Her Dragon Captor (Her Dragon King Duet 1)

She said she hated me, and she meant it. Even now, in her sleep, I can sense the animosity emanating from her mate bond.

Now that she is no longer under the heat spell…she will try to run again. This time with your progeny.

The voice in my head is more than a thought, it is a certainty.

One I cannot let happen.

After carrying her upstairs, I lay her upon the bed.

This time I do not reverently clean her magnificent body. Or hesitate.

I pick up the silver cuff and snap it back around her wrist.

Then I stride from the room, the problem of keeping my now pregnant mate heavy on my mind.

She ran. The first chance she had. And even when I came downstairs, she continued to fight miserably for escape.

She must be punished for that in a way that convinces her not to attempt to escape from me again.

The answer to my conundrum appears in the next instant.

I must kill someone she loves; I conclude quite logically. Make an example of her or him.

Not one of her fathers or her aunt Myrna…it is not their time yet and I would prefer for their deaths to be painful and slow.

But yes, it should be a family member. Someone she holds dear, but who was not part of my original revenge plot.

The person’s name appears like a wish granted.

A thrall I had yet to find much use for. But now, he will come in very handy indeed.

I wake him up with a thought and tell him exactly what to do. And by the time I reach my own bedroom, everything is in place for Ola’s next lesson.

Yes, this is a good plan, I decide as I walk through the door. A very good plan in—

I stop when I see the male standing inside my room.

Tall and broad and completely surreal.

For a moment, my mind cannot process what I’m seeing. Who I’m seeing. It is a moment of confusion I’ll soon come to regret.

For a moment is all he needs.

Part III

“If the fetus you carry survives laying…you will have granted me the boon of a hatchling. For this, I have no words to express my gratitude. In fact, on my planet, a drakkon who has been honored with a child will spend the rest of his life honoring the female who did bestow this gift upon him. Because of the young you carry within your womb, I will revere you for the rest of my breathing days, and never mate another. That is the Drakkon way, and we even have a formal set of customs to go along with this tradition. We call this custom Reverence.”

--Xenon, Her Dragon Everlasting

Chapter Twenty-One

AO QUONG

Ao Quong did not dream before he came to this planet. Nor had he experienced the sleeping trance state so many of the anthrohominids had spoken and written about over the thousands of solar rotations he’d spent stranded here.

Yet that night moving images appeared inside his sleeping mind.

He dreamed of walking upon the grounds of his palace in Zone 6. The one that he’d managed to keep fortified throughout eras of anthrohominid conflict and away from the prying surveillance of the Chinese government. He hadn’t been back to visit that palace in the nearly three decades—not since the King of Drakkon assigned him to the Idaho fating portal in Zone 8.

But this night he was back there, walking beside a female and gazing upon her most reverently. She was…something he didn’t quite understand, but he did not mind her confusing nature. Quite the contrary, he marveled that she would exist.

“Baba! Mama! Kan wo zheyang zuo a!”

Ao Quong looked up to see a small boy. He wore an anthromorphic shell but had drakkon wings, which he used to hover above them. His flame, Ao Quong noted, burned pure yellow from the top of his head to the ends of his hands and feet. Baba…he’d called him father. And he’d called the strange female beside him mama.

Could this really be their son asking them to watch him do something?

The female slipped her hand into his, and together they waited to see what their son would do.

“Incoming communication from the Lab Director! Incoming communication from the Lab Director!”

The overhead caused the dream to blink out in an instant, and Ao Quong jolted awake to find himself lying in the dark of the real world.

No, he’d never had a dream before, but having it taken away so abruptly…it felt as if a vital organ had been removed. Without warning or permission.

“Incoming communication from the Lab Director! Incoming communication from the Lab Director!” the smart room intoned again, reminding him what had ripped him from the sweet dream.

Irritation flashed through him at being awakened. But nonetheless, he sat up in bed and ordered the lights on to answer the hail. Normally, the room was set to do not disturb during his resting hours. However, his anthro Lab Director was no fool. He would not have interrupted his sleep unless it was important.