My morning is quite a refreshing one to wake up to. While I do know there's a lot on the minds of many, it feels like I'm waking up to just another day in the life of me. Probably helps that I got three weeks worth of pent-up frustration out of my system, that I could put some mare who's over twice my age into a mating press and make her walk funny, then watch her get a pretty dress for free, and then tug me over to her room for one more round in the madness of insatiable Ponyland Imperial Royalty. It's a good feeling to know that my efforts were so effective and demonstrative that she's basically back to being tame instead of the more feral brat she usually is.

I'm in a good mood, perhaps I'll make everyone breakfast.

I walk downstairs to see Amor and Hestia sitting at the table. Smolder and Ocellus is already gathering their stuff for the school day. Gabby sits on her phone, going through the daily headlines. I greet the room warmly. "Good morning, everyone."

"Hmph!" Hestia makes her retort as loud as possible, overshadowing and gaining everyone's attention over it's ferocity.

Smolder points it out. "Wow, you must've really made her mad."

"I didn't do anything to her." I say with a confused shrug.

Amor tries to clarify the situation. "She's upset that─"

Her wing grabs at her brother's head and smacks his forehead against the table, the impact is followed by a howl of pain from the prince. He holds himself as the pegasus mare snaps her head away with a childish reprisal. "Hmph!"

"Dude, you okay?" I check in on him. "If I hadn't known any better, I could've assumed that she was going for brain damage."

"The only one who seems to have brain damage is her." He comments, really getting a spicy glare from the mare. She retaliates by repeating the action, doing it even harder this time. "OW!" The prince holds his muzzle as he recoils from the impact.

Smolder chastises the incensed princess. "Yo, you need to chillax. We don't need our breakfast area covered in blood and brain matter just because you're in a mood."

She pouts even harder. "Hmph!"

I think for the moment, trying to put together why she's in such a bad mood. Perhaps it's that she overheard us getting a little frisky last night. But then again, she was pretty feisty last night too. I know she wasn't like that after coming back from the buckball game, she was pretty energetic. Perhaps... yeah, that'll do it. "Ah, I get it."

"What?" Ocellus asks.

"I think she's upset over Zenobia's new dress being a custom from Rarity. And she's lashing out because I didn't think to get her one, which is on me." The mare narrowly cuts her eyes to me again. "For her, it's more of the thought that counts."

"Hmph!" She has a little less intensity, but still remains just as prickly as before.

Amor already starts to cycle himself out of her reach by sitting next to Gabby instead. As that's going on, Zenobia finally makes her entrance into the breakfast nook. "Good morning!"

Ocellus sees the princess' swan-song attitude and quirks a brow. "Ah, I see somebody's basking in the post-dragon glow after last night."

The mare sits herself comfortably in her chair next to Hestia. "Hard not to when you're satisfied after such a wait." She shifts her weight a bit, causing her to wince at a tinge of sudden discomfort. "Albeit I'm a bit sore in some deeper places."

"Gee, I wonder how that feels." Gabby grumbles.

"You'll find out come Sunday." I reply. "Now, who's in the mood for strawberry banana waffles?"

"On a workday!?" Ocellus asks. "Madam princess, what did you do to our dragon?"

"Wouldn't you like to know." She snickers in response.

Smolder looks at me, seeing how happy I am and my willingness to serve everyone else. However, a loud rumbling noise sounds from down the hall. "Huh, aren't we missing someone?"

I know who's not here, but I'm perfectly fine with that. "Nope. We're not missing anyone. Not a single soul."

"Something's telling me you're avoiding a certain agreement made with a very specific someone." She replies.

"I don't even know what you're talking about." I answer calmly. "All I know is that I'm in a good mood and there's only breakfast that I have my mind on."

"Not a bad idea."

Zenobia turns her head, seeing Ember carrying in her new dress, plucking a few of the jeweled accents off from the chest. "HEY!" The imperial princess immediately reverts back to being loud and confrontational, this time for good reason. "Don't you fucking dare! I just got that dress yesterday! It's a custom!"

"Sweet gems you got on this dress." The dragoness antagonizes the princess by taking a slow sweeping lick of the pink diamond broch. "Would be a shame if I never got to taste them at all."

And just as easily as my morning starts on a good note, it sours into a bitter taste that leaves me not wanting to make breakfast anymore. "Oh for the love of─Ember, stop this. Please?"

She tilts her head at me, knowing that she's doing this to get my attention. "Oh yeah, you wanna do something about it?"

"If you want any kind of duel, we'll take it over to Ghastly Gorge." I tell her, looking to placate to her unquenchable thirst for violence.

But she's far from impressed with my choice of backdrop. "Oh no we aren't." She walks over to a nearby vase and knocks it over, shattering the poor innocent piece of pottery. "See that's too easy for you, that gives you the opportunity to fight like there's nothing on the line. You don't tend to take me serious if we're off in a craggy ravine and there's nothing of sentimental value to be lost. Nah, we're fighting here, and now."

My once-smile is now a twisted grimace, a contorted scowl of my trying to remain patient. "I'm not doing this with you, Ember. I already picked out our place."

"You either take it or I'll burn this place to the ground." She threatens.

"First off─" Hesitation fails to be a practice for her, she immediately resorts to breathing fire on the wooden table. "WHAT THE HELL!"

While her magenta flames make good stay on the table, she tosses the dress into the fire for kindling. But before any substantial damage could be done, I dump a pan of water over the raging flame, quenching the mess she made. "You thought I was bluffing. So I made it serious."

Zenobia hugs her dress, accompanied by a horrified Hestia who's carefully observing the damage. I finally snap on the dragoness. "Are you fucking kidding me, you crazy ass bitch!? You've could've hurt everyone with that stupid-ass stunt!"

"So I take it from the way you're talking to me now is that you're finally taking me serious, right?"

I smack the diamonds from her claws, pointing a nail at her chin with a stern demand. "You, me, Ghastly Gorge. Now." I fly off to open the door for our exit, but see that I've made the flight alone. I enter back into the dining area, seeing her drumming her digits against the now-ruined oakwood table. "So what, you're not coming?"

"Nah. I think I'll be better off finding gems to snack on and shit to set on fire." She tries to take aim for the dress, which Zenobia protects with a warding shield of her aura. "That's way more fun than just sitting around and not getting you at your best. So do me a favor, and find a way to get me to move."

I nod as I easily come up with a solution. "Zenobia, can I ask you for a favor?"

The enthusiasm that shows in the princess' eyes shows me that she's more than willing to commence to making a bounty of the dragoness. "Are you giving me a license?".

"Detainment only." I specify.

She rolls her eyes with disdain. "Well that's boring as shit, but for you..."

10 Minutes Later...

"YOU COWARD! HOW DARE YOU DEFY THE HONORED TRADITION OF A DRAGON'S DUEL LIKE THIS!"

The sounds of Ember shouting as she's finally brought to our place of sparring can be heard far and wide, thankfully, just not enough to be heard in town. I'm relieved in knowing that she's as far from the others as possible, now we don't have to compete with the principle of collateral damage in my mind. But I do know that Ember isn't going to be an easy one to get over, hell it took a lot just to drag her through town and make sure that she didn't set fire to anything with her raging rants and spewing flames.

And a majority of that 'a lot' has been charitably donated by one Princess Zenobia, who more than proves her ability to subdue creatures of my species. I'm starting to be amazed over how she hasn't already enslaved me permanently. "How did I know you were capable of this?"

As Ember is being carried along, bound in seven rings of the princess' magic, runes glow around the bindings that keep her unquestionably detained. Her movements are only limited to her head, but her snout is clasped shut by one of them, still allowing her to speak but not spew fire at a specific direction. Zenobia walks with a smug grin having the dragoness in her clutches. "To be frank, I've had a fair share of hunts I've been complicit in. Of course my brother gets the kill, and I get the cleanup. Not exactly fun stuff, but it's taught me how to defend myself in the case of an attack. I even managed to save Xerxes from one back when, though he'll never admit it."

"You always said your brothers and your father take a lot of credit for the things you do."

"At least you understand that I am still capable of handling myself. And to add to the matter, this spell does unevenly discriminate against smaller dragons. Larger dragons the size of buildings would be a more fitting challenge, but one of your size would be pretty easy to subdue." She glances back at Ember, who's still struggling behind her. "And to think you're even smaller than him, I wouldn't believe you to be the Dragon Lord over him."

"LET ME OUT OF HERE, YOU PONYLANDER BITCH!"

Smolder postpones her appearance at the school to supervise the situation, at least to make sure that Zenobia doesn't get anymore involved. She questions me over my decision to have her restrained in such a manner. "Okay, let's be real for a sec. You seriously let her do this, the Ponylander who's complicit in the death of several other dragons?"

"What!? I said I didn't kill the bastards!" She defends herself.

"And yet you claim their capture, thus leading to their deaths. Therefore, you are complicit." Smolder argues. "Now back to you, Spike. I didn't think you would dare to go this far. That's just poor form."

"You know what, yes it is." I nod. "But I don't care because she can't seem to catch a clue about how I do things. Don't overly indulge in full-dragon behavior in my house, it's not a cave. I know, I know, she's gonna be pretty pissed once she's let out of that binding spell. But tough shit. It's personal with me now." I glare at the aforementioned dragoness. "And most importantly, I warned you about messing up Rarity's hard work. That was a dress she made in her free time. That puts you on my shit list for real."

"Okay we get it, you still have feelings for the mare, always have. Everyone in Ponyville knows you've been crushing on her since you first saw her. But don't you think this is a bit too far though?"

Zenobia gawks with utter disbelief. "That's your crush?"

"Yeah, and has been using him to do her dirty work for a decade, and then some. How do you think he can get away with a stupid 'exclusive membership package' he has with her business? It's because she knows how he feels, won't reciprocate, regrets the fact he's still latched on, and throws him store credits and massive discounts for popping in every once and then to hunt gems for her stupid pony dresses. That way she can tell herself that she's given him something worthwhile." Ember angrily explains. "So yeah, fuck the bitch! She can treat Spike any way, sticking her pins and shit in him like a pincushion. She does that shit and get a pass, but I snack on the gems of two dresses, burn one like the shit can't be replaced, and I'm the fucking problem?"

"So what you're saying is that it's fine for you to beat the shit out of me just because you like me, that's fine somehow. And I'm supposed to accept the idea of you burning the dress, along with everything else in my house, also putting at risk everyone in it?" I snap back towards her. "I don't think you get it, Ember. I had to run across a mound of freshly burned corpses, all of them I'm responsible for, that I still take the heat over in the press. Just thinking about that and seeing how you're so eager to start fires in my house is already putting my mental in a bad fucking place. I know we dragons can't get burned as easy, but not everyone else can step into a fire and walk out just fine!"

As we finally reach our destination within the deep recess of Ghastly Gorge, Zenobia takes a deep breath from the extended dive into my history with Rarity, focusing now to the present. "Alright, I understand now that there's a good amount of tension between you both, some stemming from envy. But I should point out that once she's loose, there's no going back."

Smolder winces as she waits for the moment that I'd give the signal to free Ember. "I just want you to know that you're absolutely batshit for doing this. If she's in rut, you're in serious danger. Just to be real, there are reoccurring cases of 'safe' dragons who die before they finish mating with a 'rutted' one, some before they even start. I'm just here to make sure you don't end up that way."

"Well as much as I would like to say that I've faced off against worse, I've already gotten my head smashed in twice by her. It's not a new thing for me to wake up embedded upside down in some rock on the cliffside. So it's nothing new." I look to the princess, giving her the signal. "Alright, turn her loose."

The mare seems to have a lot of reservations upon seeing how Ember seems to be willing to give her nothing but death for restraining her and flying her out of town. "Um, pet, I don't think this is in any of our best interests."

"You know what, you're right." I motion her to stand next to me, which she does in the instant. "Okay, now you can let her go."

"Thank you for seeing the obvious." She replies as her spell is slowly quenched.

But instead of it being a gradual release, it's a sudden shatter as Ember forces herself free from the weakening bonds wiht all of her physical might. The bindings shatter like glass and the dragoness takes aim for the Ponyland princess. "YOU'RE DEAD, BITCH!"

I stand in her way, taking the tackle and redirecting her away. She tries to wrestle her way back, but I trip her and press her head into a nearby bolder. The sizeable rock splits as she makes her impact. Her claws dig painfully into my arm, slitting the scales and cutting deep into my skin. I grimace from the pain, but bear it and ram her into a cliff wall nearby.

As she stares at me, I can see the slitted pupils of her eyes narrow a considerable amount. "Oh, so here you think you're all big and brave and tough. You can handle the rocs eating our young, but you can't handle a few other creatures getting done in? That's what it takes for you to even take me seriously!?"

"You know, up to these past three weeks, I don't think I've ever seen death so close in the face as I have." I say as I give her another shove into the rockface. "I always said I never liked fighting for nothing. But making you into a threat that I have to protect everyone against, that's when you'll really get me at my best. The last time, I beat you off of sheer hatred for the one who gave me a virtual death sentence, and that also happened to be the same bitch who raised me like a brother. So you tell me what sets me off, between the combination of me getting pulled away from my home and you trying to bring more havoc to the place I live like it hasn't been done twice before! You tell me why I take you seriously now of all times!" As her claws try to dig deeper into my arm and fend me off, I dig deeper within myself to find more reasons to be angry, to fuel myself in this bout. In doing so, I drag her back out and pull her along the cliff's face into the air. "You threatened to burn my house down giving no shits about who was in it, knowing exactly what the fuck I went through! So how did you think I was going to respond to that!?"

"But they aren't dead, so what does it matter!?" She grumbles back at me, countering my assault with a targeted grapple of one of my wings, causing us both to tumble back to the ground. Instead of landing back in the open, we tumble down the rock face and fall into the mouth of a cave that once housed a quarry eel. As we both recover from the fall, she issues a rant towards me. "I really find it sad that you care more for a bunch of creatures who don't even care about what you went through! Like how little pride do you have for yourself!? You were the dragon lord before me, and you're this soft! It's unacceptable! You're nothing like any of us dragons! Born soft, raised soft, act soft until it's about someone else! When do you even try to stand up for you, yourself!? Why is it that you have to find your strength in someone or something else, is that the only way you get strong!? Maybe if they all die off, you'll start to find some form of that hiding inside of that hollow head of yours!"

While I'm a little quicker to rise, I see her being slow to rise back up. But that's not the only thing I see. In her slow crawl of a rise, I see just the slight hint of her arousal slithering down from between her legs, bridging a gap between her and her tail. A sizeable discharge falls from between her legs, puddling onto the ground beneath her. Her face is flushed red as she pants through the pain of her wounds. While it's nothing new for me to look at, just the idea of her being so injured and bloodied and still being this enthralled is more concerning than arousing. "Are you seriously like this?"

"I'm made this way! You're made this way! I don't understand why you're trying to fight it so damn much! Just stop this sanctimonious bullshit and be who you really are! For fuck's sake, I just wanna not feel embarrassed over this!" She takes notice of her own state, the sight of herself puddling between her legs, feeling some of her fluids run down her tail. She grimaces, but openly accepts her display of need. "You don't get to take my pride and then embarrass me like you did! So get over here now and finish it before I snap and do something about it!"

I shake my head at her. "Wow... I don't feel anything for this. If you say I'm hardwired to accept this in some way, then I must really hate your guts." I see the anger welling in her cheeks, the frustration writing it's manifesto through her eyes. "I'm sorry, I'm just not like that."

"FUCK YOU, YOU'RE NOT LIKE THAT!" She lunges into me, grabbing a nearby rock to bash upside my head. "Fuck you, fuck you for making me like you, fuck you for you being my first friend, fuck you for making me dragon lord after you, fuck you for making me like this, fuck you for not being strong enough, fuck you for making me wait!" She pauses and gives my head another bash with the rock, shattering it with the impact. "Fuck! You! For going for Smolder when I clearly ordained you to me first! You want me to talk about my feelings, fine! I hate that you left me the way you did! You think I only do this because I want to annoy the shit out of you!? Need I remind you what the fuck I'm still dealing with right now, what I've dealt with for years! How the fuck do you think I felt when the one who actually won against me just reneges when I give it up!? You think my pride can take that!?"

"Your pride doesn't matter!" I argue.

"TO HELL IT DOESN'T!" She screams as she grinds her pelvis against mine, coaxing me to crown from within my scales. "You can't say that it doesn't when it's not even your pride that ends up getting hurt! To a dragon, their pride is everything, their confidence, worth, dare I even say beauty! Even if it was by a pure stroke of luck, you beat me and earned your right! I waited for you! These entire three weeks I've waited for you to get finished with whatever you had to rush off to do! You obviously know that I somewhat give a shit about you! I told you that when we were both going through the rut!" She groans angrily as she forces herself to take me in as I'm still growing to size. "I hate talking about this mushy shit because it goes against everything that I know! I spent hours of my day wandering off in my thoughts, imagining what it's like to spend time with you! I thought you would come back to me, looking to start some shit so I can finally share my moment with you, but you don't seem to care too much about me to even wait! You just dove right into whatever was convenient for you, to hell with what I was going through!"

The blood from her cuts drip onto my chest as she claws at my shoulders, shifting her hips rapidly against me, my better self getting a harsh thrashing about within her well-coated walls. I at least try to make myself a little more comfortable while I just let her have her way, at least to work off her frustrations so that we can be done quickly.

"So yeah, I'm mad! I'm pissed off because I had to settle for my own self to quench my desires, while you go and plunge into whatever was breathing! I ached with you in mind, you were busy with other girls! I braved through my rut, finally lost a bout to you, and you leave to lay into some other creature anyways!"

"It's not that simple." I deny.

"BULLSHIT!" I wince as her claws strip at my shoulders, running across my chest and drawing blood. "Did you even think about what went through my mind when I saw that wanted poster!? I hated that moment! I wanted to drop all of my duties to uphold peace and take our dragons to war for you! I even ordered my father to go in and raze that country to it's roots! He was the one who told me to go talk to Twilight first! Do you know how bullshit that is to have MY DAD be the voice of reason instead of me!? I had to swallow my own feelings and act in accordance to what was for the good of my fellow dragons over choosing to save you! I went fucking nuts! I did all of that, waited here for this moment, ALL FOR YOU TO SAY YOU HATE ME!?" She raises her hips only once, slamming down at last and clenching around me with no regard for my own conditions. She gives off heated pants of smoke after her intense grinding. Her teeth retains a deadly crackle from the depths of her voice. "I thought... I really thought that I could start something with you. It might not have been what you were used to, but I wanted this for us. I didn't want to have to take it like this, but I had to do this... and you already know why."

She still tenses up as she slowly grinds herself against me. My hips have no other choice but to abide by her tugging me along, all thanks to the walls clutching around me with the anticipation of milking me for what I have. She shudders for a moment, her claws inching deeper into my chest before her moment of release finally subsides.

Her eyes close as her head raises to the rocky ceiling above us. Her shoulders start to relax, as does the rest of her body outside of what keeps us conjoined. She feels me fill her, but remains unsatisfied with the lack of what has yet to quench her vice-like depths. "You really must hate me... don't you?" She gives me another round of her hips grinding against me, her fluids lathering against her thighs and my waist. "I'm clutching like there's no tomorrow, and I don't feel an ounce of your seed."

I purse my lips, reminding her of what I've already disclosed to her months ago. "I told you that I don't get off like this. Even if it's involuntary, it will still take me a while to even get to that point."

Of course, she shows further frustration with our junction yielding an unequal response from me. "Can't you make some sort of exception, at least make this less awkward than it already is?"

I can only shake my head. "You're clutched, I can't move. I can't even get the friction on to keep me invested. I'm just soaking here. So your only hope now is for me to go soft, not be in pain, and try this again later."

The dragoness unleashes a flaming roar, slouching over me with disappointment. "I really wasted my first clutch like this... The dragon lord... not even able to satisfy her mate... pathetic."

"I warned you this would happen. Now we wait."

Ember doesn't say anything to me for a while, nor do I have words to speak to her in return. A lot of the time we spend clutched is a boring and awkward staring contest between us and the walls of the cave. Some of the times, Ember impatiently tries to climb from off of me, still finding herself very much clenched and unable to separate. I wonder when I'll finally go back down, but her body is keeping me as primed as I could ever be. While I don't like this time together, I can admit that she feels good to be in, just that it doesn't feel very good being stuck and unable to drive the point home. So she's got me in a vice, and I'm now dealing with the most unthinkable case of blue balls.

Time passes and we're finally able to separate from one another. Her body finally lets go of me, and I'm just starting to simmer down. I wait a bit before looking around for some nearby plants we could use to dress our wounds. Luckily this place is known for having a host of aloe vera plants dotting the ravine. So I go look for those first, and they aren't hard to find with how big they are.

I quickly get through the process of harvesting the leaves, looking for the thickest ones I could need, and cutting from the outermost leaves of the plants. I leave just enough for the plant to continue thriving before moving on to the next. I also make sure that I drain the leaves of their yellow oils before toting the back. Once I come back to the cave, I fillet the green exterior and expose the gelatinous bulk. I pound the gel into a gunky mush, and spread it on all of my wounds.

Ember doesn't so much as turn to see what I'm doing, she just sulks on the ground as I finish with my quick patch job. She winces every now and then, showing that some of her is still in pain from our bout. I offer her two of the four leaves I've cut for the both of us. She looks to her side, seeing them and growing annoyed again. "What?"

"Aloe vera, it helps with the open wounds."

She shoves them away. "I'm a damn dragon, my wounds will heal in a few days. I can take it." She winces once more as she realizes the wounds all over her body responded negatively to her sudden motion. It seems that all of her back and parts of her chest have received the most damage. But she's claiming herself to be fine.

I leave the two spears of aloe by her and walk away. "Suit yourself. But I'll leave these here for you anyways." I also give her a warning against leaving things to chance. "You know, with all those wounds on your back, you could easily lose your next big fight. Could even lose the title of Dragon Lord to some random drake with no wings. That would be pretty embarrassing."

She grumbles as she slides the leaves back to me. "You did it to me. So you do it."

"Sure thing." I accept.

As I follow through the same process I've done for myself, I start to apply the gel across her back. Though the process isn't as easy as dealing with my arm injuries, causing her a great deal of pain. But typical to her fashion, she grits and growls through it all. It takes another ten minutes to finish up, but when I lay the last of what's left, she gets right up and start walking around again. Her back is still in pain, but not as much.

She stares at me as I take the last leaf I've harvested and sling it over my left shoulder. "So... now what?"

I look back to her. "What do you mean 'now what'?"

She stammers, growing more and more flustered and angry with me. "I mean... I... well... C'mon, you know what I mean!"

"No I don't. You'll have to speak your mind." I suggest.

She growls and throws her arms to the air. "Can't you just read in between the lines for a minute? You know I'm too embarrassed to even say it right now!"

"But that's not how we communicate as adults, is it?" I turn back to her. "Tell you what, when we get back home, you take a shower and I'll do the same, then we'll go out for dinner. And after that, we'll maybe drop by Maud's for some jewel hunting, that way you keep your claws off of everyone else's shit. Then we'll come back, watch a movie, and then we can have a moment to ourselves to do whatever. Are we clear?"

"Or we could just stay here and try again!" She finally admits. "Can't we just go with that?"

"You wanna go at it again, in this rocky cave full of dust and pointy objects digging into your already-injured back, knowing damn well you like how soft my bed is?" She looks away with disgust, knowing that I'm right about her preferences. "Let's try things my way instead. You'll thank me later."

She issues a stubborn protest. "Spike, mating doesn't have to be this hard you know."

"Says the one who left claw marks and bloody gashes all over my body. Everyone outside of Smolder is going to think you tried to kill me."

She kisses her teeth. "You know that's just how we're wired!"

"Yeah, we know that, but they don't." I respond, spreading my wings to fly back to where we started our bout. "If you don't believe me, just watch what happens when we get back."

Our flight is a brief one, making a few turns until we reach back to the very bottom of the ravine. Both Zenobia and Smolder appear bored in their wait, that is until Smolder is the first to spot me out. "Hey Spike! Took ya long enough!" I land right in front of them, the pair taking immediate notice of my wounds. "Whoa, those are some nasty marks."

As predicted, Zenobia shows the most concern for my condition. "Pet! What the fuck happened to you!?"

"Well... she won."

"Augh, your chest, your shoulders, your arms, you look a mess!" She immediately goes into defensive mode. "You tell me where she is─"

"Ah, no, that's not what we're doing." Smolder holds her back down so she's not encouraged to take flight. "This is what dragons typically do when we mate, it's called 'marking'." The orange dragoness lifts her leg, showing the inside of her thigh and the healed scar against the area underneath her tail. "Even I got one from Spike when we first got it in. And if you look at Spike's back, I left some marks of my own, though not nearly as deep as the ones you see on him now."

"You leave a literal impression on the one you're mating with. I did it to you too, just not to this degree." I point to her neck.

"You look... abysmal!"

"Yeah, not feeling too great either, and the shower I'm due to take is going to sting a lot, but this is how bad it gets when a dragon goes into dragon lust."

The mare tilts her head with confusion. "Dragon... lust?"

"I'll explain it on the flight back." As I finish speaking with the Ponyland princess, Ember lands behind me. She's not nearly as loud or even as brash as she usually is in seeing Zenobia. Instead, she appears a lot more reserved. I turn back to her and ask. "Finally ready to get things moving the right way?"

Ember cuts her eyes at me before pouting. Smolder glances her up and down, seeing a growing stream of fluids on her thighs and tail. "Uh oh, I know that look. Didn't take well?"

"I don't want to talk about it." She answers under her breath.

"I didn't finish. She's upset." I reply, much to her chagrin.

"I just said I didn't─" She stops herself and sighs instead, a complete character overhaul of her usual reaction. "Whatever."

"I'm gonna go take her out to eat after we had back, I figure a bit of winding down will help move things along and get us to where we can both benefit from this."

Ember pouts with a puff of smoke shooting from her nostrils. Smolder chuckles and reassures her. "Hey, it works for me. You won't have as much of a problem with it as you think you would." The orange dragoness grabs me by my upper arm and pulls me along. "Alright. Let's get you home, big guy."

Ember quietly takes the lead, darting back to the house. But in doing so, the others see the terrible gashes on her back, and the slices in her wings that reduce her flight speed. Zenobia gawks with a slacked jaw over the horrendous sight. "Fuck sake. Are we sure he's the loser?"

Smolder cringes at the sight. "Doesn't look much like it. And given how Ember acted, I'd say she definitely lost."

The dragon lord turns back to see us lagging behind. I quickly disperse the idea before more conflict can be stirred over her pride. "She was on top, she won. Let's leave it at that and go home."

About an hour after we get home, we finally head out to a local chain that specializes in human cuisine. Often times it's a pretty controversial place on the account that some creatures don't really like to eat meat, nor would dare to even try. But for griffons, hippogriffs, diamond dogs, abyssinians, and the like who do, it's the talk of the town. Every now and then, there are a few ponies who brave the idea and try it out, and then walk out with a mix of regret for what they've done, and the forbidden pleasure with a to-go plate in tow.

Since this was a different experience for Ember, I figured this would be the best thing that would break the now-frigid ice between us. But with the wait, there's still the imposed awkward silence between us. Ember stares down at the wooden table, carving out a crude figure of her decapitating an alicorn, I can safely assume it's Zenobia.

I try to thaw the cold wall she's built between us. "So.... What's on your mind?"

"Nothing." Her answer is dry.

"I call bullshit."

"Call it then." Arid even .

"Do you want me to talk about our escape from Ponyland?"

"No." The sands of Saddle Arabia are so wet that I could swim in those hot coarse grains roasting in the hundred degree heat, and not mind the friction in contrast to her responses thus far.

"Okay." I'll admit, the wait for this food is starting to open up some unwanted space. Perhaps I'll go to a topic she's more familiar with. "So, how's everything in the Dragon Lands─"

"Can we not talk about dragon stuff right now!?" Her rebuke of that topic is probably the liveliest she's been in an hour and some change.

Perhaps I should go with something else. "You know, I've been to the human world once before. You should see some of those places at night. They really know how to make a city shine out in the darkness. Glistening towers lit in all sorts of crazy colors. Hold on, I think I have a picture of it somewhere─"

"I believe you." She doesn't even give me a chance to reach for my phone.

This is starting to get harder by the second. "Hey... did they ever get those tunnel boring machines to you?"

"Yeah." Still the weary traveler of the sands here, looking for the thirst of active engagement.

"Are they any good?"

"They do their job." And yet another water-filled oases that turns to the sand pouring from my desperate, delusional mouth.

"Good to hear."

My claws start to drum against the top of the table, my eyes wandering to the many other satisfied and anxious patrons at their tables. Our wait is starting to sour on me a bit, but it's only amplified by the fact that Ember is not daring to make the effort to engage. I suppose this might end up being a short one with hardly any good to come from it, never mind me teaching her the ways of simplified sexual practice.

My toes fall to the ground, feeling something moist at the bottom of them. It doesn't take me a long time to realize that the azure dragoness is impatiently stewing in her chair. her tail whipping up dust like she's starting the wind for the next scheduled storm. At this point, she might as well call it a tropical depression. She slams her fists against the table, silverware clattering and gaining the attention from the entire establishment by standing up. "How long is this going to take!?" She demands as her feral mood drips from between her legs.

"Our food hasn't come out yet. We'll be a little while." I answer.

"We're dragons, we don't eat pony food!" She counters.

"Yeah, which is why I took us to a restaurant that serves food for creatures with varying diets, that including meat."

She almost seems to take exception to the idea of eating meat. "Again, we're dragons, not savages!"

"Yeah, I get you. But I been hooked on ribs since I was pulled through Texas."

"The fuck's a Texas!?" She questions impatiently.

Well, at least she's engaged, and not just marinating the chair. "It's a place in the human world. We went to Austin and San Antonio. Austin is like this huge city that's the size of Manehattan. San Antonio is a smaller place, but it's got a killer theme park. We had fun out that way."

"I'm sure you did." Her sarcasm is as about as fluid as the dragon lust trickling down her legs.

"Maybe one day, if all goes to plan, we can transform you and have you walk around there. It's a pretty fun place. Big too. They have these roads that motorized carriages ride on, and some of those roads they can hang real high in the air. They take you to all sorts of places. Way faster than some of our trains, but it can get a little stuffy at certain times of the day." The disgruntled and clearly irritated princess abandons dignity and sits herself down, plunging a claw between her thighs. The quiet squelch gives away her brazen intent. "Please don't, they'll kick us out if you do that."

She huffs a small plume of smoke as she vents her displeasure. "You should look away then, since you apparently hate me, since I'm not even attractive enough to do anything for you."

Okay, she's on that part of our fight still. I suppose it's fair. "I said that while being sarcastic, I was in a moment. I'm sorry if I hurt you with anything I've said."

"I don't think you are."

And even now, she makes it hard to apologize. "But I am."

"You're not. You're just sorry that you finally got it off your chest. Just be real, you never saw me as anything more than a nuisance." She clenches her eyes shut and slams her fist into the table once more. "Dammit! Why did I even come here thinking that this was somehow worth it!?"

As she stops to sulk, I hear the sound of her claws divesting some of her attention to her own body. I quickly try to get her sidetracked before she can really get into it. "Do you want me to tell you the truth?"

"No. I want you to lie and whisper stupid nothings in my ear." I know that was a sarcastic remark, but I can tell that was more of a truthful confession than a blunt comeback.

I take a deep breath and give it to her straight. "Sometimes, not all the time, you can be a bit overbearing."

She almost lunges over the table, grabbing me by my injured shoulders, her right claw just as soaked as the condensation around our beverages. "And you can be far too open. Most dragons are like cryptid assholes who go for outer appearances."

I don't think she cares about the injuries she has anymore, she obviously doesn't seem to care about mine. "But that's not what you truly want, is it?"

"You don't get to tell me what I want." She shoves me back into the back of my chair. "You lost that privilege the moment you gave me the scepter. And you lost even more of it since you left me to suffer alone. Hell, you basically lost all of it when you said you hated my guts."

It takes a second for me to realize that the poor waiter is just keeping a distance while we have our disagreement. I'm sure that the sight of two dragons being at odds stand on the ground of an eventual firefight breaking out, that or a very ugly wrestling match. Plus given our visible scars, I'm sure they don't want to be around us for too long. So I wear my best smile and warmly flag the waiter over. "Ah, here we go."

The waiter doesn't say a word, just putting the plates before us along with our sides and taking a mad dash back to the kitchen. I crack my knuckles as I notice the slabs of meat sitting on my plate. Ember stares at me while I flex my digits hungrily. "What's... this?" She asks, staring at her own plate.

"Pork ribs. It's a special dish originated from the human world."

The word 'ribs' brings a sense of unease to the azure dragoness. She picks at the steaming food plated before her. "What do they taste like?"

"Try one for yourself." I say as I rip one from the rack.

She follows my every action, albeit a lot slower and with a lot more skepticism. I hold my rib to my mouth, she timidly raises hers in fashion. I chomp down with anticipation, she queasily pokes a tongue at the meat on the bone. I start chewing, and her eyes widen as the flavor hits her tongue. She sniffs the rib and finally takes a small bite. That first nibble goes from a disgusted attempt to a slowing realization of amazement. "No way."

"This is why I ordered two of my order, that way we can experience it together." Her eyes shift between her plate and me, then the rib in her possession, and back to me for verification. "Go on, have at it."

"There's no way I'm really eating this shit." She takes another bite, thinking that the first go was probably a fluke of the mind. But it doesn't take long for her to go for another, then another, and finally cleaning the whole bone and ripping another one for her to ingest. "What are these made from?"

"Pigs, apparently." I explain. "They have a beef version, but obviously that doesn't really go over well considering the bovines here."

"This is fucked up, but I'm enjoying it."

"Yeah, I figured you would. I was like that too when I first got a plate. Shining and Blueblood were no different than what you are right now, at least from what I heard."

"You should've fucking told me about this shit!" She cleans yet another bone, and goes to rip another rib from her narrowing slab. "Like years ago." She pauses to look around and see the other creatures having similar experiences. "They're not gonna look at me weird, are they?"

"Nope. Do you." I say as I dig into another rib of my own.

"Good." She says as she slides the rib into her mouth, pulling out only the bone and tossing it aside. She points towards the porcelain bowl beside her plate of meat. "So what's all of this?"

"Baked beans, mac n cheese, and peach cobbler."

The first thing she delves into is the baked beans. As soon as she scoops the entire bowl into her mouth like a disposal bin, she goes right into the mac n cheese, and at last the peach cobbler before taking two ribs for each fist, scarfing them both into her mouth and ripping back out a pair of clean bones. It seems that she's completely forgotten her condition and has elected to just devour everything in front of her. "They got anymore of this stuff? This is great!" She cleans the remainder of her ribs and recline in her chair. "Okay, I could totally go for another round of that." She looks down at my plate and starts with the remaining slab on mine. "Your tribute to the dragon lord is greatly appreciated. And you said we're going gem hunting after this?"

Huh, who knew that devouring meat and gems would temporarily displace her state of rut. I should probably research this a little more and see if this applies to all females of the dragon species. But for now, I'll play along. "Yup. Maud knows every place around here with all the gems and minerals that you'd want to snack on for later."

"Shit, why didn't we start off with that?" She takes another two ribs and cleans the bones with the efficiency of a well-oiled machine. "Never mind, I know why." Honestly I would've liked to keep my food, but seeing her distract herself from her state of rut is much more palatable. I stare down at the food left on my end, seeing the sides I've order rapidly change possession. I guess the next trip will be the one I'll finally be able to eat something aside from a few morsels. But the fact that her cheeks are so engorged with food, that and she's just fisting her mouth full of the stuff is a bit... well... unflattering. "You mustn't be that hungry if you're staring at me."

"Nah, just... thinking."

She swallows and out comes a powerful belch accompanied by a plume of smoke and flames. "Okay, time for you to stop thinking and start taking."

"What, you don't like me being cryptid now?" I ask as she snags my helping of peach cobbler. I could always order a round to-go, I've got the funds for it. "I'm just... I don't know. I guess I just have to ask... You got other dragons. Why me?"

"I dunno. I guess I'm just more familiar with you. Makes sense to me." She shovels the peach cobbler into her mouth. "Still pretty harsh to hear you go from calling me 'kinda cute' a couple months back, to now you hate my guts."

I reiterate my point from back then. "I said you were cute when you let your walls down. And weren't you the one asking if you could learn how to be romantic?"

She grabs me by my throat, her eyes shifting to every other direction as her cheeks run a pink hue. "I will strangle your trachea and rip it out of your mouth if you don't stop talking so loud."

My case in point. "So much for cute."

"Look, I'm a dragon with a reputation to uphold, what more do you want?"

"Comparatively speaking, I would like for us to have a moment like I often times have with Smolder."

Her pupils narrow to the deadly slit indicating her sudden trigger into kill mode. She's more than pissed. "You did not just compare me to her."

"Have to. She follows the prototype of a dragon coming from the Dragon Lands, assimilating into Equestrian life, and learning to be more open with her emotions, even in front of others. You can't beat that. And realistically speaking, your emotional development is leagues behind not only hers, but Zenobia's of all creatures. And I'll be honest with you, she only thinks of herself and barely anything else. So you've got a lot of ground to cover."

"So you're saying I can't beat them both!?" She flexes her claws, her sharp nails being more than capable of hewing solid rock.

"Not what I was implying." I grab her wrist, lowering those loaded weapons of hers. "I'm merely pointing out that Smolder and I are able to be intimate without having to go through physical violence on the repeat. We have a great time together, she's found out that some things are worth a different kind of conflict. That's something I want you to find out for yourself."

"Well I'm not Smolder." She rebuts.

"I'm not asking you to be."

"You just─"

I play the dangerous game of pinching her snout shut. "─And I'm not even going to pretend I didn't. I'm just hoping you'll see things my way tonight. That is all."

"This isn't going to work." She stresses through her teeth.

"Believe me when I say it. You'll be visiting me more often if it does, and I'll be more willing to give you the time of day."

After a successful journey through the local caverns, and a few monotonous discussions about mineral deposits that may be better suited for a dragon's taste according to their particular emotional response─which was a rather surprising in-depth lesson to hear from Maud of all creatures─we head back home for the early evening to make good on earlier-kept promises.

Ember isn't all too excited about it. Her main issue is that she's already done what she could on her end, and now I'm just going through with unnecessary steps that make our process tedious and uncomfortable for her. It takes a while for us to get settled in the bedroom, everyone else heads downstairs for a impromptu game-night while I take my time satiating the dragoness currently staring back at me.

I do try to make it worth her while either way by wagering all of my gems over to her if I don't give her a good time. She accepts the deal, but our initiation process starts on frigid ice. She's sitting on her claws, which keeps her from socking me at the first touch. And with her being as fidgety as she is, I know better than to move fast. So I go slow, laboring at a snails pace to scoot her legs towards the edge of the bed, carting her tail to where she's more comfortable, rubbing the scales of her belly as her cleft shows a vested but involuntary interest.

As I lean closer to her belly, my nose picks up on her feminine musk. She twitches nervously, impatient and afraid. "What the hell are you doing?" Her words are harsh, but they show her timidness.

I try to negotiate with her. "I'm giving your body the proper attention. If I don't acknowledge what it's saying, you'll forever be a prisoner to your thoughts. In short, I'm finding ways to release you."

She rolls her eyes in disbelief. "And just like that, you've lost me. I mean what even is the point in all of this? 'Prisoner to my thoughts, finding ways to release me,' what are you, Garble and his stupid poetry?"

"You'll understand in a bit." I say as I slowly rub my palms along the moistened scales of her inner thighs. I kneel before her, looking to take the first plunge into the prickly dragon lord. "Oh, and try not to punch me while I'm down here."

"Why are you down there anyways?" I lightly tickle the base of her tail, inches away from her glistening entrance. She tightens her legs around my head in response. "Stop!"

I barely get enough room to wiggle in comfort while her thighs threaten to crush my chin. "What?"

"I don't like having my tail played with." She complains, her tail batting against the floor in an odd contrast to her words.

"You won't know until you've tried it."

Her thighs tighten even further, threatening to close around my neck in a dangerous manner. "Okay, you have this weird idea of mating due to your strange pony influence."

"Five minutes." I request while tapping her thighs for her to ease up. She loosens up a little, but still holds my head. I have to politely pry myself free. "Five minutes, just let the walls down and let me work."

Her tail smacks the ground, a genuine show of frustration. "Great, now you'll be taking way too long with this bullshit."

I lean back down to get myself started. "Bear with."

The thing I've always known about Ember is that she's a walking contradiction. She always looks to make power her one feature that she lords over everyone else. A contest of strength, she wins virtually every time. But in moments where her sexuality surfaces, she continues the façade of toughness while her certain parts of her body give away her intentions. Her tail is particularly a major player in her mood, and it's better to pay attention to that as opposed to her steely eyes, her balled up fists, her loud voice, and jagged teeth.

So I go with what her tail says, and dive in.

She closes her eyes shut, waiting as my tongue starts to get curious about her taste. She is a bit tart, but I've learn to ignore the minor flavors that don't pose as a real disturbance. Hers is abundant with flavor, but not to the point of dissuading my interests.

Her claws find my bedspread, especially towards the side of her hips. Her legs relax completely, letting me indulge to my hearts content. And my tongue does more than discover forbidden territory. It delves into places, embraced by the cold-natured flesh of her most tender places.

As my tongue and jaw offers tribute to the dragoness, I feel a dull throb against my tongue. It patterns in a beat of two, followed by a rest of one. I delve more into her, but my eyes are opened to the sensation that feels too familiar to be confused with anything else but a beating heart. "This is pointless." She decries.

I withdraw momentarily to speak. "I don't think so."

She's still holding true to that façade of hers. "Well I don't feel anything."

I eye her claws, how slowly they loosen against my sheets, almost as though she's trying to hide the fact that they were giving her away too. "You know, pretending that you're not feeling something is a bit cute too."

"Can you shut up?"

"Your wish is my command." I do as I'm ordered and go return to my late-night feast.

Her tail flicks now at every motion my tongue makes brazenly against the carefully concealed kernel, hearing the sounds of her claws making small tears in my bedsheets. My eyes trail up to see hers clenched, her facial expressions contorting in silence as her stomach dips in motions to her hips instinctively responding to my every move. She releases my poor sheets and plant her claws to her thighs now, rubbing their inside scales as though she's hovering over the action.

A shudder of breath leaves her lips, a subtle far cry from the boisterous complaints she'd offer in place of her praise. But I have learned to accept her lack of compliments. After all, her body tells me more than her lips ever will. Maybe I should tease her more, that would be a bit fun to see her struggle to keep that cracked exterior up when she's all but a smoldering ruin.

Actually, that's an idea.

I make her squirm in place, though the poor thing's trying her best to be brave. But now it's time for me to give one specific place the attention it's deserving. So I attack, and I strike decisively with no quarter drawn to the dragoness. After all, she wanted a fight, now I'm going to make her fight to keep that aura of indifference.

It takes but a minute from my onslaught to break her at last, her mouth falls open, her thighs shift, her legs threaten to close, I keep them pried open as I swirl my tongue over the swollen bean. Her eyes finally launch open as she takes a deep breath, her back arches, her claws clench to themselves as she writhes from the surge. I have to duck down to avoid her knees from crushing my head, but she thrashes about with a trembling heave of breath.

She wriggles in riding the after-tremors of her regal collapse, the sheets of my bed now stained with much of her involuntary release. "Having fun yet?" I question as she suffers.

The method of her continued resistance makes her look the part of a failed ruler, her throne burning behind her, holding on to the hilt of a broken sword with the threat of taking my head, all while there is but an inch of blade left. The danger is there, but there is yet so little of it now. "What the fuck did you just do?"

Her claws hold at her innermost thighs, her legs curling into her abdomen while she adapts a fetal position. Poor thing is confused of the new fight she's got on her mind. "Got you clutching to yourself."

"You know that's not how this works, right?" Her tail whips against my bed, obviously showing both gratitude for the release, and frustration that it came without the desired reward.

I add insult to her proverbial injury by tenderly swiping a digit against her post-orgasmic slit. "Here's the thing about me. I love destinations, I love closing my eyes and opening them to find myself where I want to be. I think that's a great thing to want, that ambition. But sometimes we miss out on the journey by trying to rush to the end. So we have to pace ourselves, get things ready for what's to come."

She uses her tail to ward me off, only for it to tightly ensnare my wrist. "That's stupid. You're stupid."

Her words continue to make insult, but yet again it's her tail that draws me back towards her. So I climb to my bed and make for a much more sinful encounter this time. I slowly inject a pair of my digits into her, watching as her legs fall away like a locked door holding wonderous treasures. I loll my tongue at her, anchoring myself to indulge in her body yet again. "I'm gonna go in again. And this time, I want your words to be honest."

The moment my tongue makes contact, she squirms against me yet again. Her legs shudder as her right claw elects to do with a little more honesty, grasping at my shoulder. "This is so weird."

The foreign sensations she's experiencing amounts to tremors natural to others. But I'm sure without the subsidiary adrenaline boost from a fight to the near-death, those waves appear to be much more of an earthquake. But I know the truth, she has the ability to be pleasured unprompted. I remember the moment her tail choked mine in a coil, how we stood back to back, when we were both afflicted with the dreaded rut, how easily her claws found her slit and mine found my better self. We were so close then.

We're so close now, I'm literally tasting it.

I'm getting riled up. What was a dormant obelisk is now proudly standing firm, awaiting the attention it's due. How cruel to leave a hard worker unattended to, unpaid for the work that's due. It's better that I do something about it, maybe ease it's wait by holding on, running my palm along it's length, possibly tease the poor thing.

"Okay... feeling pretty funny about this." The squeeze at my shoulder gives me a painful reminder that I shouldn't just get lost in my own thoughts.

I pause to check on her. "You good?"

"Shit still feels weird." Her claws find the back of my head and give it a firm press against me, shoving my snout into her labes. "I didn't say stop though." It seems she's finally being honest.

What beauty to see her finally open her eyes a bit, the bronze colored iris that shine like newly sharpened brass now made docile and eager. I can tell from the way her claws flex against my head that she enjoys this brand of attention. The northern shift of her hips lets me know that she's receptive. And her tail whips against the ground, followed by a slow rise, and back into a swift slam.

She mouths a confession. "Oh shit... why does this feel so fucking good?"

Her claws massage the back of my head, intermittently offering praises for my work. But I start to feel jealous, and rightfully so. I'm giving her all that she deserves and yet I'm so exposed, so turgid, and so unloved. My claws aren't doing it anymore, there's too much open space. I need to be embraced, to be welcomed properly.

I bat away her claws, raising my head to make the transition to take what I now want. But in doing so, I leave her short of another destination. Her complaint is quite colorful. "You fucking asshole! Why the hell did you stop!?"

I prod inward, finding her rather easily. "Cause I got something else for you."

My hips drive forward slowly, feeling just how much she's been wanting to see me. Her eyes widen at my girth, now realizing that our earlier encounter was simply an incomplete matter on more than one front. She grabs at my arm, unprepared for how much I spread her open. "Oh, OH, oh shit!"

"Loosen up a bit." I warn her.

Her abdomen raises as her back arches with the surging surprise. "I'm clutching up real bad! The fuck you want me to do!?"

She's not lying, I can barely fit myself halfway, and I know from the earlier experience that there's so much more of her to explore. So I slowly retract my argument, looking to reiterate myself with heavy steps. "Relax, we'll go slow."

I lumber over her body, prodding inward and shifting back out. She grits her teeth with every push, and mouths my name on every pull. It takes her grabbing onto my hip to prompt me to go faster. I speed up my pace, still only able to meet halfway as her clenching cycle inflicts her still. But the friction is eased by the means of her body's response to my requested entry. She elicits a gasp as her clutching gives way, and I'm able to delve further within. "This is some bullshit." Her swearing is sourced from the sensation of my meeting with her at hilt, also from her reluctance to admit that this method is already proving to be much better.

I intentionally keep the wager from my lips, settling for only mocking her at the present time. "Never knew you could feel like this?"

"You're weird as shit." She groans, looking back down to where our bodies melded so wonderfully.

But I couldn't allow her to keep that image in her mind, it would rush her to the finish and leave me without my due payment. So I lift her chin towards mine. "Look at me." Her eyes drop back to where we join, but I kiss her to grab her undivided attention. "No, don't look at that, look at me. Keep your eyes on mine."

While my first kiss was to get her attention, this one's to keep it. She jolts back with shock over the taste of her own body being introduced to her by my tongue. It makes her seize, then shiver, and then I pull back to give her air, only to be violently yanked back by her into another.

The entire time, we watch each other be greedy towards ourselves. Her tongue outmaneuvers mine, going on the counteroffensive. And I vie to pull back, only to have her wrap her arms over the back of my neck, keeping me close to her, a complete contradiction to her prior words of saying how weird I am for going in this direction. But I have counterplays for her too. I reach back down, teasing her as I bury myself into her body. She yelps, then blushes upon having it heard by me. I chuckle at her shy response. "You're cute when you struggle too."

"Stop... making fun of me... asshole." She locks her legs behind me, ensuring that I don't dare to retract any further than I have been. She pulls my head in, burying my snout into the nape of her neck, she feels me growing just a bit more, revealing my intent to spare no ounce of my seed. She whispers words of encouragement each and every time I bottom out, kissing against the back of her body. "Right there. That's it." The more we stay together, the more my instinct drives me to my more primitive actions. A kiss against her neck turns to small nibbles, almost as though I'm queuing her to prepare for me to bite down on her. And true to form, I open my maw and pinch down. "Oh... shit... no!" A panic sets in her voice as she buries her claws into my shoulders.

Feral trembles causes the muscles in her arms to tense mightily, her claws drag down my back with an unapologetic trail of her memory being carved deep into my skin, far beneath the layer of scales that protect my body. They drag down to even my sides. I don't even feel the pain as I'm lost in pleasure myself. I finally reach my breaking point and feel every last throbbing pull she makes to milk my seed from my loins. I'm unable to withdraw any further, her grasp holding firm while I express my immense satisfaction.

But she's not done yet. Another crash of bliss causes her to wrap her tail around mine and pull down, prompting me even more to stay inside. Her legs clasp around my waist, furthering her objective. Her voice breaks into a youthful whimper. "Shh, it's okay. I got you." I whisper to her, hearing her stammering breaths that sound akin to her crying. "You good?" At last, she falls into her after-tremors again. She takes deep labored breaths, trying to get back the breath she's lost. "You know, every time you breathe like that, you tug me along."

Poor thing, she's just going through her first proper orgasm induced by a partner. I know the feeling, it's like seeing stars localized in the room, speckling every bit of her vision. She's still experiencing the shock. "What the hell was that!?"

"Now that's popping a clutch." I proudly state to her.

"Smolder taught you this!?" She pants heavily, still jolting a little.

"Well, Ocellus taught me the other stuff, Smolder taught me about the clutch thing, and I just kinda put together an idea of how to exploit that a bit."

She grabs my head on either side, making sure that I see her eyes when she speaks. The cracked grin on her lips and the faint shape of hearts in her eyes already tell me that I might have broken her a bit too hard. "I'm having your eggs. I'm definitely having your eggs, and I'm gonna love having them. And with what you've just did to me, you might as well set your appointment for next year because I'm going to have more with you. And we're going to keep having them. And we're not gonna stop until we alone repopulate the Dragon Lands with a bunch of dragons that look like either you or me. And you and I will be the progenitor of a higher breed of dragons, and we'll live happily ever after."

Talk about breaking the façade, "Um... that's... a wee bit too grand. Can we hold off on that?"

"Okay, motherfucker, you need to listen to me, and listen reeeeaaaally closely." She smushes my cheeks as she pulls me in closer. "Spike, you just sealed your fate here! You've spilled your seed in a female dragon undergoing dragon lust.... No let me correct that. You've spilled your seed into the Dragon Lord undergoing dragon lust! I'm going to lay my eggs, fertilized wholly by you and no one else, and there's not a damn thing you can do to stop it! I am Dragon Lord, and I hereby declare you Dragon Dad! And we are doing this again, same time next year, because biologically speaking, you won't have a choice! Now, you need to stop bitching about it, pop the fuck up out of me, and make me clutch again and again until I'm so properly bred that my my pussy looks like an Arimaspi's sloppy seconds! Have I made myself perfectly, CRYSTAL CLEAR!?"

...Why do I seem to fall into the trap of sticking my dick into crazy so often? "Male refractory period. Give me fifteen minutes to get soft and reset."

"Spike... You're nineteen. You don't have a refractory period yet." I find myself completely popping free of her as she uses her legs to pound me back into her. "Now, we're gonna stay here and you're gonna do all that weird shit again, cause that was awesome, I love this bed, and I want nine eggs at least. So you better find another load to spill and quick, you stupid sexy son of a bitch."

...I've won the wager... but at what cost?

Some time after our much more successful romp, and the following rounds after, Ember decides in her mind that it's better to take her immediate leave for the Dragon Lands. The announcement comes to the surprise to everyone in the house, but mainly to the relief of all who's endured the verbal war between both her and Zenobia. I'm definitely headlining that list of survivors.

Hestia quickly says her blunt goodbye, still upset about the damage to the dress, and heads back up to her room. Smolder watches as the azure dragoness takes up her sack of gems we've accumulated earlier in the evening. "Damn, after one night of not-dragon mating, you're leaving already? Thought you would've been stuck here."

"Have to, especially now. This isn't exactly the best place to have dragon eggs incubated." She explains. "That is, unless you want to constantly breathe laughing fire for five weeks straight, you can go right ahead."

"Hard pass." Smolder turns down the offer.

Gabby goes through her notepad, seeming to be drafting the next leg of our tabletop campaign. "Wait, so does that mean we have to change our calendar again, or will we go back to the normal schedule?"

Ember glances over to me. "Well, I guess you can slot me in for sometime next month. Or two weeks from now, that's if I drop by around that time." Her eyes sprout wide as another thought comes to mind. "Oh yeah, I want a bed."

"You mean like one of the ones in the guest rooms?" Ocellus asks.

"No way! I'm the dragon lord, I'm deserving of a bed like the one Spike's got upstairs!"

Everyone glances towards me as I facepalm in frustration. "We just negotiated for pillows, that was hard enough to distribute to that area. The logistics of that was difficult as hell, now you want a bed my size? It already takes a miracle to ship that from the distribution center in Canterlot to here! How much more do you want?"

Smolder chuckles. "If you ask me, I think Ember's turning into a real softy."

"So I like sleeping on soft things." She almost butts heads with the orange dragoness. "Got a problem with that?"

"Not really, just pointing out a fact." She replies calmly. "Though that next go with the big guy on one of my days, I'm afraid we'll have to contest that next time."

"Like the idea of that. Looking forward to scheduling my next visit on a Friday. And I might stay till Tuesday midnight. Loser takes the piss on watching the winner collect." She offers. "Since Spike's too much of a pussy to fight it out himself, we'll just duke it out for him."

"Can't wait to see you lose. Might even become dragon lord on top of it."

Ember giggles and points a claw at Smolder's throat. "Don't push it, bitch."

At long last, the azure dragoness departs from our house, gliding through the front door and finally shooting into the sky for her long journey home. I bid her well on her travels. "Fly safe!"

"Are you shitting me!" I hear a loud shrill come from behind me. I turn back around to see Smolder huffing and puffing as she slams the door shut and push my head into the door. "Did she just mark over my marks?"

"Wait, what?" I glance back to see her inspecting my back, the pupils of her eyes dilate as she snarls a response.

"That bitch, she really just clawed all over my shit!"

"May I bring up the point that my body is not a canvass for anyone's claws to draw into?" I try to argue in my own defense.

Smolder turns me around, violently snags my wrist, and yanks me up the staircase while addressing Ocellus. "Olla, I know it's your day next, but there's at least twelve minutes before midnight. I've got some wrongs to write over."

As I'm yanked into the hallway, the changeling hollers back at her. "Try not to hurt him too bad! It's been a rough one on him all day!"

Zenobia offers to join upstairs. "I will go and supervise so that she doesn't do any harm to the dear pet."

But as she vouches to fly off, Ocellus summons a turquoise tether comprised of her aura to snag the mare from the ornate collar affixed to her neck. "Oh no you don't, you can get your happy imperial ass back on down here." The princess looks down at her neck, seeing the tether stretched from her neck to the horn of the changeling. "Now I get that you might be a bit late to the party, but we still have our initiation process to consider."

The mare stammers in response to the show of dominance the changeling provides. "W-w-what do you mean initiation p-process!?"

Ocellus smirks as she slowly turns her head to the griffon down the hall. "Gabby, remember that thing we did that one other Friday, you know, when we had that x-rated game of Oggs and Oubs?"

The griffon's eyes shimmers with realization, her talons drumming into one another as she giggles. "I do remember that! Had a casualty in the process of that, but the new girl was shipped in a little while ago." A devious look falls upon her beak, producing a cruel Cheshire-like grin. "I'll go get her from the basement. Be right baaaaaaaack!♪"

Amor starts to shy away from the situation. "Uh... this is going to get very explicit, isn't it?"

Ocellus gives the stallion a glance up and down. "Huh... I guess it could be fun to put you in a blindfold and let you work out what's gonna happen next. You could totally use the relief." She snickers the second before changing her voice. "It would be pretty exciting for you to hear what she could sound like in an intimate setting. And no need to mind the mess this time, I'll be ready for it." She swaps back to her normal voice. "Hey Gabby, bring the whole box of goods while you're down there! We got another hostage!"

"Say less!"

"What all is she going to get?" Zenobia asks as her nerves start to tingle down her spine. The griffon comes back up with her first round of items, namely a motorized sybian with a vibrating saddle attachment. "The fuck... is that thing?"

"Another one of those items you can only import from the human world through means of a specialized order at a certain marketplace I'm not allowed to disclose for the time being." Gabby answers with a smile, slowly gliding a talon along the bumpy ridges of the seat. "This baby came in the day before Spike got back. And fun fact, it's got a much higher speed setting and different patters tailored for the experience of different users. It's even got a restraint latch for the more, let's just say, gluttonous rider. But wait, there's more!" Gabby walks back down to the basement, bringing up another matching sybian. "Why stop at one when you can get two? The more, the merrier!" She glances over to Amor. "These aren't just made with girls in mind, you know."

"They aren't!?" The stallion yelps nervously.

Ocellus tries to contain her laughter as she walks behind the stallion. "Oh no. They're built for fun. Lots and lots of fun. And I'm sure you'll love suffering just as much as Zenobia will."

"Suffering?" He mewls nervously as Gabby comes back up the stairs with a large box of toys.

"Just the good kind." Gabby reiterates as she pulls out a translucent gel onahole and a bottle of water-based lubricant. She plants the item against his muzzle, the end appearing to mimic the shape of that of an equine mare. His eyes buck as he notices both the shape and how soft it feels against his lips.

"Hope you drank plenty of water. And you better hope your diet was any good. Because if not..." Ocellus' voice shifts as she casts her orgasm denial spell on Zenobia. "I'll know."

"Having that said." Gabby gives a teasing smirk as she rubs her claws together with building interest. "Alexa, red alert."

As the lights in the entire house immediately shifts to red, music starts to play throughout the home. Starting with a bass guitar slowly fading in. As the words sing throughout the house

♫Thinking ahead of time, why don't you spend the night?
I know you love me

Pick up and roll the dice, read in between the lines
I know you love me

We can book a flight, wake up in paradise
Sun up above us

Tell me you're down to ride, then you can bet your life
No one above you♫

Ocellus teleports behind the stallion, whispering in his ear using Twilight's voice. "Last time was a little unfair. I'll give you a fighting chance this time."

The stallion trembles in place. "Oh shit."

Meanwhile Elsewhere...

The airship hovers at a gingerly pace through the night sky, many of it's lights dimmed for the travelers on board. The small collection of centuries maintain their post for the night shift. Overseeing them for the time being is none other than Prince Agamemnon, who grows frustrated from the fact that he hasn't been able to enjoy the downtime in San Fransiscolt for a while longer, as his usual activities upon travel happen to be the fraternization of mares coupled with beer, crude jokes, drunken shenanigans, and the morning after ritual of waking up in some random bed with no recollection of the mare he obviously inseminated.

As that opportunity was deprived of him, he takes upon the task of keeping himself distracted with being a player in relieving the post of his younger brother, who now walks into the bridge, offering only the usual sibling retort. "That sash looks terrible on you."

"My looks were compromised since I've lost an eye." He replies. "I'd rather this cringeworthy apparel than the indignity of the horrendous scar desecrating my attempts to woo the unworthy mares."

"Always you and your lack of standards. So picky to choose which fight you'll join, but never as much bat an eye for who you sire with. Selective glories, I suppose."

"Better than keeping unrealistic beauty standards for your chance to either be rejected or mated with. Still, Adelphos did your whole thing a lot better by at least looking past your level of selectiveness."

The lavender streaked prince draws a heavy sigh in thinking of his deceased sibling. "Strange thing is that we got along, he and I. Never could agree in standards, but he was at least one to reach out to all of us and see if we could unite into one front and make a clear decision. I could tell that Amor really picked up that optimistic habit of his. Too bad that Xerxes liked the lesser-blooded bastard better... to the cruel end he gave Adelphos."

"With murderers on the mind, the asshole hasn't dared stepped out of the room since we've boarded back on this piece of shit. What's with him?"

"He's... processing."

"Over what?" The one-eyed prince scoffs.

"Family matters, you know how it is now. Just the sight of Zenobia defecting has to do something for him. I'm sure he's probably between trying to correct her, or maybe even cleanse himself of her completely, along with that dragon she's fancying." The prince steps in to replace Agamemnon's shift. "He's been stuck in that room for a while. You've been filling in for his shift, which is more noble of a cause than any he could conjure up in that room. Take a moment will you, we don't need your lack of depth perception to be a navigational issue."

"Well I'm not one to refuse favors, even if they come with backhoofed insults." As the scarred prince walks into the hall, his head turns to the direction of a room with a pink rose insignia etched into the door. "I wonder what he's cooking up in there. Whatever perverse thoughts he have in mind, it's probably infected with Zenobia's varying smells and juices by now. I shouldn't envy it too much."

As Agamemnon walks towards his quarters, Xerxes sits quietly, meditating on the words his sister spoke in the public address. The conviction she carried in her demeanor, seeing how proud she was of her choices. And after the initial round of stumbles and miscues, how she appeared to be a true leader with conviction and steadfast dedication to her words. It was a stunning reminder of the level of perfection their mother once aspired for him. The words of the late Lady Rosa giving him praises for not even his best efforts, but offering harsh rebukes for his sister who could pass as the quintessential envoy of foreign relations if given the chance. Her power was in full display.

While the country they live in maintains a strict code of succession, he knows that her presence and stance rings favorably with the international audience. Especially in contrast to his views of supremacy, his father's views of ironclad governance, and the many others that ultimately maintains the status quo, she stands as a beacon of upheaval. The last who dared to do so being nothing more than a memorial portrait hung above the dinner table.

The ambition of his plans fall into question, with no scapegoat to blame his failures, nor a foundation laid to claim his successes. And standing by her was the one who gave her the podium to speak from. The bane of his reputation back home, the source of his failures recent, and now the obstacle that stands in the way of the country's voucher for militaristic redemption.

The meek smile on his face hiding the discomfort of her craggy start, the gradual nods of approval from the others that stand around him, the shaking of hooves, the bowing of heads, the quintessential exchange of democratic gestures among the world's elite, and his overreach of influence. How dare he attempt to outmaneuver he, the crown prince of the Grand Holy Empire of Ponyland. An utterance of foul words struggle past his lips as he quietly vents his anger. "F-fucking bastard."

"Not usually one to swear much, are you?"

The whispery voice, unknown in origin, startles the prince into summoning a spear to his side. "Who said that?" He turns about, seeing nothing and no one behind him. "Speak now or I'll cut you asunder!"

An airy chuckle offers a reply. "Such primitive emotions on display. Heed my voice, servant." The prince turns around, seeing a white flame appear in the looking glass in front of the bed. "Yes. Come closer, come so that I may see you." The prince obeys cautiously, carrying the spear along with him. Upon getting closer to the glass, he sees the faint image of a mare staring back at him. "Tell me, what do you see?"

He steps even closer towards the looking glass, seeing a foggy figure looking back at him. It takes a moment before the figure clears up, revealing a unicorn mare with a coat of light pink fur, eyes as blue as the boundless ocean, and a mane as white as the virgin snow. "My... mother?"

"You see naught but her pride, her source... Everything she's depended on. You."

The prince feels the faint trace of his foalhood warmth greet him, giving him a brief moment of joy. But the scowl she wears reminds him of his last day with her. His heart is one more filled with sadness. "Mother was never proud of me. She knew what I was."

"Disappointed, yes. But that doesn't change the manner of what she thought of you. She was quite proud of the power you possessed. And if she were here now, she would be proud of what you will soon become."

The speat falls from the crimson aura that once contained it. His hooves tremble as he pleads towards the mirror. "Who are you?"

"A lowly spirit, having made tributes to a world that halfway appreciates him, made to a land that did not." The voice answers warmly. "We are the same, you and I. Our ambitions are the same, despite our means differing in many ways. But I assure you, your purpose is far more than the borders of this world."

Upon discovering what is manifesting before him, he bows his head out of respect. "What wisdom do you have?"

"That to obtain what is rightfully yours, you must look not within, but outside of yourself. Stubborn pride yields many results, but not the ones you seek. But in my way, you remain steadfast and obedient. And in your obedience breeds the authority you seek." A faint smile appears from the looking glass, a mouth replacing the image of Xerxes' mother. "Perhaps you are looking for a source of that authority."

Upon the prince's lips contests madness and joy in hearing the words spoke to him. "What I would do to have my mother see me in my most proud moments, the ones that are soon to come."

"Then look to me, my faithful servant."

The mouth develops further, now with only the ghostly image of an eye floating above the mouth. "Doctor." The prince clasp his hooves together, his eyes lift to the disembodied effigy, offering his most ardent prayers.

"Yes. For it is not what you do for others, for it is what you'll do for me."

Author's Note

Hey there, it's been a long while. Far longer than anticipated. I'll just go ahead and give you the long and short of it. As many longtime readers know of me, the summer months are the months where I sometimes get the busiest because of engagements, bookings, and conferences. So it's given me few opportunities to catch up with everything plot-wise. So there's that. Then there's a brief scare where my laptop refused to charge, turns out that the CMOS battery had jiggled out of place and prevented the battery from receiving charge.

And now there's the other reason.

So it's been a while since I've been going through with the publishing of chapters. But it's mainly because I've gotten so overly invested in trying to pick a direction that I just sat down and continued drafting... and drafting... and drafting... until there's seems to be a colossal backlog of somewhere around +30 chapters I've drafted, with maybe eight of them completed. So now, I finally get around to releasing this one with about seven more to release on a timely schedule.

There's interesting stuff I want y'all to talk about, but I can't disclose any of that until we finally reach those plot points. So no spoilers... except that there will be a lot more chapters due to the shortened word-count of each chapter going forward. Which is obviously a thing I'm trying my best to do since this story's predecessor. I'll look to see you guys next week.

By the way the song for the second scene before last.