Feed the Dragon Something New or Be Dinner novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: First Snow

The first real snow of the winter came down that night, thick and soft and silent.

Riko stood at the edge of the courtyard bath in her cotton robe with a flask of warm sake in her hand.

Her breath smoked in the lamplight.

The tub was a long stone basin, big enough for six, fed by a pipe straight from the mountain's hot spring.

Steam rolled off the water and into the falling flakes.

Everything beyond it was blue-white and quiet, even the walls.

"Daigo says you do not bathe outside," she said. "Daigo says you are too proud."

Kagiro stood beside her in his own robe, looking at the water.

"I am not proud. I have simply never had a reason."

"You have one now."

"I have several," he said, and his amber eyes dropped to the knot of her sash.

Her skin prickled under the cotton, and it was not the cold.

She put the sake down on the rim, pulled her sash loose, and let the robe fall.

The snow touched her shoulders, her chest, her stomach, and she gasped at the bite of it.

Then she stepped into the hot water, and the gasp turned into a groan that echoed off the stones.

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