Page 180 of The Discount Damsel

Bradley took a step closer, lowering his voice. “Dirk, listen to me.”

“Millie was helping me find a cure,” he blurted. “She knows a thing or two about dragons, you know. She’s not some pretty-in-pink airhead. She⁠—”

“She knows nothing of this and neither do you,” Bradley shouted. “Curses don’t work that way, Dirk! Magic is precise. One curse, one target. Curses—dark magic—still follow the same rules. Master Excelsior assured me of that the same day Gladstone ruined my life. Because you know what my first thought was? To make sure you were safe!”

“I-It was?”

“And then you go confiding in her, making secret plans and sneaking around and never once giving me the opportunity to share your burden, because what? You think I’m too self-absorbed with my own problems?”

“Well, you were.”

“Alright, maybe so, but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t make space for you. And you never gave me the chance! I’m your best friend, Dirk, we’re supposed to share each other’s loads. And Master Excelsior made me responsible for you! After six months, I might’ve left the tower still cursed, but at least you would be alright.”

The heat left Dirk’s yellow eyes. He had thought, on rare occasion, that Master Excelsior had saddled Bradley with him just to gain some peace amongst the baby luck dragons. That their resulting friendship had bloomed from necessity rather than true compatibility. He’d been so wrong.

“I’m sorry.” Dirk’s voice was softer than the wind.

Bradley ran a hand through his tangled curls. “Me, too. And I’m sorry I gave you the impression that you had to bear this on your own. You don’t have to, Dirk.”

The Mini Red held out his paws. “Hug of forgiveness?”

“Yes.” The apprentice pulled the dragon into his arms.

The crowd watching them cheered, surprising them both. Then a little boy tugged on his mother’s skirt and said in the loud voice of all innocent children, “Mumma, now that the dragon isn’t going to eat him, can we go get ice cream?”

Dirk retrieved the broth, and together the friends made for The Dreary Pelican. “Master Excelsior’s gonna be pissed if we don’t figure this out, isn’t he?” the dragon asked.

“Let’s see, we’ve got less than two weeks until my Master’s exam, I’m still cursed, you’re half naked, and we’re on holiday in Pierpont. Yep.”

“Ugh, he’ll have me mucking out the griffin stalls for months, I just know it.”

“You’d be that lucky,” Bradley groused. “He’s going to force me into custodial work at the College or hire me out as a valet to another Franklin Gladstone type to pay him back for all that time in the tower and then send me back to the Cut.”

“I’d rather go to the Cut than muck out stalls. Wanna trade?”

Bradley barked a laugh and Dirk giggled.

The Mini Red flew close, the sparkling in his eyes reflected in the container of broth. “Now that we’re all good again, about Millie⁠—”

“I don’t want to talk about her.”

“She was only keeping my secret because I asked her to.”

“It’s not that. Not just that.” Bradley’s mouth puckered like he’d just swallowed a mouthful of sauerkraut. “It’s . . . complicated.”

“Is it complicated because you think she’s pretty?”

“No! And lower your voice,” he hissed. “She wants to be everything I despise, Dirk. You don’t know what pirates are like, but I do. And yet . . . And yet—” And yet she drew me a picture of my sailboat. She learned how I like my coffee. She held me. She helped me speak again.

“And yet you think she’s pretty.”

He blustered a sigh. “Just forget it.”

Millie, who had passed out in the fetal position once again, roused when they entered the room.

“Nash made you broth,” Bradley said gruffly. “And hold on.”

“Hold on to wh⁠—”