Before you were born, there was love - Sup: EP

Before you were born, there was love

US Hardcover Version
Wings of Fire: Escaping Peril
Chapter 15, Page 211

"He stopped and looked at Peril.

"I'm not an evil dragon, Peril. I like the security of having a queen who will pay me handsomely for my services, and I love the luxury of so much treasure. But I'm not going to give anyone all this power, especially not Queen Scarlet. I'm much too smart for that."

"Oh," Peril said.

Her mind was spinning a little. Was he implying that Peril wasn't that smart? Would she have given Scarlet that scroll without even thinking about it? Wasn't that what loyalty was about? And if he didn't trust Scarlet completely, why help her at all?

"Have you done anything else with the scroll?" she asked. "I mean ... couldn't you use it to make your own treasure, somehow, instead of waiting for Scarlet to pay you?"

Chameleon opened his mouth, closed it, and blinked at her for a moment. "I suppose I could," he said slowly.

"Scarlet hired me before I'd gotten very far with using the scroll — she caught me transforming and gave me the option of explaining how I did it, or coming to work for her. I chose option B, obviously. And I haven't wanted to do anything risky that she might find out about."

"I have a very nice life, though," he said quickly.

"And so can you, once this kingdom is all sorted out. We'll be her right-claw dragons, and we'll be together. Maybe you can help me come up with clever uses for the scroll. It'll be nice to have family at last."

"Yes," Peril agreed.

Family — that sounded amazing actually. She'd barely had a chance to meet Kestrel before her mother died. And if there were any other dragons related to her in the Sky Palace, they'd never introduced themselves."

Peril looked out over the mountains that stretched from the Sky Palace and hunched her wings shielding her somewhat from the chilly rain. After a brief moment she soon felt no rain at all and then felt a wing, glancing back she noticed it was Soars wing over her protecting her from the rain.

It was strange in a way Peril thought at first, she still wasn't used to touching others and the whole feeling of contact was eerie and foreign, but she felt she could learn to like it. Being untouchable while on the arena might have been a strategic advantage, but feeling a friendly wing embracing you, that feeling was better than any arena fight so far.

Peril sighed contently which drew her father's gaze, "Something on your mind Peril?" he queried. She shook her head at first but now Peril couldn't help it, only a few months ago she met her mother for the briefest time only to squander it on a few raw, bitter emotions, perhaps her father could fill in some blanks for her.

"What was Kestrel like when you first met her?" she asked flatly. Soar thoughtfully looked off in the distance and closed his eyes for a few moments in thought.

"As you know already your mother and I met in the breeding program. I had asked Queen Scarlet to inform the breeding officer to specifically pair us together as opposed to their usual random pairings within select age groups.", Peril blinked curiously, "Why did you ask Scarlet for the pairing?", he shifted back and forth a few times and looked down at his forearms a bit embarrassed, "I'm not exactly the strongest SkyWing, if I ever wanted dragonets which I did, how would I be able to protect them if I wasn't strong enough to do so? Their mother would have to make up for my lack of muscle and Kestrel fit the bill superbly." he said admittedly.

Peril wrinkled her snout, "Not strong enough?", he nodded vehemently, "Exactly, it's a cut throat world as you've probably seen many times first claw, I would never be able to live with myself if my dragonets or mate died because I wasn't able to protect them."