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The ruby red dragon crouched on the balls of his feet. He spat blood onto the dirt floor and, with a groan, stood. Across from him another dragon waited in the middle of the sparing ground. A matching dragoness with a long blade in her hand. Both shared golden fronts, similar scale patterns both begot from their mother. The brother was bigger, taller, and had been taking a beating from his sister for the last hour.

“If this was a real attack you’d be dead by now,” Setara, the dragoness said.

“If it was a real attack I would have blasted you across the room with magic,” Chisur, her brother, snapped back before he sprung forward.

He spun and lashed his tail out at his sister. Setara leapt over his swing before using a beat of her wings to throw her body into a kick that Chisur managed to anticipate for the first time that day. He caught Setara’s foot and swung his sister over his shoulders and into the ground. He did not expect his sister’s tail to wrap around his shoulder and yank him down as well. They fell into a clumsy tangle, Chisur on his back before he felt his sister’s thighs closed around his throat and arm in a leg lock.

She pushed the blade to his ribs and said, “You didn’t get this away from me when that was your whole goal. This is the seventh time I could have killed you.”

Chisur growled, and tried to move but was kept pinned. It annoyed him how easily his sister could hold him down like this, and how present her scent was right now. At least no one else occupied the sparring grounds, and his mate could not connect to him with their tether blocked. No one else needed to see him so easily handled.

Setara said, “I will let you get up when you tell me what you did wrong.”

The prince grunted, and asked, through the strain of trying to break Setara’s hold, “Is this any way to treat your little brother?”

“If my little brother is going to lead this country instead of me, yes,” Setara said. Her cloudy-blue eyes softened and she sighed as her brother struggled. “Will you just be patient and think for a moment? Here.” She released him and threw the knife away, scooting backwards so he could sit up. “That better?”

“It would be better if it felt like I had a chance against you,” Chisur said, rubbing his throat.

Setara reminded him, “When I was named heir to the throne, mother had the best martial artists in Archay train and spar with me almost every day to refine my ability to defend myself. You’ve had only two months of practice. If you beat me at all in the coming year I would be surprised.”

“Year?”

“You didn’t think your lessons would end any time soon, did you? We’ll need to meet like this at least twice a week. Do you know how many assassination attempts I’ve warded off, Chisur?”

The prince sighed. “I suppose I never asked. Seemed the wrong topic to have over tea.”

This got his sister to smile. She ran a hand through her silver hair, which she cut short recently. It was obvious at the gesture she was still not used to the shortened length. Now she also carried a black tattoo on her toned abdomen of a phoenix rising up to her diaphragm. A thing Chisur knew was part wry stab at their mother and an act of self-loathing. It was a terrorist group named Archayon’s Phoenix that cost Setara her position as heir before it was given over to Chisur. She wore only a compression bra and a loincloth. Chisur only wore the loincloth. Her muscles were lithe and tight, and her figure enticing even when she was busy beating Chisur into the dirt.

She asked, “What’s that look for, hmm?”

“Huh, oh, sorry, lost in thought.”

“You still have not told me what you did wrong just now.”

Chisur reflected on it for a moment, recalling their basic, less hands-on lessons of self-defense. The prince adjusted the golden band holding his long mane of red hair back while Setara patiently watched him. Eventually he said, “I suppose my first mistake is I keep charging you.”

Setara nodded. “First mistake, yes. Why was that wrong though?”

“If I let you come at me with the knife, you’d have to extend your arm in order to use it on me. That’s when I could have grabbed your wrist and wrestled it away, or at least knocked away your thrust to get under your guard and subdue you.”

“Well done,” Setara said. “You get so hotheaded when fighting you don’t think things through. You’re very sharp little brother, but you need to stay that sharp when attacked.” She got up and offered a hand.

Chisur took it and grunted as he got his feet under him. “It’s hard without my other half with me.”

Setara squeezed his hand at the mention of his tethered mate and said, “You need to be prepared to rely on yourself first and foremost.”

“I am, but with Kyle I’m invincible. You can get a lot more done with dragons you can trust in your corner, Setara,” Chisur said, pointedly not releasing her hand.

“Hmmph, this lecture again?” His sister’s eyes narrowed, “I never asked you to be my therapist, Chisur.”

Chisur studied her face for a moment. As far as he knew, these sparring lessons were the only thing his sister did anymore. It had only been a year since her most trusted mate and childhood companion was revealed a traitor of the state and part of a plot to destroy the royal family and much of the government. Setara practically lost everything in the ensuing fallout: her title to the throne, her position as spymaster, her reputation in the court, and most of her friends. The prince had tried, subtly as possible, to keep tabs on her the last few months, but she made it difficult. She knew how to disappear, how not to be tracked, and was only found during their regular self-defense lessons. Things like the tattoo just appeared suddenly, with a refusal to explain herself or what she did when not beating up her youngest brother.

He let go of her hand and said, “I would still like to train a little longer, if it’s in your schedule.”

“How about you try to take the knife from me again?”

Chisur nodded and retrieved the blade, tossing it to his sister. She caught it and immediately charged her brother. Chisur gasped before leaping backwards, beating his wings to put extra distance between the two of them, but Setara’s pursuit was just as fast. When Chisur’s feet touched the ground she slashed out, and he grabbed her wrist, just like they discussed. Setara immediately dropped the blade and caught it in her other hand. In a movement too quick for the prince to track, she flicked the blade around and stabbed Chisur harmlessly with the pommel.

“Dead,” Setara hissed.

Chisur growled and shoved her backwards. “Again,” he insisted. This time she led with a thrust which the prince knocked away and brought an elbow up into his sister’s muzzle. She was knocked backwards, spinning with the knife extended and cutting Chisur’s arm.

She laughed and said, “Good attempt, but you didn’t get the knife,” before she leapt into the air. With her wings she cleared a few meters off the ground before she was silhouetted in the artificial light overhead. Her arm flung out and Chisur felt a thick, punching pain erupt in his shoulder, which distracted him the moment Setara needed to dive onto him like a bird of prey. She slammed into him feet and claws first, knocking the prince hard into the ground with the knife still buried in his shoulder. She removed it and slid it under his jaw. “What’s wrong brother? This time I gave it to you and you didn’t even manage to take it from me.”

A small part of the prince knew his sister was baiting him. All the wounds and pain were superficial, especially when a mender could magically seal them in a matter of seconds. With Kyle there to keep him on an even keel he might have been able to stay his temper, but his mate wasn’t.

He kicked her off him, and Setara easily sprung to her feet while Chisur scrambled to his. He charged her this time, striking out with a flurry of blows his sister dodged and blocked, but Chisur moved too quickly for her to counter without actually using the knife again. She was driven backwards until she eventually reached the end of the sparring ground. Chisur came at her with a kick she taught him that involved using your wings to flip one’s body so their foot swung downward at the opponent’s face. It came with enough force that blocking it was impossible without hurting oneself. Setara dropped the knife and tried to catch him at the ankle, but the weight of the blow still pounded into her shoulder and dropped the dragoness, or so Chisur thought. His kick slammed into Setara’s shoulder, and a loud grunt from her was the only sign of pain as her knees bent and her hands slid up his leg to his knee. She pulled him down with her, twisting her body to throw Chisur against the wall.

The prince felt stone slam into his back. It knocked the air out of him before an elbow slammed into his throat and a familiar pommel dug into his diaphragm. Setara straddled his lap, panting while Chisur struggled for a breath. The two royal siblings stared at each other, Chisur noticing his sister’s eyes were wide with adrenaline and a joy he only saw when they fought. She dropped the knife and grabbed his muzzle before muttering, “You stupid, handsome fool.”

Setara kissed him. Rough enough Chisur’s horns scraped against the wall as the soft scales of her lips opened and her tongue sought his. It was only then Chisur noticed the smell of her arousal, something that must have started as their fighting escalated. Chisur groaned and relented. They had never done this, but…

As soon as her tongue tasted his she ripped herself away. “Shit,” she spat on the ground beside them, “What was I thinking?”

“Setara—”

“I should go. We both have things to do.”

She got up but Chisur yanked her back down into his lap. “It can wait. How long have you felt this?”

“How long have you? I can smell your arousal, had I kept going you would have—”

“Who says we won’t keep going?”

“Idiot little brother,” Setara said, putting a hand on his bleeding shoulder. “You’re bleeding all over yourself. You need to see a mender.”

Chisur rested a hand on the one she laid on his wound. He squeezed it, and at a draw on his magic, painfully closed it while gritting his teeth. She felt the scales seal up and removed her hand with a snarl. “You’re going to scar yourself if you don’t let a serious healer—”

“Setara shut up and tell me what you want right now.”

Setara grit her teeth and growled. She obviously fought with what her body made apparent. Eventually she said, “I’ve not touched anyone except you here in the training ground in a month, and I’ve not kissed anyone since… well, you can probably guess. This has nothing to do with you, I just need to visit a brothel.”

Chisur squeezed her hand again and she didn’t stop him when he lifted it to his muzzle and kissed the back of her hand. He felt just the slightest of quakes run through her body before he said, “You’re a very good liar, Setara, but you know you can’t lie to me.”

Setara laughed, the noise bitter and sour and deep in her throat. “So you know my shame? It changes nothing.”

Chisur’s stroked her throat, thumb brushing her jaw before he said, “It’s my shame, too. You know there are times I wanted Kyle to fuck you just so I could feel it.”

Setara scoffed. “If you want me then just take me, Chisur. You’ve never let anything stop you from pursuing what you want.”

“It’s different when I don’t know how it will affect the people I love.”

“Ugh, don’t use that word around me.” This time Setara did remove herself, leaving Chisur sitting against the wall. “Don’t expect any weakness from me again,” she said before she turned to leave.

Chisur asked, “We still on for next week?”

Setara headed for the door, raising her voice as she did, “Of course. You’re still too weak to protect yourself or the dragons you…” she stopped, her tail lashing behind her, “care about.”

Chisur sighed as the door slid shut behind her. His sister couldn’t stand the word love. When her mate Phelise first upended Setara’s life by betraying them all, Chisur had worried Setara would not have someone in her corner. When Chisur lost his first mate to an accident, Jerawk and his mother and sister were there to keep him from totally spiraling into despair. As far as Chisur knew, Setara had and would let no one keep her from being swallowed by her own dark thoughts. The only loss that might pitch the prince to such depths was if he lost Kyle, his tethered partner and at this point emotional anchor in all the upheaval of their lives.

He wondered if… but no, if Setara and Phelise had shared a tether, how would she have hid her betrayal from Setara? Chisur left the room, and after crossing the threshold of the wards in place there, felt the welcoming return of his mate’s presence in his mind, even as it was occupied with other matters…

***

Jerawk studied the lines of a speech he had no part in writing but would be speaking. The small dragon reclined in a chair in Chisur’s bedroom before a desk made of plum-colored wood. He scrolled through the text on a tablet, claw tapping the plastic screen as he scanned the words penned by about a dozen different authors. One being Chisur and another being…

From behind, Kyle’s hands slid down his shoulders. “Reading that again?”

“Trying to wrap my head around it.”

Kyle’s black-scaled hands slid down the yellow dragon’s striped torso. His arms soon wrapped around Jerawk and their cheeks rubbed together. “What’s there to worry about?”

“I mean, can I really do this Kyle? A lot of people are already upset with me—”

“Jerawk give yourself some credit. You’re clever, good at reading people, and you have actual experience interacting with humans.”

“Human,” Jerawk corrected before setting the tablet on the desk. He squeezed Kyle’s draconic hands with his, “And you don’t really count anymore.”

“Hush,” Kyle said, kissing Jerawk’s cheek. “You’re worrying too much. Little Eska is sleeping, Chisur is closed off with his sister, and Mephis is busy politicking. You should be paying attention to me.” He nibbled Jerawk’s neck and whispered, “We don’t often get time alone together, you know.”

Jerawk felt a warmth stir in his slit. “I suppose we don’t, do we?”

“Mmm, you were my first dragon, Jerawk. I have a lot of fondness for that memory, the two of us in this bedroom with you on top of me.”

Jerawk murred and nuzzled his cheek. “Is that what you want?”

“It’s where I want to start.”

Jerawk let Kyle lead him to the large bed in the room. The black dragon with a grey front had once been a human, but had been grievously injured before Chisur was able to give him this new body. Jerawk had to admit the sway of Kyle’s hips, the roundness of his thighs, the way the other dragon shuddered when Jerawk bit his neck… his once-human mate was all too enticing for him to resist. Kyle lay on his back, already panting while Jerawk kissed the grey scales of his belly, so recently swollen with life, and down to his partner’s mound. Red flushed beneath the nearly silver scales around his pussy before they yielded to the lips of his needy partner. The clit already throbbed stiffly above his entrance.

Kyle’s tail wrapped around Jerawk’s as the yellow dragon kissed his sex. A soft, “Oh” from Kyle as his mate’s tongue teased around the opening of his vent, not quite penetrating it. Instead it dug against the folds of his wet sex to make sure his mound glistened; Jerawk’s eyes shut as he savored Kyle’s scent and taste. The cunt smelled closer to a male’s need and left a heady scent that soon filled the room. The familiar ache in it made Jerawk’s cock peek from his slit; the dark, pointed length wet with his slit fluids. His musk rose to answer Kyle’s while his tongue finally dug into that cunny. Kyle bucked his hips and let out a pleased sigh. His hand found its way on the back of Jerawk’s head, encouraging him to continue. Jerawk’s wings quivered at the heated taste of his mate’s walls. Familiar feelings of affection stirred in the yellow dragon’s chest as he nuzzled his snout against Kyle’s clit.

His claws dug into Kyle’s thighs, the black scales yielding a little before the scrape of his claws made Kyle’s hips quake. It was as if his body already wanted to throw Jerawk off, but he knew better. He withdrew his tongue, coated in the bitter sour of Kyle’s heated cunt and kissed the top of the mound. His eyes watched Kyle’s face as three fingers sank inside his pussy. Kyle bit his bottom lip as those digits sawed wetly in and out of his dribbling sex until they hilted at the knuckle. When they curled upward and pushed against something firm along the walls of Kyle’s sex, the dragon threw his head back in a moan. Jerawk murred at the response and started working Kyle’s spot with a familiar precision. “Fuck… Jerawk…” Kyle whined, and the sound of his name like that made the remainder of Jerawk’s cock spill dripping from his slit—knot already inflamed from his partner’s needy cries.

Jerawk didn’t let up. He began to pump his fingers faster. Each time the knuckles hilted it sent a shock up the black dragon. His boy cunt rippled around those digits, juices dribbling out around them. Jerawk’s muzzle broke into a predatory grin as he and Kyle watched each other. His mate’s mouth hung open, chest hitching for breath as the yellow dragon brought his cunny to the edge. It was then, eyes still on Kyle, he dipped down and wrapped his lips around his mate’s clit. Kyle’s legs shut on Jerawk’s head and his hips bucked as the small dragon gently sucked and licked that throbbing button. “Jerawk!” Kyle screamed it while the yellow dragon moved his fingers faster. His tongue wrapped around Kyle’s clit and dexterously worked it over. It was too much. His mate tried to push Jerawk’s head off with his legs, but the smaller dragon merely growled and kept working until juices began to squirt around Jerawk’s knuckles. Kyle was all breathy, pained moans as his cunny quivered weakly around Jerawk’s fingers before he finally slowed his work.

He released Kyle’s clit with a murr, his partner’s legs falling to the side with an exhausted slump while Jerawk spread his pussy with his thumbs. He enjoyed the sight of those exhausted, quivering walls a moment before he savored their taste with a long lick across Kyle’s sex that made them both shudder. Jerawk then climbed up his partner and a dazed Kyle pulled him into a kiss. The black dragon whimpered as he tasted his cunt and juices on Jerawk’s tongue. His legs stirred, his thigh brushed against Jerawk’s firm need which, even for the small yellow dragon, was still bigger than most human males. Something that gave Jerawk no small sense of satisfaction to know.

Without breaking the kiss, Kyle reached down and led Jerawk’s cock to his entrance. A growl deep in Jerawk’s chest echoed the pleasing descent into Kyle’s wet snatch. Slick arousal pushed out around his shaft and across grey scales as those heated walls enveloped him. Jerawk bottomed to his knot, and broke the kiss with a pleased sigh. Kyle squeezed down on his cock and wrapped his legs and arms around his mate. They nuzzled cheeks for a moment, uttering simple chirrs and growls. Jerawk nipped at Kyle’s throat to hear him gasp. His shaft buried in his mate’s cunt ached as those walls milked it with their own pained need, but neither dragon broke away from the affection. Jerawk’s claws, some still wet from before, kneaded into Kyle’s side.

Jerawk licked up Kyle’s jawline and along his ear before he said, “Has Chisur bred you since Eska joined us?”

Kyle’s cunt clenched around his cock in answer before he whispered, “I told Chisur I’ve already given him his heir. I’m interested in giving someone else theirs.”

Jerawk murred and buried his muzzle into Kyle’s chest before taking a deep breath. He said, “I can smell your need, Kyle.”

“I want it to be you Jerawk.”

“Say it.”

“I want you to breed me.”

Jerawk sat up to fuck his mate properly. He grabbed Kyle by the thighs, panting a little with the need to do this. Jerawk had never considered himself interested in bedding a dragoness before, but Kyle… if it was Kyle swollen and heavy from his seed. Fuck. Jerawk’s claws dug into Kyle’s thighs as he finally pulled back and slammed forward. His tail twined again with his mate’s to keep it from lashing about as his knot popped against that mound. Kyle’s already slutty, well spread pussy yielded a little to the black bulb. The black dragon groaned and reached down to spread his pussy lips just so Jerawk’s knot went a little further. He bit his lip as his mate fucked him hard as he could. Jerawk groaned as his cock kept bottoming out in that sopping cunny. Kyle urged him on with breathy moans and begging.

Jerawk’s knot quickly ploughed into Kyle’s cunt. The whole mound caved a little before it popped inside, but the yellow dragon was not finished, and with a snarl yanked his knot out of Kyle. His mate cried out at the feeling of his pussy being spread both ways from that knot. It was like Jerawk fisted him, quickly leaning forward, panting as he did it again and again. He no longer pulled all the way out, but continued in rough, quick thrusts that pummeled Kyle’s cunt. It opened and closed around Jerawk’s knot again and again until a sloppy mess of fluids drenched the black thighs of his mate. Kyle no longer held his pussy open, all he did was scream and cry out. Each time that knot hit against his cunt it slammed his clit, and when it pulled out that mass of flesh grinded deliciously over his g-spot. Jerawk had to struggle to keep Kyle held down while his cock stirred up his mate’s insides. He might not have been as big as Kyle’s other mates, but Jerawk was certain to still leave the needy cunt beneath him a slobbering mess. Even as such treatment quickly did push the dragon to the edge. Kyle begged between cries, “Jerawk! Ah-ah! Please!” The yellow dragon snarled. He felt his internal testes boil with a heated need to breed the bitch beneath him.

When Jerawk finally left his knot sealed around Kyle’s battered, spasming boy cunt, he fell onto his mate. He bit into Kyle’s shoulder with a snarl as his knotted cock jerked and sprayed seed into his partner. The black dragon closed his legs and arms around Jerawk again, even his grey wings fanned out and tried to wrap around the two. Kyle whispered in his ear, “That’s it. Seed me, Jerawk. Fuck I can feel all that cum spilling into my womb. It’s so warm.” Jerawk moaned at the encouragement while those walls gently squeezed around his firing cock. Spunk poured in prodigious waves into Kyle’s pussy, and might have left his stomach warm and swollen had the knot fucking not loosened his entrance so much. Thick pearls of cum dribbled from his lips, down the grey scales of his taint and around his tail. Most stayed inside Kyle’s cunt however, breeding Jerawk’s mate as surely as any virile dragon could breed the womb of a receptive partner.

Panting, Jerawk released his shoulder and nuzzled his mate. “Thank you, Kyle.”

“Mmmph, I should be thanking you. That was so… good, Jerawk.” Kyle’s fingers teased along the base of Jerawk’s wings, just enjoying the touch of his partner. He said, “I’m glad we got to have this moment together.”

“Mmm, me too,” Jerawk admitted. “Though I would love to do this to you again while Chisur is tied up in the room.”

Kyle giggled, “I doubt he would let himself be tied up for long—oh, speaking of.”

“He back?”

Kyle nodded.

“How’s his sister?” Jerawk asked. This was the reality of being mates with two partners who shared a tether. He felt always bound to them both, and while he knew both Chisur and Kyle loved him deeply, their bond between each other ran deeper just by the nature of it.

“Troubled. We can talk about it later. He’s very pleased what you did to me, by the way. And also a little sore.”

“From me?”

“And Setara.”

Jerawk nipped Kyle’s neck and said, “If he ever wants me to fuck him like I did you he just needs to say the word.”

Kyle sighed, “Someday, I will get him to.”

***

It’s not me, it’s him, Chisur told his mate while he made his way through the palace to meet with his mother. Every time my cock so much as peeks from its slit he raises his tail.

It’s not his fault you have such a lovely cock, Kyle teased. Through the tether, Chisur felt his mates lying together, felt the satisfying warmth in Kyle’s belly and the pleasing ache around his pussy. It made him long to lie there with the two of them. Thank the Queen he had Mephis around, and that Mephis had his own private office. Not that Chisur wanted to fuck at the moment—really he just wanted to share in the intimacy of those two making new life.

It’s only fair, Kyle said. Jerawk wasn’t there when you bred me.

Says you, Chisur responded, Jerawk at least couldn’t feel any of it. Chisur’s dick did feel heavy in his slit, and it was with some difficulty he kept it from engorging. Chisur watched his transparent elevator quickly climb the central column of the palace ziggurat. He admired the sea and the now diminished magical storm that hung over it, mere miles from the great glass and steel structure that made up the central hub of Archay’s government. Last year, Kyle had almost died sending that explosive storm of magic over the ocean rather than detonating in the heart of the palace. It would have killed thousands had he not done it. It made Kyle a beloved hero and celebrity overnight, cost the once-human his previous body, and laid the groundwork for why Archay was ready to try and establish diplomatic communications with Earth.

We’re a few weeks away from our anniversary, Kyle commented.

What should our anniversary be? The day I almost killed you? The first time we mated? Or the day I almost killed both of us turning you into a dragon?

I prefer the first. The moment our minds touched. Kyle told him. And you don’t have to make it sound so grim.

Sorry, I suppose I’m still troubled by my sister.

Behind Chisur the city of Archay climbed and climbed. The urban sprawl of towers, megastructures that were cities unto themselves, answered the lack of habitable land in their world. Dragons had caused the lack with a great and centuries old war that left most of the land on the planet a swirling chaos of magical storms like the one over the ocean. At the top of the skyscrapers, verdant gardens grew and spilled off the sides like each one had a head of lush hair. Most food in the sprawl was synthesized, but the gardens provided commodity foods sought after for their natural growth. Chisur insisted on eating the synthesized variety, to remind himself of all they had lost.

Recovering, Kyle corrected. It was true. Working together, Kyle and Chisur did what Chisur failed to do with his previous mate two years ago. They found a way to reverse the damage to the scarred lands and beat back the darkness that always lingered at Archay’s edges. But the process was incredibly slow—it took weeks to reclaim half an acre of land, and even then the land was ravaged and dead, in need of new life to be sown into it. But a solution using magic that could be done carefully by a group of mages had been discovered by Chisur and Kyle. It elevated the two’s status to a reverence typically only reserved for the Queen, and that was when his mother Airok finally decided to name him her new heir. And that’s when Setara returned to his life insisting they needed to work on his ability to defend himself.

I wonder if she went all those months without the touch of another, Kyle said.

I worry she did, Chisur answered, with an audible sigh. For dragons, being touch starved was considered a form of torture. What pain must his sister have felt to have just punished herself like that… Chisur sighed. The feeling of his sister’s lips against his was all too easy to bring to mind.

The elevator stopped near the top of the ziggurat. Here the structure closed off like the tip of an obelisk into a rose quartz point. The rock gave the apex of the palace a swirl of pink and whites that glittered in the sun, moon, and city lights. The elevator, which was a private one for high ranking members of the government, took Chisur alone to a chamber adjacent to the queen’s throne room. A grand hall that existed solely for ceremonies and broadcasted speeches. Most business the queen took in her office, which nested in the floor above the throne room. Chisur needed to get off the current elevator and take a smaller one up to the final floor of the ziggurat. Here the halls were no longer transparent floors but inlaid with soil and gardens. Lush greenery covered these rooms, a strange contrast to the stone, metal, and steel opulence that constructed the floors before. But given the state of their world, the active greenhouse effect of this floor did hold a different sort of wealth. The lights overhead mimicked natural sunlight and cast a gentle warmth on Chisur’s scales. The walls were reactive screens that warped towards one’s perception, so when your gaze fell on them it seemed as if you looked out into a verdant landscape rather than just an image of one. A soft dirt path was the only real way to avoid walking straight into one of the walls.

Chisur made his way through the overgrown hall to his mother’s office. It was a circular room in the center of this floor, with several offshoot rooms wrapped around it. Chisur passed a set of guards and an attendant checking on a set of fruit-bearing vines before he entered the office. It resembled a small plaza. More verdant growth surrounded the walls of the chamber, split by a stream that circled the length of the room with a few small sloping bridges to cross it. The middle of the room was a smooth, soft dirt floor with the queen waiting behind a desk with a chair in front of it. As Chisur stepped to it, he felt the dirt yield strangely to his feet, warping to be softer than expected and not clinging to the bottom of the soles. He knew this was because nanites actually made up the floor and the furniture in the room. They were connected via an implant to his mother’s thoughts. She could conjure anything at a whim.

Chisur took a seat and his mother observed, “This is the first time you have ever been late.”

Queen Airok Archay carried the same scale pattern that was Chisur’s royal lineage. The ruby red scales matched with a golden front and complemented by golden jewelry: a filigreed collar with delicate chains that went down to her nipple piercings, her supple breasts joined together by a chain of their own. Golden bands wrapped around her wrists and ankles. Her red hair matched Chisur’s and was kept in a loose braid that currently hung over her right shoulder and down her side. His mother’s horns, arching strait back before curving slightly, matched his sister’s. His mother’s figure and height matched his sister’s, too, though their mother lacked the lean muscle Setara honed. The queen almost never wore clothes, so Chisur was unperturbed seeing his mother nude.

Chisur said, “I’m sorry, my training with Setara ran long.”

The queen arched a brow but left whatever remark she had sit between them. “More importantly, how is my granddaughter doing?”

“Eska’s robust and loud as ever. Kyle and I sleep very little at night.”

Airok smiled, a thing he rarely saw his mother do.

I’ve only seen her smile when holding our baby, Kyle remarked. His presence drifting in before it drifted out. It took some concentration at this distance to sense each other and communicate. Currently, Kyle was finally untangling himself from Jerawk to check on their sleeping daughter.

The queen said, “The joys of parenting. I seem to remember you were quite loud yourself, Chisur. Once her teeth come in I’m sure she’ll let you sleep through the night.”

“We can only hope,” Chisur said. Chisur was an adolescent when his grandmother passed and Airok ascended the throne. In that time, Chisur had spent much of his childhood close to his mother and her attendants. His father had been a palace guard and not one Airok cared to keep in touch with. Each of the queen’s children came from different fathers, which was common for the queen to do.

A thing that seemed to be on Airok’s mind as well. “Have you found another fertile mate yet, by the way?”

Chisur couldn’t help the brief grimace. “I’ve not spent much time looking. Between trying to be there for Eska, pushing Jerawk as ambassador to Earth, and overseeing the recovery of the scarred lands—”

“Royal duties are never ending, aren’t they Chisur? It shouldn’t be too hard to find a willing partner, though. I certainly had my pick of males when I was your age,” Airok said. Chisur managed to restrain another wince. The trouble was, his mother could always bed a male and cast him off the next night. Any partner Chisur slept with he’d want to remain involved with until at least the child was brought to term—but even then the thought of cutting the parent off from their young… then there still lingered the scent of his sister’s need in the sparring ground. Her weight on top of him, the warmth of her tongue in his mouth. No—indulging in carnal lusts was one thing, but the scandal of an incestuous parentage was the last thing he wanted to bring to bear on his sister or any young she might decide to carry. Not that his sister ever seemed interested in it when she was heir. She shirked the duty of maintaining the royal line by only ever keeping the company of dragonesses.

“Is everything alright, Chisur?” Airok asked. “You seem more distracted today than usual.”

The prince wished Kyle could be closer to help keep him on task. “I suppose I have a lot on my mind. But for now we should get to business shouldn’t we?”

The queen nodded. “I read the speech prepared for Earth. You have my approval to broadcast it. What are the plans for Jerawk?”

“I thought the video could be done in the Atrium with the sprawl in the background. The more moving pieces the less humans will believe this to be some stunt someone uploaded to their web. We have the coordinates in place for where the ansibles should appear when they pass through the Tether. Assuming nothing goes wrong, our expectation is most will be picked up by local government officials, and with the video instructing them on how to use it, they should be able to contact us within the week we send everything.”

“You just need the council’s final approval.”

“And yours, mother.”

Airok nodded. She studied her son for a moment, meeting his level gaze. “If it was anybody but you pushing this you know what my answer would be.”

Chisur said, “I understand—it is something we are all reluctant to do.”

“But still you wish to do it,” Airok said, resting her cheek on her fist.

The prince leaned over the desk and said, “Mother, we need to intervene on their behalf. If they kill their world the way we did ours, the shock through the Tether might—”

“I know the risk. And yet we are telling the public this is all diplomatic. A show of good faith to the human who saved us all.”

It was true it was Kyle’s idea, but only after the two had discovered the reason Archayon didn’t entirely collapse when magical calamity roared across most of the planet. The Tether to Earth had kept Archayon alive. The same way Chisur’s kept Kyle alive when his mate nearly died in the rebound that saved the palace. With Kyle’s planet barreling towards their own mass extinction event, Chisur worried what the next century might entail for Archayon as it felt the reverberations of all that overwhelming death march across Earth.

Airok sighed. “You know you have my approval, Chisur. I will send word with an official endorsement tomorrow, which should sway some of the older members on the council.”

“There is one other thing I’d like to ask you, mother.”

“Hmm?”

“Have you been keeping tabs on Setara?”

The queen stiffened a little and leaned back in her chair. “I keep tabs on all my children.”

“You know what I mean,” Chisur said before he admitted. “I’m worried about her.”

“She is fine, Chisur. Suffice to say she keeps busy with work in Archay’s name. She still has loyalties to the people, if not to me anymore.”

Chisur’s fingers closed to fists in his lap. “I suppose that is all you will tell me.”

Queen Airok shook his head and surprised her son with a rare admission. “Ohk Chisur, it is the only thing I can tell you because I don’t honestly know what she’s doing. She doesn’t wish to be found, and there is no one in the sprawl better at going unseen. I saw to that personally.”

Chisur let the weight of that sink in, feeling a mixture of surprise, anger, and grief. Surprise that all the resources at his mother’s disposal in the Lower Warrens weren’t enough to track Setara, anger that his mother seemed flippant about Setara’s fate, and grief at the thought his sister might truly be all alone.

You wish to find out what’s going on, Kyle said once Chisur caught him up on the meeting. The prince now descended in the elevator he took to the top of the ziggurat.

I do, Chisur said. But there is so much that already needs to be done.

Easy, love, don’t be so hard on yourself. You have Mephis working for you on the council, Jerawk is nearly ready to lead the team we’ve put together for establishing communications with Earth, and I can easily take over the recovery efforts happening along the edges of Archay. The only duty I expect you not to shirk is your daughter.

I know, it’s just—

Hush, you’re always trying to be responsible for everything. Let others help you so you can help those who need you.

Chisur studied the magical storm over the ocean. It looked like a nebula hung in the sky, with forks of lightning flashing through it from time to time. It was a permanent reminder of the sacrifice Kyle didn’t allow him to make, and had Chisur done it, there’s no telling if Kyle could have saved him like the prince did his mate. He felt a rush of tenderness swirl through him, easing the bundle of nerves coiled in his diaphragm. A warm kiss passing between their connection. He laid a palm against the transparent glass, covering the nebula. From the other end of their bond, he sensed Kyle laying his hand on the window in their room as well, their daughter snoozing gently in his other arm.

We’ll figure out a way through this.

I know… Together the two of us can do the impossible.