Roxy woke up to the sensation of being scrubbed.
She blinked her eyes open, groggy and disoriented. For a split second, she expected to see the wooden beams of her bedroom in the Iron-Wood Manor.
She expected to smell food from Kaelen's cooking. She expected Zarek to be grumbling about the morning light.
Instead, she saw bioluminescent moss pulsing in soft purples and blues. She smelled crushed pearls and saltwater. And instead of a Dragon King, she was surrounded by a squad of very enthusiastic mermaids.
"She wakes!" Nimue chirped, hovering directly over Roxy's face. "The Queen wakes! And she glows! Look at the scales! They are pinker than yesterday!"
"...What?" Roxy groggily asked, still trying to wake up.
"It is the post-mating luster," Thalassa sighed dreamily, polishing Roxy's tail with a cloth made of woven kelp. "The King must have given her the time of her life."
Roxy groaned.
