To Enchant a Dragon by Amanda Milo Page 0,8

what little water I can patter around in. I’m pleased when Kalos expresses interest in what I find; he’s truly as enamored with flash as I am. “I think these are old coins,” he even muses in wonder as he digs through my little pile.

Unlike when one of my sisters touches my treasures, I don’t shriek at him not to steal anything. Not because I’m afraid of him, but because I… I don’t know anything about this creature, and yet I have the strangest desire to blindly trust him.

It’s peculiar.

In the afternoon, the ebb tide pulls the already low water entirely out of the bay, leaving nothing but the sandiest excuses for puddles. The positive side to this is that the oysters have nowhere to hide. We deplete their population by half just trying to satisfy the dragon’s stomach. I knew dragons had an appetite; I didn’t know they could empty half the ocean. It’s a good thing they live in the air and not the sea. Nothing would be spared. This thought has me gazing narrow-eyed at the quiet cliffs and the silent sky.

Not one gull in sight.

Did the dragon eat the seabirds?

An itching sensation on my lower half has me glancing down to see I’m already drying out. Morosely, I inch over until I’m submerged in the soft wet sand with the most water pooled in it.

Kalos’s shadow falls over me. Instinctively, I twitch. He doesn’t notice. “Is it normal for the tide to wash out like this? The whole bay is empty,” he exclaims, sounding shocked.

“Tides leave like this in many places,” I confirm. I bite my tongue to prevent myself from adding that my family’s cove doesn’t disappear. The waters fall low, sure, but they never empty, not like this place.

“What an unlucky phenomenon,” Kalos says. “I believe I’ve been told that funnel storms off of a coast can drain a bay. Perhaps it’s temporary.”

I nod because I know this to be true.

“Never had cause to see it before. Never had cause to much care—I’ve always avoided the coast if the skies look bad,” he continues, clearly perplexed. But then his dragon’s chin firms, and for the first time, I notice little spikes on it that form a short sort of leathery beard. It gives him a wiser, slightly older appearance than I first assumed. “I can no longer afford not to care.” He turns his gaze to me. “My mate needs her safe seawater.”

I say nothing, because I do need it. And I don’t address the part where he refers to me as his mate, because unlike him, I don’t feel any such bond. If he’s experiencing any sort of bonded drives and instincts, it’s entirely one-sided.

“You’ve been very quiet,” Kalos notes.

“I don’t have anything to add.”

“You don’t sing?” he asks, and if I’m not mistaken, there’s something besides curiosity in his voice. Longing, maybe.

It’s with sadness that I tell him, “Kalos, a mermaid only sings when she’s happy.”

CHAPTER 6

KALOS

The tide still hasn’t returned by the time night falls. To my dismay, the moon that rises in the sky is as red as the scarlet streaks in Adella’s gorgeous fall of drying hair.

But it isn’t as lovely a sight as her crimson sections of wild mane. Oh, it’s beautiful, to be sure. But not welcome. Because to see the red moon rise in the sky is to begin the full effects of heat.

Heat. I understand that word now. There’s fire in my lower belly, an incessant, angry drive that cannot be quenched.

This wouldn’t be a suffering I’d endure to this degree if I hadn’t captured this mermaid. If I were free to find a female dragon, I would not suffer this moon’s cruel effects at all.

I would revel in them.

But I have a mate, I cannot and will not go seeking any other—no matter that my taken female is not of my kind. We aren’t physically compatible but she is very likable, and surprisingly, we share several commonalities, and we’ve only known each other for the briefest of time. For however long our lives last, we will surely find more.

Still, I curse myself for the thousandth time for snatching a sea maiden. It was thoughtless, it was foolish, and now we are both suffering.

And to my utter shame, my mate is suffering. And whats more, if I hadn’t taken her, she wouldn’t be so unhappy as she clearly is.

Adella huddles in the meager leaving of water remaining here, and if I were feeling well, I