Sea Dragon (Dragon Knights Book 9) Read Online Free PDF

day.
    “There’s a new pair coming in tomorrow from the Castle Lair,” Bronwyn said, changing the subject again. “They’re going to be filling in for old Tercel and Ailish while Tercel heals from his broken leg. Ailish was most insistent that her knight be given time off from his duties to spend with his family while he rests. He is the oldest of the serving knights and should probably have been allowed to retire to a less active duty post a few years back, but he is a stubborn man. I think this injury has finally proven to him that he is not as young as he used to be.” Bronwyn laughed. “In fact, none of us are. Which is why I have you to help me, dear boy.” She reached out to stroke Seth’s hand in a motherly way.
    “Tercel and Ailish are wing leaders, are they not?” Hrardorr asked, his sightless eyes narrowed in thought. It seemed to Seth that Bronwyn’s change of topic had engaged the dragon’s interest.
    “They command the first flight,” Seth answered readily.
    He knew all the positions in the battle groups, having grown up with two of the best knights in the Lair as his fathers. They’d always made certain he knew how everything worked among the fighting cadres, thinking he would be a knight one day himself. But Seth had gone down a different path.
    He couldn’t fault Bronwyn or fate or whatever for his current position. He was doing what his conscience demanded, following a difficult path to help another person whom he loved as family. While he might regret giving up his boyhood dreams of being a knight, he couldn’t be bitter about it. He’d chosen this path. He’d made his bed, and he had to lie in it.
    Still, he kept up with the fighting units and knew them all. Not only did he help them when there were injuries, but he’d grown up with many of the younger knights and still counted them as friends.
    “Who did they get to replace such a strong pair?” Hrardorr asked, breaking into Seth’s thoughts.
    Bronwyn answered, “A dragon named Genlitha who is partnered with a knight by the name of Gowan.”
    Hrardorr’s head lifted. “I knew Genlitha when we were children. She is an excellent flyer.”
     
     
     

CHAPTER THREE
     
    “Stop fussing, Gen,” Gowan said soundlessly to the dragon who was so uncharacteristically nervous that she’d almost unseated him three separate times during their flight from Castleton to the Southern Lair. Gowan was still learning about dragons, but Genlitha had always been steady and calm with him. Until now.
    “Apologies. I’m just…”
    “Yes, I know, milady. You’re nervous about our new post and about meeting the new dragons and people of the new Lair. You’re not alone in that. I may have been a warrior all my life, but fighting with you as my partner is still new to me. Nobody was more surprised than I when the new orders came down, sending us here.”
    He was, frankly, still confused by the orders. There were many more experienced knights who could easily have taken this post. So why had they chosen him and Gen? They were still bonding. Still learning their way together.
    Gen was the true veteran of their pairing. She’d had a knight partner before. More than one, in fact. Dragons lived very, very long lives. Even when they shared some of their magic with their chosen knights, extending their human partner’s lifetime by centuries, they still outlived their chosen human friends many times over. Genlitha was considered in her prime years among dragons at about five hundred years old.
    That was his best guess at her age. Gowan hadn’t asked her exact number of years. He suspected that females of any sentient species would balk at such a query.
    “What is that in the distance?” Gowan asked, hoping to distract his dragon partner as they flew toward their destination. He had never been this far south and didn’t know the terrain. Besides, Genlitha had much better eyesight than he did, and way more experience in the air.
    “That is the ocean,