DONAR (Planet Of Dragons Book 4)

by Bonnie Burrows

  DONAR

  PLANET OF THE DRAGONS BOOK 4

  BONNIE BURROWS

  Copyright ©2018 by Bonnie Burrows

  All rights reserved.

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  About This Book

  When Brianne Heatherton volunteered to support alien life conservation on a far away planet she really had no idea what to expect. The aliens that resided on that planet were sick and needed human intervention as soon as possible.

  But it was on this journey that she met Donar.

  A blonde haired, muscle bound weredragon who had an equally handsome twin brother named Conran.

  It was clear that Donar wanted to enjoy Brianne all to himself and she wanted him too.

  However, the dragon twins were used to sharing everything in life. And that included women...

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  The great sun Catalan came up golden over the trees of the horizon, bringing dawn to the city of Greenscale on the planet Lacerta.

  Brianne Heatherton drank in the first warm rays of the day, thinking that it should not be so remarkable that she was standing, dressed in her form-flattering work coveralls, on one of the terraces of a great and stately mansion built into a mountainside. As a xenobiologist, she had traveled all over the known galaxy. She had visited more planets and moons than she could count, throwing in an asteroid here and there, and once even a comet.

  She had experienced environments that could kill a human being as quickly as one looked at them, and been to places so beautiful and delicious and congenial to human life that they could make one want to spend at least two lifetimes in them. She had observed, catalogued, touched, handled, petted, wrestled with, captured, and examined life forms of every description, from the most repulsive to the most exquisite.

  She had met beings of every civilization and every stratum of society known to space-traveling humanity and seen or stayed in places as wretched as one could imagine and as fabulous as one could dream of. So, on the face of it, there should be nothing so extraordinary about the place where she had spent the last night. It was only a spectacular mansion constructed in the sheer face of a mountainside, wasn’t it?

  Well, frankly, yes. But this particular mansion built into a mountain happened to be on one of the most storied planets in Commonwealth space, the home of beings who were as spectacular as the piece of architecture in which Brianne was lodging. This was, after all, Lacerta, home of a society of once-human colonists whom fate or nature, depending on one’s biases, had mutated into a species of their own—a species of men and women with the power to become living dragons. Brianne happened to be staying in the magnificent home of one of the most lavishly wealthy families of a magnificent race.

  Greenscale, the city so lovingly crafted into its natural surroundings, was designed to exist in harmony with nature. The population of the place was mostly well-to-do or upper-class, if not outright rich, and that was the kind of place where they had decided long ago that they wanted to live. So, homes and shops and other structures were built into hillsides or constructed so that only their upper floors and rooftops were at ground level and covered with grass and flowers and hedge rows. Or they were built into immense rocks, tucked into stands of trees, or even constructed partly inside trees themselves.

  And some places were actually built in the boughs of trees or placed between the trees and connected by walkways that served as streets and boulevards above the ground. There were even habitats and homes constructed at the bottoms of lakes and ponds or floating on the surface of them. Looking out from the terrace, Brianne could see handsome, gleaming dwellings that sat on a lake, and gazing out farther, she could make out more beautiful and elaborate homes dotting other mountainsides.

  Seeing the homes on the lake reminded Brianne of the origins of the people who lived here and the care that visitors like her must always take, for all the waters of Lacerta were insinuated with a native mineral called Draconite, a mutagenic compound that had turned a lost colony of humans into a race of dragon men and women.

  Visitors to Lacerta routinely took mutagenic inhibitors every day to ensure that they would not be so mutated themselves. Brianne had remembered to take her inhibitor this morning; otherwise, with one swallow of Lacertan water or one bath or shower in it, she would soon know a dramatic new meaning of the expression “going native.”

  The entire community was made to feel almost as if one did not know where nature left off and civilization began, though once civilization took over, it was one of the most gleaming and luxurious expressions of civilization on this or any other planet.

  And with a new sun overhead, out came some of the people that made Lacerta one of the most impressive places to visit or live in all of space. Brianne smiled to see them in their sleek, streamlined native clothing with backs either completely open or collapsible to make way for the thing that made them so impressive. A Lacertan had not a single shape, but two, and as Brianne watched, she could see some of them taking flight, soaring and swooping and circling along in the shapes that were not human.

  At will, they could become creatures of myth, beings of scaly flesh covering hard, lean sinew, with serpentine tails and necks, cushiony spines down their backs, and long, proud, and horned reptilian heads. They commanded the air with broad and mighty wings that propelled them powerfully aloft, steering with wing beats and twists of those fantastic tails. Lacertans, by their very nature, inspired varying degrees of wonder, awe, respect, fear, fascination, and envy in common humans. There were some who admired them, and there were some who even wanted to be them.

  Brianne, for her part, was grateful, for this was somehow her first visit to their planet, for their help. Thanks to the Lacertans—those who owned the property where she was staying—she was about to realize one of the greatest ambitions of her career.

  Just visible between some of the trees in the distance was a gleaming spot of light that Brianne knew was the center of that ambition. Out there, in one of those places carved into the nature that the citizens of Greenscale so respected, was a project that Brianne had conceived, over which she had labored long and worked hard, to the point of venturing onto one of the more distressed planets in known space on what amounted to a rescue mission. A biological, ecological rescue mission. And today, that mission would enter its final stage, thanks to Brianne’s hosts at the mansion in the mountainside.

  No sooner had she thought of them than she heard a voice, a male voice as warm as Catalan above, coming over her shoulder from the threshold of the
terrace. “Good morning, Brianne. All dressed and ready, I see.”

  The ones stepping out from the house onto the terrace with her were not nearly so dressed as Brianne. And it was all good that they were not: if anyone ever belonged naked or nearly so, it was the twin brothers Donar and Conran Quist. They were as dazzling to behold as the very star that warmed their planet. They were clad only in loincloths now, but Brianne was well aware that Lacertans liked to sleep nude and were not in the least shy about it; thus, they had stretched out in bed overnight wearing nothing but the solid and hard, perfectly sculpted, amazing muscles wrapped around their godlike frames.

  Truly every muscle on those twin bodies was wrought and honed to be as perfect a thing as it could possibly be, each one lending itself to the overall perfection of the identical forms. They were blond, each one crowned with thick, golden, perfectly groomed hair. They had sparkling sapphire eyes set into shockingly handsome faces that spoke of the boundless energy and exuberance of youth passing into the beginning wisdom of young adulthood.

  In a race of men who morphed into mythical beings, Donar and Conran Quist were things of mythical beauty, worthy of the best of men and dragons alike.

  Brianne turned around to greet them. The gaze of the twins’ handsomeness fell on Brianne, her quiet beauty adorned by darker blonde hair pulled back into a braid behind her back. She basked in their morning looks as she basked in the warmth of Catalan. As she did when she first arrived on Lacerta, she noticed the slight differences in style between the twins. Donar kept just a bit of a stubbly goatee on the perfection of his face and had a tendency towards darker colors than his brother. Conran’s features were immaculately shaved, and he showed a preference for brighter, warmer colors.

  Brianne guessed that what lurked under those loincloths, Donar’s dark green one and Conran’s golden yellow one, was also identical—and generously proportioned. Lacertan males had a tendency to be, frankly, very well-endowed. Very well. She had never had what must be the breathtaking pleasure of going to bed with one, but she had heard stories of those who had been bedded by these dragon men, and not one was ever a story of dissatisfaction.

  Their ways in the bedroom were as legendary as the creatures into which they morphed. The twins would likely have thought nothing of giving Brianne a look. Lacertans were strangers to body shame. Brianne, however, kept that idea in check, reminding herself that she had come to their planet for other reasons and that she had a very specific relationship with these brothers, one that she did not care to complicate.

  “Good morning,” Brianne said back. “You’re right. I couldn’t wait.”

  “We can’t blame you,” Donar replied. “In your position, I’d be anxious to get things started too.”

  Was there a double entendre in that statement? Brianne doubted it and chose to dismiss it as just the consequence of her seeing them this way after having seen them only clothed since they came to pick her up at the spaceport and bring her here. She swept from her mind all thoughts of the Quist brothers and whatever “positions” she and they might take up. Their positions were those of a scientist and the two men sponsoring her work, and so they ought to remain.

  “I’m sure we’re about as anxious as you are to see the culmination of your work and our contributions,” said Conran. “You’ve put so much passion and dedication into bringing our guest to Lacerta, and we’ve put so much of the Quist Foundation’s backing into it, this morning is the reward for all of us.”

  Brianne smiled. “Or the first reward. What I’m most looking forward to, still, is the payoff of everything we’ve done.”

  “We’ll get it,” Conran said confidently. “Cardax III is standing by, just waiting to receive word that our guest is ready.”

  “I like the way we’re talking about it as our ‘guest,’” said Donar. Noting Brianne’s reaction, he corrected himself, “That is, talking about her.” Brianne, from the beginning, had never once used the pronoun it to refer to their subject. She had always spoken of her in more personal terms. The “guest” was female, and Brianne had consistently used she and her, never it, in talking about her. He added, “‘Guests’ are usually invited, or invite themselves.”

  Conran nodded, agreeing with the observation. “What we have out there is not so much our ‘guest’ as a refugee.”

  “I guess the word ‘refugee’ would fit, in a way,” said Brianne. “Taking in a refugee is an act of mercy. Of course, refugees usually ask for the help they’re given. Damara wasn’t asking.”

  “Refugees usually ask,” said Conran, “or someone sees that someone else is in trouble and volunteers. That’s what you’ve done, seeing that Damara and her kind are in trouble and stepping in. And we’ve stepped in with you.”

  “And I’m grateful for that,” Brianne said admiringly. “Grateful for me and for Damara. Everything you’ve done has made all the difference. And the work you’ve had done out there… I was up late last night looking at the scans and video of the whole process of constructing and preparing the space after so many times watching it before.

  After so much time preparing, and then the whole expedition to Torado IV to get Damara, bit by bit it’s all been becoming real. It’s been so long, doing the research, making the proposal, doing the work to get ready for this day—and now this day is here.” She looked out again to that gleaming spot in that one opening between the trees. “It’s finally here. It’s finally happening.”

  “I’m only sorry I wasn’t along for the trip to Torado IV,” said Donar. “I would have liked to help with that part of it.”

  Brianne looked back at Donar and Conran, her admiration unwavering. “You and your brother have done plenty,” she told him. “Without the two of you, this morning might not be happening at all. Like I’ve been saying all along, Lacerta is the perfect place for this to happen. There couldn’t be a better planet for this project. You have everything exactly right: the perfect type of planet, the perfect place to set up the habitat, the perfect climate-control infrastructure—everything is just the way it needs to be. And then there’s you and your foundation, and all the work you do.

  I had backup candidates, as you know: other planets, other foundations as sources of backing. But Lacerta was my first choice all along. And the Quist Foundation. All my research said this was the place I most wanted to bring Damara. Really, I can’t tell you enough how grateful I am to the two of you.”

  “We’re just as grateful that you came to us,” said Conran. At this, a look passed between him and Donar, and between them and Brianne, that made things seem very personal. Very personal indeed.

  Shifting the tone, Donar added, “This is the kind of work I most like to see our family’s foundation associated with, the kind of work I most like to see us doing.”

  “And you’ve made it all happen beautifully,” Brianne complimented them. “I couldn’t ask for it to have turned out better than it has.” She looked out again to where she had looked before. “Everything depends on her now. It’ll all come down to how she reacts to being here, how she takes to it. I think we have everything prepared as well as it possibly can be—but from this point, it’s up to her.”

  “We haven’t come this far, and you haven’t done everything you’ve done, to see it fail,” Conran said confidently. “And it won’t fail. This will work, and we’ll get the result we’ve all been working for.”

  “And the result we’ve put so much of the foundation’s money into, right?” said Donar.

  “It’s not only about the money,” said Conran with a cocked eyebrow at his brother. To Brianne, he added, “He loves to prod me about the financial side of things because I’m always the one who takes the point with the foundation’s money and seeing where it goes—and dealing with the people we have to deal with in the process. I’ve always been the best at the ‘people’ side of our work. This is his perfect project because after the executive and administrative part is over, it’s not about people anymore.”

  “Stop m
aking me sound so antisocial,” Donar chided him. “I’m fine with people. It’s only the complications that people bring into things that I don’t care for. I like simplicity.” To Brianne, he added “Once you’re past a certain level, a project like this is simple.”

  “As a biologist,” said Brianne thoughtfully, “I can tell you it’s not always as simple as it looks. There are always variables to work with. If one thing is ‘off’ in any way in a project like this, it gets to be not as simple as you might think. That’s why I wanted to come to Lacerta, a place where we can get everything as ‘right’ as it needs to be from the beginning.”

  “I understand that,” Donar said. “What I meant was that people bring all kinds of different motives to what they do. Take away human motives and how they’re in conflict so much of the time, and everything gets simpler. Damara isn’t as complicated as we are.”

  Rolling her eyes thoughtfully, Brianne noted, “Or at least she isn’t complicated in the same ways that we are. She represents a different set of complications.”

  “We can start getting all that sorted out this morning,” said Conran, “after our morning flight, and then breakfast. I still hope we’ll have a chance to take you up flying with us while you’re here, Brianne.”