnt offerings out of them."

I stretched the sheets I spent the night on. The night was long and chilly with a few insects flying in through the window. I had nightmares of flying curses and twice, I jarred awake, feeling myself falling into a dark and unending pit.

I followed after him to the kitchen, one of the few rooms that had a bit of decency to it and to my surprise, there lay breakfast. Seeing as he did not reproach me when I started for the food, I concluded they must be for me and I scarfed them down in a few minutes.

I stifled a belch.

"Do you know, your brother's temper got us into this mess with the witches in the first place." I wiped my lips with the back of my hands.

A few months ago, we all lived happily with the witches in the Dragon Mountains, fellow supernaturals that humans liked to hunt. With the witches, a lot of humans did not believe in their power so they were not on the brink of extinction like the dragons were.

"Who is 'we'?" Mikhail asked when I sat on a dust stool in the big, abandoned kitchen.

"The Drakii," I responded on reflex.

"Are you a dragon, Kitten?” Heat crawled up my nape.

Indeed, I had become too familiar with the ways the Drakii, enough to speak like I belonged with them. But I owed my life to the Dragon King. My king.

He took me in when he had no reason to. He kept me in his castle with his dragons keeping watch over all that lay within. He was as much my king as he was to his dragons, whether I had scales or not.

"I am not but –"

"My idiotic brother got the Drakii into this mess. It has nothing to with me," He said to shut me off but I refused to be shut off.

"You speak of the Drakii as though you do not share a part in this war. Are they not your people?"

A short bark of laughter followed after my question, so sharp it made me jump, almost toppling out of the stool.

"My people?" He snorted as if I had suggested the most laughable thing that could ever be suggested. "I am my own person." After that, I could think of nothing more that could be said.

We all suspected Mikhail had a hand in all these. There was no secret that he craved warfare like a newborn craved milk. He gloried in it. A few months ago, the dragons had gone to war with humans. The war did not last long but it left enough damage to be felt on both sides in years to come. The war had been a result of the manipulation by the man standing before me.

Before the war with the humans, we had been gearing up for a confrontation with the witches which we all suspected had been Mikhail's doing as well. A high-profiled witch had defiled the dragon king and the king had let his temper run away from him, killing the witch in the process. We all knew Mikhail was in cohorts with witches so it would not be hard to link the incidence with the witches to him. After all, what sane witch would challenge the dragon king if they had no strength backing them? Like the strength of the dragon prince.

"Just because you stay so far away from the others does not mean you are not a Draki."

"I do not want to have this conversation. Let us speak of you and your lack of sight." I looked away, feeling I would rather not speak of myself then or any time. He would ask questions. I knew he would. He would ask of things that would open up wounds that had not healed.

My early life had not been pleasant. I was forced to grow up before everyone else when I lost my mother. We had not been a rich family so with my mother cold in the grown, my sole guardian and relative, I had had to fend for myself. Our neighbours took me in for a short time but no one would treat you as their own when they had eight of theirs and barely enough to feed on.

I left my neighbours. I would like to think they had searched for me but the same part of me agreed they would have been relieved to have one less mouth to feed. I worked. I wandered and I survived. It was the reason I never took the King for granted. I never disobeyed his directives. I never put a foot out of line with him. I knew what it meant to be without shelter and now that I had it, I never wanted to be without it again. I never wanted to be tossed into the cold streets, shivering with an empty stomach and dried tears.

"You are certain your mother was human but what about your father?”

"I never knew him," I responded.

As a child, I tried to coax my mother into speaking about him but every time, she ended up crying when asked. Again, I would like to be naive, to pretend that she loved him so much and that when he died, a part of her had died with him but I knew bitter tears. On certain days, she looked at me like a darkness she wished to escape from.

"When I look at you, I see nothing but a human. You carry the pungent smell of waste that makes me angry but I am certain you are more than meets the eyes." I looked down at my hands, hoping to find a clue. The absurdity did not get lost on me. It could not. How could I not be human?

I did not meet my father but I knew he was a useless father without a lick of special blood in his veins. But the prince stared at me in a way that could only be described as fascination.

"Do you know you talk in your sleep?" I froze. I slept in the same room as two other girls and they never once said anything about me talking in my sleep.

"I do? What do I say?"

"I too would like to know. I have never heard that language, which is strange. I know seventy percent of spoken languages." I looked down at my hands again. I almost believed I was something else, right there, under the scrutiny of his gaze.

"There is another thirty percent then. I am nothing special, Prince." I snorted.

"I never deemed you as special but I am certain of your difference. The question now is, what makes you different?" He mused to himself.

"Maybe you are blinded by my impeccable looks." I blurted out of nowhere. "There is nothing that makes me different from any other human serving under the Tor Drakis." His eyes met mine in distaste.

"Your elbows can slice bread. There is nothing blinding about your looks, human." I fought a wave of shame and embarrassment. I had been kidding yet his words stung worse than spirit on a fresh injury.

"Maybe you are fascinated by my elbows then." I shot out, feeling both annoyed and insecure.

"First I was fascinated by your lips now it is your elbow. What barbaric thing on you would I be accused of being fascinated with next?" He sneered.

He did that thing again. He made a show of reminding me of my humanity anytime I got on his nerves. Saying human as one would pronounce words too dirty to be uttered, cursing me in so many syllables.

If he would continue to keep me here in this dead and decayed place, then I would make sure to find out as many things about him as one possibly could. Perhaps I could author a book to help others understand him so they could know how best to evade his madness.

"I never accused you of being fascinated with my lips. I said you looked like you wanted to kiss me. Since you mention fascination, it gives me the idea that indeed, I had been right to –" Laughter interrupted my tirade.

"If I was not immune to the flames of my beast, I would set myself ablaze to avoid the nonsensical words spewing from your mouth." His eyes hardened to steel. "Remember your place, human. Appreciating your company does not place you above my wrath."

I kept mute after that, thrown off by his sudden ire.

A small spider came skittering across the wall behind him. I jolted, feeling as if a thousand hairy fingers were running across my body.

"Why have you let this castle decay so?" I muttered, rubbing the goosebumps on my skin.

"How is it any of your concern?" He replied.

"The same way what I am is any of your concern." He stilled at that and not because I had offended him.

"Today is not a good day.' He hissed just as I heard what could be a crash and groan. He kept his closed his eyes and a mini later, Lucille strode in.