by Kate Rudolph
“I could be full of you.” It was porny, but in the heat of the moment my brain thought it sounded good. My entire body felt heavy with need and I wrapped my legs around his waist to bring him as close as I could. With his hard length pressed against me it was almost as good as it got.
Drikal groaned. “I didn’t bring you here to seduce you,” he insisted, but his lips found one of my breasts and started to tease until I was moaning helplessly.
“Then it’s a good thing I’m taking up the slack,” I murmured, but my mind was quickly turning to mush and I didn’t know if I’d be able to manage coherent sentences for long. Drikal’s skin was hot against my hands and the light in the cavern seemed to glow brighter, but that could have just been my senses sharpening with pleasure. It should have been too hot, the near boiling point of the pool mixed with Drikal’s even hotter skin, but I soaked it up and loved it.
And at that moment I wasn’t going to question it.
His fingers at my entrance made me make an undignified sound, but I was beyond shame, and judging by Drikal’s grin he liked my noises. I could live with that. I’d never been quiet in bed and I wasn’t going to start now. I knew what I wanted and if I wasn’t getting it, I was going to make damn sure that changed. But Drikal seemed to be hitting all my hot spots without issue. A distant part of me wondered if there was some mind reading component to the whole dragon thing, but everything he was doing felt so good that I didn’t care.
Another finger joined the first and I wanted to tell him I was ready, but I could still feel his cock and wondered if I really was. He fucked me with his fingers, pressing in just right until I was panting and begging for more, and the more I begged the more he tortured me, and the more he tortured me the more I wanted it. Our surroundings faded away until Drikal and his wicked fingers were everything.
Then he pulled them out and brought his hand up to his mouth, licking what was left of my taste off of each digit. God, that was hot.
“Are you trying to kill me?” I didn’t even know if it made sense, half panted and half moaned, but Drikal’s dark chuckle told me that he knew exactly what he was doing and he wasn’t about to let up.
I didn’t want him to.
And then he was easing himself against me and opening me up, the blunt tip of his cock pushing inside me bit by bit. It was slow, the torture even greater than what he’d been doing with his fingers. It felt so good, but I wanted more, wanted all of him.
He gave it to me, giving me enough time to get adjusted to his girth before pressing me hard against the edge of the pool and using the buoyancy in our favor. He drove in, hitting me just right until I was cursing and already on edge. I was suspended above the little bench, my back wedged against the wall, but without much leverage to do anything.
It was me that bit him, leaning forward and latching onto his shoulder when a particularly hard thrust almost sent me reeling. I didn’t bite down hard, but I could taste his skin and wanted even more. I didn’t think I’d ever stop wanting him.
Release tore through me and I cried out against his skin as my body shuddered. It went on and on, the pleasure almost unbearable but something I never wanted to end.
And when I felt Drikal spend a moment later my body proved it wasn’t done. I clung to him, riding out the storm and watching in awe as my hands glowed against him. I didn’t know how I was doing it or why, but with him I wasn’t scared, and with the satisfaction that permeated my body I wasn’t sure I’d ever be scared again.
With Drikal by my side, how could anything go wrong?
Chapter Fourteen
Drikal
“Our scouts have tagged at least six incursions in the last week, with the skirmish with our alpha being the worst of them,” Veyne reported. I’d gathered my top lieutenants to my war room to finally discuss the escalating wyvern threat. It meant leaving Kristen warm and inviting in my bed while I managed these problems, but I’d been ignoring them for long enough. And even though a part of me wanted to tell Veyne to deal with it and return to my mate, that deeply ingrained duty that made me an alpha forced me to stay. Keeping the wyverns away kept my people safe, and keeping my people safe kept my mate safe. To do any less would make me unworthy of my position.
“And how has Greer responded to our inquiries?” The first thing Veyne had done after I’d been injured was open up a line of communication to the wyvern alpha. The incursion by the wyverns could have been taken as an act of war, but we were not so eager to rush in, not if there was some way to avoid it.
“Poorly,” was Veyne’s succinct response. “He claims to have no knowledge of any attack perpetuated against you and promises to mount a full investigation. If the guilty party is found, he says he will inform us. But he will not allow any dragons into his territory to observe and under no circumstances will anyone be turned over to face dragon justice.”
“So he’s doing nothing.” I couldn’t exactly blame him. If some of my idiot dragons had made an incursion into wyvern land and attacked Greer I’d want to be the one to punish them. I would never allow another alpha to seize that authority from me. “Do we have any reason to believe he didn’t order the attack?”
To get so far into dragon territory undetected took skills that youthful wyverns weren’t likely to have, and the wyverns had been experienced fighters, most likely warriors with years of training. Plenty of youths tested the border every year, but those were pranks that involved some minor property damage and we were just as guilty of it as the wyverns. This, though, this wasn’t random. And while a trio of soldiers might have planned it on their own, I had trouble believing it. At best they’d been sent as spies and got lucky in their attack on me. At worst it was the first stage of war.
“Our spies haven’t uncovered anything either way,” Veyne said. There was some grumbling from the other alphas, but they remained quiet. Veyne was the head of the lieutenants and spoke for all of them. If they wished to elect a new leader that was up to them.
“We know they’ve wanted war since Greer solidified his base,” one of the lieutenants, Jayk, finally burst out. He could be hotheaded at times and was always certain that the wyverns were up to something.
Veyne glared in his direction and Jayk subsided.
“Increase the border patrols and notify the villages to keep a keener watch. No matter what happens, we won’t make the first move. I’m not willing to challenge Greer on this yet, but I want us to get eyes on what their warriors are doing. Winter will be here soon and I’d much rather sleep in the keep during the cold months than make camp.”
There was a general muttering of agreement before I heard one of them say, “Of course he thinks that now that he has a hot piece in his bed.”
The room went silent and all eyes turned to Jayk, who froze where he sat. He was the newest of the lieutenants and still determining his place in the hierarchy. There was potential in him. He could one day be the alpha if he got his instincts under control. But if he spoke of my mate like that he wouldn’t live long enough to rise any higher in power.
“Would you care to repeat that?” I asked, keeping my suddenly bucking temper under control with a steely grip. I wanted to lunge across the table and take him by the throat, slam him down in front of everyone, and tell him that no one spoke disrespectfully of my mate. But that would only breed resentment and insubordination. I needed to give him a chance to correct the error, and once it was done the message would be out. No one spoke poorly of Kristen or there would be consequences.
Jayk glanced at Veyne as if my second might save him. I didn’t know if Veyne looked back. My gaze was locked on Jayk and he was lucky I was keeping my fire at bay. For now.
“I only meant that rumors have been swirling, alpha. I meant no disrespect.” He shot his gaze down and mumbled out the last.
I hadn’t wanted to make any declaration so soon. I could still feel Kristen’s flesh pressed against mine, could remember the pool as if it were a moment ago rather than several hours. I knew sh
e still hadn’t made a choice and might want to return home, even if I couldn’t imagine being parted. But no one in my keep could question her position, especially not if rumors were already circulating. They’d know she had dragon blood soon enough, and if she wasn’t mine the other alphas would be relentless. But I didn’t care about her dragon blood. If she never shifted it didn’t matter. “She is mine. Take your speculation elsewhere.” I might have been a creature of fire, but ice coated my words. “You’re all dismissed.”
It took a moment before the mad scramble began, but then they were all moving, trying to beat each other to the exit. At the end I was left alone with Veyne and the various papers we’d been studying. A bad feeling sat heavily in my gut. If things didn’t escalate to war, I feared I’d face a challenge over my newly chosen mate.
“Jayk’s an idiot filled with too much bluster, but he didn’t mean anything,” Veyne said once the door was closed. “He’s been looking for a woman for months and none will have him.”
“No wonder, if that’s his attitude.” Dragon women didn’t suffer fools and if Jayk said something stupid to them he was lucky the burns were easy to hide. But that still didn’t settle me. “She’s my mate. My true mate.” I hadn’t told anyone, but if I couldn’t trust Veyne, I could trust no one. He’d been at my side for years. And he knew how to keep his own counsel.
“That’s…” He blinked his eyes several times as if he couldn’t wrap his mind around the shock.
“The embers of her flame don’t burn me.” I needed him to know this was real. The legends of what truly mated pairs had done in the past, how they’d led our people spoke of endless possibilities. But my mind hadn’t started turning there yet, not until Kristen was at my side for good.
“Merely the embers?” Veyne leaned a hip against the table and gave me a searching look, the same one he gave to misbehaving new recruits. “You mean to say she’s shifted?”
Embers or flame, it made no difference, but I didn’t want to get into a semantic argument. “She summoned the embers while I healed and kept near me through the night. Do you think I would be standing so tall if my mate hadn’t given me strength?”
“You’re the alpha, of course you would. I just assumed you had crushed the pain inside of you and it fled in terror.” He offered a ghost of a smile, but still seemed hung up on what I’d said. “She summons flame in human form. She’ll be an alpha when she shifts.” I didn’t know what I was hearing in his tone and I wasn’t sure I liked it.
For just a moment I questioned whether I should have said anything, but this was Veyne, of course he needed to know. It would affect everything in the keep, everything in the dragon lands, and it would be poor form to surprise him if she accepted me. Once she accepted me. She’d taken me into her body, and I could find my way into her heart.
“Of course she’ll be an alpha, she’s my true mate. What else would she be?” I truly didn’t care. My heart sang with the fact that one day we’d be able to fly together, but even if she’d been bound to her human form I would still want her. My soul called out and she answered, and the fact that she would one day be a strong dragon was a bonus.
“Have you told anyone else? What does your mother think?” Again with that tone. There hadn’t been a truly mated pair in living memory and Veyne seemed more wary or jealous than anything else. Did he not trust Kristen because she wasn’t from the dragon lands? Did he think she had something to do with the wyverns? She hadn’t even known what a wyvern was until today.
I might have suspected someone else, but Kristen was my true mate. And she’d been delivered here from Earth. She was no tool of our enemy.
“My mother will not know until it is done.” That was an order. My mother had meddled enough and I didn’t want to think what damage she could do if she knew that Kristen belonged with me. “And you’re the only one who knows. I haven’t even told her yet. I want to give her time to adjust. It’s a big change. She hasn’t told me much about her world, but I gather it is very different.”
“Earth? I’d never heard of it until she said something.”
We hadn’t spent much time talking, but I’d had one of my assistants pull up an information sheet on the planet. “It has the technology of an Oscavian colony, though it has nothing to do with the empire. Large cities, space stations, all that noise. And no dragons, none that can shift, anyway.” It sounded terrible. Give me the wind in the trees and blue skies all around. I would go mad living in a forest of metal.
“Do you fear that she’ll find things too… slow here?” Veyne got to the center of one of my worries. “Or perhaps too warlike.” And there was the other.
But this conversation had gone on for long enough. “I’m an alpha. I fear nothing.” And I left him there to deal with that. I had a mate to woo.
Chapter Fifteen
Kristen
Things were… good. Really good. Scary good. Sure, there was the looming threat of wyvern attack, and I still didn’t feel like I fit in. But Drikal was with me as much as he could manage over the next week and I was starting to feel weird and warm and safe and like things wouldn’t go wrong. Happy, that was happiness. And it wasn’t just the sex, though that was excellent. Like blow my head off, scramble my brain, turn me to mush amazing. If Drikal wanted to keep me in his bed for another week and do nothing else, I wasn’t going to say no.
And Drikal, despite all his responsibilities, was kind of the best boyfriend I’d ever had. It was weird to think of the alpha dragon as my boyfriend, but I didn’t know of another word that would work. We hung out, we ate together, we joked, we had lots of sex, and it was all good. He’d introduced me to several of his lieutenants and sat me next to him at dinner every night. He showed me off to the entire keep and still respected me when we were behind closed doors.
I’d basically moved in with him. Yeah, I’d been given those quarters next to his, but that second night after he was injured, one thing led to another and we didn’t get to sleep until well past midnight, and at that point I was way too wrung out to walk those few meters back to my own room. Besides, Drikal had been holding onto me too tight for me to even try to go.
He was a cuddler. You’d never know it from looking at him, all hulking muscles and serious expression, but he couldn’t seem to stop touching me. And since I was the same way I couldn’t say that I minded.
If he could promise me that every week would be like this, I’d want to stay. It was so perfect it almost made me forget about Earth, not that there was much to remember back there. If things kept going like they were, I’d be in love with him before I was supposed to go home, and then I wouldn’t know what in the hell I was supposed to do.
I’d never been in love before, but I’d seen what it could do to those around me. One of my friends back in high school had been head over heels for her boyfriend. And when he’d needed money he’d convinced her that the local shop was the best way to get it. Not by applying for jobs or anything. No, they’d robbed the place, and because they were dumb kids they’d gotten caught. She’d refused to say anything to the police while he’d told them it was all his girlfriend’s idea and he’d only been there to talk her out of it. They both went to jail, and I’d never seen her again.
Another girl I knew stayed around because she loved her boyfriend even though he hit her. Another gave up her dream job cause he wanted to roam the country to “find himself” and finding himself, for some reason, involved a lot of other women’s beds.
Love didn’t work out. I’d never seen it and I wasn’t quite sure I believed it was anything more than insanity. And yet, if Drikal asked me to rob a store with him…
Well, I wouldn’t. He wouldn’t ask that, in the first place, and he wouldn’t put me at that kind of risk in the second. I wasn’t sure if it was naive to think that, but he cared for me. And I cared for him.
Caring was different than love. It was safe. It wouldn’t make me stupid. The stupid thing would be to stay on a planet I didn’t know just beca
use a guy I was attracted to wanted me. I needed to think with my brain, not with my horny body. And, oh boy, was there horniness. It was like once we’d gone to bed once, or, rather, gone to the pool, a switch had been flipped and I couldn’t get enough of him. It would have been embarrassing if he wasn’t just as enthralled. We’d been caught kissing by more than one person in the palace, and it would have been much worse the second time if that servant had walked through the door about two minutes later.
Lust. Not love. Lust was okay, it was understandable. Who wouldn’t lust after Drikal?
But he was only mine to touch. The sudden lance of possessiveness had been a shock the first time I felt it, but after the last week it was practically an old friend. While I was here, Drikal was mine, and I didn’t want him looking at anyone else. He didn’t seem inclined to do so, and he never once mentioned anyone but me. But I wanted the world to know he was mine. For now, at least.
I could obsess about it all night, so I tried to put it out of my head. And lurking right behind it was the thing I still couldn’t wrap my mind around.
I was a dragon.
I hadn’t shifted—I didn’t think it would be real until I did—but the evidence was stacking up. Two days ago I’d gotten the hiccups and while trying to get rid of them I’d ended up belching up a cloud of dense smoke. If they had fire alarms around here I would have caused the entire building to be evacuated.
I’d been casually snapping my fingers one afternoon while I was lying on the grass outside and somehow caused a spark that lit the dry greenery all around me. And at night I dreamed of flying. Not like Drikal had taken me, but flying under my own power. I imagined a sleek body, like Drikal’s but not solid black. I’d probably be a good deal smaller, if our sizes in human form were anything to go by. My wings pumped through the air, sending me gliding from cloud to cloud. I could pull them in and spin, rolling around like I wasn’t dozens of meters in the sky and could fall out at any moment.
