Dragon Joined

by Rebecca Royce

  He looked up at the sleeping dragon that should have been guarding the entrance. Narrowing his gaze, he took a second to be amazed. How did they keep killing his people if they were this dumb?

  Before he let her walk by the lizard, he pulled her to the side.

  He spoke in a whisper. “It’s not at all concerned?”

  She shrugged. “Why should he be? They’re on top of the food chain with the other dragons. None of the others have successfully waged war against them for years. And their human-joined pairs are completely asleep. Their servants are terrified.”

  “Wait.” He paused, letting her information sink in. “They’re at war with the other dragons?”

  “Sure.” She yawned. He’d lose her soon. “They’re all fighting over land. When they came here from their planet, after it had been nearly destroyed, they brought their clan warfare with them. The other dragons tried to take this location from them. But no one human joins as well as Princess’ people. Maybe because she’s so good at it. In any case, it’s been a long time since anybody made an attempt.”

  He leaned over and planted a kiss square on her mouth. Her eyes widened. “You, sweetheart, are a gem. Time to get you in.”

  Dean took her to her room. By the time she lay down on the mat where she spent nights, she could barely form words. As he watched, her eyes closed, and within seconds she was snoring lightly. He grinned. She’d probably hate it if he told her she snored.

  Given the direness of his situation, he should probably be afraid. Only he didn’t get nervous when the cards were against him. Too many times he’d stared down death and watched it blink. This time would be no different, because this time he had the added benefit of knowing this was his chance to make things right for Amanda.

  Maybe there really were second chances.

  He snuck out the way he’d gotten in and headed back to his bed. Not that he’d sleep much, but a little bit would clear his brain.

  Dean needed to plot. The dragons were at war? There had to be a way to use that information to his own benefit.

  The night air felt cooler without Amanda beside him. She made everything better just by being with him. Maybe all he needed to do was make the dragons weaker, then the other beasts would step in and do the job for him.

  He grinned. Thank you, Amanda. Tomorrow might actually be lots of fun.

  Chapter Seven

  Amanda opened her eyes and blinked at the midday sun. Princess, wearing Amanda’s body, strode around the feed room making a checklist.

  “Well. You’re awake. Someone was a lazybones today. It’s a good thing I don’t need you alert to use you.”

  That’s disgusting. Amanda could think whatever she liked. Princess didn’t listen unless she needed something from her.

  She supposed she could come up with some kind of reason why she’d slept late but Princess didn’t really care. Living with the dragon for so long had at least taught her what the creature wanted an answer to and what she didn’t.

  “Are you getting sick? I won’t be in a sick human body. I just won’t.”

  Amanda sighed. “Not sick.”

  Dragons didn’t die well. If they weren’t shot down or killed in battle, they ended up in such a state of pain that it made human aging seem kind. Usually the leader, Princess in their case, killed them to get their uselessness out of the group. Anything that might be seen to increase the aging process, like illness, made Princess crazed.

  “Well, then. That’s fine.”

  Besides, wouldn’t Princess know if she were sick? Amanda rolled her eyes. She dominated her body—surely she’d be alerted first if Amanda took ill. She stopped her thoughts.

  Maybe not. If Princess had to ask, then maybe she didn’t have all the answers the way she pretended to. Amanda had already managed to do something Princess thought impossible when she’d temporarily freed herself. What else could she get away with?

  Princess was writing numbers down. In her life before coming here, Amanda had never learned to write. Well, she’d tried, but school hadn’t worked out well for her. The only reason she’d figured out how to speak a little bit better had been because of Princess’ constant prodding. Apparently the dragon didn’t want to listen to her prattle on if she couldn’t do it correctly.

  What could she do to interfere with her writing? Amanda pushed her own vision into her eyes with Princess’. As long as she didn’t try to take control, Princess probably wouldn’t mind her sharing. It turned out that the dragon didn’t even notice.

  We share a body, yet I’m too below her attention to acknowledge. In this case, Princess’ inattention would benefit the experiment.

  The dragon was writing down the weights of the vegetables they’d brought it. The scale read 15.8 pounds. Some poor human joined had been out in the heat picking them. Princess bit down on her lip and Amanda tasted blood. The metallic taste made her gag.

  “I specifically told him sixteen pounds. What is wrong with all of them? Incompetence.”

  The poor guy had probably broken his back getting it up the side of the building. His dragon wouldn’t have bothered to go and get him, or at least none of the dragons Amanda knew would have taken the time.

  “When he sees this report, he’s going to be punished. And his dragon too. Who let him get away with 15.8 pounds of corn? What good does that do me?”

  Princess wanted to write down the number 15.8. Amanda narrowed her eyes and took a deep breath. Using every bit of strength, she’d mustered up, she made Princess write the number 16 instead. Her dragon captor didn’t even notice as she moved on to the next box.

  Amanda did a little dance. Well, no one would see it, but she managed to experience the joy just the same. She’d really be boogying around if she could.

  “So now that you’ve deigned to wake up for the day, I must tell you that I have decided what to do with Dean. I thought you might be interested, since you had sex with him yesterday.”

  She listened to Princess. Somehow she had to keep her anxiety under control, otherwise Princess might read her thoughts and discover her late-night antics. To say that would be bad would be an understatement.

  “Oh yes?” She wanted Princess to tell her details. Then she could, maybe, find a way to relay that information to Dean.

  “I’ve decided to make an alliance. One of the less-worthy dragon clans has requested to our join ranks. I’d like to do it but the question always comes as to how to make the rest of the clan kowtow to me without having to resort to blood. You know how I feel about that.” Princess preferred to leave her slaughtering for humans and enemy dragons. Nothing pissed the dragon off more than having to kill when it hadn’t been her idea. “This will solve that.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not following you.” Worse, she actually feared she had.

  Princess was a monster but her taking over of Amanda’s mind had been virtually painless. All the joinings went well among her dragons. If the human could connect, they connected. Bad for the victim on one hand, but it could be so much worse.

  Amanda shuddered. She’d heard the dragons speak of other clans. The destruction of human minds just for fun. The person left a mindless shell. Dead except for the use of his or her body.

  Princess didn’t like mess. That constituted mess.

  “The king of their clan is going to take over Dean. He has a human now whom he’s going to discard. Then he’ll join with one of our humans, which will bring the clans together, under my rule. He and I will mate. That way we can continue to have sex using Dean’s body if that’s what we wish. I’m interested in seeing if he can bring me that level of feeling again. Yesterday, I went somewhere else during sex. Tell me, are all men from New Strauss able to do that?”

  “I was a child when I left New Strauss. A teenager when I last saw it. Other than Dean, I’ve never had sex with anyone before.”

  Dean burst through the door. Princess looked up from her work. He looked at them for a second before scratching his head. He swallowed, his neck m
uscles clenched.

  Either he was acting or he didn’t look like a man who had expected to find them in there. What on earth did he want in the food storage room?

  She shook her head. Having asked him the night before not to tell her, she had to live with questions for a while. Just until tonight. That was what he’d told her. Unless the Dean she knew had disappeared by then, brutally taken over by some dragon clan leader.

  No. She wouldn’t let that happen.

  “What are you doing in here, Dean?” Princess sauntered forward. Amanda hated how it made her hips feel to move like that. The movement didn’t come naturally. Seduction didn’t seem to be built into her body’s natural rhythms. “Not that I’m not glad to see you. I have to give you good news.”

  “I’m helping the servants.” He nodded. “I wanted to see where everything was.”

  What? Amanda couldn’t see the servants sending Dean to inspect the vegetables. Doing so constituted a cushy job. Why would they give it up? Something else had to be going on.

  “Well, feel free.” She pointed downward. “You can start with the corn. We’re short .2 pounds. Because of idiocy.”

  “Mind if I take a look?” Dean walked over, sticking his head down into the corn before she gave him permission.

  “Are all human men this dedicated to produce?” She rubbed his back.

  Amanda wanted to throw something. How dare Princess touch her man? She had to get her breathing under control. Since opening her eyes, all Amanda had wanted to do was touch Dean, kiss him, make sure he still felt the same way about her that he had the night before—even if thinking like that made her seem insecure. Whatever. She wanted him.

  And only Princess got to touch him and that just…sucked.

  Dean looked up for a second, staring in her eyes. He made a nonsensical noise and looked back down into the corn. “No offense, Princess. But when I’m studying corn, I don’t want to be touched with scaly hands.”

  “Your nastiness will be ending soon. We have found you a match to join. After he is with you, all will be better.”

  Princess had to be deluding herself. The leader might want to join with her for strategic purposes, but no ruler wanted to subject themselves to another monarch. This had to be eating the other dragon alive. He wasn’t going to immediately fall in love with Princess and start spewing romantic poetry. Not that she’d ever heard of a dragon doing such a thing.

  Dean pulled his head out of the corn. She expected to read horror in his gaze. Instead he didn’t seem the least bit concerned about that at all. He stared at her for a moment with a blank expression on his face. “Has anyone taken any of this corn? How about any of the other vegetables? How is the food distributed?”

  Princess opened and closed her mouth once before she spoke. “You are quite obsessed with this.”

  “It’s a hobby.”

  Amanda wanted to laugh. Dean Andrews had no time for farming. Oh, he’d make sure the agricultural needs of New Strauss were taken care of. They’d be as safe as he could make them, but Amanda doubted Dean had ever looked at a vegetable he wasn’t eating before in his life.

  “And you are more concerned with it than your future?”

  Dean wiped his brow. Amanda never knew if it was hot or cold. Princess could regulate her body temperature both in her dragon and her non-dragon forms. But if Dean was sweating, that meant it had gotten really hot outside. Not that it ever really cooled down in the jungle. Some of the dragons were less concerned with their humans’ comfort. They let their joined be very uncomfortable. For that, Amanda could count herself lucky. Princess always took care of the small details.

  Her obsessiveness over things made her a very formidable enemy.

  “I don’t really consider you to have much to do with my future. But that corn.” He pointed to it. “I might eat that. It matters.”

  With that, he turned his back on her and stormed from the room.

  Princess called after him, “Your dragon will be here in a few hours.”

  She hadn’t been able to resist giving him the information she felt he needed, even though he’d been uninterested. Amanda sighed. Some things were predictable.

  Princess put her hands on her hips. “Infuriating little creature. Maybe I should have killed him.”

  How on earth was she going to get Dean her intel while she remained trapped in Princess? She couldn’t very well make her lie down and start sexually fantasizing about Dean.

  * * * * *

  Amanda watched as they dragged Dean into the room. He had a black eye. It had been hours since she’d seen him. What had happened in that time? Princess must not even know or Amanda would have heard it too. Her heart stuttered. How badly had they hurt him and why?

  Flapping of wings made Amanda look upward. Four black dragons swooped in from the hole in the ceiling. No wonder Princess had dragged Dean in. His dragon had arrived.

  Princess had spent the day like any other—inspecting, cleaning and ordering her dragons around. Several had returned from a raid on a local village. Apparently the villagers had been caught in areas of the jungle where they didn’t belong. They’d paid for that with their homes and some with their lives. Princess didn’t feel anything about the news. To her, punishment had to be doled out like vitamins. It made everyone stronger.

  Amanda suspected that the villagers hadn’t seen them coming. Her heart broke thinking of their families. Why did she have to be so totally incapable of stopping Princess from doing these things?

  Dean looked up at her. “I’m fine.”

  Princess shrugged. “No one asked.”

  She appreciated him letting her know. What had happened? She wanted to open her mouth and ask. Had the fight been his fault? Or had someone attacked him?

  “I attacked a dragon-joined human.” He sat back in his chair as if he hadn’t made a startling announcement.

  Princess stormed over to him. “Why would you do such a thing? I will not have this kind of disorder in my home.”

  “I felt like it. Let’s say I conducted an experiment and I liked the results.”

  Princess slapped him across the side of his face that was already bruised. He hissed in a breath, rubbing his damaged eye socket but giving no other indication he’d been bothered by her assault.

  She huffed. “You are a barbarian.”

  “Maybe.” He rubbed his forehead. “Maybe not.”

  What the hell did he mean he’d experimented, and did she even want to dwell on that? Hadn’t she told him not to tell her anything? She wanted to groan and stick her head under a pillow.

  The largest of the black dragons that had entered the room stepped forward, its footsteps shaking the table where Dean sat. Her lover looked up at the new dragon with a raise of his eyebrow. Didn’t he feel nervous? When Princess had taken Amanda, she had screamed and yelled. Not her best moment, considering she had lived outside the protection of a homeland feeding two toddlers for years without a complaint.

  Yet that day she’d wailed for her mother. She closed her eyes, unable to remember that moment any longer. No one had come to rescue her and she’d been well past the ability to save herself from her fate.

  Acceptance of the inevitable hadn’t happened until Princess had slammed into her mind, leaving her no other choice.

  Did nothing faze Dean Andrews?

  The dragon roared. Inside she shuddered, but externally Princess barely recognized the assault on her ears.

  Princess brushed her bangs out of her eyes. “You don’t have to shout, Xor, I can hear you fine. And I’d like to keep these human ears for the length of time I keep this human.”

  Xor growled low in his throat and Princess nodded. “I know it takes a little getting used to. You were not as successful as we in your joinings. But here we all have humans, if we are strong enough to warrant them. I assure you, it doesn’t take long to get used to regulating your voice.”

  Princess grabbed Dean by the ear. “This specimen is to be yours. I can talk you thro
ugh the process of joining and if you fail this time there will be others. I liked him, but right now I wouldn’t mind having him move on.”

  “Oh gee.” Dean grinned at her. “I’m so upset I’ve lost your affection.”

  Sighing, Princess moved away from Dean. “Go ahead. Take him. And then we’ll mate.”

  Having Dean touch her would never be a problem but the idea of having a dragon take over Dean and then engage in sexual intercourse while using their bodies? She shivered. It hadn’t happened before. She had been spared that horror. But others had been through it. She knew it had happened. Damn the moon, she didn’t want to experience that now.

  She covered her mouth, a surge of nausea threatening to overtake her. Breathe. She had to breathe. Anger surged through her veins. If she ever got out of this, she’d see that the dragons paid tenfold for what they did to their joined humans. Just because it hadn’t been done to her didn’t make it okay. These creatures had come uninvited to Earth and they’d destroyed it, leaving its people begging for scraps, barely hanging on.

  She wanted to make them pay.

  “Oh.” Princess grabbed her head. “I have such pain in my head. What is going on?”

  Pain in her head? Amanda grinned for a second before regaining control of herself. She’d managed to cause Princess discomfort. Well, this had turned out to be a very interesting day.

  That’s right, you bitch. I’m going to make you pay in such ways that your headache will seem like a piece of candy.

  Princess shook out her head. “I’m not sure what that was about. My apologies. These human bodies can be funny things.”

  Dean watched her through hooded eyes. He didn’t utter a word but she would swear, even though she’d never be able to prove it, that he could see right into her soul at that moment. Did he know what she was suffering with? Or was he wondering what had prompted her outburst right at that moment?

  He turned his gaze from her back to Xor the dragon. “Gee, if these bodies are so odd, maybe you’d rather not have one? You know, you could turn your wings skyward and get the hell out of here.”