Monster Girl Islands 11 Chapter 3

“This process is taking forever,” Rikuri grumbled as she poked at the dead crab’s shell with her sword-spear. “At this point, I’m not even sure the meat inside will be worth it.”

“Congratulations,” I chuckled from behind the wheel of the ship. “You’ve just had your first ever experience trying to eat crab. Trust me, though… If that meat tastes anything like the crab back in my world, it definitely is worth it. Slather it with some Old Bay… Dip it in a bunch of melted butter… It’s like an orgasm for your taste buds.”

“That sounds delightful,” Zikiu gasped. “Baratu, do you know anything about this ‘Old Bay’ he’s talking about?”

“That depends.” The Cero chef shrugged and then turned to me. “Is it some sort of spread? Like palm jelly?”

“It’s a seasoning,” I explained. “So, like, a mixture of a bunch of spices.”

“What spices, exactly?” Baratu continued with a curious expression.

I opened my mouth to answer, and it hit me that I actually had no fucking idea.

“Uhhhh… Old Bay spices?” I guessed awkwardly. “If I actually knew, then I’d be the one raking in millions from selling all those little yellow cans, and not Mr. Old Bay or whoever came up with the idea.”

“That’s alright,” the chef noted as she yanked a hunk of shell off the crab and tossed it overboard. “Even if you don’t know the exact recipe, I’m sure I can just experiment with spice combinations until I get the right one.”

All of the other Cero women stopped what they were doing and cried out “No!” in unison, but Baratu remained oblivious to their concerns. The blonde rhino-woman simply wiped her hands off on her striped apron, flipped her sword-spear around in her hand, and then tried to pry off another piece of shell.

“There are many spices on the Dragonkin island,” Anora said before she plucked off a hunk of shell much smaller than any of her peers. “I’m sure Hali would be happier than a water dragon in a hot spring to show you all the different things you can make with them.”

“No offense to this Hali woman,” Baratu mumbled, “but I’ve always been the head chef for my people. She might know the tastes of her own people, but nobody knows the Cero flavor palate like I do.”

“I think you will be surprised,” Mira laughed. “Hali has yet to find someone who doesn’t enjoy her cooking. I swear that woman’s food could satisfy Urlon the Great.”

“I don’t know if I’d go that far!” Jonas scoffed with amusement. “You weren’t around during the days of Urlon the Great… He refused to eat anything but roasted sand dwellers, no matter the occasion. A great victory feast? Roasted sand dwellers. Post-bonding celebration? Roasted sand dwellers. If it wasn’t a long, scaly creature that had been blackened over a fire and attached to a wooden skewer, he wouldn’t touch the thing.”

“I still think Hali could have changed his mind.” Mira shrugged.

“I probably could have, too!” Baratu argued. “You saw the kind of awful food I had to work with in our village. If I actually had a shot with some fresh ingredients that were plentiful and didn’t take months to replenish? I could probably change the temper of a spotted hound.”

“Well, now you’re just being boastful,” Rikuri laughed. “Your food was a gift from Tembori himself, but I don’t think it would go that far.”

“Either way.” Jonas shuddered. “I am just glad Queen Nerissa appointed Hali to be our cook. I believe I can still taste the tart, fishy taste of the sand dwellers on my tongue just from thinking about it.”

“Tart and fishy?” I cringed.

“Urlon the Great was a strange man,” the soothsayer conceded.

“All this talk about disgusting food is making me wonder,” Ashanti announced as she stood from the dead beast and stretched out her arms. “Shouldn’t we test some of this thing’s meat before we spend the rest of the trip trying to deshell it?”

“It doesn’t appear to be poisonous, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Candara noted. “There’s no bright colors or change in texture after death, so it should be safe to consume.”

“I’m sure it’s safe to consume,” the three-horned Cero scoffed. “I just want to know if it tastes bad or not.”

“I agree with Ashanti,” Batari added. “We should test this creature’s meat out before we proceed.”

Can I volunteer? Swaer smacked his lips. I’ll gladly take the risk if it’s as good as Ben says it is!

“We’ll all need to try it,” I explained to my crew. “Our bodies are all different since, well… We’re all different species. Why don’t we tear off some chunks and have Tirian cook ‘em up real quick?”

The rest of my crew gave nods of silent agreement, and then they got to work. Every one of my crewmates sliced off pieces of the dead crab monster while Darya disappeared to the lower deck, but after a few minutes, the golden-scaled warrior returned with the stone dutch oven that we carried aboard the ship. My crew tossed the meat into the pot, which was then placed onto the ground cautiously.

“Make sure you don’t accidentally burn the ship down,” Darya warned Tirian as he floated down into position.

Don’t act like I’m an amateur, Tirian teased. I could burn a furry-scurrier from a hundred feet in the air!

“You know she can’t hear you, right?” Mira chuckled.

Tirian shot the jade-haired beauty a dirty look, but then the silver fire dragon took a small breath, which caused orange and red embers to glow from deep inside his throat. Then Tirian pressed his lips together and blew softly, and he sent a pencil-sized blast of flames down onto the pot below. The top of the stone smouldered red-hot as the dragon charred the meat inside, though he only held the blast for a minute or so.

When Tirian finally finished, the crab meat inside the pot was blackened, and I could smell it from all the way over here.

Instantly, my stomach let out a hearty growl.

It smelled freaking amazing.

“That’s much better than before,” Zaraya chuckled as she picked up one of the pieces. “I was starting to wonder if our whole boat was going to smell like fish after butchering this big guy. But this? I can handle this delicious smell.”

Zarya popped the bit of crab into her mouth and began to chew. Soon, her eyes rolled back into her head, and she let out a long “mmmmmm” sound.

“So, I assume that means you approve?” Jonas chuckled.

“See for yourself, old man.” The dragonkin warrior winked as she held out the container.

My crewmates all took turns plucking out a piece of crab, eating it, and then overreacting with their own pleasurable noises.

“Okay,” Nadir conceded, and she ran her tongue along her sharp teeth. “I’m not usually one for cooked meat, but this is delicious!”

“Here you go, Draco Rex,” Mira said as she approached with a small offering for me.“I didn’t want to make you leave your steering wheel. If I had to take it over again, you just might not get it back.”

“Well, in that case, I’m going to hold onto it extra tight,” I chuckled and intensified my grip on the steering wheel.

“Wow,” Mira teasingly scoffed. “I guess this is just gonna have to be for me, isn’t it?”

“Not so fast.” I smirked, and then I opened my mouth wide.

“You’re really letting the title of ‘Draco Rex’ go to your head, aren’t you?” the green-haired beauty giggled as she slowly placed the piece of crab in my mouth. She then proceeded to float her fingers across my chin and push my jaw closed with a playful wink.

Instantly my taste buds were assaulted with an unfamiliar, dull fishy taste, but the real flavor came out when I took a bite of the crab meat. Juice squirted into my mouth as I devoured the morsel, and my entire tongue felt like it was in seventh heaven.

“Damn.” I whistled after I’d gulped down the meat. “That was definitely a good call. Now, just imagine what Baratu or Hali could do to that…”

“I need to get back to shelling, then,” Mira mused. “They won’t be doing anything if we don’t get it harvested and preserved.”

The dragonkin warrior turned to walk away, which left her wide open for my attack. I slapped her tight ass gently, and the green-haired beauty let out a startled gasp. She glanced back over her shoulder with a mischievous smile and her eyebrows raised to the sky, but all she did was shake her head before she walked away.

“You know what?” Lezan smirked at Nadir. “I’m gonna try a hunk of this thing the old fashioned Coonag way. I bet it tastes a thousand times better.”

Lezan then lurched forward, stabbed her claws into the flesh of the crab monster, and ripped off a meaty chunk, and her eyes glowed with excitement as she raised the meat to her mouth and bit into it using her razor-sharp fangs. Lezan chomped on the meat for a split second before her entire body froze, and her smile dropped into a disgusted frown. The racoon woman’s cheeks puffed out as she covered her mouth and tried to contain her disgust, but try as she might, she couldn’t fight it for very long.

Lezan rushed over to the side of the ship, leaned over the edge, and sent the hunk of meat hurling toward the briny sea.

I heard a large splash as something jumped out of the water, followed by a loud gulp and the hum of a water dragon.

Tell Lezan ‘thank you’ for the morsel, George declared.

“You do realize that was just in her mouth, right?” I asked my bondmate telepathically.

I did not, George said. Why does that matter, though? I’ve seen you kiss her on the lips hundreds of times, so her mouth can’t be too dirty.

“It’s not,” I chuckled. “I’m just surprised you’re okay with eating half-chewed food.”

Have you seen some of the creatures that live in this ocean? my water dragon retorted. Half-chewed meat doesn’t even come close to being the strangest thing I’ve devoured, dear one.

“Fair enough.” I shrugged before I turned my attention back to Lezan. “I’m guessing it didn’t taste as good as you thought?”

“I can’t believe I’m saying this.” Lezan gagged as she brushed at her tongue with her fingers. “But I’m never eating that again unless it’s cooked. It tasted like a dead fish.”

“Maybe because it is a dead fish?” Rikuri snickered.

“It’s probably for the best you don’t like it,” Candara added as she plucked at the beast’s shell with the spine of her fanblade. “We had a Morpho man who was trying to impress us all by eating raw fish.”

“As if that’s something to be celebrated.” Batari cringed.

“Needless to say, he was violently ill for quite a long time,” the golden haired butterfly woman giggled.

“You know, raw fish are actually a delicacy back in my world, ” I noted. “We call it ‘sushi,’ and people pay out the ass to eat it, usually wrapped in seaweed and rice.”

“Your people ate raw fish for fun?” Zamwae gasped, and the shaman covered her mouth in horror. “You must have had a terrible mortality rate.”

“Proper precautions were taken,” I explained. “They were flash-frozen before they were served, so any of the creepy-crawlies that lived inside were killed on the spot.”

“Flash-frozen?” Anora stroked her yellow chin as her eyes looked to the sky. “What does that mean?’

That’s when it dawned on me… These women had no concept of frozen food whatsoever. It really shouldn’t have surprised me, though. Every single race we’d come across so far lived in a pretty temperate climate. Maybe some of the tallest mountains on the islands had peaks covered in snow, but otherwise there would have been no way for any of these women to have experienced a snowfall or seen a frozen lake or anything like that.

So, it was up to the Draco Rex to explain.

“It’s when you make something super, super cold,” I elaborated. “Really fast. And when you do that, all of the living organisms inside die.”

“You can kill something just by making it cold?” Ashanti raised an eyebrow. “Is that like when Zikiu fell in the lake and then had to sleep by the fire to stay alive?”

“Kind of.” I shook my head. “See, back where I come from, there are entire landscapes that get really cold during the wint-- er, the cold season, as you call it. So cold, in fact, the frozen rain falls from the sky and turns everything it touches cold and slippery. We call it ‘ice.’”

“That sounds as awful as finding a bone in Hali’s stew,” Anora mused, and the dragonkin healer scrunched up her nose. “How do your people survive such terrible weather?”

“Layers,” I retorted. “Lots and lots of layers of clothing. That, and we mostly stayed inside during that time of year.”

I continued to wow my crew with stories of my world as we pushed across the horizon. Eventually, my friends were able to get all of the crab meat off its body, cut up into edible pieces, and then tucked away into salted barrels. Once that was all done, we proceeded to toss the bits of shell and bone overboard and watched it disappear down into the watery abyss below.

Finally, after a long, harrowing journey, I saw the island on the horizon.

I could see the massive mortar wall we’d created, with its archer nests and the various fortifications of debris that had been scattered along the beach in front of it. Even from back here I could see the nests were occupied, and I saw a figure gently gliding down the stairwillow.

When we got even closer, my heart swelled with happiness.

I instantly recognized the woman who stood on the beach waiting for the arrival of her friends. She had dark mahogany skin whose every inch was covered with pearl scales, and on her head were silver locks that had been braided with various seashells of different shapes and sizes.

It was Nerissa, my beloved queen.

We anchored The Dragon Queen once we were into the shallow water and then proceeded to exit the vessel. As my legs plopped down into the sea, I saw two blurs, one silver and one blue, zip past me like two bats outta hell.

Why are you rushing back to our castle? George teased Tirian. I’m the one who hasn’t seen my partner and my children.

Don’t flatter yourself, George, Tirian snickered telepathically. I’m off to see my bondmate. Going on a voyage without Jemma just didn’t feel right.

“Those are… a lot of trees,” Rikuri noted as we all splashed through the tide. “It’s like you have thousands and thousands of cloudbrushes, only of different shapes and sizes.”

“This is nothing,” Nima promised, and the deer-woman smiled. “You should have seen the island my people called home… We had whole settlements up in the trees!”

“I don’t think I could do that,” Ashanti mused. “Sure, you would have the high ground over anything that tried to attack, but all it would take was one bad step to send you spiraling down to your death.”

“You would have really not liked our homes on the Morpho island, then,” Candara chuckled. “They were quite literally made of flimsy throatsilk, and they hung down from the trees by only a small thread.”

“You lived in hanging houses?” Batari gasped. “That sounds like disaster waiting to happen.”

“Tell me about it,” I added. “We stayed the night in one of their little makeshift villages, and I just about lost my son when a storm hit.”

“It’s not our fault.” Candara shrugged. “They were made to be disposable.”

“You have a son?” The Queen Mother’s eyes widened as she looked at me. “Why didn’t you bring him along when you came to our island?”

“We were headed to an island we thought was full of wind dragons,” I explained. “As much as I love Arrick, I wasn’t going to bring any of my children to a place that dangerous.”

But you’ll gladly sacrifice us! Tirian snickered telepathically.

“Don’t start with the pity party,” Mira warned with an amused smile. “Right now, you’re the most deadly creature we have on our whole crew, so I think you would have been fine either way. No offense, Swaer and George.”

No need to apologize, George retorted. Tirian here can burn our enemies alive, while the worst I can do is attempt to drown them. Unless they are standing perfectly still, with their mouth wide open, that is fairly difficult to do.

Come on, George, Tirian laughed. I think you’re being a little overdramatic. You can still bite off our enemies’ heads and knock them off cliffs and all that with your water breath. Plus, I don’t think drowning somebody would be as hard as you think.

Perhaps, the blue water dragon admitted. Though I hope I’m never in the situation where we must do that. Drowning is a terrible, terrible way to go.

“I’ve seen worse.” Mira grinned. “Usually when those orc fuckers of mothers are being slaughtered by the Draco Rex.”

“That’s the truth,” Rikuri agreed. “I’ve never seen anyone quite so brutally effective in combat as the Draco Rex.”

“What can I say?” I smirked. “I was trained by my world’s military to be an elite killing machine.”

That was only partially true. They taught us everything we needed to know during our basic training at Cape May, but it wasn’t like I was going toe-to-toe with Navy Seals or anything.

Hell… I’d never even killed a man before I got to these islands and started going on these swashbuckling adventures.

When we finally got up to the sandy shores of the dragonkin island, Queen Nerissa was right there to greet us. Rays of light glistened off her pearl scales like a kaleidoscope of pure bliss, and her lips stretched out into a wide, radiant smile when she saw us.

Before I was even fully out of the water, Nerissa strode across the beach, threw out her arms, and wrapped them around my neck tenderly.

I dipped her backward and pressed my lips firmly against hers without missing a beat, and pure euphoria surged through my body as I kissed my lovely Queen, with lips as soft as silk and her fragile, scaly figure in my arms.

When we finally came up for breath, Nerissa’s face was red with embarrassment.

“Welcome home, Draco Rex.” The Queen cleared her throat as she tried to contain her emotions. “It has been far too long.”

“You’re telling me.” I winked at the silver-haired goddess. “It was a long, hard journey, but we’re finally back where we belong… With my beloved and all of our children.”

Nerissa’s eyes flitted over to the Cero women. “I see you brought back some new friends from this journey, too.”

“Nerissa, meet Batari.” I stepped aside and motioned for the two women to greet each other. “She was the Queen Mother of her people, but she decided to give up her title so she could come and live with us.”

“It is always nice to be in the company of royalty,” Nerissa announced as she stepped forward and held out her hand. “Welcome to the dragonkin island, Batari. I shall ensure that you and your friends are treated just as we’d treat one of our own.”

Batari looked at Nerissa’s hand with a frown and a raised eyebrow.

“It’s a greeting Ben taught us,” Mira finally interjected after a short, awkward silence. “My sister wants you to jerk her hand.”

“Shake her hand,” I corrected.

“Oh, right,” the jade-haired woman chuckled. “She wants you to ‘shake’ her hand, as is the custom in Ben’s world.”

Batari seemed to mull it over for a second before her expression changed to one of determination. Then the white-haired rhino-woman stepped forward, grabbed Nerissa’s arm around the wrist, and shook it like she was trying to snap it off.

Nerissa and Batari simply smiled at each other as they continued the strange motion, and all I could do was chuckle at their attempted comradery.

“Close enough,” I announced when the two women finished their shaking.

Afterward, I introduced Nerissa to each of the Cero women, one-by-one, but then Nerissa’s eyes fell on Swaer. The Dragonkin Queen let out a gasp as she threw her hand over her mouth, and her pointed ears wiggled with curiosity.

“Is that… Is that our egg?” she finally sputtered.

Who you calling an egg? Swaer grumbled. I’m almost a week old, thank you very much.

“This is Swaer.” Batari smiled and motioned to the red dragon. “My bondmate. The Draco Rex and his crew helped us eliminate a monster who plagued our lands, and in return we helped him hatch his wind dragon egg.”

“So, if that dragon is your bondmate,” Nerissa began with a raised eyebrow. “That means…”

“Yes,” I confirmed. “Batari is bearing my child. So is Zikiu.”

Nerissa’s eyebrows raised a fraction higher as she looked between the Queen Mother and me, but then a coy smile twisted on her lips.

“You really did have a productive journey, Ben,” the Dragonkin Queen giggled. “Perhap next time you will come back with an entire pregnant crew?”

“Gods, was that a joke?” Mira gasped sarcastically. “From my sister? I think we have been gone for too long.”

Nerissa’s smile dropped into a deep frown as she shot daggers at Mira from her eyes, but the green-haired warrior didn’t seem to be fazed whatsoever.

“So, he was hatched from the egg,” Nerissa tried to ignore her sister’s joke. “But what about this large, spotted dragon?”

“This is Huwar,” Zamwae announced from atop the beast. “He has been my loyal land dragon for hundreds of season cycles.”

“He looks ferocious,” the Dragon Queen noted.

“I would say his bark is worse than his bite,” I teased. “But I’ve seen his bite in action. It’s much, much worse.”

Nerissa eventually turned her attention back to me, smiled once more, and placed a soft hand against my cheek.

“I couldn’t wait for you to get back, Ben,” she whispered to me in her angelic voice. “I have some wonderful news.”

My mind raced with the possibilities of what it could be. Did we finally secure those fences in the chicken coops? Had the other Coonag women stopped tearing up their beds in their sleep?

Or was it the news I’d been waiting to hear for months now?

The news that Jemma or Ainsley had their children.

“Don’t tell me…” I trailed off in a joyous disbelief.

Nerissa smiled, and I pressed my lips together hard to prevent myself from getting overwhelmed with emotion.

“Jemma went into labor yesterday,” the Dragonkin Queen confirmed. “And Ainsley was not far behind them.”

“And the babies?” I gulped as, for a brief moment, dark thoughts entered my mind. “Are they--”

“They are perfectly safe and healthy,” Nerissa reassured me. “Would you like to meet them?”

“Y-Yes!” I chuckled with disbelief as I ran my hand across the back of my neck. “A thousand times yes!”

I wrapped my arm around Nerissa’s tiny waist, and the two of us began back up the beach. The rest of our crew followed close behind, all the way up the stairwillow trunk, over the perimeter wall, and then down the path that wound through the humid jungle.

“I think this is the most green I’ve ever seen,” Zamwae mumbled in awe as she and the rest of the rhino-women looked around at the forest. “At least, the most lively green.”

“Yeah,” Ashanti scoffed. “The only green we had in our land was the sickly, greenish-yellow of the dying grass.”

We continued down the jungle pathway for quite some time until finally, the foliage of the island parted, and we were all staring at our castle. As we approached the structure, the Cero womens’ jaws practically dragged on the ground.

“I’ll admit,” Zikiu whispered. “I’m impressed. How did you manage to build all of this?”

“The castle has been around since the times of our ancestors.” Darya spoke up. “But everything else was the result of the Draco Rex’s knowledge and leadership.”

“That is an understatement,” Nerissa said as she leaned against me. “Before Ben came along, our island was not fortified whatsoever. All we could do was cower in our castle as pirates pillaged, raped, and destroyed everything we held dear.”

“Orcs?” Rikuri growled.

“Yes.” The Dragon Queen looked away with tears in her eyes. “But we need not worry about their kind any more. With these dragons and all of these new allies at our side, I know the Draco Rex will lead us to ultimate victory.”

I appreciated the kind words, but right now all I could focus on was getting inside the castle and seeing my newborn children.

The second we entered through the castle threshold, I announced I was going to the healing rooms.

“You guys all make yourselves at home.” I smiled proudly. “I promise I’ll come back and see you later… Right now, though, I need to meet my children.”

The rest of the crew headed in the other direction as Nerissa and I wandered to the healer’s section of the castle. Soon, we came to the doors of the infirmary, and I took a deep breath.

No matter how many times this happened… No matter how many children I fathered or newborns I met… I could never keep myself together.

Who the hell could?

My heart raced with excitement as I peeked into the room and saw both of the Niralope women. Their beds were right next to each other, and they looked like they hadn’t slept in days.

Still, they were as beautiful as ever.

Ainsley’s slender torso sat straight up when she saw me enter the room, and she quickly tousled her strawberry blonde hair to make herself look more presentable. The very ends of her long, slender legs stuck out from beneath the bedsheet on her body, though she looked as content as ever.

Jemma, on the other hand, sat without a blanket. She wore some sort of dress that looked more like a burlap sack than a piece of clothing, and she had one long leg crossed over the knee of the other. Her auburn hair rested on the pillow behind her, but she was all smiles as she held the small bundle in her arms.

Our resident dragonkin healer, Talise, was in the room as well. The aqua-scaled woman held a second bundle in her arms as she spotted it with a wet sponge and carelessly whispered a song in her native tongue.

My entire body was a shaking mess as I approached Jemma, but the Niralope woman didn’t have a care in the world.

“Hi, my love,” Jemma whispered to me. “Would you like to hold our daughter?”

A little girl.

I couldn’t even find the words to speak. All I could do was nod, and then Jemma extended the little bundle of joy out for me to grab.

I willed my nervous shakes away before I gently placed one hand behind my daughter’s head and cradled her in the crook of my arm.

She was so beautiful.

She had wispy black hair like me, though I could tell from the gleam in her green eyes that the little girl was going to have a similar personality to her mother. My daughter was much more lean than any baby I’d held before, and her legs were nearly half of her height. Though she had a few patches of scales around the sides of her head, she mostly shared the features of a Niralope, with her long legs and large eyes.

“Hey there, baby girl,” I whispered as I tickled her nose and smiled. “Daddy’s got you…”

My daughter let out a gleeful laugh, and my heart melted right in my chest.

“I’d like to name her Nirali, if that’s okay with you,” Jemma announced. “She is a gift from the goddess Nira, so I find it fitting that she would share the same name.”

“Hello, Nirali.” I smiled at my girl. “Welcome to the world.”

Though my child looked content in my arms, she soon began to fuss.

“I think she’s hungry,” Jemma sighed and then motioned for me to give her the baby. “She’s been nursing just about every hour.”

“Maybe she just needs a lot of nutrition,” I mused as I handed our beautiful baby daughter back to her mother. “Maybe that means she’ll be a strong warrior like her mom.”

“You flatter me too much,” Jemma scoffed as she held Nirali up to her breast.

“You deserve to be flattered.” I winked at the auburn-haired beauty, and she just rolled her eyes.

“Go see your son, Ben,” she chuckled.

My son…

I turned around to see Talise was now sitting on the bed beside Ainsley, and my other child was now back in the arms of his mom. I dashed over to the bed, crouched down so I was at eye level with our child, and then brushed my fingers through Ainsley’s hair.

“How are you holding up?” I asked the blonde Niralope.

“About as good as I can for having just pushed a baby out of my body,” she joked, and then she smiled tenderly. “He has your eyes, Ben. Look.”

Sure enough, it was like looking into a mirror. A miniature, pudgy mirror.

My son’s eyes were narrow, with two tiny caterpillars of hair above them. Though he had the same long legs as a Niralope, his entire body was covered in scales, and he had the ears of a dragonkin.

“He does have my eyes,” I sighed longingly. “He actually looks a lot like me.”

“I know.” Ainsley smiled. “And I couldn’t be happier.”

I leaned over and gave the Niralope woman a slight kiss on the forehead, and then I repeated the action with my newborn.

“You’re gonna be a great leader to your people, son,” I whispered.

“Algon,” Ainsley corrected. “I want to name him Algon. It was my brother’s name. He was the most kind, caring, and gentle man Nira had ever bestowed upon this world. And then those orc heathens took him from us.”

“I like that name,” I reassured the Niralope. “It sounds like a fitting name for the future leader of the Niralope people.”

I sat in the infirmary room for nearly two hours, and I went back and forth between the two mothers and my two children. Pride swelled in my chest each time I saw my beautiful babies, and I couldn’t help but think about the future that was in store for them.

I was going to train them both to be wise, thoughtful leaders and cunning warriors. I would teach them the ways of the dragonkin, while their mothers would instruct them on the Niralope traditions and way of life.

I was going to be the best damn father I could possibly be, for their sakes and the sake of my lovers.

However, I soon had to come back to reality.

Nirali and Algon both began to fuss, so Talise and I started to rock them in our arms until they passed out. Once the children were back in the arms of their mothers, Nerissa placed her hand on my shoulder.

“We should be getting back to the courtyard,” she whispered in my ear. “The Cero women will need to be introduced to the rest of our friends, and I think we should both be there for that.”

“It’s alright, Ben,” Talise reassured me in a hushed voice. “They need their sleep right now.”

“The kids, or Ainsley and Jemma?” I teased.

“Both,” the healer confirmed with a soft, musical chuckle.

With that, Nerissa and I said our goodbyes and then headed out into the hallway. I gave one final glance back at the incredible scene before we began to head toward the courtyard.

However, we didn’t get that far.

“Ben!” I heard a bubbly voice call out.

Suddenly, two dark green arms wrapped around my chest from behind and pulled me into a bear hug. I felt somebody’s face press against my back, take a deep breath as she savored my cologne, and then pull away.

When the woman finally released her grip on me, I turned around to see the dragonkin cook, Hali, staring back at me. Her red hair was parted to both sides and decorated with seashells, and she placed a hand on one hip and cocked her head to the side.

“I was wondering where you were, Hali,” I chuckled. “You didn’t want to come out and greet me on the beach?”

“Of course not,” the bubbly dragonkin woman scoffed. “You know me, Ben. If it wasn’t for those pesky things like latrine breaks and sleep and all that, I don’t think I’d ever leave the kitchen.”

“I’ll leave you two to catch up,” Nerissa giggled before she kissed my cheek. “I’ll go perform my Queenly duties for our new guests while you two talk. Just promise you won’t keep him for too long, okay, Hali?”

“You and I both know I can’t promise that.” The chef winked at her Queen.

“Then I’ll have to stretch my duties beyond what I normally do,” Nerissa chuckled. “Don’t have too much fun, now.”

“Wait, I’m confused…” I trailed off as Nerissa turned and walked away. “I thought she wanted me to go do Draco Rex stuff?”

“I’m sure she does,” Hali reassured me. “But while you were gone, we all made an agreement…”

“What sort of agreement?” I raised an eyebrow as my heart fluttered in my chest.

“Well…” Hali glanced at the ground. “An agreement on who had the right to become pregnant next. I’ll give you two guesses as to who we all decided on.”

A smile spread across my face as my pants grew tighter around my dick.

Hali gave me a knowing smile before she grabbed my hand, turned around, and began to lead us off to an unknown destination.

Yeah… it was good to be home.