To Tame a Dragon (Venys Needs Men)

by Tiffany Roberts

  He came back for me.

  7

  Falthyris clenched his jaw and stretched his wings, straining the new muscles that controlled them. He wobbled, struggling to keep his flight smooth, and the human tightened her hold on his neck. This whole situation was demeaning in more ways than he cared to reflect upon—and it certainly didn’t help that the Red Heat had blended with his heartfire again, that his cock was aching for the feel of her warm, wet human slit, that his anger was in danger of being overwhelmed by his hunger.

  He glided directly into the entry of his lair, a feat he would not been able to accomplish in his true form. He’d not made it far inside when he lost the air current and dropped, his mane flipping into his face and obstructing his view.

  His feet hit the cave floor hard, and he stumbled forward a few steps before claiming his balance and standing up straight. The female leapt out of his hold.

  Falthyris growled and snapped his head back, tossing his mane out of his face. What purpose did it serve other than getting into one’s mouth and eyes? It was almost as irritating as this human.

  His female, appearing paler than before, retreated and dropped to her knees, bowing forward to lay her hands flat on the ground. Her shoulders heaved with her ragged breaths.

  “What are you doing, mortal?” he asked.

  “Fighting back the sickness,” she said.

  His heartfire swelled in alarm, and he took a step toward her before forcing himself to stop. Had he not wasted enough concern on this human? Had he not done enough for her already despite what she’d done to him? And yet he could not prevent himself from asking, “What sickness?”

  “From flying.” She let out a long, shaky breath. “I think you would do best to remain upon the ground.”

  “And what do you mean by that?” he growled through bared teeth.

  The female lifted her head, brows furrowing as she met his gaze. “I have seen birds of all sorts in flight, and you have none of their grace.”

  “Because the human form is incapable of grace.” He glared at her, but it did not have the intended effect—she did not turn away in fear, she did not tremble or scream, she did not so much as flinch. And his damned Heat-hazed mind seized the opportunity to appreciate the beauty of her face.

  She moves with grace.

  Falthyris snarled at that thought and stalked past the human, giving her his back as he made his way deeper into his lair. A soft scraping sound, followed by the gentle padding of bare feet over the gritty floor, told him that she was following.

  “Humans are plenty capable of grace,” she said.

  The image of her naked body flashed in his mind’s eye, nearly provoking another growl from his chest. Oh, there was grace in her form, but that didn’t mean he had to acknowledge it. That didn’t mean he had to like it.

  And he hated the fact that a growing part of him did like it.

  “You are also capable of getting yourself killed by vermin,” he replied. “Should I be impressed?”

  She growled. Growled. The sound of it went straight to his cock, making it pulse strongly enough that his steps nearly faltered. Seed seeped from its tip, and it took everything within him to keep himself from wrapping his hand around it to alleviate the ache—or from turning around, pinning his female to the ground, and thrusting into her tight, hot depths.

  My female. My female.

  No. She is just a human, a weak, short-lived creature of no importance.

  “I am a huntress. I have slain many beasts and provided for my tribe,” she said.

  The pride in her voice, the confidence and strength, affected him nearly as much as her growl had. A huntress. A warrior. The sort of mate he could only have hoped for.

  No! I do not accept this. I do not accept her.

  The mating bond wound itself around his heartfire anew, squeezing as though to remind him that he had no choice in it—his acceptance did not change the situation. He could hate her with fire and fury to rival the sun, but he would remain bound to her. And he was now just as mortal as she was.

  Falthyris forced himself to keep walking. He would not look back at her. He would not succumb to his infuriating, irrational, insufferable desire for her. “Would that I could slay you.”

  Her footfalls went silent, and Falthyris felt the distance between them widen with his strides.

  “Then do it,” she challenged.

  He halted and bowed his head, shoulders stiff, wings stretching, and tail lashing. Heat flowed through his veins, spreading outward from his heart to suffuse him entirely.

  “You cannot do it, can you?” she asked. “As much as you wish to, you are unable.”

  Falthyris curled his hands into fists, digging his claws into his palms. He recalled perfectly the feel of her throat in his hand—the same hand that had so easily torn apart the creature that had attacked her. The same hand that could not generate the force to do her any harm.

  She couldn’t be correct. She couldn’t have this victory on top of the others she had already claimed. He would not allow it.

  Heartfire blazing, he spun to face her and closed the distance between them in a few long, quick strides. “You are not worth the effort, human.”

  Her dark eyes rounded with a glint of fear, but she stood her ground and held his gaze unwaveringly. “Then why did you come back for me?”

  Rage, Heat, and heartfire collided in his chest, roiling into a firestorm he could not hold back. His hands darted out, grabbing the wet fabric of her robe, which he tore apart with a snarl, baring her chest and those black markings upon her belly. She swayed as though meaning to retreat.

  Falthyris halted her by clamping his hand around her slender, elegant throat, pressing the pad of his thumb along the underside of her jaw. He felt her trembling, felt her fluttering pulse beneath his fingers. Her full, pink lips parted, and she curled her fingers around his wrist, but she was otherwise still.

  He raked his gaze over her, studying the soft, delicate features of her face, the graceful line of her collarbone, the smooth curves of her chest mounds and the dark flesh that served as their peaks. Those circles tightened before his eyes, becoming hard points he longed to take between his lips and flick with his tongue. His eyes dipped lower, over her flat stomach and those intricate markings, stopping at that accursed scrap of cloth covering her pelvis.

  With a growl, he tore the cloth away with his free hand, baring her slit to him. The scent of her arousal perfumed the air, and his tongue slipped out unbidden to draw more of that scent in.

  “Because you have other uses, human,” Falthyris rasped. He forced his gaze back up to hers, struggling internally to fight back the surging Heat and lust within him even as his cock wept with want for her.

  If he were to give in now, it would only further prove her power over him. His arm trembled, and his fingers flexed, the tips of his claws pressing against the soft skin of her neck.

  She raised her chin and smiled. “Do it, dragon.”

  That challenge stoked the flames of his heartfire, consuming him from within, burning his resolve to ashes.

  Falthyris snarled as everything roiled to the surface and a crimson haze swallowed his mind. He swung the human around and forced her back until she was against the wall. She gasped, but held his gaze firmly, a lustful gleam brightening her eyes.

  He dropped his hands, hooked them behind his female’s thighs, and lifted her, immediately stepping between the cradle of her legs. Without hesitation, he brought her sex down upon his cock and thrust into her slick channel.

  His female gasped, and her thighs tightened around his hips.

  Pleasure further clouded his mind, mingling with the Heat, and he bucked, driving himself as deep as he could into her hot sex.

  She made another whimpering, breathy sound and slipped her arms around his neck. Falthyris hissed. This was not about intimacy, not about mutual pleasure. It was only about his release—about asserting his control over her. About showing this human her place. He sho
uld not have allowed that touch, should have shrugged her arms off, pinned them against the wall, should have made her feel as trapped as he did.

  And yet Falthyris made no move to dislodge her arms. Her warm, smooth skin felt good against his scales, and he wanted to feel more of it. He wanted his mate to—

  No! Not my mate. Not my female. She serves only as a means to obtain my release.

  But she is my mate. Mine.

  He shifted his hands to her backside and pumped his hips furiously, that word—mine—repeating in his head over and over, faster and faster, setting the frantic rhythm for his movements as he rutted her.

  Mine. Mine. Mine!

  Elliya slid her hands down the dragon’s shoulders and curled her fingers against his back scales as he pounded into her, desperate to pull him closer. The brief pain from his initial impalement gave way to whispers of pleasure as his cock repeatedly thrust into her, stretching her to push deeper, its ridges running along the sensitive inner flesh of her sex. He filled her so completely—and yet she still wanted more.

  She wrapped her legs around his waist and used her heels to urge him on—not that he needed encouragement. His hips moved at inhuman speed, and his strong, firm hands drove her down on his shaft harder with each passing moment. His every thrust was punctuated by a guttural sound from his chest and the slap of his flesh against hers.

  Liquid heat flooded her, easing his passage and heightening her pleasure. The sensations coiled tighter and tighter within her core, intensifying with his every stroke, sending echoing ripples throughout her body. The press of his claws against Elliya’s skin only added to the intensifying maelstrom inside her.

  Elliya moaned, the sound breathless and needy. Her lashes fluttered, but she refused to let her eyes close. She watched his savagely beautiful face—his sharp, bared teeth, the burning blue of his eyes, the hard set of his brow. His expression, posture, and movements blazed with possessiveness and lust, with insatiable hunger, with rage so old and deep she could scarce comprehend it.

  And his lips…

  Elliya licked her own lips, wetting them, and the dragon’s eyes dipped to watch.

  I want to feel his lips on mine.

  Pulling her hands back, she cupped his jaw and leaned forward, pressing her lips against his.

  The dragon’s eyes flared. He snapped his head back and shook off her hands, releasing a huff of heated air through his nostrils. The orange glow in his chest brightened, and the heat he emitted grew. Elliya felt suddenly as though she were beside a cooking fire back home. But it didn’t matter—she was already burning hot all over.

  On his next powerful thrust, she burst. Pleasure exploded from Elliya’s core and raced through her body, stealing her breath and curling her toes, making every bit of her tingle. For those few moments, her awareness shrank down to only what she felt. The rest of the universe was gone, forgotten, unimportant—everything except for him.

  Her dragon.

  That unseen tether that bound Elliya to him sang, rippling through her to resonate with her heart and soul. Its song was her song—it was their song—and it was a taste of what could yet be.

  Elliya squeezed her eyes shut and tilted her head back, crying out as spasms of ecstasy took hold of her. Slickness flooded her, and her sex quivered, contracting tight around his cock, as greedy for more as she was.

  The dragon’s rhythm quickened, and his snarling breaths grew more ragged. The heat radiating from him built further, and the darkness behind Elliya’s eyelids became a warm red glow. She opened her eyes and watched from beneath hooded lids as the orange light in his chest spread to his neck, arms, and abdomen.

  His pace faltered as he drew in a hissing breath. He bucked his hips, slamming into her deeper than ever before, and roared his release. His cock thickened and jerked, and his hot seed bloomed within her. Silently, she prayed to Cetolea that his seed would take root.

  The dragon’s wings flared wide and curled around Elliya, sheltering her, as he shuddered through his climax. Inside the shadows cast by his wings there was only that roiling ember glow, there was only this otherworldly being of fire and fury, there was only Elliya’s male. Her mate.

  Panting, and with her sex still contracting in the aftermath of their mating, she pressed her palm over his chest. It was hot—hot enough that it should have burned her—but she didn’t feel any pain.

  He tipped his forehead against hers as he caught his breath, the scent of which was reminiscent of burning incense. His fingers flexed on her ass, and he drew Elliya closer still, as though he could somehow bury himself deeper within her. He undulated his hips slowly, grinding against her pleasure bud with faint growls rumbling his chest.

  “Dragon,” Elliya moaned, curling her fingers against his chest as that spark of pleasure at her core flared.

  The dragon grunted. His grasp tightened for a moment before he lifted his head, brows angled sharply toward his nose. His eyes were bright and glaring again. He searched her face, scowled, and withdrew from Elliya without warning, tearing his cock from her sex and dropping her.

  Elliya fell, too surprised by his unexpected withdrawal to react in time to catch herself. She hissed when the wall scraped her back through the fabric of her torn robe, but the pain from the scrape was overshadowed by her backside hitting the hard floor an instant later.

  Regret softened the dragon’s features for the space of a heartbeat, forming a barely perceptible crease between his brows and easing his scowl into a concerned frown. He swayed as though to reach for her.

  With another snarl, he clenched his fists, spun on his heel, and stalked toward the cave’s entrance.

  “Where are you going?” Elliya asked as she climbed onto her feet.

  “Away from you,” he snapped over his shoulder.

  His words shouldn’t have hurt her, but they struck true, as wounding as a spear through her heart. She and the dragon didn’t even know each other’s names, yet for a reason unknown to Elliya, he despised her. Despite that, she felt a deep-running connection with him. She knew he felt it too.

  Elliya leaned heavily against the stone wall, not trusting her legs to hold her up without support. His seed dripped down her inner thighs, and she pressed them together, halting the flow.

  She’d thought bonding with a dragon would have meant more. More…meaning, more connection. Instead, she felt used.

  This was too much like what she’d seen from the males of her tribe, who took pleasure from their wives whenever they desired, considering it their due. Elliya had seen Dian approach his wives while they were working in sight of everyone, toss up their loincloths, and rut them with half the tribe watching. That wasn’t the life she had wanted.

  “Dragon,” she called when he reached the opening at the end of the tunnel.

  He paused there, a dark silhouette against the deep purple of the night beyond. When he spoke, his voice echoed back to her through the tunnel, becoming a rumble as deep as rolling thunder. “Do not leave this cave, human.”

  The dragon spread his wings, looking suddenly massive though he didn’t even fill a third of the opening, and leapt into the night, leaving her alone in the dark.

  8

  Falthyris glided over a rocky landscape that should have been wholly familiar to him, but every aspect of it was wrong. Everything was larger, rougher, the distances greater. The whole world had changed around him to become something haunting in how right it should have been.

  Of course, the world hadn’t changed at all—Falthyris had. And it had drastically altered his perspective.

  The mating bond tethering him to the human pulled taut, just as it had the first time he’d left her. Were he to lower his guard for even a moment, were he to relax his will for so much as an instant, he knew that bond would drag him straight back to her.

  He growled and pumped his wings in defiance of that urge, pushing himself a little higher, a little faster.

  He had rutted her in the tunnel to relieve the pressure in his loi
ns, to punish her insolence, to show her the price of forcing this bond upon him. But she had enjoyed it. She had taken pleasure from their coupling despite his anger, despite his roughness, despite his hostility.

  Why? And why had it felt so good when she’d reached her peak, when her slick, quivering slit had clamped around his cock?

  Why had he enjoyed those small, tender touches she had bestowed upon him so much? Why had that brief press of her lips against his roused such an intense feeling in him? It had been so powerful, so overwhelming, so incomprehensible—and he wanted more.

  Falthyris needed solitude, needed peace, needed to reclaim control of himself and the situation. He needed to contemplate all that had happened since he’d first picked up the human’s feminine scent on the air. Everything had changed over the course of that brief encounter—the normalcy he’d known for centuries had been erased by a single touch.

  But the one place he would’ve gone to find that peace—his lair, his sanctuary, his home—had been invaded by a human.

  Not invaded. I brought her there. She was afforded no choice in the matter.

  And what better a place for Falthyris’s mate than his lair? He could not lie to himself—he wanted her there. Even after finding release in her body, even with the Red Heat’s mind fog having thinned a bit, he still burned with desire for her. But while Dragonsbane’s influence on him waxed and waned in waves, his longing for the human had only grown. It was an itch he could not scratch, an ache he could not soothe.

  His cock, still hard and extruding from his slit, throbbed with the remembered sensations of his mating with the human, throbbed with a yearning for more of her.

  Falthyris clamped his jaw shut and pressed his lips into a tight line. His mind raced through everything he knew about the female—her heady scent, her warmth, her smooth, soft skin, the musical quality that sometimes crept into her voice as she spoke, and those dark, steady eyes that seemed to look straight into his soul. No creature had ever looked at him with such directness, such intensity—at least not since his own sire, who had been dead for many centuries.