Dragon Chapter 8: Brother (3) (Patreon)

Only when Gron had fully retreated did Noah’s taut nerves finally slacken in a dazed rush. Barely holding himself up, he began stumbling back, step by step, toward that same dim corner from the beginning.

Curling in on himself, he pressed his still-bleeding face against the relatively cool floor and panted violently.

A few more seconds passed.

Then an extremely faint, hesitant set of footsteps began to approach.

Noah did not lift his head, but he could feel it.

That small crimson dragon, just as battered and scarred as he was, had stopped not far from him.

She did not keep the usual safe distance, nor did she immediately curl up on the other side. She simply stood there, as if hesitating, struggling with herself.

Around them, the muffled hisses and movements of the other hatchlings rose again, but those sounds seemed separated by a thick curtain of water, blurred and distant.

Within that little corner, only the uneven, ragged breathing of two wounded hatchlings remained.

At last, that faint rustling came again.

A few seconds later, that small crimson figure finally edged over in silence.

Very slowly, she lowered herself at a distance closer than ever before—yet still not quite touching him—and curled up there as well.

She did not look at Noah. Instead, she buried her head between her forelimbs. Only her small tail, marked with scrapes and blood, curled lightly and unconsciously, the tip almost brushing Noah’s tail.

Noah’s pupils contracted slightly.

For the first time, some of the drawn-bow hostility between brother and sister had ebbed, replaced by something subtle and fragile that had quietly begun to grow—something perhaps even red dragons themselves could not understand.

“...You look awful.”

Quen’s voice was even hoarser than before. The fin membrane at the side of her neck fluttered faintly, sending out a few warm breaths tinged with the smell of blood.

“What?”

“Your face.”

Quen looked at him. “One eye’s all smeared with blood. Ugly as hell.”

Noah smiled a little and rubbed his fangs together.

“You’re not much better yourself, my beautiful and charming little sister.”

He deliberately lowered his voice, tossing it back as a tease.

“Where did you learn to talk in such a disgusting way?”

Quen shot back immediately, her voice rising slightly, edged with its usual sharpness.

Her jaw was tight, and a few of the small side teeth meant for slicing showed faintly between her lips, flashing with a dangerous white gleam.

But the tip of her tail curled lightly on its own, as if the exchange had eased the tension in her back just a little.

“He won’t let this go.”

As she spoke, her forked crimson tongue flicked quickly out past her snout and withdrew again.

The motion was fast, like a snake tasting the anger and blood still lingering in the air.

Noah knew who she meant.

Gron.

That brother of theirs.

The two of them both knew exactly how vindictive red dragons could be.

After retreating in such disgrace in front of so many “siblings,” there was no way he would swallow it. Once his wounds had healed, once he had thought of a way to deal with them, he would definitely come back.

Noah narrowed his eyes.

“Next time, I’ll bite through his neck.”

Quen turned her head. In the dim light, her golden slit pupils narrowed to two thin lines as she stared at him.

“You mean that?”

“Of course. After all, you’re thinking the same thing too, aren’t you?”

Quen smiled as well.

So what if he held a grudge?

As if she weren’t a red dragon too.

She lowered herself again, but this time rested her chin on her crossed forelimbs. In that posture, the line of her neck looked a little less aggressive.

Her slender tail swayed faintly behind her, the tip brushing the ground and tracing a mess of shallow scratches.

“...You’re not completely useless after all, my brother.”

“?”

Noah nearly smacked his head into the floor.

He whipped around and stared at the sister beside him.

But Quen kept her head lowered, her slim crimson dragon neck stretched stiff and straight. A small patch of scales behind one ear opening had lifted slightly—an involuntary reaction red dragons had when their emotions fluctuated violently.

“What did you just say?”

Noah pressed.

“Nothing!”

Quen denied it at once.

The answer came too fast, too sharp, and carried a hint of flustered embarrassment.

“I heard that.”

Noah poked at the scales by her ear with a claw. “Did you just call me brother?”

“I did not!”

Quen still refused to look at him, offering only her profile, but the rhythm of her breathing had already gone uneven.

The fine crimson scales along her cheek glistened damply in the faint light. It was impossible to tell whether it was from blood that had not yet dried, or something else.

Noah parted his jaws. The scales at his throat and his vocal cords rasped together, and all that came out were a few hot, meaningless breaths.

He stared at his little sister for a long time.

Quen never turned back, never lifted her face. Only her tail kept swaying lightly, its tip sometimes sweeping the floor, sometimes brushing near his tail.

A thought suddenly occurred to Noah.

Logically, the way he ought to feel toward his sister should have been disgust—perhaps even hatred.

It really should have been.

When you knew that the reason you were weaker than other dragons was this shameless little pest had seized half the resources that should have been yours from birth, then of course you would think, at every waking moment, of tearing open her throat and reclaiming the strength that should have belonged to you.

She was a thief.

A robber.

Even if he had no way to kill her right now, the very least he ought to do was keep his distance.

If he wanted information, or wanted to discuss their situation, she should not have been the first one he sought out, either. There were plenty of other hatchlings around just as ignorant, and perhaps easier to coax answers out of. He could have picked anyone. There was no reason it had to be her.

And yet...

And yet it was truly hard to endure.

He could not stop himself from wanting to talk to this sister who wanted to eat him—to speak with her, to be close to her.

He wanted to hear her speak.

He wanted to be near her.

Noah strongly suspected she felt the same.

Even though she always tried to deny it with that vicious tongue of hers.

Always speaking in the sharpest tone. Always cursing him with the nastiest words. Always putting on an “I don’t want to bother with you at all” expression.

But the restless pull of shared blood was impossible to resist. It made the siblings unable to stop drawing near, even though they knew getting along with each other was like dancing on a blade’s edge, and that the very next moment the other might pull a knife and stab it into their heart.

Noah thought, so he really had become a brother with a little-sister complex.

And not just any kind—the most dangerous, most twisted kind, the sort that could turn at any moment into “slaying his sister” or “being slain by his sister.”

The thought was a little absurd.

But it was true.

A stomach only half full. A slight increase in strength. The still-lingering desire to devour his other half. And... a faint, indescribable illusion of being “whole,” born simply from the other’s existence.

Noah realized that when they looked at each other, the hollow feeling inside him eased a little.

As if two cracked bowls had been pressed together: they still leaked, but at least for the moment, they could hold a little something.

It was a cursed kind of comfort.

Thinking that, Noah slowly closed his eyes amid the blood, the pain, and the exhaustion and drowsiness so thick they seemed almost tangible.