The Book of Fire by Marjorie B. Kellogg

that dear lady not died in Erde’s early childhood. Conversations her grandmother the baroness had been too busy to have. Conversations she could never have had with her father because of the way he’d begun to look at her and touch her in the months before she fled Tor Alte to escape the clutches of the hell-priest.
    Ever since she’d begun to grow, men had grabbed at her in one way or another, as if it was their right to lay hands on her without her permission. And this man-right seemed to demolish all class and duty lines, even religious vows. To Erde, it was more than just disconcerting or dangerous. It overturned a very basic principle of her childhood: men were meant to protect the women in their charge. Like Hal. Having tracked her down in the deepest wilderness, he could easily have taken advantage of her. But Hal Engle was a King’s Knight, and true to the oath he’d sworn. And a decent man, besides.
    N’Doch, too, had kept his hands to himself from the very beginning, though Erde could hardly call him a
gentleman
, the way he looked at every other woman who crossed his path. Erde ceased tracing the grout lines and began to pick at a particularly offensive clot of soot. And then there was . . . 
him
. The man who kept invading her dreams, as if she had no choice.
    It wasn’t just the dreaming about her enemy that disturbed her, or even that she worried about his well-being. It was that she was so . . . attracted to him.
    The very notion brought up her blush again. Erde was not too innocent to notice how consistently any thoughts of what men and women did together brought Baron Köthen’s bright image to her mind, to disturb and confuse her.
    “Erde, dear? Are you all right?”
    Raven, returning from the beer cellar with a fresh pitcher. Erde hoped the shadows would hide the evidence of her unseemly thoughts. Although, she reflected wryly, Raven would not think them unseemly. She smiled and shrugged. “Just tired. Still so tired.”
    Raven circled her free arm around Erde’s waist. “Sweeting, it’s only been three days. Remember what you’ve been through.”
    Erde could not think of how to reply. Raven set the pitcher down on a nearby joint-stool and wrapped her in a hug. This helped Erde banish the image of Baron Köthen and find her tongue again. “And think of what’s still ahead, when the Quest resumes.”
    “Ah, yes,” Raven agreed, “but you mustn’t worry about that for now . . .”
    “No. Not for now.”
    Raven let her go and took up her pitcher again. “The young man seems very nice.”
    “Who, N’Doch? Nice?” Erde couldn’t imagine such a thing.
    “Well, then . . . charming. A little overeager, perhaps. But very lovely to look at, don’t you think? So tall and . . . exotic.”
    Erde stared. Was she kidding?
    “No wonder his dragon enjoys taking man-form,” Raven went on merrily. “I think she might be just the slightest bit vain, don’t you?” Then she caught Erde’s expression.“Hmm. I see. Well, you and the boy
seem
fond enough of each other. Comrades-in-arms and all that.”
    “He’s not a boy.”
    Raven chuckled. “No, and I expect he wouldn’t want to hear me calling him that either. Come, tell—have you not been getting along?”
    Erde felt no urge to detail every disagreement she’d had with her fellow dragon guide. After all, he had improved noticeably since she first met him. “He doesn’t know very much about dragons,” she offered instead, realizing only then that of all N’Doch’s irritating qualities, this was the one that bothered her most. “Or the duties of a dragon guide. People don’t even believe in dragons where he comes from!”
    Raven smiled. “Ah, but he has a dragon who knows a great deal about men. And from what I observe, she seems to be managing him very well.”
    “She does?”
    “Certainly. There are other ways of turning a man to your purpose besides ordering him to follow. Lady Water discovered who in his