Unwilling to Succumb (The Dragon Lorde #2)

Chapter Twenty-Five: Ms. Harry & Mr. Larry

Lorde Kaede held a long pointer finger to his lips, with a cautioning glint in his eye. And slowly, very slowly, Lorde Alonso slinked behind the trunk of a tree, a tall purpled stem vanishing in the greenery.

"Is it them?" I mouthed slowly, towards Lorde Kaede.

He curtly responded with a nod, the action sending strands of dark hair into his eyes. I then noticed something in front of me.... or actually still attached to me, like an ironed chain to its prisoner. As if realizing it too, Lorde Kaede shoved my wrist back towards me, with an air of 'returning an unwanted possession.'

I rolled my eyes at him.

"You bloody idiot." A deep voice called out, nearly right beside me. "There is no one here!"

Bloody hell. Thank Salvador, my tailcoat is green!

I froze in a huddle against the dirt floor, with an equally silent companion at my side, though from the solid muscle moving against my shoulder, I knew he wouldn't be for long.

"I saw something, Harry!" A man's voice barked, with a tone far higher than the other. A few branches snapped under-foot, before a pale hand appeared above me, moving the prickly leaves so they tickled the top of my head. "Here, I swear-'

Suddenly the man was knocked to his feet, his sentence cleanly cut in half, by the slamming jolt of Lorde Kaede's knuckles.

It happened all so quickly! Branches snapping, like twigs sidling against a creek, a wet and ghastly tune to the ears. The sound of a heavy weight finally hitting the dirt floor, rolling once, then twice, then no more.

Frozen in shock, still hidden beneath the wide green leaves surrounding me, I hardly could tell where the other man was, but Lorde Kaede did. For there he stood beside me, blossoming out from the foliage like a sleek black panther, eyes latched onto its prey.

A metallic sound of a blade being pulled forwards by its master hand was heard, before the man revealed himself. "Where is Larry!" He demanded, voice trembling in anger. "In the name of King Vincent, you will bloody tell me!"

King Vincent?

Peering through the cracks between the leaves, I noticed something rather more intriguing than the scratches and chinks, brought on by my dagger to these green monstrosities. It was the amusing yet entirely bewildered sight of the man.

The man was tall and thin, like a frail beam pole, a thin shrewish scarecrow far away from his home. His eyes were small and round, but a brilliant blue against the greasy stands of yellow hair tied behind his neck. Rather then he appearing as the strange sight, it was actually the red robes wrapped around his frame, the bright metal armor slung precisely over it and the gold straps hanging loosely from his belt.

What the bloody hell! This is the uniform that we are in much need of? So much in fact, that we will be stealing it right off their backs?

He looks like a bloody roman soldier!

"No." Lorde Kaede moved silently through the leaves towards him, his voice hard as a block of ice. "No, I don't think I will."

The roman soldier scrambled backwards, as Lorde Kaede advanced, causing the man to finally trip over a basket-size green leaf behind him.

"Oooff arga ouch!" The man rubbed his arse sourly, as Lorde Kaede stopped in front of him, his face hardly amused compared to my own.

I truly wonder if that man has ever had a bloody humorous thought to cross his mind...

"Emoriah." Lorde Alonso's velvety voice, startles me from my thoughts.

Concern instantly pulls me to attention, for he never calls me without some added formality to my name.