Lydia and the Draca Read online

  “So sweet,” she murmured. “You would hardly know I’m actually lost in time and space, and yet here I am, smelling roses.”

  “You are not lost, my lady,” Camus said. “I would say you are found, more than you are lost.”

  That struck a strange chord. “What do you mean, I am found?”

  “Shall we sit?” He indicated a rustic wooden table. “Let us make ourselves comfortable.”

  Lydia settled on the bench, sheltered beneath a leafy maple tree, and Camus perched on the tabletop near her elbow.

  “We are on the mountain. You call it Mt. Hood,” he said. At her incredulous look, he added, “But not as you know it in, ah, human time.”

  Mt. Hood towered over most of northwestern Oregon, the king of the Cascade range. It should be covered in deep snow this time of year.

  “Yeah…so, okay. I still don’t understand, but go on.”

  “We are in the sideways time. We call it ‘Dracan.’ In Dracan, we live separately, in the human world, but not.” He looked up to see if Lydia was following.

  “Here, we are protected from the humans who sought to destroy us for centuries. We follow our own timeline, answering only to our gods. And no one but Draca, or those we allow, may enter.”

  “The Draca. Are they—are you—dragons?”

  Camus shifted and looked away. “No. And yes. We are…other.” He turned back to her, his green eyes darkening. “And we are dying.”

  He paused. “And you—you are here to save us!”

  “Hold it right there. What do you mean I’m here to save you?” Maybe it was his diminutive size, but Lydia felt bolder about demanding answers from him than from the others.

  “We have lost our…” He wiggled his fingers at her, as if that would tell her.

  “Your what?” “How do you say this? The flame? The spark that makes life? For Draca, this spark… It must be, or the baby cannot be formed.”

  Camus hopped down and started a slow pace back and forth in front of her. “You see, we were forced, because there are so few of us. We needed young ones, so we…bred amongst ourselves for many hundreds of years. And we live very long lives, longer than you or any human can imagine. But after a time—the genes, the blood lineage—started breaking up in some fundamental way, and our women stopped conceiving.

  “In desperation, we turned to a great working, an ancient spell of immense power. What we could not have predicted were the consequences of such a working. No one, not even the oldest and most powerful, could have predicted what would happen.”

  Camus looked over at her, his face mournful. “We tried to mate with humans. And it came at a great cost—the ceremony to do the human and Draca mating. And later also, there were tragedies and mistakes… I…ah, I am one of those called a mistake. I can barely fly, or do much of anything in my true form.”

  His voice trailed off, and he looked away. It was the longest speech anyone had made yet. She felt restless, itchy, wanting to resist sympathy but unable to stop an odd pain in her heart. Yet surely there was more to the story than this.

  “What happened when you were here before?” Camus asked, surreptitiously wiping his eyes. “I heard tales of you, but I never understood what happened at the end.”

  “Yeah, well. That’s all still kind of fuzzy. I remember mostly being terrified.”

  As she glanced at him, a vision of his other nature shimmered to tentative life, superimposed over his human form. Wings and claws, elongated head and fangs, rose briefly and then faded like smoke.

  Memories pounded at her again, images of being surrounded by fantastic beings—creatures of nightmare and myth. She trembled as emotions cascaded along her spine, and the vision rocked her to the core. Even at the time, as she had cried out in terror, something had been so familiar. As her conscious mind tried to reject what she was seeing, something deeper had rejoiced. What had Camus said…? She was found.

  She blew out her breath. She must be crazy to be thinking like this.

  “We never meant to frighten you,” Camus continued as if he didn’t notice she was quietly freaking out. “We had forgotten how to speak in the human way, how to explain… But now, thanks be to Nareen, we have the words once again. That is why you are back here. We needed another chance to ask you.”

  “Ask me what?” she said sharply. “And why me? Why am I the one you want? I’m nothing, nobody. Just a single Portland girl, trying to make her way in this world. I didn’t ask for this, and I don’t want it!”

  Yet even as she said the words, she knew part of it wasn’t true. Newly awakened emotions were clamoring, Tell me more!

  He gaped at her. “Did not Nareen show you?”

  Heat unexpectedly laced her cheeks. Oh yeah, Nareen had showed her something, all right.

  “You mean that’s it? I…I what? It’s that I turn all of you on?”

  “Well, yes, of course there is that, but… She did not mention perhaps something about your blood? And the Wall?”

  “My blood? What do you mean?”

  Camus looked nervous.

  “What? Camus—come on. Are you afraid to tell me something?”

  “Now now, sweetiekins. Let us slow down here.”

  Sweetiekins? Lydia snorted. “No, let’s not slow down. How about we tell Lydia the whole story? How about that for a change?”

  Camus hesitated. He glanced at her and then quickly looked away. “You must forgive us our ways. I am under strict instructions from Nareen not to—” He bit off the next words and then continued slowly, choosing his words carefully. “In our excitement at the emotions you stir in us, I am…I am so sorry we captured you and made you so afraid.” He looked at her, his eyes pleading for understanding.

  “Captured me? So I’m some kind of prisoner? For what, my blood? For…sex?” All thoughts of her having any trace of control over this new reality vanished. Captured. The word brought a strange thrill. Her life in the hands of sexy shape-shifters. She should be angry or demanding, but the interest that sparked had nothing to do with outrage.

  “Well. The fact of the matter is”—Camus cleared his throat—“there is one of our kind, I believe humans would refer to him as a prince. He is one of our eldest and holds great sway in the opinions of our people. He has become, ah, how can I say, entirely accepting of his Draca state. He does not wish to mix Draca and human, even to continue our bloodline. He is of the mind that the Draca as a species are near their natural end. He persists in believing our race has come to its inevitable conclusion, and there is nothing to be done about it.”

  There was that aroused interest again. Camus’s bushy red hair shimmered in the sunlight like an iridescent patch of garnets. “But you, dear sweetness… You have everything needed to convince him otherwise.”

  For the first time she noticed his face had the same sculptured handsomeness as the rest of the hunky males she’d met. Camus grinned at her as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. Even this small-sized Draca had hormones that called to her.

  She’d never been needed by anyone before. Not really. Not like this.

  “So…who are you, in all this? You’re the first one to really answer any of my questions.”

  “Ah. Well, you see. I am the brother of Eremon. I am here to plead on his behalf, the ungrateful, stubborn Draca. He needs you—whether he is willing to acknowledge it or not.”

  He needed her. There it was again, the whole needing thing.

  “Have I met him?”

  “He was there, in the reception room. You probably did not notice him. You were too busy dealing with the unwise offer of our gold liqueur and my kin’s intrusive attentions.”

  But she had noticed him—the dark-haired one, brooding alone in the shadows. Her pulse sped up as she remembered the hulking god saluting her with his drink.

  Lydia breathed in the smell of jasmine wafting in the sweet air and tried to wrap her brain around this crazy new reality. She turned with more questions on her lips, but Camus forestalled her with a
raised hand.

  “It is not my place to offer any further words. It is now simply a matter of you and Eremon meeting once again. Then what shall happen after that—only the gods can know.”

  It felt like a foretelling. Just as Lydia noticed the strands of her hair crackle with static electricity, the entire mountaintop scene faded.

  Chapter Five

  She crash-landed back onto the overstuffed couch, with an audible thump. Her stomach felt a little queasy with all the abrupt swooshing around. She felt like an otherworldly yo-yo, being pulled across lines of invisible universes.

  She was back in the bat cave, with its black, carved walls and mysterious gold lights. She remembered what Camus said about a wall. Could this be the wall he had been talking about?

  Thoughts of Camus fled as she realized she wasn’t alone.

  Eremon leaned against the obsidian wall, his arms crossed in front of his broad, muscled chest, a picture of arrogance.

  “You must forget whatever it is they have told you,” he said coldly. “I am not interested in this game, or anything to do with it. You may go. Now.”

  Lydia jumped up, her heart pounding. Eremon towered over her, his black eyebrows low over hooded emerald eyes. He radiated a palpable sense of danger, setting her heart beating even harder.

  The dim light around them lifted as if to showcase his presence, and she gulped at the rugged, sculptured lines of his face. He was quite simply the most magnificent man she had ever seen. Familiar electrical currents were starting a jig up her spine. She breathed in the increasing scent of smoke and tried not to think of sex.

  “You do not belong here,” he snapped.

  “Well then, tell me how I get out.” The boldness in her voice surprised her. As if they created their own tiny microclimate, the air became denser, charged. Eremon straightened and took a step toward her, and she immediately backed up.

  “You must forget us. You have been put through much, for all my family’s good intentions.” Without warning, he raised a hand and lifted a strand of her hair. For a brief moment he held it to his face, his eyes closed, and an expression like pain crossed his face. Then it was gone, replaced by an inscrutable look. He dropped his hand abruptly and turned away.

  Lydia stood, stunned. She could still feel the electrical charge of his hand on her hair, catching a brief glimpse of long, thick fingers and a flash of calluses and scars. His touch had been unexpectedly gentle. Suddenly, trying not to question, she knew she wasn’t ready to leave this. Not quite yet.

  *

  Eremon paced back and forth, unable to look at Lydia. How could he explain why she must go, when she didn’t even understand why she was here at all?

  His back spasmed in reaction to the emotions swirling around him, and he ached to spread his wings. He didn’t want this false promise of hope to rip out his heart again.

  He was done. They all were. It was time to let it go, let the humans have what was left.

  Nareen’s unrelenting scheming and spell casting always left a price to pay. He would not be the one to suffer again with the results of her meddling in the powers only the gods should have.

  The scent of the human woman wafted in the cave air, tantalizing and testing his resolve. She was not what he expected. Most shocking of all, once he’d gotten a real whiff of her, his cock, flaccid for a hundred years, had burst into almost painful life. He refused to believe what he’d felt in the reception room when she’d walked in. He barely believed it now.

  A small growl escaped, his beast awake, interested. The predator in him, the brother to his human nature, had been full of approval from the moment they both caught a glimpse of her. Still, he resisted what his senses were telling him: a faint Draca essence swam in tiny currents through her blood. If it was real, her journeys to the Caves of Remembering must have activated the powers in her blood to the potency that allowed them to detect her.

  No wonder his brothers and sisters were going crazy.

  It couldn’t be true. Nareen had to be wrong about this, yet when he looked at the woman, she shone with a familiar Draca beauty. She probably had no idea how she appeared to them, or what it was about her that attracted his kin so strongly. Her auburn hair glinted with the same shades of red as all the Garnet Clan. The high, delicate cheekbones reminded him of his sisters, and a strength he would never have expected resonated from her.

  How bravely she faced him! He could swat her down in an instant; she must know that, yet she didn’t flinch. This only made her more attractive to one of his kind.

  The thin fabric of her dress clearly showed a sweet swell of breasts and a lean, athletic build. He could just make out stiff nipples and caught the scent of her arousal mixed with his own. Something pulled at him, something he was determined to resist.

  He circled the edges of the cave, avoiding Lydia’s eyes. He should not have touched her hair. For a brief instant, a door in his consciousness had crashed open. A door that he had shut, cemented in place, a hundred years before. A blazing memory seared to life, before he had a chance to slam the door closed again.

  No. This must not be. He could not allow it. Humans weren’t the answer; they were too weak. They couldn’t even survive the breeding ceremony, let alone endure the rigors and dangers of giving birth to the children of Draca. He had no desire to watch any more brave, beautiful women torn apart by childbirth in this senseless pursuit of the impossible.

  Every attempt to use humans had been a complete, disastrous failure. His brother Camus’s small stature was just one of the failures that haunted him, one he’d been paying for every single day of his long, meaningless life.

  And now Nareen had somehow found Lydia, and all his kin’s impossible hopes had been rekindled.

  “No!” he snarled. Yet unable to stop himself, needing to know for sure, he reached out and grasped Lydia’s slim shoulders in his hands. She gasped, and her head snapped back, but she didn’t pull away. Her eyes were huge, full of questions and a trace of fear. But she stood her ground.

  He gripped her harder, and still she didn’t flinch. He said through gritted teeth, “You have no idea why they brought you here, do you? What could happen to you, what you must endure. Has no one explained?”

  His sexual awareness was stirring; he felt his talons stretching to the surface, and his wings pulsed with the subtle beat that signaled such hunger. He wanted to shake her. Shake her or just…crush his mouth against hers, so near to his own, so red and moist and trembling. Rings of agitated smoke circled the room, his cock pulsed to hard attention, and the very air crackled in the awakening sexual pulse of a Draca male.

  This human Daughter of Draca was upsetting everything.

  He felt the echoing response from the Draca kin, invisible all around him. Alert, aroused. Waiting for his next move. At the thought of all the Draca cocks that could possibly be springing to life, intense irritation flooded him. How dare these brothers assume they had any right at all to…

  “Please…” Lydia said breathlessly. “The way you look—Are you going to kiss me or kill me? Make up your mind before I fall over in a dead faint at your feet.”

  His last resistance crumbled, and he brought his mouth down on hers. His lips met hers in a heady rush of long-forgotten sensation. He opened his mouth and pulled in her tongue, suckling and licking. The feel of cool human flesh under his hands, in his mouth, her tongue stroking his… It seared him with the intoxicating promise of life itself.

  More—he wanted more. Quickly, before he came to his senses, he dropped to his knees and, in one smooth movement, pulled up her gown and thrust his face between her legs. He pushed against her damp curls and inhaled hard.

  She moaned, not resisting. Her hands moved up to clutch his hair.

  Eremon rubbed his face back and forth, unable to stop his predator from insisting on his mark. He clutched her hips convulsively, pinning her tight against him, and opened his mouth against her dripping flesh. He drank in her womanly fluids and swallowed, the liquid he
at exploding in his throat. The truth of it was undeniable. The old blood swam in her; the slick wetness coated his mouth in pleasure he had forgotten was even possible.

  She moaned, arching into his mouth, and then losing her balance, stumbled back, grabbing his head for support. That was just enough to bring him to his senses.

  He remembered another beautiful woman calling out to him—not out of love or ecstasy, but full of pain, pleading, pleading for him to release her from the agony loving him had caused.

  Shuddering at the memory, he pulled away from Lydia, breathing hard.

  Flinging himself to his feet, he turned his back on her, walking away. “No,” he said, his voice strangled. “This cannot happen—I will not have it. Not again. Not ever again.”

  Lydia sank down to the couch cushions and leaned her head back, her hair a mass of tangled curls and her thin dress bunched around her waist, the wet curls between her legs still visible. She looked impossibly erotic, and it was such a rare sight, Eremon barely held on to his control.

  He couldn’t just leave her like this. Forcing calm into his raging libido, he struggled for the words that would send her away from him as fast as possible.

  Reeling from the implosion of pleasure that had just rocked her world, Lydia yanked down her dress, Eremon’s sudden rejection giving her brain melt. What had just happened? Oh God, how she wanted to finish what they had started. She squeezed her legs together and tried to calm her breathing.

  He stood with his arms crossed over his chest, scowling at her.

  “Lydia, I need to tell you…” He stopped, his eyes cold and secretive. How could he be so cool with her juices all over his handsome face?

  “You are—you carry the old blood.”

  “The old blood?”

  “Draca—in what humans call their DNA. You have it, a strain from our oldest lineage. It is in your blood. It is the reason why Nareen arranged to bring you here.”

  Lydia couldn’t believe her ears. This was nothing but a soap opera, Draca-style. For God’s sake, she was part Draca?