Morning arrived beneath a sky washed clean by the night's rain.
Sunlight spilled across the eastern courtyards, catching on wet stone and the banners hanging from the castle towers. The castle had already settled into its familiar rhythm by the time Lexi left her rooms. Servants crossed the corridors carrying breakfast trays, clerks hurried toward the council wing with bundles of reports tucked beneath their arms, and somewhere below an impatient dragon announced to the entire kingdom that breakfast was taking too long.
Nimbus answered from somewhere nearby.
Lexi smiled before she realized she was doing it.
She found him waiting outside her door.
The young dragon lifted his head as she approached, stretched with enough enthusiasm to shake water from his wings, and fell into step besid
