by Kate Rudolph
12
When Courtney saw the alien slavers outside their cave, she knew they were screwed. Monsters were going to eat them as soon as the sun set, or the slavers would capture them and probably kill them.
They'd definitely kill Crux. Maybe they'd lock her back up.
She would die first.
Crux ran, and she followed. Now was not the time to argue about strategy. The dragon man knew more than her and she had to trust him.
Now would be a really good time to magically manifest dragon powers, but it wasn't going to happen.
"There." Crux pointed further up the hill. The cave was difficult to see, just a dark dot against a dark hill, but Courtney made it out. "We can hide there."
"What if they see us?" They'd have to cross near the path that led to the original cave, and she didn't think she was up to fighting half a dozen slavers.
"As long as we make it to the cave first, we're fine. It only takes a couple of seconds to put up the force field. You still have the generator, right?"
Courtney placed a hand over her pocket and confirmed by touch that the device was there. "I do."
He nodded. "Good. We run together. If they spot us, run ahead of me and set it up, but don't power it on. Once you're in the cave, I'll follow."
"And what if there are monsters in the cave?" She didn't want to catastrophize, but was pretty sure it wasn't catastrophizing when they really were on Monster Planet.
Crux made a series of strange expressions and tilted his head toward the side as he considered it. "We'll just have to hope for luck. We're running out of time."
Courtney did not like the sound of that. But it was true. They were running out of time, and they had to move.
Another monster screamed, and it sounded closer.
But it didn't sound like it was coming from any cave on the hill.
"Let's go," she urged. Her muscles were tight, bunched up and ready to sprint, and she'd start shaking if she didn't move soon.
They moved.
Courtney barely breathed as they made their way up the hill, coming dangerously close to the slavers that had stolen their cave. It was a nice cave. Spacious. Homey. It was her cave, and if she had time, she would make Crux get rid of anyone who dared steal it from them.
But there wasn't time. Darkness was falling faster than it should have, and she was terrified of what would happen once all the light was gone. She'd seen those bones. She didn't want to be stripped of all her flesh. It seemed a horribly painful way to go.
Her roller skates swung against her shoulder, one of the wheels hitting the same spot on her chest over and over so that she was sure she'd have a bruise. It was worth it if she ended up needing to bash in more alien skulls.
Bash in skulls. Jesus. What had she come to?
"Run for the cave, now," Crux commanded. He didn't raise his voice, but the urgency sent Courtney sprinting even if she didn't see the threat.
But as soon as she was clear of Crux, she understood. He hadn't seen slavers. It was a pack of the planet’s monsters right behind them and moving fast. She got an impression of dark gray skin and large, dark eyes. Big limbs. She didn't see claws or teeth, but she was sure the animals had both. They had to, considering the damage that they wrought.
She made it to the mouth of the cave just as Crux let out an unholy burst of fire at the monsters that had made it within feet of him. Courtney wanted to cry out, needed to do something, but she was too far to hit anything with her skate and he didn't need the warning.
Heat churned within her, and she burned hotter than she'd ever felt before. It didn't feel like a fever. It didn't feel like herself. She didn't know what it was. Battle rage? Fury? She didn't have time to ponder.
She skidded to a stop in front of the mouth of the cave and almost dove into the forbidding darkness of the entrance when two more of the monsters stepped out.
They were flat to the ground and then rose up and up and up until they were as tall as elephants, but lithe like panthers. They were something out a forgotten nightmare, and they opened their mouths to reveal sharpened tusks that could rend her in half in one bite.
The monster closest to her roared, and with that roar come a torrent of saliva and gross monster goo that covered Courtney.
The fire burned even brighter, and she let it out with a scream.
Fire burst out of her mouth and lit the two monsters up. It didn't burn like a regular fire. No, this was like napalm on steroids. In seconds, the monsters burnt to a crisp until only bone remnants were on the ground in front of her.
Crux ran up to her and shepherded her inside of the cave, pulling the generator from her pocket and setting it up with practiced motion. He flicked out a hand and set a pile of debris on fire, giving them light. There were no more monsters in the cave, and the monsters had taken care of any critters that might have lived in there.
With the force field up, she and Crux were safe for now.
But Courtney had no idea what had just happened, what she had just done.
She looked down at her hands, but there was no sign of the fire she'd miraculously summoned. She felt her lips and found them chapped, but her lips ran dry and Monster Planet wasn't doing her any favors.
She looked up at Crux. Maybe it was a trick. Maybe he had done it and she had imagined the whole thing. "How?" It came out scratchy, and her throat was a desert. She needed water and hoped Crux still had one of those canteens somewhere.
He stared at her for several silent seconds before reaching around and retrieving a canteen from his pack. She took it and swallowed the liquid greedily. It went down hard and she sputtered, hacking half of it back up before trying again.
Finally, she had to put the canteen away. "How?" she asked again. Crux had looked away from her, and he wouldn't look back. She didn't know why, and that made her even more scared than she'd been facing down those two monsters. "How, Crux?" She reached out to put her hand on his arm, but he flinched away from her.
"It's impossible." He said it so quietly that she was sure she wasn't supposed to hear.
"What's impossible?" The fluid was restoring her throat, and she could almost pretend she hadn't actually breathed fire if she tried really hard. Of course it was impossible. She was a normal human. Normal humans didn't breathe fire.
"Stay here. Recover. I need to investigate the cave." And before she could stop him, he left her sitting there alone.
13
Crux knew he was the highest level of bastard to leave Courtney sitting barely beyond the force field while he dealt with his own damned emotions. But it was impossible. He was a dragon prince. He would one day be king.
He couldn't have a human mate.
His people, his father, had certain expectations. And they would not appreciate if their queen wasn't even from the correct planet. There was no way his father would assent to the match. It didn't matter that fate decreed it. It didn't matter that Courtney had called upon Crux's flame and used it for herself, something that was spoken about in legends because it was that rare.
They would see that she was human and fail to look beyond that, just as he had.
The psychic matchmaker had insisted that he would meet his mate on this journey. In fact, she had told him that the first woman he met would be his future, if he could hold onto her.
And he had disregarded that. Because, he had told himself, clearly when she said woman she meant dragon woman. But it was becoming increasingly clear that there were no dragon females on this planet. There were human women, slavers, and monsters.
And his mate.
Crux scanned the small cave quickly, determining it was safe for the night. There was a little pool of water in this one, too, which he scanned. Clean. And warm to the touch. There must have been a hot spring somewhere.
Courtney would like that.
How could he keep her when this was all done?
How could he walk away?
Crux sat at the edge of the pool and stared into the w
ater as if it would offer him answers. All his saw was his own dim reflection, and he scowled at himself. He was to be king one day, and the decision should have been simple.
He had to do what was best for his people.
But what was that? A loveless marriage to some proper dragon lady? Or one blessed by the hand of fate to the most courageous woman he'd ever met?
Fated pairings did not come along often. His own father had never found his mate. But Crux had been holding out for thirty years on the hope that he would find his own. And here she was.
Could he really throw her away simply because she wasn't a dragon?
He heard footsteps, but he wasn't ready to talk. From the look Courtney gave him, she wasn't ready to say anything either. He'd acted like such a bastard she must be eager to get away from him.
"Is the water safe?" she asked, hand hovering over the pool.
"Clean and warm," he confirmed.
"Do you have something I can use as a towel? I need to try and clean monster goo off my clothes." She spoke matter of factly, and Crux had the sinking feeling that whatever emotions had been brewing between them before, he'd smashed them to bits.
He reached into his pack and pulled out a spare undershirt. "Will this do?"
She took it with a nod of thanks and waited. It took Crux a moment to realize that she wanted privacy. "My apologies. Let me know if you need assistance."
"Been bathing myself for years. I think I'll be fine." She stared at him until he left.
He heard her dip into the water and did his best not to imagine what she looked like. He had no right.
Fate said he had all the right.
Crux groaned and leaned against the wall in defeat. Fate could say whatever she wanted, it didn't matter if he didn't make a decision.
He wanted Courtney. The feel of her skin earlier in the day had been one of the greatest temptations of his life. And he would have begged fate to make Courtney his. It looked like fate agreed.
But the road ahead would be hard.
And Courtney wanted to go home. To Earth.
Would she ever want to be the dragon queen? How would she react if he told her?
She'd reacted remarkably well to all of the trouble so far, but would this be the one thing that pushed her over the limit and sent her into panic? He couldn't know if he never told her. But keeping this from her felt like a sin.
A fated mate was supposed to be a blessing.
A gift.
And here was Crux, spitting in fate's face.
He didn't know how long he sat there, but it was long enough for Courtney to finish bathing and for Crux to realize just how much his own clothes were covered in muck and, as Courtney said, monster goo. Now would be a good time to clean them.
He skirted around the edge of the fire where she was curled up in his undershirt, her clothing laid out on the rocks to dry. He didn't do anything more than glance at her to respect her privacy.
She didn't look at him.
He deserved it.
Crux stripped off his clothes and dumped them in the spring before diving in after them. Only once he was fully submerged did he remember that he'd given Courtney his spare undershirt and didn't have much in the way of spare clothes to dry himself.
Oh well.
The water was more than pleasant, and Crux floated for a while. He let some of his worries wash away and didn't dwell on the fact that they'd come back as soon as he dried off. He wished he could fully shift and submerge his dragon self. Back home, there was a huge spring that could accommodate his other form, and he'd once spent an entire day in the water.
But this was good.
It would be even better if Courtney was with him. His cock perked up at that thought.
No.
She was his mate. Fate had chosen her for him. But he couldn't make a move until he decided what to do with her. It would be unfair to them both.
That was what his good intentions said. His yearning body told him to damn his intentions and slake his desire. It would feel good for both of them. They needed the release.
Crux sank deeper into the water.
But he couldn't hide forever. And he was hiding. From his mate. Someone he should never need to hide from. He wasn't worthy of the rank of warrior.
So Crux climbed out of the spring and shook himself off like some kind of animal. Then he slipped into his warrior form for just a moment and then back to that of a man. It got rid of most of the water.
There was no such solution for his clothes. He wrang them out until they were no longer sopping, but he didn't want to put them right back on.
He thought he had a spare set of underwear in his bag, but the bag was set out by Courtney. He held his clothes in front of him and stayed on the other side of the fire, just barely reaching his bag to search for what he was looking for.
"You don't have to contort yourself," his mate said. "I've seen naked men before."
That almost had him growling and demanding who. But Crux was no fool and he had no right. Courtney didn't know who she was to him. He had no claim on her. And he certainly had no claim on her past.
It didn't mean he had to like it.
He didn't know how to respond to her observation, so he put some of his diplomatic training to use and said nothing. He laid his clothes out beside hers and dug more intently into his bag, looking for his underwear.
"Damn." They weren't there.
"Is there a problem?" Courtney looked at him over the fire, and she no longer looked angry.
Crux lazed back on his rock. His nakedness would have been on display if it wasn't for the fire blocking them. "I'll need to wait for my clothes to dry before I have anything to wear."
"Oh." She looked away, and he was almost certain her cheeks flushed. Then she plucked at the shirt she was wearing. "I can give this back, if you want."
If he wanted. No, he didn't want his shirt. He had another desire entirely.
"Or you could take that off and we'd be equal in our nakedness."
14
The heat that suffused Crux's words was enough to burn Courtney up from the inside. Her nipples tightened, and it would have been obvious if his shirt was anything but black.
She knew what Crux was offering. It didn't have to mean anything. They'd barely survived the day, things kept getting worse, and there was no guarantee that they'd make it out of this planet alive.
But they could spend some time together forgetting their worries, pleasuring each other.
He lay on the other side of the fire like some recumbent king, and it was disturbing to realize that one day he would be. He was a prince. A dragon. An alien. And there was lust in his eyes.
For her.
She shifted a bit and became even more aware of the fact that she was naked except for the shirt she was wearing.
It might be the biggest mistake of her life to sleep with the dragon prince.
Or the biggest regret.
But when was she going to get another opportunity like this?
She still didn't understand what had happened right outside the cave. She could hear the monsters outside screaming and killing, and she was acutely aware of the fact that the evil alien slavers were only a little down the hill from them.
Tomorrow would be a shit show.
More reason to celebrate tonight.
Courtney pulled off the shirt.
The breath that Crux sucked in echoed around the cave.
Courtney grinned at him. "What? Didn't think I would do it?" She lived for a challenge. It was the only way she'd survived so far. She folded the shirt and put it beside her roller skates, not that anyone would judge her if it got wrinkled.
She didn't try to get closer to Crux. She sat back, mirroring his position, and let the heat of the fire soak into her skin. It felt almost as good as the bath in the spring. With another person she might have been self-conscious. She wasn't one to sit around naked all the time.
She could feel Crux's eyes on her almos
t like a caress, and there was no room for self-consciousness. Not when he was looking at her like that.
"I never know what you're going to do," Crux replied in a cryptic tone.
She wasn't sure how to interpret that. She didn't think she was that far off the mark from a regular woman. She did what a normal person would do, she survived. And without another response on the tip of her tongue, Courtney just grinned at Crux.
The fire flickered between them.
And Courtney took his statement as a challenge. She reached up and cupped her breast, flicking her finger over her nipple before circling her thumb around it, making it come to a stiff peak.
He sucked in another breath.
She shifted until her back was propped up on the wall and then used both of her hands on her breasts, staring at Crux the entire time, waiting to see what the dragon prince would do. She bet the dragon ladies back home didn’t do this for him.
Where did the wild stab of jealousy come from?
Courtney shooed it away. Right here, right now, it was just her and Crux. She didn't need to care that he had a fated mate somewhere that he was supposed to be looking for. Right now, he only had eyes for her.
His hand moved, and she was sure he was touching his cock, but the fire was in the way.
"I want to see you," she said. Her breath shuddered a bit, and she was tempted to reach between her legs and stroke, but not yet. They had all night, and nights on Monster Planet were long.
She expected Crux to stand up and move towards her or beckon her closer. She didn't expect him to breathe on the fire and shift it towards the back of the cave, where it could still keep them warm but didn't get in their way.
She opened her mouth to ask how, but no words came out.
Crux read the question on her face and grinned. "Dragon."
She'd seen him use his fire powers. She'd somehow managed to use his fire powers. And yet it was still difficult to believe whenever she saw him do something impossible like this.
She dipped her hand between her legs, and her fingers came back wet.
Crux moved with a speed she didn't know he possessed and knelt before her, sucking her fingers into his mouth and tasting her.