by Lexa Lumos
Abducted by the Dragon Lords
(A Paranormal SciFi Reverse Harem Romance)
Dragon Shifters of Kiyria – Book One
Lexa Lumos
Abducted by the Dragon Lords
Dragon Shifters of Kiyria – Book One
COPYRIGHT © 2018 by Lexa Lumos
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
Cover Art and Design by Amanda Kelsey of Razzle Dazzle Designs
Editing by Theo Fenraven
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without express written permission of the publisher.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Abducted by the Dragon Lords (Dragon Shifters of Kiyria, #1)
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 1
Note from the Author
About Lexa Lumos
Reverse Harem Books by Lexa Lumos
With thanks to Tara West, who encouraged my love of reverse harem; Linda Mercury, who challenged me to explore my wild side; and Deb Carroll, who cheered me on.
Chapter 1
Taryk, Lord Taul, High Commander of the Dragon Sect, paced the small confines of the captain’s cabin on the Kiyrian ship, Dexxa. His long legs ate up the space, too small, even in this form. He desperately wished he were anywhere but here. “They can’t be serious.”
“I’m afraid they are,” Dexxa’s captain, Vane, responded calmly, but his eyes sparked gold as he tracked Taryk’s movements. “They’re desperate. We’re desperate. The entire Kiyrian race is running out of time. And options.”
Grim words, and nothing but truth. The captain wasn’t prone to hyperbole. Panic gripped Taryk’s stomach.
“Cloning.” He was grasping at straws, already knowing the answer. They’d tried it during the early days.
“That’ll be good for, what, another generation or two? It won’t last. Short-term fix at best.”
“The artificial wombs, then.” Technology they’d been forced to develop during the Krull War after the first of their women began dying. “They’ve worked so far.”
Vane snorted. “Sure, but without female genetic material, we will only ever be able to create male children. Not exactly a long-term solution. Besides, this isn’t just about procreation, and you know it.”
Vane was right. It was about so much more than that. Without women, the entire Kiyrian civilization was at risk, and his people would become extinct within a matter of generations.
“It’s not like we don’t have permission,” Vane continued, strumming long fingers on the map table in front of him.
“If you can call it that,” Taryk muttered, running a hand through his hair. The human government—well, one of them; apparently they had many—had agreed: women in exchange for weapons. It didn’t sit well with Taryk, but they had no choice. The Krull had taken that from them, along with everything else. All the hopes he and his triad had—
He shoved the thought away. That way lay madness. If he did what his people asked, Fen and Erys would never have to face life without their fourth. The humans would be most displeased when they discovered the weapons the Kiyrians gave them were, in actuality, mechanisms to assist in the cleanup of pollution on the planet. Something far more valuable, but clearly the humans were too primitive to grasp the concept of anything but violence.
He slumped in one of the chairs and scrubbed a hand over his face. He needed a shave. “I can’t believe that, in all the known universe, the only place we can find genetically compatible women is this backwater planet.”
Captain Vane turned to stare at the viewscreen behind him. It gave the impression they were looking through a massive window. Below, spinning in the vast darkness of space, was a little marble of blue, green, and white. “Our scientists tell us we’re related somehow. Distantly, but we’ve got the same DNA rambling around inside. The vedics call it a miracle.”
Taryk snorted. “More than likely they’re one of the lost colonies, even if they can’t shift.” The scientists had also assured them that, despite sharing DNA, the humans were stuck in a single form. Unfortunate, but that was the reality. No one knew what offspring of Kiyrians and humans would bring, but as Vane had pointed out, this wasn’t just about babies.
Vane shrugged. “Likely. But it’s still something of a miracle. A one in several billion chance. Our only chance.” He turned back to Taryk. “You’ve seen the vids of their leader?”
Taryk nodded. “He is not sincere.” Understatement of the century.
“Bluntly put but accurate.”
“I assume we expect subterfuge.”
“It’s likely they’ll attempt to smuggle some kind of weapon onboard. Chemical, biological, even mechanical,” Vane said.
Taryk snorted. “Let them try. They are far too primitive to have anything we can’t handle. They are not the Krull.”
“They are likely to attempt such, you are correct. You are also correct in that they won’t succeed. But I think they’ll doing something even more underhanded.”
Taryk raised an eyebrow. “Like?”
Vane pressed a button, and an image of a woman appeared on the viewscreen. Taryk was unfamiliar with humans, but she did not look young. In fact, she looked well past the age of breeding naturally, but it was nothing their technology couldn’t overcome if the woman desired it. “Who is this?”
“This is an example of the ‘prime women’ the human government from the country referring to themselves as America has offered us.” Vane didn’t hold back an amused smirk. Not at the woman, but at the perfidy and stupidity of her government.
Taryk tilted his head. She had dark hair peppered with strands of silver. Her lovely face was lined with experience, the edges softening with age, and her dark eyes seemed... sad. He felt a stab of something inside, something he’d never felt and couldn’t identify. He cleared his throat. “I do not see the problem.”
“Nor do I. I have seen her file. She is intelligent, experienced, and alone. No family. She appears perfect, but there is something about the government’s attitude that gives me cause for concern. I want you and your triad to watch this woman closely while she is aboard. If things go well, and she is amenable, she will be yours.”
Taryk nodded, ignoring the thrill that coursed through him. The others would be overjoyed. He was cautiously optimistic. “As you will.”
Chapter 2
“It happened again.” The mousy girl—what was her name? Brie? Briana? Bridget? —twisted a tissue between her fingers. Little bits of fluff crumbled off to dance in the air.
Anya managed to keep her expression passive, but it was getting harder. Her little group
had some serious issues. She may no longer be a licensed counselor, but she knew messed up when she saw it. “Tell us about it.” She was proud of how soothing her voice was. Like during the hypnosis sessions she’d once charged $200 a pop for back in Los Angeles.
Now she was in a dank church basement with peeling green paint that smelled of stale coffee and mold. Instead of a plush armchair, she sat on a creaky metal folding chair. Gone were the days of insurance billings and exorbitant fees. Instead she worked for donations. How far the mighty had fallen.
She barely repressed a sigh.
“Come on, buck up,” Jane urged, leaning forward, her nearly white hair almost sparkling beneath the lights. Was she wearing glitter? At her age? “Tell us everything, Brea.”
Brea, that was her name.
Brea nodded, her expression pinched, her knuckles whitening. “It was last night. I was sound asleep, and I heard that rumbling again. Then the bed started shaking—”
“Bright light, yadda, yadda. We know the drill. Get to the good stuff,” Jane barked.
“Jane,” Anya cautioned. It was important to keep control of the meeting and not let Jane go off on one off her conspiracy tangents. “Go ahead, Brea. In your own time.” Secretly she was on Jane’s side. Every damn story was the same with Brea. Some hot alien dude or other kidnapped her, took her on a spaceship circling Earth, and then they had hot, steamy sex. Anya was starting to think there was something wrong with her. Well, there was probably something wrong with everyone in this damn group, if she were honest. But Brea seemed unusually fixated. Maybe she read too many science fiction romance novels.
Anya’d had a lot of dreams growing up. Ballerina was probably top of the list until she realized she couldn’t dance. Ninja came later. Nurse. Actress. The very last thing she’d ever imagined was that she’d end up in some Podunk, Oregon, town in the middle of nowhere, facilitating a support group for alien abductees. Frankly, it was nuts. Not that she’d ever say that publicly, but normal people didn’t have alien abduction fantasies.
“—and then they were there. All three of them. Looming over me like... gods.”
While her mind had been wandering, Brea had been describing the latest in a series of supposed abductions in which a particular group of aliens had, well, apparently there was a heavy sexual undertone to Brea’s dreams. It probably meant something Freudian, but Anya had never been into dream interpretation.
“So they were hot then?” Jane demanded. Her eyes sparkled with interest.
“Super hot,” Brea affirmed. “But scary. Really scary.” She shivered, but Anya noted that she didn’t appear particularly frightened.
“Did you discover why you were on the ship?” Anya interrupted before Jane could go off on a tangent. “Did they explain anything to you this time?”
Brea twisted her fingers together and bit her lower lip. “They told me their people needed women. That’s why they’re here.”
“They’re here? On Earth?” The shriek came from Carla, who clutched a rosary to her ample chest. The plump, middle-aged woman had thick streaks of silver running through her hair and was a grandmother twice over. Like Brea, her abduction fantasies strayed toward the erotic, but she was less enthusiastic about it.
Brea shook her head and pointed skyward. “Up there.”
Carla crossed herself. “Madre de Dios.”
“Why do they need women?” Jane asked sharply. “What are those bastards up to?”
“They need to procreate,” Brea said. The twisting grew worse. Round and round, ripping little pieces of tissue that fell like snow around her chair.
“What’s wrong with their own damn women?” Jane demanded, hands clenched on her thighs as if ready to take on the aliens barehanded.
“I don’t know,” Brea whispered. “They wouldn’t say. Something bad, I think.”
“How did the dream make you feel, Brea?” Anya asked, trying to focus the group. Good luck with that.
“Terrified. Helpless.” Brea shrugged, bony shoulders rising and falling. It didn’t look like she’d been eating or sleeping well lately. Maybe they should have a potluck, then she could ensure Brea got at least one decent meal.
“It’s frightening, isn’t it, to feel out of control?” Anya said soothingly. She wanted to tell Brea it was all nonsense. It was in her head. Some kind of twisted fantasy, maybe mixed with mental illness, but she couldn’t. The poor girl looked on the verge of an emotional breakdown. Anya was here for support, not judgment. Even if she did think the lot of them were crazy. “We’re all here for you. We all support you. Right, everyone?”
The other women murmured their agreement, but Jane still looked fierce, and Clara was working her rosary for all she was worth. Sometimes they had other local women join them—some because they’d had an experience, others because they just wanted to get out of the house—but tonight it was just the four of them.
“I have an idea,” Anya suggested. “This week, why don’t we all keep diaries? Every time we have a dream, any dream, we write it down as soon as we wake up. When these... abductions occur, try to retain as much detail as possible and journal that, too. Next week, bring your diaries, and we’ll go over them together.”
“What good will that do?” Jane snapped, her small, brown eyes angry, almost accusing, as if realizing Anya didn’t buy any of this.
Anya felt a momentary stab of guilt. “It will help us process what’s going on. Perhaps allow us to find a common thread. Something we can work on together.” Maybe if she pretended this was real, she’d do a better job convincing Jane she was on their side.
Carla nodded eagerly, toying with her rosary, beads clacking softly. “That sounds good. I can do that.”
“Until next time then,” Anya said. “Everyone stay safe.” It was an easy enough thing to say. Blasé. Noncommittal. Yet something inside twisted, and her words came out sounding ominous.
ANYA DROVE AWAY FROM the white church on State Street, on the east side of town where the support group was held, through downtown Hope, Oregon. She made sure to observe the speed limit. Willy Beals, the town’s only deputy, was fond of handing out tickets. It was why they called him Willy Nilly, or at least anyone who’d gotten a ticket from him did. That group consisted of more than half the town of 4500 people.
She came to a complete stop at the four-way on Cedar, then made a left turn on Main, away from “Historic Downtown.” There wasn’t much to get excited about. Downtown consisted of exactly two city blocks, spanning either side of Main Street. One block housed the city hall/police station/library. The other three contained small local businesses and a divey little tavern that had a dodgy reputation but served delicious burgers.
She’d come to Hope on a whim. Kind of a stick-a-thumbtack-in-a-map kind of thing. It had sounded nice, and she’d needed all the hope she could get back then.
It had been a year since she’d arrived, and while life had definitely improved, she still felt like an outsider. Her only real face-to-face contacts were the women in the alien abduction support group. Most of her time was spent alone in a tiny one-bedroom duplex. Her life was online these days, ghostwriting advice articles. She pretended she wasn’t lonely. Most of the time, she believed it.
She pulled into the parking lot of Morton’s Market. It was hardly more than a minimart, but it had the basics and a few extras. Her fridge was empty, and she was craving pizza. She’d have preferred delivery, but there wasn’t anywhere in Hope that made pizza—the local joint having gone out of business several years ago—and none of the nearby towns had pizzerias that would deliver. Frozen would have to do.
The electronic bell above the door bonged loudly, but Eddie didn’t look up from his comic book. He was sixteen, with dark, scruffy hair and too many piercings. The classic small- town rebel, except he was forced to work at the market because his parents owned it. His true love was The Justice League.
She walked past him with an off-hand, “Hey, Eddie,” to which he grunted. Pleasantries over, An
ya arrowed straight for the freezer section at the back of the store. The overhead fluorescents cast a harsh glow that washed everything with a pale and sickly light.
She was studying her choices—pepperoni or peppers and onions—when the lights flickered. Then she felt a presence behind her.
“That looks... interesting. Is it good?” The voice was low and rich, and as she whirled to face him, matched its owner perfectly.
The man was well over six feet, broad shouldered and well-muscled. His chiseled features were gorgeously, painfully masculine beneath a tousled mane of golden-brown locks. He looked like an underwear model, except what would an underwear model be doing in Hope?
She inhaled and caught his scent: musky man, smoky fire, and something fresh and green she couldn’t put her finger on. A zing of arousal skittered its way through her. “Uh....” Well, that was brilliant. She reminded herself she was probably old enough to be, well, his aunt anyway. “It’s not bad for frozen pizza.”
“Pizza.” He said the word as if it was the first time he’d heard it. “Sounds delicious.”
“Well, it’s pizza.” Of course, it was delicious. “Your accent... you’re not from around here.”
His smile was wide, showing perfectly white teeth with sharper incisors than expected. “No. My home is far way. I am new to town.”
“Er, right.” She yanked open the freezer and blindly grabbed a box. “Welcome to Hope, I guess.” She didn’t imagine he would be staying long and chastised her libido accordingly.
She felt the heat of his gaze on her all the way through the meager wine section and at the front of the store, where Eddie checked her out, eyes still on his comic book. He hadn’t even noticed the interplay between her and the insanely hot stranger.
As she pushed her way out the door, she couldn’t resist a glance back, but he was gone. Lines creased her forehead. The store wasn’t big enough for a person to disappear in, so where had he gone?
She gave a mental shrug as she climbed into her car, pretending she didn’t feel a stab of disappointment. “Don’t be stupid, Anya. You’re off men, remember?”