Alien Dragon's Spawn (Dragons of Arcturus Book 1) Read online

He raised himself up, spine erect, and spread his massive wings in a horaltic posture, basking in the glow of the sun. His wings drank in that heat, speeding up the sluggish blood in his veins. After a few minutes, the dragon felt like his old self again, ready to take to the skies and rustle up some breakfast. A nice ox, perhaps. Maybe even two. Hell, he felt just about hungry enough to eat a scimitar cat.

  While he was thinking these thoughts, a faint sound drifted to his ears.

  Drums.

  The steady thumping pulse of drums.

  It was the sound of the villagers signalling that a sacrifice had been prepared.

  Skalamagdrion’s gizzard panged and his mouth watered. He hadn’t eaten since before the winter, and now he was starving. A nice, tasty sacrifice sounded like just the thing.

  With a shove of his powerful hind legs, the dragon launched himself from his rocky perch. He flapped his wings once, twice, and then glided like an enormous kite, diving swiftly downward into the sea of clouds below. Jagged shadows sped past him in the murk—the crags of other lesser mountains that made up the range he called home. The obscuring smoke made little difference. He knew every peak and narrow defile by heart, and he could fly them with his eyes shut.

  The dragon soared through the warm gray billows toward the sound of the drums. There was chanting now, a chorus of tiny human voices calling him in to feast.

  Actually, they were not calling him by name. They were merely calling a dragon, any dragon. Skalamagdrion’s kind were spread all over this planet, having migrated here eons ago, following the great war.

  Skalamagdrion did not demand sacrifices from the humans, but he gratefully accepted their offerings, and in exchange he occasionally provided them protection by thinning out the numbers of the scimitar cats in the nearby forests or frightening off the nomadic raiders who sometimes threatened them.

  It was nothing heroic on Skalamagdrion’s part. It was merely a convenient arrangement. It made sense to keep the villagers around, as long as they gifted him the occasional morsel from their flocks of sheep or herds of cattle.

  Mordragg, however, held a different view

  Mordragg was a stormdragon who lived in another mountain many miles away—the fiery volcano that belched out all of the damnable smoke that covered the land. He did not help the villagers as Skalamagdrion did. He did not protect them. Instead, if they did not pay Mordragg their regular tribute, he would terrorize them, using his lightning to burn their homes and smiting whole herds of their animals out of sheer spite.

  And Mordragg demanded a different kind of sacrifice.

  Skalamagdrion did not like the stormdragon’s cruel and barbaric ways, but there was nothing he could do about it. By law, Mordragg was the lord of this territory, the largest and most fearsome dragon around. The sight of his black scales, glinting like chipped obsidian, struck terror into the heart of every creature for hundreds of miles around.

  Every creature except Skalamagdrion.

  Someday, the younger dragon would be big enough and strong enough to challenge the cruel dragonlord, but that day was was still centuries off.

  The drums were close now, the chanting loud in Skalamagdrion’s ears. With each throbbing pulse of the music, his gizzard pulsed as well. His gut was hollow with hunger. He could practically taste the offering in his mouth—the furry hide and warm, flowing blood. Skalamagdrion beat his wings, speeding his flight toward his breakfast.

  Abruptly, the drumming ceased. For a moment the only sound was the thump of the dragon’s wings pushing the air, then a cry went up in the distance.

  The humans heard him approaching. Now they were fleeing back to their village.

  Good. Skalamagdrion hated having anyone watch him eat. And right now, desperately hungry as he was, he intended to stuff his face without the slightest regard for manners.

  The veil of smoke pulled back, and before him the humans’ sacrificial dais appeared.

  But the offering is not what he expected. No bleating sheep or stupid, glassy-eyed cow stood there staring back at him, but a woman. The villagers were sacrificing one of their own. The meaning of this was immediate and clear.

  This offering was not meant for Skalamagdrion.

  She was meant for Lord Mordragg.

  Mordragg had a taste for human flesh, and the human villagers knew this. Therefore, every spring, they would offer one of their people—not a man, for they needed their strong backs for hunting and farming—but a young woman, usually who had borne no children, one whose body would be a soft and toothsome morsel for the terrible dragonlord.

  And as the chief dragon in this territory, Mordragg had dibs on the first sacrifice of the season. Normally the elder dragon woke from his slumbers far earlier than young Skalamagdrion, but this year was different. This year Skalamagdrion had been roused early by his strange dreams.

  He could not take Mordragg’s offering. To do so would definitely mean a fight, and it was a fight he would no doubt lose. He was about to soar past, to the forest beyond, to rustle up a less troublesome meal.

  Yet something stayed Skalamagdrion’s wings

  He landed, even though he knew that he shouldn’t. The elder dragon had surely heard the drums. Even now, he was probably waking from his own seasonal rest, and in a few minutes he would arrive to claim his prize.

  So why had Skalamagdrion stopped?

  The scent.

  It was the female’s scent that had arrested him. The odor was unmistakable. Even just the faintest wisp was enough to do him in. For this was the scent that he had smelled in his dreams.

  This was the scent of his mate.

  His mate was a woman!

  Folding his wings behind him, Skalamagdrion advanced with slow, cautious steps, and as he approached, he examined the tiny female chained by the wrists between two pillars of blackwood.

  He had never paid much attention to women before, or to any humans for that matter. Of course he had caught sight of the diminutive creatures scurrying about on the ground below as he soared high overhead. But they had held no special interest for him.

  This one, however, was different.

  This one was his.

  She was naked to the waist, and her smooth, soft skin was the pink-gold color of the clouds in the early evening. Her head was covered in a thick pelt of curly fur the color of raw honeycombs, and it tumbled down her shoulders and fell in front of her otherwise naked breasts.

  But the dragon only saw these details peripherally. The focus of his attention was her face, framed by that honey-golden mane. The small, impossibly delicate nose. The coral-tinted lips that stirred strange feelings in his belly. And most of all, her eyes. Lovely round eyes fringed with soft lashes around gray irises, like gemstones formed from solid smoke.

  And they were locked on his, reeling him in with a strange power he didn’t understand.

  The female didn’t seem to be doing it on purpose, alluring him this way. In fact, she seemed frightened, which was understandable under the circumstances. Her lower lip quivered deliciously, filling the dragon’s mind with unspeakable thoughts and filling his mating appendage with blood. Her tiny body quaked, rattling the chains that held her arms.

  Then it came to him again. That scent from his dream.

  Skalamagdrion prowled forward until his muzzle nudged the human’s soft belly. She gasped lightly at his touch, but she did not flinch away. Then again, bound with chains as she was, there was nowhere for her to run. That pleased the dragon. He could scent her at his leisure.

  Drawing a deep inhale, Skalamagdrion pulled her aroma deep into his nose.

  Goddess, she smelled delicious.

  Skalamagdrion inhaled that scent, held it inside until his lungs ached and he could hold it no longer. He exhaled, blasting the tiny female with his hot breath.

  Now the human moved. Her arms struggled in her chains, her muscles tensed. She drew a deep breath as if preparing to say something, then let out the loudest, most blood-curdling scream the dragon had ever he
ard. A sound so sharp it pierced like a dagger. Skalamagdrion could scarcely believe that so much sound could come from such a small creature.

  And then, when the last of her breath had been expelled, the female’s body slumped heavily in her chains.

  Momentary panic surged up the dragon’s spine.

  Was she dead? His precious little creature that he had only just met.

  He nudged her limp body with his snout, and she swung lifelessly in the chains. But he knew she wasn’t dead, for he could feel the beating of her miniature heart, and her faint breath exhaling from her tiny nose.

  The little female had fallen asleep.

  Humans were peculiar creatures indeed.

  The dragon’s curiosity was piqued. A desire to examine her body more closely surged over him. He wished to nip away that flimsy grass skirt and scrutinize every detail of her anatomy, especially that scentful place between her thighs.

  But Lord Mordragg would be waking soon, if he had not already.

  Any minute now he would arrive to claim his offering.

  As Skalamagdrion saw it, he had two options. The first was the thing that he should do. He should leave the little human be. Leave her for Mordragg to claim. After all, he was the dragonlord of these regions, and the first offering of the season was his by right.

  However, the second option seemed much more appealing.

  Skalamagdrion would take the human as his own. He would hide her away in the depths of his cave where no one would ever find her. He would make her his atma, the mother of his brood. He would fill her belly with many eggs, and she would bear for him much spawn.

  It was, in fact, no choice at all.

  The matter had already been decided by Fate.

  This little atma was his, Skalamagdrion’s. Why else would he have dreamed of her? Why else would the sight of her speed his blood and stir his aching loins?

  Yes, this creature was destined to be his. Fate’s signature was all over her, written in that irresistible scent.

  His mind made up, Skalamagdrion leaned forward, powerful jaws open wide, baring rows upon rows of spear-tip teeth. With a swift, sharp motion, he brought those jaws back together again, chomping down hard.

  The chains broke easily beneath his fangs, first one and then the other.

  The sleeping human’s legs buckled, and she started to collapse, but before her body struck the hard stones of the dais, Skalamagdrion caught her with his clawed forelimbs and hugged her to his chest.

  She was so small, so fragile, and so warm.

  She belonged to him now. It was his duty to protect her.

  Skalamagdrion beat his heavy wings, stirring the dark sands around him. With a couple of flaps, he lifted off, turned back toward the wall of smoke from which he had come.

  Before he left with the woman held protectively in his scaly embrace, he stole one last glance back at the empty dais and the broken chains dangling from the twin pillars.

  Mordragg would be furious to discover that his offering had been purloined.

  Much trouble would come from this, that much was certain. But there was no going back now. They would simply have to cross that bridge when they came to it.

  As he dove into the obscuring smoke, Skalamagdrion chuckled at that phrase.

  He was a firebreather.

  He didn’t cross bridges.

  He burnt them.

  CHAPTER 9

  Katrine awoke with a pleasant, restful feeling in her limbs. A faint smile tipped the corners of her mouth. She stretched against her cushions like a lazy cat.

  What strange dreams she’d had.

  First there had been the bit about the chaos in the control room of the Blue Mesa facility. That part made sense. It was a product of her anxiety about the upcoming test run. But the rest of the dream had been far weirder. The smoke-swept alien world. The forest of gnarled trees and glowing mushrooms. The shadow-black saber-tooth tiger. The primitive people with spears.

  And that last part…

  The dragon.

  Yeah, she had dreamed of that before.

  But now the dream was over, and she was awake, back in her living quarters at the Blue Mesa facility.

  Only, she didn’t remember her government-issued bed being anywhere near this comfortable. And she most certainly didn’t have a fireplace in her bedroom, especially not a gigantic one carved from stone and bracketed by a pair of exquisitely sculpted dragons. And for that matter, her bedroom wasn’t an enormous domed cavern.

  And then there was the bone jewelry and iron shackles around her wrists, still clinking with links of broken chain.

  Katrine shifted on the heap of silken pillows that had been arranged for her, letting her eyes follow the curve of the high, cathedral ceiling. She rolled over, and her gaze traveled down the other side until she found herself looking into a pair of eyes.

  Enormous, yellow eyes, cut with vertical slits for pupils, and set beneath a pair of scaly red brows.

  Her heart kickstarted. Something like an electric shock tingled through her muscles.

  It was the dragon.

  The cry that burst from Katrine’s lips multiplied and rebounded around the stony walls and ceiling of the spacious, firelit chamber. Moving on pure instinct and a double dose of adrenaline, she scrambled away from the creature in a kind of awkward, panicked crab walk.

  Silken pillows scattered in her wake. Her grass-skirted butt dragged across a warm, smooth stone floor. Her breath came in rapid, painful gasps.

  Something caught her from behind.

  Something hard and scaly.

  With a gasp, she saw that it was the dragon’s tail, which the creature had whipped out to stop her from fleeing. Behind that, over the top of the spiny ridge that ran down the middle of that tail, she saw the roaring flames of the fireplace, toward which she had been unwittingly scrambling.

  “Careful, my little atma,” said a voice both rumbling and sibilant. “You don’t want to get burned.”

  Katrine froze. The muscles of her arms and legs went as rigid as those stone statues flanking the hearth behind her. The only part of her that remained in motion was her face. Her eyes opened into circles of shock, and her jaw fell open bonelessly.

  That voice had come from the dragon, who was now gazing at her intently with those eyes that flickered like golden cups.

  “You…you can speak?”

  The beast’s crimson body shook, and a sound issued forth from its chest. A deep rumbling sound that was more felt than heard. It rumbled through the stone floor like a minor earthquake, sending curious vibrations through Katrine’s butt and deep into her core.

  The dragon was actually chuckling.

  And was that a smirk curling at the corner of his crocodilian mouth?

  “Of course I can speak, little atma.”

  Katrine’s heart was pounding away with the rhythm of a boxer hitting a speed bag. Two emotions were wrestling in her chest now—fear and awe. For the moment, the latter seemed to be winning.

  Then a realization swept over her like a breath of wind.

  Not only had the dragon spoken, but he had spoken English. Well, maybe it wasn’t all English. There was that one word he kept using, which Katrine had never heard before. But the rest of it was perfectly understandable to her.

  That could only mean one thing.

  She really was dreaming.

  She had only thought that she had woken up, but it was one of those dreams where you wake up inside the dream. A dream within a dream. She must have watched Inception one too many times. Yes, that was the only explanation…

  But when she willed herself to wake up, it didn’t work.

  And when that massive, muscular tail began sweeping her back toward the messy mound of pillows, the way the warm stone floor abraded her barely clothed butt felt way too real.

  “Come, little atma. Rest. You are very tired.”

  With one final flick of that tail, Katrine was sent sprawling forward, and she found herself submerged in
the pile of pillows. Part of her wanted to simply stay put, buried in the soft darkness of that silken nest. But she needed to check, to see if this was really real.

  She poked her head up, peering from between the cushions that surrounded her.

  And there was that enormous, scarlet face and those terrifying yellow-gold eyes flickering with reflected fire. That smirk, quirking the edge of his fanged mouth. That hot gust of breath warmed by some internal flame.

  “Are you real?”

  It was perhaps the silliest question Katrine had ever asked, but under the circumstances, she was quite incapable of feeling silly.

  More of that rumbling laughter, this time muffled somewhat by the enclosing pillows.

  “Of course I am real, tiny atma.”

  There was that word again.

  Before Katrine had a chance to follow up with a question about that word’s meaning, a huge hand, scaly yet surprisingly supple, dug into her pillowy fortress and scooped her up like a doll.

  In response, Katrine emitted a rather embarrassing squeal of shock. Her skin prickled at that reptilian touch. The frightening red face loomed in her vision as she was pulled closer to it. Once again, images flashed through her head—images of her body broken and gnawed by those savage fangs.

  Did “atma” mean breakfast in dragonspeak?

  But the dragon did not eat her. Instead, he set her down, somewhat un-gently, atop the mountain of cushions.

  Katrine simply stared. A long moment stretched out, filled only with the crackle and pop of the logs on the fire and the deep steady sound of breathing—the dragon’s and her own.

  She felt as though she should say something. But where to begin?

  “You speak English,” Katrine whispered.

  “What is English?”

  Katrine’s fear was briefly tempered with surprise and perplexity.

  “The language you are speaking. It’s English.”

  “Ah, I see. A strange word. What is its origin?”

  Katrine adjusted her weight on the springy bed of pillows. She briefly considered fleeing, but she could sense the dragon’s long tail still curled behind her, ready to catch her should she attempt to bolt.

  “Um, you know… English. It’s the language that people from England speak?”