“Claudia is unharmed?”
They made him wait, muscles shaking from the tension of not knowing.
“Speak. Is she unharmed?”
“It seems our Claudia continues to deliver. There’s a battle royal underway at Fire Mountain, and the viewing figures are through the sky. Why do you think we chose that particular wyvern to take her?”
He’d heard how she humiliated the stupid wyvern and earned his undying ire. The seer said he would not fall for her thrall again.
“Right now, they’re evenly matched. Get going, dragon. The viewers have given both of them free rein, so it’s anyone’s guess who will win. Oh, and General Tharius, that kiss was genius. Your rewards are already stacking up.”
He didn’t hesitate. Fire Mountain rose from the western Drae’lar plains. They hadn’t gone far. Flying would get him there faster, but that wasn’t an option for him. Might never be an option without the seer’s help.
I’m sorry, he said to his dragon. He said the same to the male. He might never see either of them again.
Save her and she will save us. His dragon growled in his head. She will, the male said. And the thought of our child will keep her alive. She’ll fight for that.
The soft patter of Serllia’s boots sounded behind him. She’d catch up eventually, and he’d deal with her then, but this first. Claudia was out there, battling the wyvern, doing everything in her power to save their child. Brave, feisty Claudia, who looked wyverns in the eye and did not quaver.
Who tamed a mighty Draegon general with a touch.
Keep fighting. Do not give up. I’m coming for you.
The ground squished soft beneath his feet, turned to mud by the heavy rain. Clogging his boots and slowing his steps. The wind blew his hair in tangles across his eyes. Another storm brewing, and in the far distance, Fire Mountain, a holy place to the Draegon, shrouded in smoke and cloud and a fitting place for his first battle.
Serllia’s angry demands that he stay, that he kiss her again, rattled around his head until he lost her to another voice. The voice of Claudia, his, faint and frantic.
Now would be good, Tharius. I can’t hold him off for much longer. Tharius, where are you?
An eye followed him. One remained to track the seer. As he ran, Tharius’s spirits rose on a beat of pure hope. Perhaps they were yet on his side.
The eye swung around, an almost malevolent gleam in the flashing lights.
“Are you wondering about your hoard, General Tharius? The viewers think you might be. They want you to know that the stripping of the treasure proved very entertaining. We will be billing the battle for possession as a prime time special.”
We must go back. Defend the hoard. His dragon cried out in anguish.
It is lost, let it go. His male form channelled Claudia’s sage advice. He ran on, ignoring the pull to return to the lair to protect and defend what was his. Mere baubles, compared to what he fought for now.
He pumped his arm faster, cursing his useless limb. And in his mind, Claudia’s voice grew louder and more desperate.
Now, Tharius. I need you now. We both do.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Now, Tharius. Now would be a very good time to show up.
Claudia sent out the frantic thought as the wyvern dropped onto the lower slopes of Fire Mountain. Mouth pressed firmly closed, because the hell she was showing her pain, she endured the rough scrape of rocks and stones, rolled and looked around for the others.
They wouldn’t be long. The wyvern had already whispered the destination given to him by the controller to his comrades, and the war-band would simply follow them.
If Tharius had any sense, he’d do the same, though pride might stop him. Pride, or Serllia. In the grip of the wyvern’s claws, her last view was of Serllia turning her face to Tharius, with every intention of putting him in thrall.
She thought it that easy? Tharius had a stubborn streak as thick as this old dragon haunt, where none ventured close, for fear of vengeful ghosts. The wyvern glared suspiciously at the rising slopes of Fire Mountain. Though legends said otherwise, Claudia sensed the echoing growls were nothing more than the lava-like sludge grumbling inside the crater atop the mountain.
The wyvern had shifted to hybrid form to watch her until the others arrived, his head churning with fury when he realised he would not be getting a bite of this pie. Only the first six into the fray were to fight Tharius for her. He remained relegated to guard and he wasn’t happy.
Understatement of the century, she thought, watching his lips peel back in a snarl. Death glowed in his red eyes, and from the thoughts coursing his mind, he planned to fuck her inside out and then tear her limb from limb.
“And that camera will kill you for it,” she said, hoping he feared the Corporation more than he desired his revenge. They’d chosen him as guard knowing it would frustrate and enrage him.
As the moments wore on the wyvern’s fear of retribution was fast giving way to his desire to kill her as violently as possible, whatever the consequences. She had no choice but to throw her last drops of energy into keeping those thoughts at bay.
So far, her mind tricks had confused him enough to keep him snarling at a distance, content with merely visualising the torture he would inflict on her. But she was weak and hungry, her energy draining like water through a sieve. So far, she had the viewers on board, cheering her corner, but they were here for the big feature not this B movie. They’d soon get bored and start demanding action.
Tharius, where are you? She had three followers on her radar now, indistinct, but their auras were moving closer and coalescing to form living breathing beings out for blood. Why was Tharius not with them? Were the Corporation holding him, or did Serllia have that honour?
Fight her, she thought. Don’t let her mess with your head.
Coming.
Oh thank you. A faint whisper, but it was Tharius. She hooked her wet hair behind her ears and pulled at the lacings of Ekala’s gown. She’d made her grand entrance but she couldn’t fight with the bulky gown tangling in her legs and weighing her down. Time to dress for battle.
The distraction proved enough to drop the connection holding the wyvern. He lunged at her, claws extended, searing her cheek in a stinging slash. She pushed the gown off her shoulders, letting the weight of it slide out her arms. The few stashed pieces of treasure clinked into the dirt.
The wyvern cast the shimmering scales a greedy glance and swung again, catching a corner of the heavy hide material pooling at her waist with one curved talon. The momentum sent her toppling, cracking her temple on the rock face.
Stunned, she blinked up at the scaly male looming over her, mouth stretched wide in a feral grin. His erection, thick and heavy, threatened to burst the lacings of his pants. He gathered up the material, trapping her in the folds and turned to the camera.
“Me and her. Now. Ask the viewers. I despoil her, kill her even, the dragon will still fight to avenge her honour. Worth big reward - yes?”
Damned, that was a good offer. What the hell could she say to counter that? Tharius would still fight, and all the more fiercely, if avenging her honour.
Could she get the volcano to blow? No, that was more in Serllia’s gift, and even a seer as powerful as she couldn’t command a volcano.
Tell them you’re pregnant. Hell, did she even just think that? What else could she say to keep herself alive? The wyvern’s foot twisted on the fabric, pushing her into the gritty rock.
You can’t feel your foot. She tried to get into his mind while he was full of his own smug pitch to the camera. His attention wavered earned a slight loosening. Enough for her to slither out of the imprisoning gown. She pushed upright, leaning on the rock for support. Wondering vaguely if any of this stress might hurt the baby.
The hell any of them were hurting their child. The ember flared in a wash of protective heat. She had to restrain herself from placing a healing hand on her stomach. A signal even these beings couldn’t fail to understand.
/> “You’re going to let that thing kill me?” If she’d built up any goodwill with those viewers, now was the time to call it in. “When I haven’t had nearly enough fun with the simple-minded idiot yet?”
The controller laughed softly. “Calibrating audience response. Claudia, you’re killing me.” He threw one of her own expressions back at her. The Corporation had a humanoid face after all.
“The others are near. They’ll kill you if you deny them a fight.”
The wyvern dipped for the fallen scales, turned one over and stuffed them into his jerkin. Smirking, he casually unlaced his pants.
“Not kill me if I strike a deal with the seer and Veton. You know he plans a coup? Othrid is finished, and I be here offering my allegiance to the new order.”
“Your dick’s nothing but a shrivelled up maggot. A dick’s that thing you keep in your pants, by the way. The thing that couldn’t poke a hole in a sponge pudding.” She visualised the audience punching the unfamiliar references into their modules so they could get the joke. The wyvern looked down at himself almost comically.
“It’s withering before your very eyes, folks. Look at him.”
“You have hexed my rod?” The wyverns red eyes flared wide. He rubbed at himself, frantically attempting to revive the dying organ. But she’d planted the doubt. Didn’t think it would work, but evidently it was enough.
“Step away from the female, wyvern. The viewers wish to see real males fight. You will continue to guard the target.”
His claw paused. He might still defy the order and rip her head off.
“I will find you. Kill you and the dragon slowly. I will take you. Make him watch before I kill him. I will not rest until you have suffered long and hard for this.”
She let him talk, her attention more on the incoming threats than this defused one. Defused for now, she corrected. Once made, like the dragons, the wyvern code demanded they carry out the threat unto death.
“You think my dragon will let anyone near me?” He was close, they were all close. Tharius handicapped, with use of a single arm and his dragon and male at war with each other. She smoothed down her simple gown and addressed the camera with the mocking bow they’d come to expect from her. The wyvern turned his back on her, yanking with muttered curses at his laces.
“Thank you gentle viewers. I love you all.”
Two wyverns in flight, the runners at their backs. And behind them, Tharius and Serllia.
“Name your reward, Claudia.”
“I want to know what happens next.” She meant to help Tharius. While he fought, she’d engage Serllia, and hope the seer arrived depleted and spent.
“We’re holding everyone at a distance, giving them all time to arrive and to stop the wyverns dominating this fight. The viewers don’t want that. Then the dragon will engage one at a time.”
“Is Serllia with them?” She knew it, but it served her purpose to keep some of her abilities secret.
“Count on it.” The controller chuckled. A strange sound coming from the robotically rendered voice. Hell, Mario might be nothing more than a computerised automaton at the other end of that camera. “And Claudia, you’ll never believe what she and Tharius have been up to. Seems you have a rival for your affections. That, or he’s as easy a mark as that wyvern, there.”
He kissed me, Claudia. Freely and willingly. You believe he could resist?
Serllia was nearer than she realised. The plain narrowed as it melded into the lower slopes, giving way to closely packed forests flanking a wide, grassy path connecting it to the sacred mountain. Easily defended, but giving a poor view of anyone approaching outside the thickets of trees.
But the seer was out there, gloating and sending her venom on ahead. Tharius kissed her? Claudia turned the words over and heard only the truth. And she remembered the last time she saw Serllia kissing a male. She’d kissed Othrid’s will from him. But Tharius would not be so easy to enthral.
Would he?
Why willingly, though, when his hatred for the seer had been so obvious?
She let down her guard, overwhelmed by jealousy and then fear. If Tharius lost this fight, Serllia would have no problem extracting her from the victor to carry out her threat of breeding her in captivity. What a show that would make.
The dull thud to the back of her head took her by surprise. She stared around, wondering why the trees had suddenly decided to dance a jig, and her head grown to twice its size. Nigh was falling. No, too soon for that. Her knees crumpled, and the wyvern’s smirking face swam before her.
Her head bounced off the rock to the sound of a female laughing. Jubilant, pitying. Rough wyvern hands circled her neck.
Oh, shit. Tharius, where are you…
Chapter Twenty-Five
“The viewers have noted the dragon’s maimed arm, so they’ve naturally voted to see a down-and-dirty fistfight.”
The camera operator paused for a reaction. The war-band giving him the evil eye, the wyverns pawing the ground in their impatience to have at the fight, burst into raucous laughter. Some called out, words he did not need an interpreter to understand. They thought him weak and disabled. An easy mark.
On the short run to the rendezvous point, he’d done nothing to change that opinion, alternately limping and cradling his maimed arm. Though it infuriated him to play the role of the vanquished, Claudia would be proud of him. Only the seer saw through his play-acting. She’d called in a wyvern eventually to give her a ride, otherwise they’d have been waiting for her all day. The eyes obviously wanted her in this fight, and she stood now, watching him with a deceptive calm that could not hide the lust in her eyes.
More than wanting, she needed him, he realised with a jolt. Her power of thrall lay in sexual dominance. But he’d never been a male to be led around by the cock. Only Claudia got to do that.
His advantage now lay in knowing every scrap of this valley, the narrow approach to the sacred mountain he’d been climbing since he could walk. Flying over since that first day he discovered sufficient strength to lift him airborne in his wings. If it was still there, a path through the dense forest cut a diagonal line straight to the lower slopes.
They’d all been ordered to this point, and when the eyes gave the signal to move, he would wait until the others ran for fear of being followed.
Claudia where are you? They’d established a mental link, but she’d suddenly become worryingly quiet. Surely, this near, she should be screaming in his thoughts with perfect clarity. He flexed his fist and heard the swish of Serllia’s skirts, the faint crackle of her damaged rattle.
Listen in vain, dragon. The wyvern’s gone rogue. Might have even killed her by now.
She lives, I can still feel her.
Nothing. No words softly whispered in his mind. No pulse of her blood. No more frantic pleading that he speed to her aid. Dread turned his heart to ice and there was Serllia, rummaging about in his brain. What did he care? What in the name of Dramis happened to Claudia? She would not give up her life without a fight. He’d have heard her desperate last words.
Around him, the waiting warriors quaffed at wineskins held over open mouths. Wine ran down their chins like small rivers of blood. He smelled bread and charred meat, and his stomach rolled and demanded food, no longer willing to fight hungry. Food he didn’t have, and none seemed inclined to share. Claudia, speak to me. Tell me you, our child, are safe.
Oh, this just gets better, dragon. We are rightly amused by the story of your pathetic charge to save your females, but to hear it from your own thoughts? And yet again, history repeats and you are too late to save your mate.
I will save her. He would go now before they gave the order. Every muscle twitched, urging him to move.
They will cut you down if you break the rules. You’ll be even less use to her then. If she still lives.
He stepped away to further himself from the sour pheromone emanating from her body. An aphrodisiac to some. To him she smelled of old hag. He wiped his mouth, remo
ving the memory of the kiss. The hag watched his fingers with an uncontained longing. He’d do it again if called to. Claudia would forgive him for laying his mouth on another.
Sexual thrall worked both ways.
My wyvern is inside her now, dragon. While she lies cold in the mud. There’ll be little left of her when you get there.
“Remember the rules,” the operator said. “First six in the zone fight the dragon. The rest of you are out of the game. We…”
Enough. If they followed him to the shortcut, so be it. He knew enough blind alleys to lead them astray if he could muster speed. They’d eaten well, he had not. Dramis in chains, he’d been all but dead for so long, he remained a mere shadow of the dragon.
This half-state was not yet the best of both worlds, only the weaker of his two halves. Growing stronger by the day but nowhere near to fighting strength.
Chaos exploded behind him, a cacophony of guttural yells and cries of the males and wyverns scrabbling to follow and ignoring the controller’s indignant orders that they wait on his command. Splashes of water spat from his feet pounding dips in the wet soil filled with puddles from the rainstorm.
A strong fist grasped his shoulder, trying to take him down. He turned and threw a punch, thankful it wasn’t a wyvern in half-shift. They’d been ordered to fight in that or male state, and they were the ones to watch for. The rest of the war-band were no match for a hybrid dragon.
The warrior ducked under the flying fist, going for his useless arm. Tharius swallowed a grunt of pain and kicked out, knocking the warrior to the dirt. Three ran past them, more intent on being chosen than looking for early glory. An ever-present eye hovered near, watching the encounter; others flew ahead, keeping up with every bit of the action.
“Wasting. Precious. Time.” He doled out a punch for each word, finally silencing the warrior. No weapons to steal. They’d all been disarmed, but the lure of the satchel hanging crosswise over the man’s shoulder proved too much. Tharius stooped and yanked it away, throwing it over his own shoulder. A roasted leg of something he didn’t recognise nestled in the bag, wrapped in parchment. He jammed it into his mouth like one who hadn’t eaten in an age.
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