The Fifth Moon’s Dragon

by Monica La Porta

  Dragon’s surprise almost cost him his life, but he blocked the deadly thrust. His palm took the brunt of the hit. Tendons and little bones severed, but he barely felt the pain.

  He only had a few heartbeats left before the poison reached his brain. Blindly searching behind him, Dragon found Carellian’s feathery-soft muzzle. With the knowledge that his draglet would protect him, he gathered his last strength and mind-spoke to Carellian.

  Don’t let the enemy escape, he ordered, using their shared mental channel.

  Carellian huffed his assent, his nostrils warming the air as he pushed against Dragon’s back.

  The pull of gravity increased tenfold in the blink of an eye, crushing him to the ground as he finally lost consciousness.

  6

  The moment the man released Jade’s throat, she spun around to crush the shifter’s windpipe with the blade of her hand. The chop successfully executed countless times met no resistance as her target moved out of reach. A soft thump resonated above the infernal howling of the winds. Her formidable opponent had collapsed, raising a large cloud of dust that clogged her nose and irritated her eyes.

  In complete darkness, she carefully toed the ground, probing for the shifter’s body, but found nothing.

  So far, not one single aspect of her mission had gone as it should have, but Jade would overcome every obstacle thrown her way.

  Plans change. Assassins adapt. She had never needed to repeat the mantra so many times before as she had today.

  The sound of big paws advancing toward her made her freeze on the spot. She held her breath, stilling her body to near-perfect immobility and slowing her heartbeat. That trick usually fooled predators.

  The beast halted a few inches from her. For a moment, she thought it worked. Next, a large, soft muzzle pressed against her chest.

  Jade pivoted on her heels, trusting her senses to let her through the maze of columns and began running. The loud winds that hindered her hearing were now acting like beacons she could follow toward the faint light, dancing several yards away from her. With no other point of reference, she squinted, keeping her eyes on the blinking luminosity.

  She turned a corner and the feeble light disappeared, plunging her into blinding darkness once again. Disoriented, she reached out her hands and found a wall.

  A few feet above her head, two emerald-green, round eyes opened, then closed, only to open again a blink later. Jade understood her error, but it was too late. A warm puff of breath enveloped her just before a large, cavernous mouth closed around her upper body, effectively caging her arms against her sides. The beast tightened his hold when she wriggled, and she ceased any attempt at escaping lest the draglet crush her chest. As it was, her lungs could hardly expand, and her already bruised ribs sent sharp pain signals to her brain.

  Without a warning, the draglet lifted her from the ground and took flight. Panic gripped her as she dangled helplessly from his mouth, but the animal didn’t hurt her. Instead, he carefully flew for several heartbeats before landing with the same effortless elegance he had shown in taking off. The entire time, the winged beast navigated the chamber in the darkness, his eyes the only source of light, but they only projected a meter or two ahead.

  When her feet hit the ground, Jade realized that the draglet had brought her inside a lateral chamber, somewhere protected from the squalls by thick rock walls. After the cacophony of the winds outside, the relative peace reigning in the place was a welcome change. But when she adjusted to the silence, Jade’s ears caught a different and more ominous kind of sound. Deep breathing resonated throughout the smaller cave.

  Someone else dwelled there. Judging from the amount of air displaced by powerful lungs and the warmth emanating from a body only a few feet away from her, the animal was massive. Larger than a draglet by several measures. Bigger than any wild beast roaming the Solarian prairies.

  Sturdy legs shuffled around, and the draglet’s eyes illuminated the creature that lay in the corner. Iridescent scales shone in every hue of the blue palette.

  Irrationally, Jade thought the sight beautiful. When the draglet moved again, another part of the large animal’s body was revealed.

  Blinking, Jade took in the large head with the crest. Long eyelashes framed the closed, round eyes on either side of the muzzle. Puffs of hot breath escaped cavernous nostrils.

  It took her brain a few frantic heartbeats before it started working.

  In front of her, there was a giant dragon, simultaneously majestic and terrifying.

  7

  This is a real dragon. Jade could barely believe her eyes.

  Everything she had read about dragon shifters transforming into their animals when wounded was true. The High Lord had changed into his dragon form and was now sleeping away the toxins in his body.

  Jade’s emotions were suspended between awe and terror, but she didn’t have time to sort them out, because the draglet shuffled and turned, taking with him the only feeble source of light and plunging the chamber into darkness.

  Aware that she had wasted precious moments already, she spun around, looking for the exit. Her senses sought the variation in air pressure and the muffled sounds from the distant winds, directing her toward the point where they resonated louder, but it was too late. The draglet stood sentinel before the chamber’s mouth, effectively blocking her only way out.

  This time, repeating the assassins’ mantra didn’t soothe her or give her peace of mind.

  The draglet snorted as if making fun of her.

  Placing one foot in front of the other, her outstretched hands before her, Jade measured the room and the dragon within. The two animals occupied most of the cave, leaving only a narrow corridor she could use to pace.

  It might have been the absence of light that blinded her and forced her other senses to work at full capacity, but her hearing seemed to have become super sensitive. Besides her own, three other heartbeats resonated in the small cave, lending credit to the old legends.

  “So, that’s also true,” she said out loud. “Dragons carry their shifter heart when they change.”

  It was inane talk, but she needed to hear her voice to anchor her thoughts, otherwise it was just oppressive darkness and the rhythmic thumps of three hearts, drowning the sound of her own.

  A low humph commented on her monologue. The sound reverberated under her feet, rattling the ground. Soon after, her legs were swept out from under her by a moving column that she guessed was the dragon’s tail. The same appendage coiled around her, scooping her up like a puppy and depositing her by a soft, scaly body.

  The dragon rearranged his big body until he cocooned Jade in his warm embrace, trapping her against his belly.

  8

  Dragon dreamed of long limbs circling his waist and small breasts under his hands. All in all, not a bad way to heal from the effects of paralyzing poison and the deep cut in his hand.

  The moment he woke, his body shifted back into his naked human form, and he found reality not as amusing as his dream. Something had roused his senses and forced a shift, even though traces of the drug still lingered in his system.

  The square point of a boot was firmly pressed against his crotch, reminding him of the assassin’s presence. When he moved, the boot retaliated with a kick that only missed its intended target because Dragon was faster than any human. The wooden heel hit his thigh, though, and he cursed.

  Sensing his master’s distress, Carellian came to Dragon’s aid, shoving the man back with a nudge of his oval head and sending him head-over-heels to the ground.

  “Stop,” Dragon ordered Carellian when his loyal steed lowered his muzzle to pin the man to the ground. “Close your eyes.”

  The cave plunged back into darkness, and a muffled oath escaped the man’s mouth, but even with his enhanced hearing, Dragon didn’t understand a word.

  “Who hired you?” Dragon asked.

  He didn’t expect an answer to his question but wanted to hear the man’s accent. In the meantime,
he studied the wiry form, taking advantage of his skills. Besides his superhuman strength, his dragon shifter genes allowed him a few other tricks, like night vision and the ability to hold his breath for a long time. Only a few knew of the extent of Dragon’s powers, and he liked to keep them hidden.

  At the moment, he could observe undetected what the other man was doing. Dragon gave credit to the mercenary for the calm accompanying the man’s every movement. The assassin now sat on the ground, his back straight, his legs crossed, and his hands palms up on his knees in a lotus position as if meditating. The man’s eyes were closed. His heart beat slowly.

  Dragon stood to his full height and closed the small distance between them, keeping his steps as soft as possible. Only another shifter could have heard his naked feet barely touching the ground. Or this assassin.

  The man’s head moved toward Dragon, and he opened his unseeing eyes, tilting his chin to the side. One hand reached inside his tunic, and soon after, he shifted from sitting to crouching and lunged at Dragon with a long knife.

  Dragon mechanically deflected, chopping down the knife pointed at his heart. He grabbed the man by the lapel of his long outer coat and shoved him to the wall, where he proceeded to pat his body, looking for other concealed weapons.

  He pinned the mercenary’s hands overhead with one of his. The man raised his knee to finish what he had started, but Dragon predicted this move as well and shifted to the side, only to press his large body against the smaller man a moment later, entrapping him from head to toe.

  “Enough.” Dragon couldn’t help but smile. The man had balls.

  Leaning away—but keeping his lower body flush to the man’s—Dragon used his free hand and made brief work of removing the assassin’s leather tunic and throwing it to the side. The garment produced a resounding clank when it hit the ground, revealing the presence of at least another knife. He kicked it toward Carellian and resumed his search for weapons, tearing open the leather vest. Sure enough, underneath, he found needles and a vial, probably poison. With a jerk, the vest followed the tunic in a heap at his draglet’s foot. He then grabbed the cotton shirt by the collar and rendered the fabric with a loud tear, uncovering a second leather vest, this one skintight and plastered to the man’s chest that rose and fell, betraying his fear.

  At such a close distance, the man’s scent hit Dragon’s nostrils, sending his senses into a merry ride. His hand went to the remaining vest, and the assassin’s eyes widened as his heart beat loud enough for Dragon to hear the frantic staccato.

  The assassin shook his head but kept silent.

  Instinctively, Dragon’s head dipped lower, his nose at the mercenary’s throat. His sense of smell confirmed his hunch. “You are a woman.”

  He jerked her mask away. Delicate traits were revealed, framed by cropped hair that would have made her pass as a man at a superficial glance. Before the assassin would take advantage of his surprise, he manacled her wrists once again in his hold and cursed under his breath, blood boiling in his veins.

  Dragon was shocked at his reaction to the discovery, not because the assassin wasn’t a man as he had thought, but because the moment he scented the woman’s peculiar bouquet, his only thought was to kiss her.

  To complicate an already uncomfortable situation—in a moment or two, it would be impossible to hide his growing arousal—his dragon paced inside his mind, making demands of his own. Unbidden, visions of mating played before Dragon’s eyes. A long growl formed in his throat.

  Only the sudden look of panic in the woman’s eyes stopped Dragon from lowering his mouth to hers. Still, his lips hovered for a second before he could retain full possession of his senses.

  He kept her wrists tightly in his hold, though, lest she try some of her tricks against him, and stepped away from her now shaking body.

  “I won’t rape you,” he said and felt the worst cad in the whole Fifth Moon System for having to make that pledge.

  9

  Only on one other occasion had Jade felt so powerless.

  Memories of filthy hands on her body came back, and with them the nausea that always accompanied those unwanted recollections. She was small then, and defenseless.

  The High Lord spoke, and his words reached her ears. They were meant to soothe her, but only when his hard body wasn’t pressed against hers any longer did she breathe again.

  The moment he released her wrists, she forgot her training and collapsed to the ground, like a stringless puppet. She hugged herself tightly, unable to stop the shaking. She wouldn’t cry though.

  “I won’t touch you again,” the dragon shifter said. His voice came from a lower point as if he was crouching a few feet from her. “But I can’t let you kill me.”

  Somehow, she understood and nodded.

  “Remove your leather vest and your pants, so I can see if there are any weapons left on you,” he continued in his calm, unhurried voice. When she shook her head, he added, “You can have them back. I don’t intend to keep you naked, I just need to make sure you aren’t hiding anything else underneath your clothes while I rest in my dragon form.” He paused before adding, “I have nothing on me. If you want to pat me down, just reach out.”

  The moment was surreal. The man had proved he could best her with his bare hands and he could clearly see in the dark, but she could appreciate how he would give her the choice.

  “I won’t be able to postpone my shift for long, and I gave you my word I wouldn’t touch you—” He moved, and when he resumed talking his voice came from a higher point. “But I can always ask Carellian to chew on your clothes.”

  Sending a long, annoyed puff of warm breath her way, the draglet opened his large, round eyes, revealing the silhouette of the dragon shifter. It might have been an optical effect due to the dim illumination in the dark chamber, but the man looked enormous, his form filling all her sight. Taller and larger than she had expected him to be, he stood on big legs. Naked, powerful thighs—

  Jade pushed herself up and leaned against the rock wall for stability. Her trembling fingers reached for the lateral stays on her vest, and she fumbled with the leather strings before the stiff garment loosened and fell at her feet.

  “That too must go.” The dragon shifter pointed at the strips of fabric tightly binding her chest.

  Jade’s heart beat loudly against her ribcage, but she unfolded the cambric, layer by layer, until her small breasts were freed. Even with her blood roaring in her ears, she heard the man’s intake of breath and feared he would step closer, but he didn’t.

  She kicked off her riding boots and leaned at the waist to work on the buttons on each side of her leather pants. It took a few shoves to lower the custom-made trousers that hugged her like a second skin. Underneath, she was bare.

  “Good,” the man said, his voice huskier than before. He bent to examine the clothes she had discarded. “You can put them back on.” Neglecting the fabric bindings, he handed her the pants and the vest.

  He watched as she covered her nudity with hasty movements, then swaying on his legs, he braced his fall with his outstretched hand. A moment later, his body convulsed and transformed, leaving the man behind as the dragon took his place.

  The draglet—the shifter had called him Carellian—hissed, puffing his chest. He opened his wings before readjusting his weight in front of the chamber’s exit, while his paws rested on what was left of her arsenal.

  “Message received. You are in charge,” she said, and was rewarded by a swat from Carellian’s flat, triangular tail that sent her straight into the dragon’s corner.

  The creature’s big muzzle nudged her side, gently pushing her against the dragon’s flank.

  This time, Jade didn’t offer resistance. She was tired, and there was no way out of there.

  10

  Fully restored, Dragon reemerged from his healing shift with more questions than answers.

  He eyed the mercenary standing at the ready a few steps from him. Surrounded by darkness, she direct
ed her blind gaze at him, her head tilted to the side, using her hearing to gather information.

  “Are you in an amorous mood?” she asked, surprising Dragon into a laugh.

  He was but didn’t dare tell the truth. “You have nothing to worry from me, fair maiden.”

  At the accolade, the assassin stiffened, her eyes darting lower to her hands she kept fisted. From her earlier strip, he knew that white filigrees tattooed most of her naked skin as if she were covered in a fine web of Celestian lace. One single curlicue adorned the left side of her face, starting at her ear and sitting over her high cheekbone before framing her almond-shaped eye.

  “What happens now?” Her voice was low and husky and had a foreign lilt, a pleasant mix of Solarian and Celestian.

  “I’ll take you to my convoy, and hopefully, you tell me anything I need to know before we reach Sol Palace.”

  “Or what?”

  “I’ll have to release you into the capable hands of the Fifth Moon Confederation, and I’m sure one of their interrogators will make you talk.” He shrugged. “I hope it won’t come to that, because I personally hate violence in any form.”

  The idea that this strong woman would end up in one of the confederate interrogation chambers didn’t sit well with him. And if he were completely honest with himself, he didn’t want her to be harmed. It didn’t make sense, because the assassin’s only task was to kill him, and if he dropped his guard for only a moment, she would try to end his life.

  “I said I wouldn’t touch you, but I’m afraid some contact is inevitable from now on.” He paused to let his words sink in. “I’ll bind you so we can get out of here.” He stood and went to retrieve the long fabric strip that had flattened her chest. With the corner of his eye, he saw that her tilted head followed his movement. “Stand and turn.”