Dragon Beloved: A Reverse Harem Dragon Mythology Romance (Dragon Gladiators Book 3)

by Zara Stark

  “Duh, I’ve watched plenty of heist movies, you have to lose them first,” I scoffed.

  “Try not to re-injure your arm or worse! Or get Nevada hurt in the process,” Raiden ordered, sounding more like a worried mother hen than our team leader. He swung around to face Nevada, fixing him with an icy glare. “You take care of her and yourself.”

  “No, I thought I would just leave her for dead,” Nevada sighed, his monotone voice belying his sarcasm. He latched his arm through my good one and pulled me up to my feet.

  I waved to the other guys. “Wish us luck.”

  “Oh we will, you will be needing it,” Cobalt sniggered in a low rumble.

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence, Coba,” I stuck my tongue out at him.

  “Careful who you stick your tongue out towards, I might just bite it,” Cobalt growled low, his eyes smoldering with sanguine fire.

  I blinked a few times. “Was that supposed to be sexy? That seemed far more cannibal than Casanova.”

  “Cannibal!” The other three said at once.

  “That’s the beauty of having me in your life, you never know which you’re going to get,” Cobalt gave me a sharp-toothed grin.

  “Not really selling yourself well,” Nevada shook his head and tugged me along with him towards the door.

  I waved one last time at the guys and followed Nevada out of our door and stepped into the hot streets of Rome. It was nearly noon and the sweet scents of cooking food drifted through the thin alley of Ancient Rome to our castelli only a few streets away.

  The pungent but pleasant aromas of herbs tickled my nose, ranging from fennel, thyme and mint drifted on the thick air. Despite being a vegetarian, the smell of cooking meat made my stomach growl a little bit, a sensation I ignored having just stuffed my face full of bread and cheese.

  Nevada pulled me away from the direction of the marketplace, weaving in and out of alleys made of pale limestone and dark pozzolana. Though not as beautiful as our white marble castelli, the volcanic building materials had their own certain beauty. I ran my fingertips over the wall of one alley, the way the Ancient Romans built their building was beautiful, so very textured and unique looking but quite sturdy.

  Nevada sighed and stopped.

  “Ready?” He asked.

  “Yes,” I replied, not even needing to ask what he was talking about. Without any hesitation, I pulled a card from my hip holster. My poor deck was so very thin and my heart panged for my destroyed cards. Their sacrifice had been so very worth it though, Cobalt had lived through being hit dead on with a banshee screech. I had used far too much power to use a healing card on Cobalt, in hindsight I’m not even sure a healing card would have even worked on a man whose soul was being ripped from his body by the screech of a monster. I turned the card over in my fingers, the Alpha of Shields reflected the light of the sun off of its metallic surface. Inlaid in each corner of the card were black andradite garnets that seemed to soak in all of the surrounding light like black holes deep in space.

  I tried my best to twirl the cards in my left hand but the motion was clumsy but I still felt the familiar flare of life spring forward. Darkness spread like snakes from the black gemstones and traveled through my fingers and up my arm. Nevada quickly grabbed on to my bare shoulder and the shadows spread through him too, rendering us invisible and intangible to everything but each other.

  Once the card completely worked its magic I tucked it into the top of my makeshift arm cast so that it touched the soft, sensitive part of the bottom of my hand. The cast was useful for something at least.

  “Do you ever wonder why the card renders you intangible to everything but the surface of the earth itself? Shouldn’t you be sinking through the Earth to the other side?” Nevada questioned. “There’s a paradox in there somewhere.”

  “I don’t look at it like that,” I shook my head and tilted my chin up to meet his eyes, loving the academic curiosity in his eyes. “If someone reaches out to touch me, I’m intangible. If I reach out and touch someone I can do it, I look at it like my feet are touching the ground and therefore I don’t sink through the Earth.”

  Nevada nodded like my explanation made sense to him. I didn’t think my cards made much sense myself, I was the kind of person who rolled with the punches and my cards were the same way.

  Nevada and I made our way to the opposite side of Rome to the Atrium Libertatis. It was hard to miss, the large dome-shaped structures that composed the library were made of shining white and black-speckled marble and trimmed with gold plating. In front of the building was a giant statue of the deity Apollo, god of the sun but also knowledge. He was recognizable by the golden sunrays that jutted out behind his head and the scarf of gold that hung from his extended arm, the other carried rolled up scrolls. I had always wondered why Apollo kept the same name in both Roman and Greek mythos when all of the other deities received new names, even his sister went from Artemis to Diana. There was also a statue of the goddess Trivia that I recognized by two gigantic lapis lazuli stones they had in place of her eyes, the scarf covering her entire body like a shroud and the giant torch-like staff she carried. At least I guessed it was Trivia, the Roman Hecate, goddess of magic. Who else would a bunch of warlocks and witches worship?

  Instead of the excitement, I felt every time I entered a library, the tingling excited feeling in the pit of my stomach at the thought of all of those precious books, each a world of their own, just ready and waiting for me to pick them up and dive right on it. Instead, the feeling was ominous. Raiden told me it was usually guarded heavily but now only a few lingering Concilium members guarded the doors. He also explained that there would be magical wards in place but we were confident my Alpha of Shields would get us past them without tripping them.

  We stopped in front of the library at the same time with the same exact foot. I momentarily marveled at how in sync we were.

  “It’s so unguarded, let’s see how far we can get in,” Nevada whispered.

  “I thought we were just going to scout,” I whispered back.

  “That was just to placate Worry-wart-Raiden, we’ve been scouting it forever. I’ve been here a thousand times, the security is lax right now. There won’t be a better time,”

  What he said made total sense to me but at the same time, my stomach churned with nervousness. I tried to push that nervousness to the back of my mind.

  “Do you even know where to look?” I asked, my voice trembling.

  “Yes, they keep the carefully curated selection books for their enslaved dragons in the front most part of the building, in that same area it had a map and list of the different sections of the library. I have passed it so many times in the last ten years, I couldn’t help but memorize it. In the second basement level books of magical creatures, that is where I think we’ll find something on your powers,” Nevada explained, his expression drifting away as if he was picturing the map of the building in his mind.

  “Basement? If we get found out, we’ll be stuck,” I warned.

  “We’ll figure it out,” Nevada voice took on a sharper tone.

  I gave him a confused look. “You don’t want to form some meticulous plot?”

  Nevada scoffed. “I’m not Raiden, I’m looking at it like a calculated risk and running different scenarios through my brain. I’m confident we’ll come out of this alive.”

  “Well, at least you are,” I sighed, running my good hand through my hair. “Alright, let’s do this.”

  “That’s the spirit. I don’t know if it’s the horrors you’ve recently experienced or our years apart, perhaps both, but you used to trust me implicitly. I would like to have your trust put in me again,” Nevada’s cool hands went to my cheeks as he cupped my face firmly. His sapphire eyes stared down into mine and his teeth bit his bottom lip.

  “I know, I need some time to get there, I’ve been on my own for a while now and I’m so used to being extra cautious because I had no one to watch my back. It can be hard to adjust to life wit
h people in my corner again,” I smiled up at him. “Not that it’s not amazing to have you all back in my life, you know what I mean.”

  “I do,” Nevada smirked down at me with half-lidded eyes. “Well, we should probably get going. How long can you keep your Alpha of Shields up?”

  “As the only card? I think at least twelve hours at this point,” I low-balled my estimate to Nevada. Honestly, I was almost certain that if I was only using one card at a time, I could keep it present for days or even a week. My shield had stayed active even when I passed out from exhaustion when we were attacked by the assassin in our castelli. That had been when I only started using my new deck, I had only grown stronger since then.

  “Perfect,” Nevada’s smirk spread into a devious grin, his sapphire-hued eyes gave a dangerous glint.

  He tugged me along and we stepped over the threshold onto the property of the Atrium Libertatis. He didn’t flinch but as soon as we passed the property line a shiver passed through me. A cold wave of ancient magic hit me, rocking through my body like an earthquake.

  “Did you feel that?” I whispered to Nevada.

  He shook his head and pressed his index finger to his lips to quiet me as we walked past the guards.

  The guards, white robbed men with meticulously groomed snowy white hair, faces and eyes painted with thick chalky makeup. It struck me as odd that they didn’t speak to each other, instead of standing quietly with bored expressions on their faces. If not for the shallow rises and falls of their chests I would have been sure they were mannequins, cheap imitations of real life.

  The entrance to the library was open, an intricate archway of polished pure white marble that gleamed in the noontime sun. I blinked a few times, unsure if it glowed from the sun or if from magic, it seemed to be pulsing like it was alive. Nevada and I walked through it and the same unearthly chill rocked through me. The only magic I had ever felt was that off cards and more recently dice. Whatever sort of magic we were walking into gave me the same sickly feeling in my stomach that I got when using my dice. A new and alien feeling.

  Nevada held my hand tightly in his and marched through the building like he owned the place, leading me further into the building. If there was somewhere that Nevada was comfortable it was definitely a library, even if it was owned by the evil warlocks that were keeping us trapped in the past. I shook my head with a smile on my face, this whole situation was so very Nevada, and it warmed my heart.

  I should be terrified but the familiarity of a library. Whether my modern place of employment back home or a library two thousand odd years ago, a library felt like home. The austere woody scent of papyrus and the familiar scent of dust filled the air.

  The library was illuminated within by a verdant light from wrought iron torches full of flickering green fire hung from the walls. Numerous, thick columns held the structure up and combined with the odd lightning, the library had a strangely ominous and dark feeling to it. Shelves full of stacks upon stacks of thickly rolled papyrus scrolls. My greedy little hands wanted to get my hands on all of the scrolls and disappear for a few weeks of reading and research. I had been so very preoccupied with almost dying a magical death every day that I forgot I was actually in the past and was living the very history I had only seen in movies and television before. It took my breath away.

  Nevada led me to the back far wall and took a hard right. My shorter legs struggled to keep up with his hard pace and my eyes wandering from bookcase to bookcase didn’t help. At this point in history, the Latin alphabet had evolved at this point to look very similar to our own. Each shelf had a carving above them indicating the topic. My gaze darted between shelves marked ‘alchemy’, ‘cult of Osiris’ and ‘Deities of Mount Olympus’ and I practically salivated. I wanted to know what secrets those shelves held.

  Nevada paused at the top of a small square passage to a staircase that led downward, the staircase was not lit and completely dark. If Nevada hadn’t stopped right in front of it, I wouldn’t have known it was there at all. It looked so strangely out of place, a person could place a rug over it to hide and no one would be the wiser. Nevada turned his head over his shoulder and mouthed to me. “Are you ready?”

  I jerked my head into one rough nod and swallowed hard. This was usually the part in a scary movie where I was yelling at the people on the screen to not go down there and to run like hell in the other direction. Every instinct within me screamed for me not to follow Nevada but instead, I squeezed his hand and followed him down into what might have been a portal to hell.

  Chapter 3

  The staircase was a lot longer than it looked, I counted fifty steps before I gave up. I started to shiver, the air grew colder as we descended further and further underground. I dared not reach out and touch the walls around us even though it was pitch black and I couldn’t see a thing.

  I had seen enough movies to know that if I touched the walls, I could trigger who knew what kind of booby traps and spells or what have you.

  “I can’t see a thing,” I whispered. As long as I had Nevada leading I would be fine. His senses were far stronger than my own and he could see in the dark quite well.

  Nevada squeezed my hand in reassurance. The air around me kept flowing cold for a moment and then it would disappear as if pulled from the air. My eyes narrowed in Nevada’s direction, he, of course, was absorbing the cold for himself. My heart ached for him, his power was the hardest to charge up in Ancient Rome. The other guys gave him nonstop shit for it too, like it was his fault. There was plenty of heat for Azar to absorb. Plenty of electrical storms for Raiden to siphon charged particles from and plenty of metal for Cobalt to consume. It had been honestly terrifying to see Cobalt eat metal the first time. He could absorb it through his skin like the other three dragons could do with their elements but he said it took too long and chose to eat it instead. Watching him chomp through an old battered shield had been both fascinating and traumatizing.

  The air grew progressively more stale and hot as we descended further and further down into the darkness. At this rate, Nevada would be overpowered by the time we left here.

  After a small eternity, our feet landed on solid stone. It was still dark all around us, the air stale and chilled. We had to be far under the ground. I breathed a sigh of relief as Nevada pulled me around a corner and led us to a partially lit portion of the library. The same sickly green torches decorated the walls, giving off a muted half-light. Incantamentum was carved into the stone walls. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that meant incantations. It had to right? He directed my between bookshelves, weaving in and out of the shelves. It was too dark to make out the words marking each shelf.

  A shuffling close by made us freeze in place. It sounded like the flutter of fallen paper magnified by a thousand.

  “What is that?” I whispered to Nevada.

  Nevada pressed his forefinger to his lips to quiet me and my heart raced. We were invisible so we would be okay right?

  Nevada ignored it and kept leading us forward but after I heard the same sound again, I looked over my shoulder. My mouth fell open in shock. Behind us was a massive dragon, so large it was hunched over, made of ancient scrolls. Some scrolls were rolled, some unfurled twisting and contorting to form the muscled form a long lindwurm-type dragon, a long snake-like body and massive arms composed of thick scrolls. The only life-like parts of the dragon seemed to be its wide, lidless eyes that darted around the room, its sharp claws, and beak-like maw.

  Too shocked to speak, I tugged on Nevada’s arm frantically. He turned around and his eyes went wide taking in the scroll dragon. Nevada shrugged and pointed to his eyes and shook his head.

  I rolled my eyes at him. Duh, I knew the dragon couldn’t see us but still what the hell?!

  “Kyōrinrin,” Nevada whispered in a voice so low, I read what he said from his lips more than I heard it. “Made of old scrolls and books abandoned and untouched for a hundred years or more. They’re quite common in ancient libraries, they p
unish those who mistreat or misuse books.”

  “Oh like a librarian,” I grinned at him and Nevada nodded.

  We continued on and so did the Kyōrinrin, in lumbering slither across the room. Slow and awkward, its large form caught up with us and passed right through us. The strange feeling of being intangible and having another living creature pass through you was the most disgusting feeling on the planet.

  The Kyōrinrin passed through us and the phantom-like feeling of being passed through like a ghost rocked through my body. It was a feeling that took some getting used to and every time it happened I got a little better at handling it. I looked to Nevada and saw his pale face turn a light shade of chartreuse.

  Oh no, Nevada's face turned even more green and he lurched forward and threw up right on a shelf full of ancient scrolls. The Kyōrinrin stopped in place and turned around, its wide eye landing on the damaged shelf.