Page 212 of The Discount Damsel

“Millie?” came Dirk’s fearful but wonderfully youthful voice.

Coughing, Millie pushed back onto her knees and found the little luck dragon, whole and feathered and beautifully blue, hovering nearby. She yanked him into her arms. Almost as quickly, she pushed him away so she could look at him again. “Oh, Dirk! Oh you positively splen— But Bradley!”

His voice came from her left, hoarse and gravelly. “You were supposed to hold on to the harpoon and let me pull you free, Tula.”

She whirled towards his voice, long auburn tresses slinging whips of water.

Bradley, kneeling nearby in the sand, slitted his eyes against the liquidly assault. Then he gave her a shaky smile.

In a carefully curated, aloof tone, she replied, “I prefer rescuing myself.”

The apprentice’s smile was brief and fierce—a victory over the terror they had overcome. “Like no princess pirate I’ve ever seen.”

“Precisely.”

His gaze held hers, intensifying with something electric.

The moment vanished with a loud whoosh of air and a flash of multicolored light.

“It wasn’t me,” Dirk cried, flinging up his paws to shield his eyes.

It wasn’t anybody. The portal had appeared on its own. It resembled a simple doorway, arched at the top, and the air within it shimmered like sunlight caught in the dew of a spiderweb. If Bradley squinted, he could make out what looked like an amphitheater-style classroom on the other side.

“It will activate the moment your curse is lifted and bring you to the exam chamber,” Bradley whispered, recalling Miss Penelope’s words.

Millie crawled over the sand to his side, lifting one of his large hands with her own and turning it over as if the answers she sought were in his palm. “How is this possible? I thought you used the renovatio spell on Dirk.”

“I did.”

“But the incantation was in High Aetherial.” The baby dragon swirled close. “How did you speak it if you’re cursed?”

Bradley floundered for an answer. “I just did. It wasn’t like the time I leaked magic and rescued Millie from falling or roused you from your nap. This was . . . existential. I had to speak High Aetherial, because there was no other choice. Gladstone— Gladstone!” The apprentice rocketed to his feet.

“Gladstone?” Dirk’s muzzle crinkled like he’d just eaten a stinkbug. “What’s that festering turd got to do with any of this?”

“He’s the dark mage out there trying to break into this tower with Damascus steel crossbolts and steal your heart!”

As if cued, the tower shook again from another strike from the Skybreaker.

“That son of a swamp witch!” Dirk’s feathers bristled like the ruff of a fractious cat. “He’s gonna regret making that life choice when I’m through with him.”

“Master Dirk, no!” Millie jumped up and seized the little dragon’s shoulders. “You are not Dirk the Dangerous anymore. You can never go back.”

He smiled at her, soft and genuine. “I know. It will not be Lung Shang or Dirk the Dangerous who goes out there to defend his friends. Just Dirk.”

“You’re not going out there alone,” Bradley said firmly. “We are doing this together, Dirk.”

The luck dragon swirled around his best friend’s shoulders, scales flashing with ripples of luck.

“But the portal,” Millie protested.

Bradley stared at the portal for a long moment. It was a sight he had dreamed of seeing for the last six months. It eased an ache within him just as it stoked a deep-rooted yearning. He had broken his curse through sheer willpower. He could take the baby dragon and step through to the Prestigious College of Sorcerers right now, leave this entire mess behind and claim what was rightfully his.

But what kind of man would that make him? The kind who abandoned his friends when they needed him most for his own selfish gain. He had already abandoned his family and his village on the Cut, and he had abandoned his Designated Sorcerer Companion.

Never again.

Bradley turned his back on the portal and crossed the sand to retrieve his robe and spectacles. The portal flashed once, beckoning. The apprentice ignored it to smooth the smudges from his lenses.