by Bianca D’Arc
Liam picked her up and carried her the short distance to the tent opening. So few men had ever treated Rivka as if she was delicate and feminine. Liam did it without thought, and it made her feel incredibly special. She eagerly entered the tent, and he closed the flap securely behind them. He had already laid out the bedroll and his cloak, similar to how things had been arranged the night before, but separate. He’d made preparations for sleeping. Not seduction.
She smiled. She liked that he hadn’t taken anything for granted.
Last night had been his show. Liam had decided when and how and in what position to take her. Rivka had played along, fearing that he could change his mind, at any moment, if he started thinking about his dead wife. Rivka had been reticent to do anything to spoil the mood.
Tonight, all bets were off. They were both under the influence of the dragon’s breath, and they had already made love several times the night before. They knew each other, now. They knew each other’s bodies and what brought pleasure. There was more to learn, to be sure, but they’d gotten off to a great start last night, and tonight… Well…tonight, if Rivka had her way, she would learn a great deal more about what the good captain liked in bed.
Just the thought made her want to roar, but she held it in. It wouldn’t do to scare the poor man off by reminding him he was bedding not only a woman but a woman who was half dragon. She was confident in his desire and the passion that was between them, but she knew it was a lot to take in for a human man to bed a dragon. Tales abounded within her own Clan of men who couldn’t handle dragon women long term.
Not that Rivka expected this relationship to last beyond their shared quest. She wouldn’t be that foolish, no matter how attached she was becoming to the man. She knew better than to risk her heart on something that could never be.
Rivka pushed Liam down on her bedroll and took charge. It was time he learned what the dragon lady liked. With the dragon’s breath fueling her desire—which was already off the charts where Liam was concerned—Rivka was even bolder than she might normally have been as she undressed him. Straddling his body, she slowed to enjoy the moment when she removed her blouse.
He didn’t disappoint. As soon as they were freed, he cupped her breasts in his warm palms, shaping them and tweaking her nipples with a hard, perfect touch that she loved. She lifted herself higher and balanced on first one foot, then the other as she stripped off her pants and under-things until she was bare.
Savoring her task, she slid down his body until she could work the buttons on his pants with her fingers and teeth. She took a moment to run her teeth down the length of his erection through the leather covering, liking the way he jumped a bit under her unexpected touch. She smiled as she drew back, meeting his eyes as she revealed his hard cock, taking it in her hands and squeezing gently.
He growled. The dragon in her liked that. Desire flared in her body, which felt as ready to take him inside as his hardness proved he was to be there. She rose on her knees, moving upward until her pussy spread open just above the tip of his cock. She used her hands to guide him into the right spot as his hands went to her hips, urging, guiding…savoring.
She pressed downward, and he slid into her a little at a time. Delicious.
Unable to hold back the torrent of her desire, she began to move almost immediately. What happened then, became a bit of a blur as she rode him hard and long, taking herself to peak after peak before he joined her in bliss. Then, he flipped their positions and started again.
Her thirsty lover drank, again and again, of the wine of desire, giving her pleasure after pleasure and taking his own whenever she thought she could take no more. He always proved her wrong. They lay together throughout the long night in a tangle of limbs and the honest sweat of passion.
She dozed for a bit, only to wake and want him, all over again. The dragon’s breath took its time dissipating, and while it lasted, it fed both their desire and their personal energies. Rivka felt no guilt at indulging herself, knowing that tomorrow they would pay no penalty for this night of athletic lovemaking. They would be rested and ready to go due to the magic of the healing fog.
Skelaroth’s first attempt to summon the dragon’s breath had been a masterful effort. Rivka would be sure to tell him so when he woke, but seldom had she seen a more potent display of the healing fog than that which Skelaroth had called forth. She wouldn’t be surprised if—along with Ella’s help—if his wing wasn’t almost completely repaired after the fog did its work.
The important thing was that he would be able to fly again, and soon. They still had to neutralize Fisk and that mage he had traveling with him. Rivka had a special reason to want that evil magic worker dead. He’d hurt her friends. He’d caused her great worry. And he’d undoubtedly aided and abetted Fisk’s evil work in obtaining the page from Gryffid’s book and taking it Northward. There was no way the mage could be on the right side of this conflict.
Therefore, he was the enemy. Rivka knew just what to do with an enemy. Annihilate him.
That thought came straight from her dragon soul, and her human side knew it to be the right course in this situation. Such a creature as that evil mage could not be allowed to go any farther into the homeland of dragons and knights. Her homeland, now. She and all the Jinn would protect Draconia as certainly as the dragons and knights who had lived here all along would. They’d been fighting on the same side, but the Jinn had done so from the shadows.
That time was over. The Jinn had finally stopped traveling and hiding. They might still work from the shadows, but their presence in the land of their ancestors was no secret. They were back, and they had been welcomed at the highest levels. The Jinn Brotherhood was here to stay.
And, as soon as Rivka made love to her sea captain again, she would take what sleep she could get this night and be fresh to battle anew in the morning. She turned to Liam and tackled him to the ground, kissing him playfully. He was ready and willing. She liked that about him. As she liked so much about her dashing sea captain. A man she could so easily come to love…
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Liam woke the next morning to discover the cavalry had arrived. So to speak. He had left the tent to check on Skelaroth and Ella, and the hastily made camp, in general. He started out to gather some fresh water to make tea for Rivka and himself when a shadow passed over the sun. More than one shadow, actually.
He looked up to find dragons circling above. Dragons with knights on their backs. And one very familiar sight—a black dragon in among the others. He’d left Rivka sleeping in the tent, so this had to be someone else. One of her relatives, perhaps? Or, maybe, they were about to receive a royal visit.
The dragons were circling and flying lower with each spiral, so Liam reasoned they were coming down to land. He noted that the dragons with knights atop were coming down first, the smaller black dragon somewhere in the middle of the group. Liam assumed that meant the others were protecting the black, which meant it was likely a member of the royal family. Now that he knew their secret, it seemed so obvious. He wondered why he hadn’t put two and two together before meeting Rivka.
The clearing Skelaroth had landed in was large enough to accommodate a few more dragons—just barely. Two landed first and, immediately, walked closer to where Liam waited next to Skelaroth. Ella had opened her eyes and looked interested in the proceedings as the two mounted knights took up positions on either side of the fallen sea dragon.
“Greetings,” one of them called out. “I am Trevor, and that is my partner, Boros,” he nodded toward the other man. “Our dragon partners are Wyndimira and Klathenor.”
“I am Liam O’Dare,” Liam replied. “The sea dragon before you is Lord Skelaroth, and this,” Liam ducked a bit as Ella picked that moment to fly from her perch on Skelaroth’s head to land on Liam’s shoulder, “is Mistress Ella, my friend and companion.”
“Is there not also a woman traveling with you?” Boros asked, his eyes narrowing.
“Aye,” Liam nodded. �
��She is in the tent. Lady Rivka.” He didn’t say more about her, opting to leave that up to her. Only Rivka knew how much she wanted to reveal of her background to these people. Liam would not presume.
“I’ll be out in a minute!” They all heard Rivka’s raised voice from within the tent as the sides of the fabric construction started to billow with her movements.
While they spoke, Liam noticed that two more dragons and knights had landed behind the first set. The new pair went to the sea dragon’s tail, which was stretched out to the edge of the clearing, and took up guard positions.
“What happened to your dragon companion?” Sir Boros asked, looking at Skelaroth with a practiced glance. This man knew dragons. He also seemed to know what it took to knock one out of the sky.
“I assume the king got our message about the band of pirates heading North along the road to our West.” Liam thought it wise not to be too specific about the page from Gryffid’s book, just in case these knights didn’t know the full story.
Boros nodded his agreement with Liam’s statement. “The king received a messenger, and we were dispatched almost immediately.”
“Well, we finally caught up to them yesterday afternoon,” Liam told the knights and dragons. “Lord Skelaroth dove at the party and scattered most of their horses, but there was one man on a horse that did not move. And the man was able to call some sort of malevolent blood red fireball and launch it at Skelaroth. It hit his wing and made a smoking hole clear through.” Liam nodded to the right wing, which was still stretched out as they had left Skelaroth the night before. He had not moved at all, to Liam’s knowledge, since passing out after the dragon’s breath did its thing.
Sir Trevor whistled through his teeth and frowned in concern at the unconscious sea dragon. The other dragons craned their long necks to see what they could of the damage to Skelaroth’s wing.
“He crashed?” Boros asked in a grave tone.
“We crashed,” Liam corrected him gently. “I threw Ella clear, and she was able to fly to safety on her own. I jumped off about fifteen feet above the ground and rolled clear. Skelaroth…” Liam paused, remembering those moments after they’d made contact with the ground. “He was out for a time, but Rivka helped him summon something she called the dragon’s breath, and then, Ella wove her own magic around him. When I went to sleep last night, he was as you see him, now. Unconscious and healing, from all accounts.”
“May I?” Boros asked as he climbed down from his dragon partner’s back. He made a gesture toward Skelaroth’s wing, and Liam nodded, walking with the other knight to inspect the progress of Skelaroth’s wound.
“The wing looks mended,” Trevor said, surprising Liam. He hadn’t known the other knight had descended from his seat atop his dragon. The two dragons had come up behind the men and were also looking closely at Skelaroth’s wing.
“There was a great deal of fog, and Ella helped.” Liam reached up to scratch Ella’s head as she snuggled into his neck.
“You said that before,” Trevor squinted at him and looked hard at Ella. “Is she… Is that a real virkin?”
Liam was so startled, he chuckled. “Yes, indeed. Ella is a virkin from Elderland. She was newly hatched when she chose to join me and my crew on my ship. We have sailed together for nearly a year, and when I put ashore to follow this quest, she chose to join me.”
“Does she speak to you?” Boros wanted to know.
“She does.” Liam saw no point in denying it. “Though that is a recent development. She has only just started talking.”
“And you say she helped in the healing?” Trevor asked, clearly puzzled.
“I, myself, did not know that virkin had any sort of healing ability until the disaster at Waymeet. She helped heal half the town, according to the journeyman healer who was also there. Ella was able to stabilize and bring several people back from the brink,” Liam said, proud of his little friend’s accomplishments.
“Whatever you did for your big friend,” Boros said, looking directly at Ella, “it was well done. Thank you on behalf of all dragonkind for your assistance, Mistress Ella.”
Ella ducked her head and blinked prettily. “Happy help Skel,” she said so that everyone could hear her silent words. She then turned to butt her head against Liam’s cheek. “I go hunt, now. Long ear mouse in bushes.”
“We call them rabbits, sweetheart,” Liam told her indulgently as she lifted off his shoulder, using her delicate wings to flitter away.
All three men were smiling at her departure. Especially when she dove like an arrow into the nearby bushes. The shriek of a rabbit was heard a split second later and then silence.
“I would say Mistress Ella caught her rabbit,” Boros surmised, turning back to matter at hand. “Is there anything we can do for your larger friend here?”
Rivka chose that moment to appear. Clad in her leather armor with her swords crossed in their sheathes behind her back, she looked formidable, even if she was the shortest thing on two legs in the area. That was not to say she was a petite woman. Just that she was a bit shorter than Liam and the knights. Yet, somehow, she had more stature than any of them.
“I think he’ll come around soon,” Rivka said, joining them. She held out her hand for a brisk shake. “I am Rivka of the Black Dragon Clan.”
Trevor had taken her hand as she said those words, and he started a bit before shaking her hand and letting go. “Are you one of those Black Dragon Clan members?” he asked, somewhat indiscreetly. His dragon hissed behind him.
“Pay no attention to my bumbling partner,” Boros said, shaking her hand in turn. “It is an honor to meet you, Lady Rivka. If all is well here, the prince will descend. He wanted to get a bit more reconnaissance done from above before he joined us.”
“By all means, have him descend. It’s probably safer for him down here than up there where the mage might see him and lob fireballs at him,” Rivka said with a slight grin on her face.
“I am Klathenor, and this is my mate, Wyndimira,” a new voice boomed through Liam’s head. He looked up at the male dragon who was speaking to Rivka, apparently. “It is an honor to meet you, Lady Rivka.”
Rivka smiled and bowed her head. “Likewise,” she said directly to the male dragon. “I am honored to meet both of you, Lord Klathenor and Lady Wyndamira. Thank you for coming to our aid.”
“It is our pleasure.” What must have been Wyndamira’s voice came to him. It was lighter than her mate’s. More feminine, somehow.
Rivka surprised Liam by putting one hand on his shoulder. “Captain O’Dare can also hear you,” she advised the dragons. Liam noted that both the dragons and their knights eyed him with surprise at Rivka’s news. “He has been flying with Lord Skelaroth on this quest, and his daughter is newly mated into the Southern Lair.”
Liam’s eyebrows rose as Rivka shared what felt to him like gossip about his daughter, but the dragons and knights seemed impressed by the news. Suddenly, he felt like they were regarding him with more indulgence than their previous suspicion.
“He allows you to ride on his back? Are you a knight, sir?” Trevor asked, proving, once again, that he was the nosier and less subtle of the pair of knights.
Liam shook his head. “I am a sea captain with a fleet of ships under my command. Lord Skelaroth is the leader of the sea dragons in the South. We are travel companions, right now, and we share a common quest. I’m no knight,” he protested, feeling for the first time a small pang of envy for the young men before him who would share their lives with the magnificent creatures behind them.
It was a striking thought. For so long, Liam had thought nothing of the knights who protected his homeland. He’d believed the gossip about sexual deviance and hadn’t really thought much about the men and dragons who did the job of keeping the peace in the land. Then, when his daughter had taken up with her two men, he’d lost all sense of reason. The thought that his little girl would get involved in such things as were rumored to take place in the Lairs… Well, it ha
d driven him around the bend.
But, Liam had to admit, the dragons and knights he’d encountered so far on this journey had really opened his eyes. Perhaps he’d been too hasty to listen to idle gossip. To be sure, there was a three-way marriage happening with his daughter and those two scoundrels who called themselves knights, but maybe it wasn’t as bad as he’d feared.
“Here comes Trent,” Boros said, looking skyward, precluding any further conversation as they all watched a compact black dragon land with grace and style. He was bigger than Rivka’s dragon form, Liam noticed immediately, but not by much.
Liam suspected the knights or their dragon friends had been communicating with the black dragon before he ever landed because he didn’t hesitate to shift form from dragon to man while walking directly toward Liam and those gathered around him. Trent went directly to Rivka first, offering his hand and then pulling her in for a hug that made Liam bristle a bit.
“Well met, cousin,” Trent said to Rivka, surprising Liam with the title. Then again, he supposed, going by what Rivka had revealed to him about the black dragons’ lineage, they were cousins of a sort…many times removed.
“You are Prince Trent?” Rivka asked, a hint of uncertainty in her tone, though her smile was wide.
“Just Trent. I don’t stand on formality. I’m only sixth in line for the throne, and it might as well be six millionth. I don’t ever want the job. Not if it means the loss of five of my brothers. I’m better working in the background, anyway.”
Trent winked at Rivka, and Liam tried not to bristle at the younger man’s easy manner. He was related to Rivka, after all. Her head wouldn’t be turned by the young pup. She had more class than that. Or, maybe, Liam just hoped she wouldn’t go straight from his bed to the prince’s.
“I saw a small group of riderless horses not too far away,” Trent told them all. “It looked like there were a few men on foot, trying to round them up. They didn’t look like farmers. Some of their dress was foreign, and several of them were injured.”