Light Dragons 01 - Love in the Time of Dragons

do anything, mate.”
    “You cursed the silver dragons because their wyvern killed me. But I’m not dead any longer.”
    “You are also not the same Ysolde you were.”
    “I do not have strange sexual kinks!” I yelled, slamming the phone down on the table. I poked him in the chest because I knew it would irritate him. “Things just conspire to make it look that way! By the rood, Baltic! Just because a little guy-on-guy action isn’t objectionable to me, you think every little peccadillo is some majorly perverted desire on my part! Oh, hell.” I looked down at the phone, picking it up carefully. “You heard that, didn’t you, Aisling?”
    A muffled laugh followed. “I’m afraid we all did, thanks to the invention of the speakerphone.”
    “Oh, god.” I closed my eyes for a moment, overcome with embarrassment. “I will give you directions to the house.”
    “You will not tell them where we live!” Baltic ranted behind me.
    “I trust you will continue to honor the agreement regarding Jim. Once the sárkány is over, I will turn it over to you.”
    “Your turn to hold,” Aisling said, but she had an actual hold on her phone. A slight humming noise filled the earpiece.
    “Mate! I forbid you to do this!” Baltic said, grabbing my arm.
    I set the phone down, turning to face him, sliding my hands into his hair, gently removing the leather thong. “I love you, Baltic.”
    “I will not allow—er . . .” His tense jaw relaxed as I nibbled along it, gently biting his lower lip. His hands, which had been gripping my arms, moved around to cup my behind, pulling me tight against him.
    “I love you more than anything in the world, but I would like us to live in peace with the weyr. Please do this for me. For us.” I sucked his lower lip into my mouth and tried to summon his fire, but it seemed to be banked. “Fire?”
    It roared through me as he claimed my mouth properly, his tongue being every bit as demanding as he was. Just as I was seriously contemplating wrestling him to the floor and indulging in a few acts I’d seen my past self perform, the door opened.
    “Fires of Abaddon, they’re still at it? Brom, my man, you don’t want to see this.”
    “Don’t want to see what? Oh. Sullivan is kissing Baltic.”
    “Father,” Baltic said, breaking off the kiss to inform Brom.
    “Huh?” my son asked, eyeing me as if I were one of his experiments. “How come your hands are on her butt?”
    “I like her butt,” Baltic said, giving the object in question a little squeeze. I bit his chin. “You will refer to me as ‘Father’ henceforth.”
    “But your name is Baltic,” Brom pointed out.
    “Hey, is that Aisling I hear squawking on the phone?” Jim asked as it wandered over to where I’d set down the receiver. “Ash, babe, you there?”
    “Oh, damn, I forgot her again.” I turned in Baltic’s arms, but he didn’t release me.
    “It is not fitting that you refer to your parents by their names. It does not show respect. You will therefore refer to me as ‘Father.’ I will leave it to your mother to decide if she wishes to tolerate you referring to her by her surname.”
    “No, it’s cool,” Jim said, plopping down next to the table, its head lying next to the phone so it could talk and hear. “Pavel made sage- roasted game hens for lunch, and I had a whole one to myself. He needs to give the recipe to Suzanne because it was seriously yummy. And Ysolde said she was going to brush me later. No, they stopped kissing, although Baltic’s hands are almost on her boobs. Right in front of the kid, too.”
    Baltic’s hands, which had indeed been moving up from my stomach, froze.
    “I don’t like ‘Father,’ ” Brom said, his brown eyes serious as they considered Baltic.
    “Papa?” I suggested, placing my hands over Baltic’s and leaning back into his chest. Despite the worry of the upcoming sárkány , I felt aglow with happiness. That Baltic cared so much about how Brom referred to him was a good sign. Brom would have a real father at last, one who cared about him.
    “Yeah, yeah, but you’re overreacting, Aisling. I’m fine—no one’s hurting me. Ysolde keeps giving me scary mom looks, but I don’t think she can help it. Besides, it’s wild seeing Baltic being all lovey-dovey with her. How the mighty can fall.”
    Brom wrinkled his nose. “I’m nine, Sullivan, not two. How about ‘Dad’? The others at the mage school call their fathers Dad. Most of them. There’s that