by Cara Bristol
“When will this happen?” Maybe he still had time to change his father’s mind, or at least track down the advisor who’d convinced him this was a good idea and singe his neck frill.
“An envoy departs the day after tomorrow to rendezvous with the president’s daughter and escort her to Draco.”
This entire situation had been decided before his summons. He’d never had any say. King K’rah didn’t ask, he commanded. Still, it rankled. K’ev would do anything for Draco, but he wanted to be asked, not commanded.
Showing his true emotions would enrage the monarch who wouldn’t hesitate to have his wings clipped. “Very well.” He bowed his head in a gesture of respect and obedience. The thought of consorting with a thieving, smelly human was unbearable.
“I’m glad we were able to reach an understanding. You’re dismissed.”
K’ev pivoted and marched across the stone floor toward the exit. Blood heated as he prepared to shift.
“K’ev?”
He halted and turned. Please, no more.
“You never asked her name,” his father said.
“One human is the same as the next.” He stalked out of the rotunda, desperate to be free. As soon as he cleared the wide-spaced pillars supporting the massive stone dome, he shifted. Facial bones assumed their inborn triangular shape atop a long neck snaking out of a body that doubled in size then doubled again. Scales hardened. Massive leathery wings unfurled.
Human consort? The enemy? He roared, spitting flames.
In a crouch, he pushed off with muscular legs and leaped, bringing his wings down to lift himself into the air, rising into a scarlet sky fragrant with smoke and sulfur. Freedom beckoned. He left the royal palace compound, circumvented the Temple of the Eternal Fyre, and headed for open land where mountains still belched fire, and rivers of molten rock flowed.
Swooping low, he flew over Lavos. Only a thin, winding stream remained of the once large and mighty lava river. Draco used to be alive with hundreds of thousands of volcanoes, but, over the eons, its core had cooled, magma hardened into rock and soil, and the hazy vog coloring the sky a fiery red at star set dissipated with every solar rotation.
Only a few hundred volcanoes remained active, and more went extinct every year. He mourned the loss. His planet was dying.
And he would be shackled to a human.
Chapter Two
“Don’t sacrifice yourself. There must be another way.” Rhianna sank onto the silk duvet covering the canopied four-poster. From the gilded antique furniture, fine linens, and exquisite artwork, you’d never guess the bedroom was located in Bunker One deep underground, and not in the presidential mansion. “Your father will come through for you—”
Helena peered into her antique jewelry armoire. “Who do you think came up with the plan in the first place?”
“No! I don’t believe it.” Rhianna dropped her jaw. “He loves you more than anything in the world. He would never do that. The public doesn’t expect it. You’re the first daughter, the only child of the widowed president.”
“It’s our last hope to prevent an attack. It’s my duty.” Helena dangled a heavy gold necklace. “Do you think I should bring this?”
“Stop it! You’re scaring me.” Rhianna leaped up, grabbed the necklace, and shoved it into the drawer. “You’re acting like you’re packing for a vacation at a five-star resort instead of being asked to sacrifice your life.”
“Not my life. Just my freedom.” Helena closed the armoire. “You’re right. I won’t need much jewelry. The dragons are loaded. They have plenty of gold.”
Shock. Shock and fright are making her act this way. This deadpan, unemotional woman wasn’t the vivacious, fun, albeit slightly spoiled and entitled friend she’d roomed with in college, who’d taken her under her wing.
Raised by loving, working-class parents, Rhianna had studied hard and won a full scholarship to an elite private university. But, among the country’s upper crust, she’d felt awkward and out of place. She’d half expected someone to demand to see the scholarship letter proving her right to be there. She had been sneaking out of a sorority rush, having decided she’d never fit in, when Helena had spotted her.
“My doppelgänger! Where have you been all my life?” Smelling of spiked punch, Helena had grabbed her in a big hug like they were best friends.
“Excuse me?” Rhianna had said. “I think you have me confused with somebody else.”
“We’re twins. Don’t you see it?”
Only in the most superficial, generic way. While she and Helena were about the same average height and slender build, and both redheads, similarity stopped there. Helena’s muted-auburn face-flattering hairstyle had cost more than Rhianna’s entire head-to-toe outfit, and her carrot top blazed with a wildness neither comb nor twisty-tie could tame. Helena had rich-emerald-green eyes; Rhianna’s were a blue so pale, some people described them as eerie. Both had worn basic black, Helena in an elegant off-the-shoulder designer original. In the greatest embarrassment of all, Rhianna’s dress was a box-store knockoff of the same dress. The differences between them couldn’t have been more stark.
Although she had a strong sense of self-worth—her academic achievement had earned her a scholarship—next to the well-heeled socialite, she’d felt a bit like her dress, a cheap imitation of the original.
Helena had found the similarity in their appearance significant and hilarious. When Rhianna would have slunk away in mortification, Helena’s boisterous, slightly inebriated bonhomie had pulled her into her inner circle that afternoon. They’d bonded as friends and had become roomies.
Yes, despite her kindness, Helena could be clueless in a let-them-eat-cake sort of way. Born and raised in luxury, she had no idea how difficult life could be for ordinary people. Giving, when it cost nothing, required little effort or fortitude.
All of which made this ultimate sacrifice crazy. It wasn’t Helena’s nature to be so selfless. Rhianna herself wasn’t that noble. Nobody would expect the only child of the nation’s leader to throw herself on the grenade.
Maybe I should shake her. Didn’t a slap to the face calm hysterical people? Except Helena wasn’t hysterical—just the opposite. What could you do for someone acting uncharacteristically stoic?
“Maybe they won’t attack.” Rhianna paced over a beautiful oriental rug, the faded colors showing its age but not diminishing its beauty. “Maybe diplomacy will work.”
“Maybe—but maybe not. Can we afford the risk? My family has had a long history of service to this country. It’s my turn to step up.”
Rhianna swung around. “You can’t become a virgin sacrifice to save the world!” She planted her hands on her hips. “It’s not right, and then, there’s the obvious.”
“Virginity isn’t required.” Helena laughed. “Besides, he’d never know. Maybe if I was a dragon, he’d be able to tell, but since I’m a human with corresponding anatomy, he’ll believe anything I tell him.”
“You’d go that far? You’d sleep with him?”
“Well, no. Unless he’s hot—pun intended.” Helena grinned.
“This isn’t funny!” she snapped. First Helena acted almost deadpan, now she joked around like this was a big lark. Shock. Has to be shock.
“They mate in human form,” Helena said.
“Humanoid,” Rhianna said. There was a big difference. Like almost everyone else on Earth, she had seen them on the news, and once, a long time ago, up close and personal. Back then, as a young, naïve child, she hadn’t realized the threat they represented. She’d believed adults when they said dragons were friendly. Earth officials had been duped. She hugged herself and glanced around the opulent bedroom. If not for Helena, she’d be huddling in a basement or underground garage like everyone else.
Dragons could walk on two feet, but they didn’t look, act, or think like humans at all. Their faces were grayish green and scaly, their eyes a malevolent yellow. Smiling did nothing to lessen t
heir scariness—just the opposite. They had sharp, fang-like teeth. Frills flapped around their long necks. When they got angry, they swished their barbed tails. No, they weren’t human—or humane. “They have a different mindset and sensibilities. They’re brutal, vicious predators.”
“You don’t need to worry. I’m not going to get physical. This is to buy us time for diplomacy to work. There will be months of pomp and circumstance before the ceremony with the prince occurs.”
“The prince?”
“Uh-huh. Prince K’ev.”
Rhianna gasped. “Are you kidding me?”
“What good would it do to mate with any old dragon? It has to be with a creature of the royal Draconian court for it to do any good.”
If she’s going to become his consort, she probably shouldn’t be thinking of him as a creature. But, what else could you call them? Not animal, not human, they were something else—an extraterrestrial race of fire-breathing, shaping-shifting aliens.
Helena peered at her out of the corner of her eye. “You met him once, didn’t you?”
“A long time ago. In school. Before we knew they couldn’t be trusted.”
When she’d met the prince, he’d been in demiforma, a shape halfway between human and his natural state, but she’d seen him in full form on television once. Nearly as large as the president’s private plane, with a wingspan to match, he’d swooped into the royal pantheon in a blaze of fire and lethal grace. In front of everyone, he’d transformed into his man shape. Ugly, yet beautiful. And naked. The image had been etched into her brain.
“He’s going to know you’re not sincere,” Rhianna said.
“No, he won’t. And by the time he does, a new treaty will be in place.”
“And you don’t think jilting the prince will be considered a violation of the treaty?”
“No, trust me. We’ll work it out.”
“Like we worked this out?” Rhianna said skeptically. “We thought the dragons were friendly—now we’re on the verge of war, and we don’t know why.”
Draco had reached out to Earth first. Officials omitted that historical detail when they dismissed them as “space lizards,” but she remembered the facts even though she’d been a child during the first contact. The dragons had traveled the galaxy while humans hadn’t ventured beyond the moon and Mars.
Relations between the planets had been tentative at first then more open and amicable. A contingent, which had included Prince K’ev, had toured Earth. That had been followed by Earth ambassadors going to Draco, where special accommodations had been constructed since the planet’s temperature and atmosphere could be harmful to humans. The two worlds had formed a friendship, a political and galactic exploration alliance. Everything seemed to be going so well.
And then, inexplicably, Draco had broken off diplomatic relations and threatened to attack. “What could we have done to offend them?” Rhianna said for the umpteenth time. There had to be some provocation, didn’t there?
“Nothing. Dad and other leaders are as mystified as everyone,” Helena said.
She believed her. If anyone would know, Helena would. Just as she’d graduated college, her father had been elected president and appointed her as a special liaison in his administration. As one of his close advisors and a member of the first family, she was privy to information not shared with the public.
Still, it defied common sense that allies would threaten to attack without cause. On the other hand, those allies were dragons. Predators. They may have become civilized over the millennia, but aggression had been bred in their nature.
You can’t trust them, most of her professors had warned in her Draconian Relations classes at the university. A wild animal raised as a pet might appear tame, but it could attack without warning.
How true that had proven to be.
“Helena, please don’t do this. Tell your father no. Earth’s governments will find another way to work this out. Once you’re on planet Draco, you’ll be at their mercy. If this situation doesn’t improve, you’ll be trapped there.”
“Well…that’s where you come in.”
“Me? What are you talking about?” Rhianna’s heart rate spiked.
“We want you to accompany me.”
“What? Are you crazy? No, I can’t.” She shook her head.
“You’re the perfect person. You’re a member of the State Department—”
“By a technicality.” She’d been hired by the State Department, but hadn’t started yet when the global situation had changed. The president, other government officials, and world leaders had gone into hiding along with everyone else of financial means. The masses were sheltering in basements and garages.
“You’re one of the few with a degree in Draconian Relations.”
“Only my master’s. My bachelor’s is in social work.” Which she now wished she had pursued, although she wouldn’t have been working anywhere, given the current state of emergency.
Draconian Relations hadn’t existed as a discipline of study when she’d begun college. As the two planets strengthened their alliance, universities cobbled together degree programs. Rhianna had been approached by the government with an offer she couldn’t refuse: her master’s paid, followed by a guaranteed job with the State Department, if she completed the program. You can do more good for the country and the planet, yada yada yada.
“You’ve met the Draconian prince,” Helena said.
“For two minutes as a fifth grader! That doesn’t count.” When Earth and Draco had been in the getting-to-know-you phase, all the nation’s schools had entered a competition for the chance to meet the dragons. Rhianna’s essay had won the visit for her school. At the assembly, the students had been super excited until the visitors had stepped onto the stage. In demiforma, they’d terrified the kids, who’d panicked and stampeded from the auditorium.
As PR events went, it had backfired. Outraged parents had phoned and stormed government offices, several State Department officials lost their jobs, the principal got fired, and the entire school board was voted out in the next election.
Rhianna had been seated in the front row. As the essay author, she’d been promised she would get to meet the dragons personally and have her picture taken with them. The principal had announced they would appear in their “humanoid form.” The curtains over the stage had drawn back to reveal shocking huge, horned scaly lizard-people. Later she’d looked up humanoid in the dictionary to verify she’d understood the word. The other kids had been terrified, but the prince’s slouch and smirk had reminded her of her older brother, Reagan. Rebellious, sullen, bored. Their dad had threatened to “knock the chip off his shoulder,” but she adored him. Reagan called her Sprite and always had time to talk to his little sister.
Knowing him made the prince…not scary. He seemed…lonely. Awkward.
As the other kids fled the cafeteria, she had remained. The prince had beautiful cat-like eyes. Even though his teeth were sharp, his smile seemed shy.
He’d bounded off the stage right in front of her. His English had been accented, his voice rough like gravel, but he’d conversed like a regular person. His yellow eyes had mesmerized her. He’d looked like fire burned inside him, which she supposed it did. She’d guessed he was probably a little older than her brother who was graduating high school that year.
He’d seemed surprised she hadn’t run from the auditorium with the rest of the kids.
“You’re not afraid of me,” he’d said.
“No.”
“You should be. I’m a dragon.” He’d grinned, making a joke. “I could eat you.”
She’d laughed, but the principal almost had a cow right there in the aisle. He’d hustled her back to class, and she never got her photo. Until recently, she’d believed the prince had been kidding, and the principal had overreacted. She’d been a child, the prince a near-adult alien dragon, but in her recollection, they’d established a rapport. That was partly why s
he’d allowed herself to be coaxed into getting a degree in Draconian Relations—she’d hoped to see him again.
Not anymore. Given recent events, she’d reevaluated everything that had happened that day. The prince had revealed the Draconians’ true colors—fiery red, like the flames flickering in the gold of his eyes, like the fire that would burn everything on Earth if they attacked. If the principal hadn’t hustled her out of there, she might have gotten toasted.
Dragons were the enemy.
No amount of “Kumbaya” singing, live-and-let-live do-goodism could change reality. The dragons intended to conquer Earth. If she’d realized that sooner, she never would have pursued a diplomatic career, no matter how much the president cajoled. What good was diplomacy with people you couldn’t reason with? She rarely shied away from a challenge, but negotiating this peace treaty exceeded her skills and confidence. What if she failed? Too much was at stake to risk making a mistake.
“I can’t go to Draco,” Rhianna said. “Neither should you. The fact we’re hiding in a bunker ought to tell you what a bad idea that is. If they attack Earth, we’re going to be stuck in enemy territory. We won’t be guests, we’ll be hostages—prisoners of war.”
“The whole point of us going is to prevent war. This is a goodwill gesture on our part to demonstrate we’re willing to talk this out, we mean them no harm.”
“They intend us harm!”
“War should never be entered upon until every agency of peace has failed,” Helena said.
“You say that, but—”
“I didn’t say it, President William McKinley did.”
“Well, well, here’s a quote from another president: ‘No man can tame a tiger into a kitten by stroking it.’ Franklin Roosevelt.” If that didn’t describe the situation, what did?
“I know of one president who is requesting your assistance,” Helena said in a quiet voice.
“No…” She shook her head against the inevitable. “Don’t do this to me.”
“Dad will be approaching you with a formal request, but if you can’t do it for your country and your planet, could you do it for me? Please? Don’t leave me to go there alone.” Helena’s voice quivered. For all her bravado, she was scared, Rhianna realized.
