by Dena Christy
“Of course. I don’t need more time to think, but I understand that it is a big undertaking for you.” And he too wanted time to make it more special than a quick coupling on his bed in the fever of their reunion. He could wait until tonight to join with her for the rest of his life.
Evie looked at herself in the mirror, trying to see how Cynric would see her. She had to admit that she didn’t think she’d ever looked this good in the time that he’d known her, but with them running for their lives eliminating any beauty regime, the bar wasn’t set very high. She turned away to look at her two best friends, who were beaming at their handiwork. When she’d come to them, telling them that she and Cynric were performing the binding ritual tonight, they were both ecstatic and excited.
In the time that they’d been waiting to leave Nova Earth, both women had purchased clothing to take with them to Latroth so that they wouldn’t have to go to their new home with only the clothes on their back. Evie hadn’t been as fortunate, since she hadn’t thought she’d be leaving, but Miranda brought forth a bag that she said she’d gotten for her hoping she would realize that she loved Cynric and would bind herself to him. Evie had been overwhelmed when she pulled out a figure skimming dress made of scarlet silk along with matching bra and panties.
She wore that dress now, and it fit her to perfection. Butterflies danced in her stomach, but as soon as she was with Cynric she knew they would go away. She couldn’t wait to go to him and perform the ritual that would bind him to her for the rest of their lives.
“I don’t know how to thank either of you for this.” Evie blinked her eyes rapidly so she wouldn’t ruin the makeup that Collette had so carefully applied for her.
“There is no need to thank us. We both love you and want you to be happy. Now go and be with your man.” Collette stepped forward and gave Evie a quick hug. She stepped back and Miranda stepped forward to take hold of both of her hands.
“If you hadn’t made me see the truth, we wouldn’t be here.” Evie gave her friend’s hands a squeeze as she smiled at her.
“And if you hadn’t taken us in when we needed you, none of this would be happening. I’d say we are even.” Miranda hugged her quickly and took a step back. “Now go.”
Evie turned away and walked carefully toward the door. The shoes on her feet belonged to Collette, and they were a little higher than she normally wore but she was getting used to them. She got to the door and turned to looked back at her friends one last time. “Thank you.”
She touched the panel on the side of the door and it slid open. She stepped out of the room and walked down the corridor until she got to Cynric’s room. She pressed the panel, and she walked in and stopped just inside the door as it closed behind her. Her eyes swept the room, and she could hardly believed it was the same one that she’d been in only hours before.
The room was lit by dozens of candles, which lent a soft glow to everything. Soft instrumental music played in the background, and the soft perfume of the flowers strategically placed around the room lent a magical air to it all. Cynric stepped forward, and she could see his hair was still damp from his shower.
“You look beautiful.” His eyes roamed over her, and in the candlelight she could see an electric blue rim around his irises. “Are you ready for this or do you want to talk first?”
“I think we’ve done enough talking. I’m ready to join my life with yours.” She stepped up to him and put her hands on his chest. One good thing about the shoes Collette insisted she wear was that it made her a little taller, and he didn’t tower over her as much. She slid her hands over the soft fabric of his shirt and up around his neck.
“I love you.” His voice came out in a rough growl as he pulled her to him and kissed her deeply. She kissed him back with all the love she had for him inside her and soon kissing was not enough. It had been so long since they’d made love to each other, and she wanted more than anything to join her body with his when she bound her life to his. She took a step back and tugged at his shirt. He lifted it up over his head, and she leaned forward to press her lips against the mark that looked just like her hand.
His breath hissed in through his teeth, and as she pulled back she could see the changes taking place in his body. He was becoming his true self with her, his skin turning a pewter gray which glowed like an opal in the candlelight. Twin ridges appeared on his forehead as his features sharpened and his eyes glowed an electric blue. She saw his love for her there, along with the arousal that was so evident. She felt beautiful and desirable with his eyes upon her.
“We’re wearing too many clothes.” Her voice held a husky note of desire as she reached back and undid the zipper holding her dress closed as he shed his pants. He stood before her naked with his erection jutting forward as the dress slithered from her body. His eyes smoldered as he watched her step out of the shoes, take off the bra and slide the panties down her legs to puddle on the floor at her feet.
He reached for her, his large hands coming around her waist as he lifted her up against his body. She closed her eyes for a moment at the ecstasy of feeling his bare flesh against her own. She clung to him as he carried her over to the bed and settled themselves upon it. He lay beside her, and despite the fierce arousal she could see in him, he appeared to be in no hurry to consummate their love for each other. He kissed her lips softly, nibbling at them as he glided his hand up from her waist to her breast, skimming across her flesh in a slow caress that raised the gooseflesh on her body and tightened her nipples. She arched in his palm as he molded her flesh with his hand and held him to her, kissing him with all the desire that was building inside her. Their kiss took on an intensity that hadn’t been between them before as if only by admitting their love for each other could they truly be intimate.
He pulled his mouth away from hers and his lips drifted down her throat to the breast he cradled with his hand. He took her nipple in his mouth and sucked gently upon it as she threaded her fingers through his hair, and a moan escaped her. The desire for him built inside her, and her hips moved restlessly upon the mattress until his hand came down to cup her between her thighs. She opened her legs for him, to give him better access to where her body was crying out for his touch.
“Cynric,” she cried out when he stroked his fingers over her damp flesh. He stroked and toyed with her clit as he diverted his attention to her other breasts, and she thought she would drown in the pleasure he was bringing to her body. She needed to join with him, needed to feel him inside her, and mate with him so that they could truly become one. “Please I need you inside me now. I’m ready to bind myself with you.”
He pulled his mouth away from her breast, the light in his so electric that they glowed when he looked at her. He moved away so that he lay on his back on the mattress, pulling her over him so that her legs straddled his hips. “Take me inside your body and put your hand on the mark. Don’t take it off until we’ve finished.”
She reached down to hold his shaft steady at the entrance of her body and eased down on it. The pleasure his body joining with hers elicited made her close her eyes for a moment as she savored the fullness of him inside her. His hands came up to stroke up and down her thighs as he waited for her to fit her hand on the mark. It was warm under her palm, and he flexed his hips up with a growl.
She moved her hips in a slow undulation that drove them both wild. He felt so good, so right inside her, and she could feel the love she had for him welling up inside her. She wanted this moment, this night, to last forever. Soon the slow movements wasn't enough for her, and if the aroused snarl on his face was any indication, for him either.
He gripped her hips as he moved her in the rhythm that he wanted, and she moved with him, grinding against him as her own pleasure built inside her. The mark burned hotter and hotter the faster she moved.
His hands slid up her back as he pulled her down to kiss her. He rolled them over, still joined, so that he was now on top of her. She kept her hand firmly on the mark as he slammed his
body into hers, over and over, faster and faster until it all became too much, and the pleasure building inside her spilled over into the ecstasy of orgasm. She called his name as she found her relief, and he thrust into her one last time before his big body shuddered above her as he too found his release.
She held him to her, cradling him inside her body as their senses returned and their heart rates calmed. He rolled to her side and pulled her to him, settling her against his body. In the aftermath of their love, she felt different. What she felt for him had more depth. Her sense of him grew stronger with each passing moment, and she could feel the love he had for her wrapping around her in a comforting warmth just as his arms wrapped around her now.
“I can feel it. I feel your love for me. Do you feel mine for you?” She looked up at him as he leaned in to press a soft kiss on her mouth.
“I feel it. I love you Evie, and everything I went through, the imprisonment, the torture and being hunted was all worth it to find you. We are bound now, and I will spend the rest of my life showing you just how much you mean to me.”
She blinked rapidly as tears prickled in her eyes. She buried her face in his neck as she held on to him. The fear she had felt was gone, and it was replaced with a love so strong that it would last for the rest of her life. A life that she would spend loving him.
“I love you too, and I am so happy that we found each other. I was lost for so long, hiding away because I was afraid to love. I needed you to show me that love is nothing to be afraid of.” The woman she’d been before she met him would have been terrified at the prospect of what she was about to do, to go to a strange planet and live a life with the man she loved. Their love for each other had conquered her fear, and she was ready to face her future with him at her side.
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Andor
“You will never find a mate if you don’t leave the house.”
Andor Domokos lowered his newspaper with the ease of someone with all the time in the world. Six hundred years he had been asleep, and the quality of minion had not improved in that time. His eyes narrowed, and he used them to communicate his displeasure. Satisfied that he had shown his disapproval of Rickman’s attitude, he directed his attention back to the news.
“Don’t look at me like that. Under normal circumstances, I’d tell you to do what you want and if you want to mope around here and pout, go ahead. But I like being alive, and if you don’t find a mate soon, I’ll get killed when you go crazy.”
Andor sighed, folded his newspaper and set it aside. “How do you know you will survive the end of the week? I do not have to be insane to kill you.”
“You can’t kill me. You need me.”
Andor’s mouth twisted in irritation. Unfortunately, his minion was correct, he did need him. How galling to need someone who did not appear to have any sense. What sensible young man chose to have blue hair?
“I can kill you anytime I like. You should give me the respect I deserve. Are you certain you are a qualified minion, Rickman?” The corner of Andor’s mouth twitched as he watched Rickman’s reaction to his tiny barb with amusement. A creeping flush made its way up the young man’s face, and Andor kept the smile that wanted to stretch his lips at bay.
“How many times do I have to tell you, my name is Rick.” Rickman glared at him as he informed Andor of his preferred name.
Andor picked up his paper and used it to hide his face. It was so easy to rile him, and he should not be doing it. As a dragon, it was beneath his dignity, but Rickman’s lack of humility made Andor grind his teeth.
“I do not think it is. I saw the piece of paper that has the details of your birth on it, and I recall the name on it is Rickman.”
Rickman let out a frustrated noise. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing. You are trying to distract me from your issue. We need to come up with a game plan for finding you a mate.”
Andor set the newspaper aside on the kitchen table for the final time.
He crossed his arms as he gave Rickman a sour look. They had tried things his way, but his minion seemed to believe human women were available at places where they performed on stage and took their clothes off.
As if he wanted a woman who gyrated professionally to a horrendous cacophony. If that was not enough, their bodies were odd looking. Their ribs showed more often than not, but their breasts were large, perfectly round and did not jiggle. He was old fashioned and appreciated a good jiggle.
“I told you before that I will go nowhere with you if it involves those appalling places you want to frequent. How could you believe that I want a mate who takes her clothes off for money?”
“Dragons like treasure?” Rickman shrugged his shoulders as the metal ring in his nose winked in the light coming in through the window. Blue hair and metal in his face. Fashion had taken a turn for the worse while he had slept, and his minion’s taste was the proof of it.
“Green pieces of paper are not treasure.” Treasure glittered and sparkled. The glint of gold, the twinkle of gems, that was what he adored above all else. The green pieces of paper worshiped in this time seemed so mundane. Easier to obtain too, if a dancing woman could get enraptured men to tuck cash in the bits of fabric hiding her most private treasure.
“I will admit that the strippers weren’t a good idea. I don't know your type. And a strip club caters to different tastes. Did you find any woman that intrigued you?”
“None of those women were attractive to me.” The notion that his potential mate’s nude body had been seen by hordes of men sent deep disgust through him.
Rickman had informed him that virginal women of mating age were rare in this time. It forced him to lower his expectations, but he was not prepared to compromise that much. While his mate need not be a virgin, he did not want one who entertained untold numbers of men in the so-called Champagne Room. He did not know what they did in there, but based on the expression on Rickman’s face after he had come out of it once, it involved a sex act.
“None of them? Not even one or two?” Rickman chewed his bottom lip, his teeth missing the metal ring he had in it. How could he kiss a woman or use his mouth on anything else with that metal ring hanging from it? “You aren’t gay, are you? I never thought to ask. It’s not a bad thing if you are, but it would change the direction of our search.”
“I fail to see the relevance my happiness has on our search, but I assure you that I have not been happy with our mate hunt thus far.”
“Not happy gay, gay gay. As in preferring the sexual company of men.”
“I am attracted to females.” There were some men back in his time whose preferences ran along those lines, but they did not broadcast it. “What I am not attracted to are women who shake their breasts and buttocks for a living. Where can I meet a wholesome woman?”
“I’m not the one to get you an invitation to a church social. How did you meet ladies before?”
“It will not be possible to do it that way.” If only it were that easy. Andor heaved a heavy sigh as he scrubbed his hand over his face and some of his frustration came out. “We used to take whoever we wanted and all it took was one dragon to ruin that for us.”
“Did you talk to her at all, or did you just grab? It doesn’t seem like a good deal for her if she wasn’t allowed to have an opinion on the matter.”
Andor looked at Rickman for a moment as his eyebrows climbed his forehead. This was a man who watched women dance naked for money. Did he think they had a much better deal than the women chosen to be a dragon’s mate? A dragon’s mate received lavish treasure and was protected for the duration of her life. Back in a time when one bad harvest meant starvation, most women jumped at the chance to be taken care of by a dragon.
“It does not matter now. I am cursed and have to find a woman who can love a dragon.”
"Who did it? Who brought the curse on you? There was no ment
ion of him anywhere in the archives.” Rickman leaned forward, his face one of rapt attention. The usual cocky sneer he wore had fallen away, and there was open curiosity on his face. Perhaps he would become worthy of being a dragon’s minion.
“I am sure your ancestors did not feel it necessary to put his name in the archive since he is sleeping downstairs.”
Rickman’s mouth fell open. “The dragon responsible for bringing the curse down on dragon kind is one of your brothers? Which one?”
“Gregor.” Disgust tasted bitter on Andor’s tongue when he spoke his brother’s name. Gregor stole the daughter of a witch. One unwilling to stay with him and she died trying to escape. The witch cursed all dragons in her grief over her dead child. Gregor had received a special punishment. The witch had used magic to turn the clock back on his brother’s mating time. She had forced him into the same dilemma as the rest of them. “It is all in the past and does not solve my current problem. My mating time is upon me now. I need to find a woman willing to love me by the third night of the Hunter’s Moon. Otherwise, everyone around me will perish in the furnace of dragon’s fire.”
He had no desire to kill anyone, but he would not be able to stop it. He would never admit it to Rickman, but he could feel the faint tickling of panic at the thought of how little time he had to find a woman who could love a dragon.
“Well, we can't waste any more time. Strippers are out of the question?”
“Yes. How do people meet in this time? When I meet her, she will fall in love with me.” He had supreme confidence that the biggest obstacle in his way was finding her. Once he did, she would be his for the taking and his curse would be lifted.
“You think it’s that easy? Just meet her and she’ll fall in love with you at first sight?”
“I am a dragon. What woman would not want to be with me?” He was not given to ego and immodesty, but he had untold riches at his disposal and could give her whatever she desired.