Embers (Scales 'N' Spells 4)

“What?” Nikki asked, wincing when the word came out a little sharply.

“With you getting Gunter out of the dungeon and taking care of himself, Ravi doesn’t have a favorite target for his mischief anymore.”

Cameron snorted. “Tell him to focus on the ice dragons. I think they can handle him.”

“Lovely, our Consort is trying to start a new clan war,” Carla said with a groan.

“I think I’ll keep Ravi occupied just fine,” Sora reassured them to catcalls and whistles.

“But Nikki has worked wonders with Gunter. I’ve seen more of him in the past few weeks than I did the entire first six months of living in the castle,” Cassie said. She pushed out of her chair and snagged the bag of chips from Tori while giving him the bag of frosted animal crackers.

“Yes, well, he eats when I remind him to eat, but I’m not sure he’s going to remember when I’m not around.”

North nudged them with his elbow and grinned. “I guess that just means you’ll have to stick close to your dragon.”

Nikki returned the smile. It would be nice if Gunter could remember to feed himself and take breaks, but it was also very nice to be needed.

“Training a dragon takes time,” Lisette said wisely as she poured herself a second glass of wine. “These are very old beasts who live even longer. They also have very thick skulls. It takes time to get lessons through to the brain.”

Cameron snorted while taking a drink of his wine and nearly choked on the deep red liquid. “Oh god! You’re going to kill me.”

“If anyone has their dragon trained, it’s got to be Lisette. She and Dieter have been together forever,” Carla said.

Lisette threw Carla a dark look before she heaved a very heavy sigh, as if dragging it out from the depths of her soul. “Tea. Cups.”

“What?” Tori inquired.

“Bloody teacups,” she repeated. “Dieter has a private study in our apartment where he likes to work in the evenings. The dragon loves his evening tea as well, but he hates to remember to bring the bloody teacups back out of his study. I’ll go in after a few days for whatever reason and the room is littered with dirty teacups.”

Nikki covered their mouth to hold in their laughter. The elegant and always pulled-together Lisette looked as if she wanted to strangle her mate. Whenever they saw Dieter and Lisette, they were sure the couple was the epitome of the perfect couple. It was funny to think they still managed to drive each other crazy.

“Nearly a thousand years together…” she moaned.

Laughter broke out through the room. Apparently, Nikki wasn’t the only one who’d had those thoughts about Lisette and Dieter.

“Okay, okay, so they’re a handful.” Cameron paused and wiped a tear from the corner of his eye. “But they come with lots of bonuses too.”

A happy sigh was echoed around the room by everyone, which lifted Nikki’s eyebrows in surprise. What were they all thinking?

“I mean, Alric can do this amazing thing with his tongue,” Cameron said in a little breathy voice.

“With his tongue?” Nikki gulped, their heart picking up its pace.

“Yeah,” Cameron sighed again. “He sort of partially shifts and he wraps it around my…and just…wow…” Cameron’s entire body shuddered and he blinked dreamy eyes at Nikki. “Makes my toes curl just thinking about it.”

“With his tongue?” Nikki repeated because their mind was going to a lot of very interesting places while wondering what it would be like if Gunter used his tongue on all their interesting places.

“Or that they’re so tall,” North groaned. “Well, not so much for Cameron since he and Alric are about the same height, but Nikki gets it. They’re like me. Short.” North tilted his head to the side, his nose scrunching a little. “There’s like a half-foot difference between you and Gunter, right? Isn’t that great? With that height difference, it’s like they can reach everything all at once.”

“Everything?” Nikki repeated, because their brain was beyond working at this point.

The room was suddenly very quiet, and North sat up straight in his chair. “Have you and Gunter not been…fooling around?” he asked cautiously.

Nikki slowly looked at all the room to find every eye intently on them. Their mouth was suddenly very dry. Nikki gulped down the last of their wine and forced a little smile. “We’ve kissed.”

“Well, yeah. We saw that hot kiss Gunter laid on you when he was drunk,” Tori said, then looked over at Cassie. “Thanks again for sending me that video.”

She winked at him. “Anytime.”

“But I guess we all assumed…that was just the tip of the iceberg,” Cameron said a little slowly. “We figured you were…you know…”

“Fucking like horny little bunnies,” Cassie filled in to the groans of everyone.

“Cassie!” Lisette snapped.

“What? We were all thinking it. It’s why we’ve all avoided the dungeon extra hard since that kiss.” Cassie looked at Nikki, her expression eager and excited. “Have you not been totally boning in the stacks?”