Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 126358 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 632(@200wpm)___ 505(@250wpm)___ 421(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126358 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 632(@200wpm)___ 505(@250wpm)___ 421(@300wpm)
As long as I had passed the entrance exam—and I was pretty sure I had—I could hide my identity as a female for as long as I had to. I could Impress a dragon and graduate with honors and even become one of the Professors—or maybe a long-range scout, like my father had been. He’d gone out scouting for Madlings every month—even though everyone knew they’d been eradicated for over a hundred years. That way I’d have plenty of privacy and no one need ever know that I wasn’t a male.
As long as you really can Impress a dragon egg, a little voice whispered in my brain. Are you sure any dragon will want a female rider? They’ll probably be able to tell, you know—didn’t Jorn-o say they could smell your blood and your bloodlines?
Well, I would cross that bridge when I came to it. For now, I was going to concentrate on hiding my identity and living as normal a life as I could, as a boy here in the Old Drake, I told myself.
I slipped out of my brother’s clothes and into the nightshirt I’d been given. It was a little too large—which was good, because it was also a little too thin.
I tried taking off the bandages around my breasts…but had to put them right back on again. Though my breasts were small, my nipples were large and they stuck out too prominently through the worn white fabric which felt as though it had been washed and worn a hundred times before it came to me.
I wasn’t sure about the view between my legs either. My white-blonde pubic hair didn’t show through, but the night shirt was thin enough to expose the fact that I didn’t have any manhood to speak of.
I solved the problem by putting on a pair of the underdrawers I’d been given. That hid the view of my crotch enough that I hoped no one would notice I didn’t have a manly bulge.
Then, hoping I was covered enough, I left the privy closet with my pile of clothes and went to the sink. I had bathed that morning before getting dressed and hadn’t done anything more strenuous than taking the entrance exam, so I didn’t feel the need for a cat-bath. But I rolled up the long sleeves of the night shirt and washed my hands and face thoroughly, blotting my skin dry on the rough towel I’d been issued.
For a moment I just stood there in front of the mirror, looking at myself. Did I see a stunted lad with spiky hair or was it a girl staring back at me?
I touched the Dragon Glass pendant at my throat and thought with all my might,
“I’m a boy. Everyone who looks at me sees a boy—no, a man of the Academy. I’m a strong, brave, confident man.”
And as I looked in the mirror, I saw a change. Nothing startling—my hair didn’t change color, and I didn’t grow six inches all at once. But my jaw looked firmer, and my eyelashes were a little shorter. My shoulders seemed just a touch broader. In short, I really did look more manly.
I leaned forward, feeling myself tingle all over. Was it true? Or was I just imagining it? I was almost certain the changes I was seeing were being made by the pendant. Just as my father had said, it showed the wearer the way he (or in my case, she) wanted others to see them.
I hadn’t seen these changes when I first put the Dragon Glass pendant on, back at my own home. But I had been all by myself there. Maybe it was working better here at the Academy because there were more people to see me. Maybe its subtle magic was enhanced by the attention of those around me—those I wanted to see me as a boy. Also, they expected to see just another male cadet when they looked at me—the pendant fed their expectations and made them real.
“It’s working,” I whispered, touching the Dragon Glass at my throat. “You’re actually working!”
I felt a tingling in my fingertips, as though the pendant was agreeing with me. Maybe I would be all right after all.
Feeling a bit more hopeful, I went back to The Great Dorm and climbed into my cot.
“Hey—where were you? I never saw you at the Cook-pot,” Jorn-o said, when he and the others came back in the room, their skin red from steam and their hair slicked back.
I made a show of groaning as I rolled over onto my back.
“Wasn’t feeling very good,” I told him, hoping he would accept my excuse. “I think I ate too much at dinner.”
“Well, you did eat a lot.” He looked concerned. “Want me to show you to the Infirmary?”
“No thanks.” I shook my head. “Just need to get some rest. I’ll be fine in the morning.”