Stones of Dracontias

by N. D. Jones

  She peered up at the Dracontias, Afiyas and Kesins. Her kind thought themselves intelligent and enlightened beings, and they were, but they’d also allowed fear of exposure to cloud their judgment and deny Kesins the love of their human parent. In her ignorance and cowardice, she would’ve done the same. Still, her experience with the Circle of Drayke couldn’t be ignored or dismissed. Some humans did pose a threat to the Dracontias and more would if the dragons revealed too much or made themselves vulnerable.

  Humans outnumbered the Dracontias, but a war between them would leave the Earth in ruins and the humans an endangered species. The Aragonite Star Dragon’s rules were meant to prevent such possibilities, and Kya couldn’t deny his mandates had fostered peaceful relations between the two species.

  Yet, the heart was unpredictable and not subject to a ruler’s protective dictates. When the time came for Kya to serve as Akata, she hoped she’d rule wisely and fairly, as the Aragonite Star Dragon had done for over two thousand years.

  Is there anything you wish to say to those gathered before I begin?

  “Am I supposed to say something? Give a speech? If so, you should’ve told me because I have nothing prepared.”

  Since when does a Knight require advanced notice to speak?

  “Aren’t you the funny dragon? For your information, I’m here as a silent observer.”

  Oh, you’re being quite good today, Armstrong Knight. That suit and your feigned compliance become you. But it will not last. I’ll give you an hour.

  “An hour for what?”

  A hand rose to stroke her side, a back and forth movement that, if performed by one of her siblings, would’ve sent familial warmth through Kya. With Armstrong, however, his touches created a decidedly intimate heat within her. He’d learned too much from Gasira about the female dragon form, including how and where to caress Kya to produce his desired effect.

  Thirty seconds. You were good for thirty seconds. Do remove your hand from my side.

  “No one knows what I’m doing. Besides, you make the most amazing sound when I scratch you here.”

  Before action met words, Kya toughened her scales. Not enough to harm Armstrong’s hand but enough so she wouldn’t embarrass herself in front of those gathered.

  He laughed. “You’re adorable. I’ll be good.”

  For how long?

  “How long is the naming ceremony?”

  A snort preceded her answer. No more than five minutes. We dragons don’t require pomp and circumstance.

  “Well, there you go. Five minutes.” Two hands slapped together. “Better get on with it, Bloodstone Dragon, the Dracontias and Knights await.”

  Kya would miss him when he returned to his human life, which he’d put on hold to be with her and their son on Buto.

  She projected her words into everyone’s mind, including the Knights.

  On this day of Amadi, we rejoice because our family is made stronger by the addition of a Kesin, a bridge between humans and dragons. A bridge between the Knights and the Akata family. Armstrong, come forth and introduce your son.

  No longer playful, a serious Armstrong walked around Kya and stood in front but to the left of their son. His hand settled at the nape of the baby dragon’s neck, where it caressed in smooth, soothing circles.

  Their son snuggled against Armstrong’s side, content to stay pressed between his parents.

  “I once knew a human who became sick. The doctors tried their best, but there was little they could do to save him. He had four children and a wife who loved him dearly.”

  From her seat in the cabana, Mrs. Knight began to weep. Isaiah, to her left, laced his fingers through his mother’s.

  “For months, I watched him wither. His body weakened but never his courageous spirit and indomitable light. When he passed away, he took them with him. Six months ago, I felt both when I entered a cell not fit for any living creature.” His face lowered and kissed the head of their son. “My mother believes in signs from God. That night and in that cell, I sensed my father’s presence. I believe he kept my son safe when I couldn’t. Cancer may have claimed his life, but it didn’t break his spirit or heart. Awful men may have caged this little Kesin’s body, but they didn’t break his spirit or heart. He endured. Survived. I name my son Elijah Isaiah Knight.”

  Knees dropped to the sand and arms embraced. “Welcome to the Knight family, Elijah. Your grandfather would be proud. I know you’ll wear his name well.”

  Armstrong stood and received hugs and kisses from his family, but none more than from his weeping mother.

  Kya moved backward so the Knights could shower Elijah with the same affection. He glanced over his shoulder at her to make sure she hadn’t gone too far but otherwise stayed where he was and accepted the coddling.

  “You said you were unprepared to make a speech.”

  “It wasn’t a speech. I spoke from my heart.”

  “Yes, I’m aware. You’ve made your family happy, Armstrong, especially your mother.”

  Armstrong turned to wink at Kya. “I could give you more Kesins. That would make Mom really happy.” He winked again then laughed when Kya failed to respond.

  He teased and tempted but could Armstrong not see all he’d give up if he entered into a permanent relationship with Kya and the Dracontias. The Knights were the exception not the new rule on Buto. As much as she loved her diata, Kya couldn’t take him from his human family.

  Despite all that had changed since Kya first realized she was pregnant, much had not. Their Kesin wasn’t equipped to live among humans. If he ever learned to control his shift, it would take him at least a century to do so. In less time than that, the remainder of her green scales would be gone as would be her father and Armstrong.

  Eventually, the Knights returned to the cabana, with Armstrong filling the vacant seat to his mother’s right. Flanked by her sons and surrounded by her daughters and grandchildren, Mrs. Knight beamed.

  Kya would continue to watch over the older human woman. Armstrong’s father may have died in pain, with no dragon to cure and extend his life, but Kya wouldn’t allow Mrs. Knight to suffer the same fate. When her time came, she would drift from life and into death, her human heaven her eternal reward.

  Are you ready, Elijah?

  Her brave son rarely spoke telepathically, but he understood everything said to him. Elijah scrambled to her. His gold tipped tail slapped against the sand, his red face upturned.

  My anxious son. After today, you’ll have everything denied to you on the day of your birth, thanks to your father.

  Once again, Kya projected her thoughts to the crowd. Unlike Armstrong, Kya had little to say.

  A healing stone does not make a dragon a Dracontias. Yet, a Stone of Dracontias offers each dragon an opportunity to help those in need.

  The morning of their return from Ireland, Armstrong had presented Kya with Elijah’s Dracontias stone along with a box of information on their baby dragon he didn’t want to risk falling into the wrong hands. After Armstrong had read every file, she’d burned the contents of the box and kept the stone.

  Kya lowered her nose to her son’s forehead. He stayed still as her Bloodstone magic seeped from her and into him. On its wispy tentacles, she withdrew his stone from her skull and, with care, used her magic to travel up his nasal passage and to the protective cavity of his brain. The tentacles located the hollow in his skull where his Stone of Dracontias had once been.

  A gentle push of magic had the tentacles inserting the healing stone into the hollow.

  Elijah stumbled forward when the first whoosh of Dracontias magic whipped through his tiny body. His magic. Red like Kya’s but not from a Bloodstone.

  You’ll grow used to the magic and your healing stone. I’ll teach you, the way my parents taught me.

  Kya coiled her tail around her baby dragon and lifted into the air. The Dracontias, much like the Knights, awaited her choice of a dragon name. Well, as Armstrong once told her, Bloodstone Dragon wasn’t a name b
ut a title and Elijah would receive his much earlier than was normal.

  She raised her son high into the air so all the Dracontias could see. He vibrated crimson, his returned stone adding luster to already bright scales.

  Kesin. Human. Dracontias.

  Let us rejoice and welcome the Red Jasper Dragon and his healing stone of courage and wisdom.

  Below, the Knights cheered. In the sky, a rainbow of magic burst from the Dracontias, radiant streams of love. The colorful mists scooped Elijah from Kya’s tail and tossed him into the air. On winds of magic, Elijah was handed from one Dracontias to the next, beginning with the Aragonite Star Dragon and the Bluestone Dragon.

  Each dragon ran the tip of their tail or tongue over the baby dragon. For eight years, her son had known nothing but cruelty and loneliness. He’d been touch deprived, which hurt Kya’s heart.

  Seeing him now, basking in the affection of his family, safe and happy and where he belonged, the human inside of the Bloodstone Dragon sobbed tears of joy.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  ARMSTRONG PACED HIS living room. He’d heard everything Kya had said, none of which surprised him. He’d even agreed with her, which did nothing for his bad mood and the sense of desperation rampaging up and down his spine.

  Elijah slept in the twin bed he’d hastily purchased for him before he and Kya had set off for southern Ireland. For years, everyone told Armstrong he should stop torturing himself and pack up the nursery. They’d all thought his son dead. Most days, so had he. Yet whenever he attempted to close the door on that chapter of his life, stubborn hope would reassert itself. Thus, the nursery never again became his home office, and his son would always have a place in his home, even if a rarely used bedroom.

  He hadn’t been in his house for half a year, and it felt stale and claustrophobic. Armstrong wasn’t the outdoors type, but he’d been shocked by how easily he’d adapted to life on Buto with the dragons. Admittedly, he missed television, music and fast food. He did learn how to grill meats and vegetables like a champ and his body, from running after a baby dragon with an endless supply of energy, had an impressive muscular cut he hadn’t seen since he turned thirty-seven and his metabolism began to slow.

  Dressed in worn jeans and an old T-shirt, Armstrong plopped on the couch a cushion length down from Kya, who looked as awful as he felt. Well, at least that was something he supposed.

  He shifted to his side to face Kya, who leaned against the armrest of the couch, her legs pulled to her chest. Physically, she’d changed little in the twenty-two years they’d known each other. Even if she’d never become pregnant with Elijah, this would’ve been their fate. He would’ve continued to grow old while she stayed young and beautiful.

  Armstrong had his forty-seventh birthday while on Buto. He’d known men who’d dated women twenty years their junior. Some guys were even stupid enough to leave their wife for a younger woman. While he, like any man, enjoyed the sight of a beautiful woman, youth and vitality couldn’t replace the depth of pleasure that came with knowing someone for years and loving that person, all the more, for the time shared together.

  Still, he possessed enough vanity to not want Kya to see him grow old while she went from looking like his lover to his daughter and finally to his grand-daughter. Kya was a dragon, but she was also human enough to appreciate the virility of a male’s body.

  “Your father agreed to turn me into a dragon. According to Westmore’s files, if a human consumes the blood of a dragon, the shift will take place. That’s how he was able to create the Kesins.”

  “Father has never turned any human into a dragon. Westmore was insane, and so were his monsters. Do you wish to become like them, Armstrong, a mindless beast of prey?”

  “Westmore theorized the blood and stone of a full-dragon would mediate the negative effects he experienced with the Kesins. That’s why he and Cafferty turned their attention back to capturing you. They wanted a pureblood source, no offense to Elijah.”

  “Did you not hear me when I said Kenneth Westmore was insane? You cannot entrust your life to the hypothesis of a madman.”

  “What if he’s right?”

  Even in human form, when upset, Kya released wisps of Bloodstone magic from her nose.

  “What if he’s wrong? Do you know what that will mean?” Her voice rose, and the hands on her knees fisted. “It means if you shift into a bloodthirsty Afiya, which is so much worse than an out-of-control Kesin, I’ll be forced to kill you.”

  “I know.”

  In a blur of dragon speed, Kya was in his face and straddling his hips. “You know nothing, Armstrong Knight. You always think you do, but you do not. Harming you would destroy the Bloodstone Dragon and the human that is Kya. I would rather watch you grow old and die than kill my son’s father and my mate.”

  “Your kendi.”

  “Gasira talks too much. But yes, you’re my kendi.”

  “Forever love. That’s what I want us to have, Kya. And there’s only one way for us to have what we both want.”

  She shook her head and tears formed but didn’t fall. “It’s too dangerous. I won’t permit it.”

  “It’s my choice.”

  “A selfish choice.”

  “How is wanting to spend centuries with you and Elijah a selfish choice?”

  Armstrong slid his hands into Kya’s long, thick hair. They hadn’t been this physically close in years, she in human form and them alone in their house the way they once were.

  “It’s selfish because there’s no guarantee of success. If the transformation doesn’t go as you hope, your death will bring pain to your family. Is that what you want, for your mother to bury her son as she did her husband?”

  Pulling her even closer, Armstrong laid his forehead against hers. “You know it isn’t. I don’t want to leave my family. No more than I want to lose you and Elijah. Help me find a way to have both. So yeah, call me a selfish human, but I want to have both.”

  He kissed her, the way he’d wanted to do for months. But Kya, like all the Dracontias, he’d learned, rarely shifted into their human form while on Buto. They were, as she’d said many times, dragons who could simply transform into a human.

  But there, in their home and on his lap, Armstrong took what his mate willingly gave.

  Kya kissed him back with the same hunger lust surging through him. She tasted so good, her tongue in his mouth, exploring and driving him wild. His gray-and-white shirt ripped under her impatient hands. And the buttons of her blouse popped under his.

  Before he knew it, they were upstairs, on the bed, lights off and the bedroom door closed. They finished undressing each other as best they could while refusing to stop kissing.

  He worked his way down Kya’s amazing body, sucking her neck, fondling breasts, and flicking nipples.

  Throaty moans and writhing hips had Armstrong planting open-mouthed kisses on her taut stomach, curvy hips, and soft inner thighs. Kissing his way back up to her waiting lips, Armstrong’s fingers played with her springy nest of curls, his thumb rubbing the supple folds of her sex.

  Kya moaned into his mouth and swallowed his tongue deep, just as his fingers slipped inside her. Probing, thrusting, and crooking to find the ridges to her pleasure he remembered all too well.

  Wrenching her mouth from his and breathing hard, Kya arched her back, drove her sex onto his thick fingers and came in a burst of dragon magic and human cries of release.

  Hands going to his face and cradling, Kya opened green jasper eyes and smiled. “I’d forced myself to not think how good you could make my human body feel.” A lick of his lips and then a bite to his chin. “I tingle all over. It’s a delicious sensation.” With dragon strength, she shifted them. Armstrong on his back and Kya above him on her knees, their groins pressed intimately close. “I remember what you like and how to please you.”

  “Got to love that photographic memory of yours.”

  Kya took him inside, she wet and pulsing, he hard and throbbing. Hands rose and g
ripped her waist, hips lifted and pressed.

  No condom

  He stopped. Swore.

  Kya leaned down and kissed him, her nipples grazing his chest. “What’s wrong?” Not waiting for an answer, she began to move over top of him. Short thrusts to the tip of his penis, then back up. Short thrusts, then back up. One deep slide, a grind and then back up.

  The short thrusts decreased as the long slides onto him increased. By the time she reached ten deep slides, Armstrong was close to coming and had almost forgotten about his lack of a condom.

  “Kya, wait.”

  She began again with nine short thrusts and one deep slide. Eight short thrusts and two deep slides. Damn, she was going to kill him and get herself with another Kesin.

  He wanted that. He really did. To tie his Bloodstone Dragon to him with another child. She would have to give in then, right? Wrong. He wouldn’t do that to her or to himself.

  “Kya, I’m not wearing a condom.”

  “I know.” She sat up, grabbed his wrists, lifted his hands to her breasts and continued to ride him. Eyes closed and head fell back on soft, persistent groans. “A Dracontias can conceive only once every two hundred or so years, regardless of our form.”

  Disappointment welled in him, but he knew it was for the best. Unless Armstrong were turned into a dragon, he and Kya wouldn’t have another child.

  “How many years before you’re next able to conceive?”

  Glassy, passion-filled eyes opened and stared down at him. Not answering, Kya stretched her body over his. Greedy hands went to her ass and helped her rock against him.

  “By the human calendar, I’ve lived for two hundred fifty years, which is quite young for a dragon.”

  “You’re sexy for an old lady.”