“Loren!”

There was someone shouting at her outside the coil of the dragon around her, but Loren couldn’t think well enough to answer back. It was so damn hot, and she’d been here for days, long enough that the heat had burned through her and taken root, making her tired and cold and feverish, always, always desperate for the dragon’s touch. She was supposed to… attend that wedding, or kill something, and she’d run away from the dragon more times than she could count, trying to get back to her duties. Each time, the dragon watched her with wide eyes as she stumbled away, waiting for her to fall, and when she inevitably did it came for her in its sharp-boned human form and scooped her up and caged her back against its side, pulsing hot and steady until she fell back asleep. It was getting harder to leave, and Loren didn’t really want to, she knew. It was so much easier like this.

“Loren? I can’t–” They slapped a hand against the dragon’s flank; Loren could just barely feel the vibration. “No she’s not fucking awake! You’re doing something, then, I don’t–” Another thump, harder this time, like someone had taken a club to a brick wall. Loren sighed. Someone was going to get herself eaten. “Oh, you can try, you pompous little prick. I swore an oath. I’m not leaving her.” Loren blinked, brow furrowed. Oath? She’d never taken vassals during her time as a knight. There had only ever been Adla, who was her squire by technicality, but she’d never–

Loren felt a flash of cold terror down her spine. It was her. Loren hadn’t even recognized Adla’s voice, and now her vassal was arguing with a dragon – Loren flopped one hand against its flank, heart racing but still half-woozy from the heat, and croaked out a thin plea for something, she didn’t know, but Tyraxia responded anyways, uncoiling and leaving Loren sitting on a huge quilt it had laid out at some point beneath the both of them. Loren hissed at the cold winter air on her naked breasts, instinctively pressed herself back against the dragon’s flank, and then she looked blearily out again, searching.

The plateau was exactly as she’d seen it days ago, except that now it was closer to sunset, there was a horse tied up near Loren’s cottage, and Adla was standing ten meters away, dressed in her thin squire’s leathers, tracking the dragon’s massive head as it swept around in a massive circle to face them both. Adla’s curly black hair was fraying at the edges, pulled back into a bun but with loose strands all over her sweaty face, and her dark face was thin and sallow from what must have been weeks of rough riding. Her whole body was held taut like a bowstring, eyes trained on the dragon’s movements as it settled, and her left hand brushed nervously against the pocket with her own stock of magical tools. She’d come here ready to kill, clearly, but when she glanced away from the dragon’s head and saw Loren lying against its flank she startled and let out a short, relieved breath. Then her eyes flicked down to Loren’s naked breasts, briefly transfixed by her nipples as they hardened against the cold air, and then she flinched and covered her eyes and growled at the dragon, “Couldn’t you give her some clothes?”

It was so completely normal after all this dragon nonsense that Loren laughed despite herself. “Adlaaaa,” she sighed, slurring the end of her squire’s name, and trailed off as she forgot the rest of her sentence. Adla’s eyes snapped back to her, studiously trained on her face, and Loren giggled at her vassal’s pinched expression. “Hey. Come here?” Her voice was low and throaty with disuse, and Adla flinched at the sound, glancing to the side to track the dragon’s movements. Loren frowned. “Adla,” she whined, “don’t just–”

“What did you do to her?” Adla was talking to the dragon again, which was rude, but it wasn’t like Loren could do anything about it. Adla wasn’t really Loren’s squire, after all. It was more like a fake marriage, or some vassal version of that so Adla would stop getting harassed all the time by the kingdom guards, which had been a problem for years, really, and had led to quite a lot of grief. She didn’t really remember how they’d talked it out exactly, just the oath – which was fake, Loren reminded herself, Adla could do what she wanted. Even if that meant yelling at a dragon, who’d walked up in its human form sometime while Adla was talking, answering her questions with its voice pitched haughty and bemused like a noble. Loren knew better. She’d attended the tribute negotiations between Tyraxia and a few of its tribute cities, and the look on its face was the calm before the storm, the irritation before the dragon screamed fire and ate some petty nobles to prove a point. That was enough to drain the last of Loren’s ease away. She was still feverish, but she felt sharp with it now, and every exhale burned the inside of her mouth. Adla was hers, after all, even if it was just a scrap of paper in a castle somewhere, and she wouldn’t – she couldn’t –

Tyraxia sighed with both its bodies, and Loren flinched against the low, appeasing hum that rumbled through her back, still on edge. It was looking at her again. “I told you your hoard is safe. Hh. No, that won’t work,” it muttered, and then it turned back to Adla again, balancing on the front pads of its feet like a human play-acting a raptor, making impatient little clicking noises with its teeth and claws. “Your knight needs you, yes? Go.”

Adla glanced over to Loren, uncertain, keeping far away from the wide sweep of the dragon’s fifty-meter body. Loren watched her a bit desperately. Adla was too far away and too close at the same time somehow, desperately needed but so easily torn apart by the dragon’s teeth and claws. But Tyraxia had pulled back almost imperceptibly, waiting for her to move, and so Loren’s gaze settled on Adla alone. She could feel herself leaning forwards like a dog on a leash, slack-jawed but sharp with focus. She could see the curve of Adla’s neck against her leathers, could see every little fleck in Adla’s eyes as the other woman shrank away from her hungry gaze. Her vassal was clever and careful and always oh so eager, and just like every other time they’d fucked Loren knew that if she just touched her Adla’s desire would ruin every other part of her, would make her soft and wet and good in the way only Loren could make her. The hot rush of shame she always felt at that thought stayed this time, folding into her fever like it was born there. Her vassal looked so cold out there against the gray stone, holding herself sharp and flinty against the biting wind, but Adla had never been able to stay away for long. And Loren was burning up. She had so much warmth to share.

Finally Adla looked back, and Loren preened as the other woman caught her eyes and froze. That had always been the first step, when they were dressing or undressing and vaguely ready to fuck – Adla would stare and keep staring, and Loren would catch her wandering eyes and laugh at her a bit and wander over to her vassal as she cringed away, trap her against a wall or a bench and, well…

But she couldn’t go to Adla, not with her back plastered to the dragon’s burning flank, and so instead Adla grit her teeth and wrenched her eyes back to the dragon beside her, voice weak and unsteady. “She doesn’t want–”

“She’s hoarding you. You reek of it,” the dragon said lazily. It flicked one sharp-nailed hand in Adla’s general direction. “Go on. It will be good to have her treasure close at hand. Maybe she will stop running off and falling and breaking her face.”

“I’m not her– She’s not a dragon,” Adla snapped. “And what do you mean, running off? Weren’t you trying to heal her?”

The dragon chuffed. “Should I have chained her here? Would you like that?” Adla flinched at the words, looking somehow trapped.

“I don’t…” Adla trailed off, face pinched, and when Loren shifted slightly forwards, as much as the touch of the dragon would allow, Adla took a step back to keep her distance. Loren blinked at her, confused. She couldn’t be – her next breath came out with a slight hiss, and Adla backed further away. Loren watched a shiver go through the other woman’s body; the uncertainty and terror on her vassal’s face folded away into a blank, careful mask, and only a bit of it poked out around the eyes as Adla looked over the two of them. She was leaving, Loren thought with a slight panic, and she hadn’t even touched her, which wasn’t – Loren would never see her again. Adla had said that the last time they’d talked, and Loren didn’t know when that had changed but if she left now… Could Loren stop her? But she couldn’t go to her, couldn’t leave the dragon in the cold–

Adla took another step back and Loren growled, low and throaty and scared, stopping the other woman in her tracks. She looked at Loren with wide eyes, surprised – but not afraid, Loren thought anxiously, not yet. She knew what that looked like. Loren pressed herself back against the dragon’s flank, trying to calm herself down with the heat, but it wasn’t working. Her vassal was looking at her so carefully, face unreadable.

Then Adla breathed out, and looked at the dragon again. “Okay. So I just have to touch her? You’re not going to… sedate me, or whatever you did to her?”

The dragon sighed. “Stop talking. You have that human medicine, yes? I need you somewhat sane to work it. Go now and pick her up.” It motioned Adla forward impatiently, and Loren slumped back against the dragon as her vassal approached with halting steps. Her pulse slowed into a steady, throbbing rhythm, and she whined softly when Adla refused to meet her eyes, vision trained at Tyraxia’s flank instead. She wouldn’t even look at her, Loren whined desperately, but she was so, so close; just one more step towards her-and-the-dragon and Loren could touch her vassal properly. But Adla wasn’t moving any further, and Loren still couldn’t bear the lack of contact, so she just squirmed in place against the scales at her back and tried to keep from growling again, arching her back as Adla’s gaze, in avoiding her eyes, caught on her naked breasts again. Her vassal looked further down, transfixed by the half-healed hole in her stomach, and Loren stretched further to show off the pink-white scars against her brown skin, head sluggish and satisfied at the way Adla’s eyes widened further. Just one more step, Loren thought giddily, and then Adla took a careful half of one and glanced up to her eyes and finally saw her, tripping forwards as Loren snapped forwards to meet her and yanked her down into a crushing hug.

Loren had pushed herself halfway off the dragon’s flank to reach her vassal, but the brief chill was worth it as she crushed Adla back against herself, rutting her nose and mouth messily into the join of the other woman’s neck and shoulder. It was like every other time they’d touched but better, maybe because now Loren was so incredibly, wonderfully naked; her breasts were spilling out against Adla’s leathers and catching on the metal studs that secured them, which was probably some sort of health problem but Loren wasn’t really thinking about it which was wonderful, and Adla struggled against her once, then twice, and then she went still in Loren’s arms like a caught rabbit.

She was quivering in Loren’s grip, making tight, involuntary wheezing noises as she gasped for air, and Loren rumbled happily at the feeling of finally catching her in place. This felt so much better than just touching; Loren was so naked that she could feel every little shiver her vassal made as she slowly forced the other woman’s body tighter into the fold of her arms. Maybe they could do this all the time, she thought deliriously, if this still wasn’t sex. It had been weeks since they’d touched, back when they’d talked and Loren had run away to fight the dragon and die or get married to some idiot princeling if she lived, which had apparently all been the same fucking thing to Adla. It seemed ridiculous now with her vassal’s lithe body all up against her naked breasts. All that fighting, all that uncertainty, and just like always with just a touch she was caught and shaking and Loren’s, wrecked from nothing more than her lord’s strong fingers on her skin. Nothing had changed. Adla was as weak to her as ever.

Now there was just the matter of keeping her. Loren had been fucking her vassal for years, now; she’d long since noticed Adla’s fixation on her body, the way her eyes wandered as she’d donned Loren’s armor for formal events, and eventually Loren had put together exactly what that meant. Their trysts had kept Adla with her for almost a decade, and then, two months before Loren’s wedding, they suddenly hadn’t meant anything at all, and Adla had screamed at her and left Loren to deal with a dragon and a rather impatient future husband all by herself.

So touching her squire wouldn’t work anymore. It was time to try something else, but Loren wasn’t quite sure what. She’d given Adla a good chunk of her own pay years ago, and she’d given her the vassaldom herself, which was as close to a title as Loren could grant. There was nothing she could offer, especially with Loren’s wedding approaching; it would all be her husband’s soon enough. And wasn’t this all a bit absurd to think about with Adla in her lap and the dragon hot and heavy against her back? In the end she’d failed to give Adla enough, and nothing had changed since the night when her vassal had run away. But maybe she’d been thinking about this wrong. Adla had never really given herself up – Loren had taken her from the start, and she could take her again. She could fuck her forever.

Loren’s teeth ached at the thought of that, and she panted like one of the king’s huge hunting hounds, pressing herself further around Adla’s frozen form. Her vassal had stopped struggling, eyes wide and watery against her sweat-slick face. She was drugged with the dragon’s heat – Loren’s heat – and her body was pressing itself instinctively into the hot, wet crevices of Loren’s body, clinging to her lord as her chest heaved with the effort of breathing. Take her, Loren thought, and she felt the overwhelming urge to lean forwards and bite, to rip into the strong meat of her vassal’s sword arm until it scarred, until Adla finally couldn’t run and Loren could take her back and keep her, make it all fit, her vassal and her duty and her husband too.

She would make it work, if she could just fucking take Adla here, and then it wouldn’t matter that Loren hadn’t been enough to keep her properly. She felt the rush of shame at that, and guilt, but it was all swallowed by the heat, and she maneuvered Adla’s frozen body up and rested her teeth against her vassal’s neck, testing the way her all-too-human jaw clenched against the tough muscle of the woman’s shoulder. It would have to be enough, she thought, and then she drew back for the bite and felt another flash of panic that vanished into the bonfire of her heart. Not enough, Loren thought giddily. She’s ours. And then she snapped forwards and bit and broke five teeth on the dragon’s fingers as it shoved its whole adamantine-plated hand into her open mouth.

The dragon’s fingers jammed into the back of Loren’s mouth, then curled, and it pushed her back with the force of its fingers alone. Loren gagged as its knuckles pressed divots into the inside of her throat. Her jaw was bent open almost enough to break, but her hands held wrapped around Adla to hoard her; the dragon was here for her vassal, she was sure of it, and if it tried… it did. The dragon pushed Loren’s head further back as the rest of her body stayed put, narrowing its eyes at her like an especially frustrating puzzle-knot, and then it took its other hand and pried Loren’s left arm away with the force of a few dozen men. Loren snarled uselessly around the dragon’s fingers, choking on her own spit, and it let out a short bark of laughter and pushed its torso between Loren and her vassal, breaking Adla’s contact with Loren’s naked skin. It dragged its fingers out of Loren’s gaping mouth and pried Loren’s other arm off Adla by the wrist, pinned them together in one firm hand, and then it dragged Adla’s half-unconscious body a few paces back and threw Loren back onto the gargantuan flank of its larger body, leaving her to cough uncontrollably as it moved Adla into a more comfortable position. Then it crouched beside her vassal on the ground and watched Adla from barely half a foot away, humming and tilting its head at different angles to catch the evening light as it reflected off Adla’s vacant eyes.

It was disgusting, Loren had to push her away or something, but she couldn’t move an inch. She could feel the dragon’s heat pulsing against her back, not soothing anymore but a sizzling crack like a live wire against fifty pounds of flesh, seizing her and binding her in place. Her heart was screaming death, but it meant nothing against the crushing force of the dragon behind her. And in front of her it clicked excitedly as Adla slowly came to, looking oh-so-carefully at the hairless pseudohuman face of the dragon’s human form.

She looked terrified, but she let none of it show on her face, and the two of them stared at one another for a long ten seconds until the dragon spoke, ever impatient. “I did say I needed you clever. Are you going to thank me? Yes?” It snapped one finger with a deafening screech like metal against glass, and Adla flinched back as the dragon smiled toothily, eyes slit and unamused. “Thank me, pet. Another second and your knight would have fucked you full of dragonlust. Unless that’s what you wanted?”

“What?” Adla stumbled back and fell on her ass again, and the dragon smiled smiled much more pleasantly as it watched her scramble back. “Thank you,” Adla said quickly, and it smiled wider, “but what does that have to do with sex?”

“She is feverish. It is contagious. And you have been fucking for, oh, months?” It sniffed. “Years! And you’ve never even won!” In front of her Adla had gone very still, and it clicked its tongue to head her panic off. “Humans are always climbing all over each other, certainly I would not begrudge you for all the sex. For losing so firmly? Well. But we really must move her, or at least subdue her for your medications, and if you will keep rolling over for her we will not get anywhere with that. Perhaps you could try something else?” It smiled.

“Couldn’t you just move her?” Adla frowned, then looked at Loren for just a moment, and Loren felt herself shrinking back into the dragon’s side, oddly chagrined. “Or knock her out, maybe?”

“She wants you, treasure.” It smiled lazily at Adla, and when the woman opened and closed her mouth without speaking it preened and stretched back like a lizard in the evening sun, showing off the delicate grey-red scales on the joints of its chest. “Oh, I could bind her. But I won’t. Much better for you to do it, I think. I could help you, if you asked nicely?”

“…Hm.” Adla glanced away from Loren – from the dragon – somehow, impossibly at ease. She was thinking again, planning like nothing Loren had done had even mattered. “What do you need me to do? And for your help, I can–”

The dragon scoffed. “Or maybe I will help you if you stop asking so many questions. Come here.” It stood, and its scales shifted slightly against one another and ground the dust on its skin off in thin waves as it stretched a hand down to pull Adla up. She took it, and the dragon pulled her with what must have been quite a bit of care for something so strong, firm-handed and preening down at Loren’s vassal like a predator. Loren shivered as the whole beast purred with satisfaction, and its larger body curled slowly in to loosely coil Adla as she looked up at it, firm-faced. “Good. Hold still,” it said, voice low and gravelly. “This will hurt.” And then it started to say something else but Adla cut it off with a single sharp nod, and it laughed, high and reedy like a vulture, and bent and kissed Adla slowly and steadily with all its vice-grip strength, like it was pressing wax firmly.to a seal. Loren could smell burning flesh, but Adla just pressed herself back against the dragon, winding one hand around its waist and the other up to its shoulder to keep it still. They stayed like that for five seconds, then ten, and then Tyraxia finally dragged its lips off Adla’s, over to her left cheek, and then down to her jawbone and a few inches of neck before pulling away completely. And then Loren could finally really see Adla again, and she stared horrified at the patchy brown-and-red burns etched like a tattoo into her vassal’s lips and face.

The dragon was looking too, but her eyes burned with satisfaction. “That should help with the worst of it! Go on, then! Fuck her!” It laughed uproariously, giddy like a noble at a cock fight, and unceremoniously shoved Adla back towards where Loren lay frozen against the dragon’s flank. “But do try to win this time, pet. It would be such a shame to fish you out again.”