Dragon Star Read online

  “Pretty and functional,” she chuckled, pulling the sweet smelling material off of her head and began fashioning it into a toga of sorts.

  “And once a beautiful part of my décor,” a droll voice spoke from behind her.

  Spinning around, she nearly lost her footing and fell on her butt, but just barely managed to keep to her feet as she sought out the owner of that voice.

  The male was like nothing she had ever seen, and she had seen a lot of men pass through her foundling village.

  He was taller than the tallest man she had ever known, standing at least two heads above her. His eyes were a molten gold, an eerie color when paired with his pale skin and long, dark hair, his blood red hair.

  He resembled the fabled desert warriors of old, the people who supposedly ruled the great sandy landscapes when they were lush green forests.

  His body was long, but muscular; his shoulders and arms well developed. His stomach tight and muscular and his cock…

  “Oh Gods, you are naked!” she gasped, her face burning with the blush that took up residence there as she spun to face the newly denuded window.

  He looked down at his body, finding no real major faults with it, and then lifted his head to face her again.

  “Um, is that a problem, Shrill one?”

  “Shrill?” She turned to blast him with some well-placed insults before she recalled that he was totally and unselfconsciously naked.

  She swiftly spun around to face the window again, one hand waving before her to hopefully cool off her burning cheeks.

  He was … built.

  “Yes, Shrill.” Zenxian rolled his eyes at the actions of his chosen one. “You scream.”

  “I—I have good reason,” she sniffed, shifting her weight forward, her agitation showing in her stance.

  “What reasons do you have, Shrill one? Please list them for me.” Zen was curious as to what this female would say. And by that, he wanted to know what she found so horrifying about his body! He knew that he was not the youngest or the best looking male in Calizem, but he was powerful. That had to mean something, right?

  “Well, there were those scabs…” she began.

  “The crawling beasts of the desert floors? Bah,” he waved one well-muscled hand in the air as if waving away a bad scent. “Mere scavengers on the bottom surface, not worthy of attention.”

  “Not worthy?” she spun around, ignoring his blatant nudity for now, to stare in disbelief at the man. “Not worthy? They have been the scourge of many a village! We live in constant fear that they will gain intelligence and attack us en mass.”

  “And after all these years, they have not developed such a plan. What makes you feel that they ever will?”

  “Because … well,” she stammered, struggling to keep her eyes above his waist. “Because they could.”

  “Oh, I see. You fear the future.”

  “I do not!” she hissed, stepping forward, almost forgetting that her curtain was hanging by a prayer until it started to slip. “Oh,” she gasped, her gaze shooting downwards before she turned again, this time to hide her own nudity.

  “So you fear … bugs?” he guessed.

  “They are big bugs! What can mere human flesh do against claws and stingers?”

  “If you were a human, then that would be a problem.” He replied calmly.

  “I am human.”

  “No, you are not.”

  Was this man for real? She turned again, after securing her curtain toga tighter, almost feeling dizzy from all the spinning she was forced to do. “Look…”

  “Indeed I am, mate,” he grinned. “And I really like what I see. Why do you hide it behind that?” he gestured towards the knotted curtain.

  “Because … because it is unseemly to appear naked before a strange man.”

  “But I am not a strange man. I am your mate.”

  “You are not!”

  “Oh yes, I am,” he chuckled, presumably at her growing anger. “You agreed before I brought you to my home.”

  “I was under … pressure!” she snarled, her anger overriding any other emotions she could possibly feel.

  “You were safe.”

  “They were coming for me!”

  “They are mere annoyances.”

  “For you, maybe,” she was nearly screaming. “But for us poor human beings…”

  “You are not human.”

  “ARGH!” She bellowed as she turned away, this time because her anger was great and her control was slipping. She was ready to sock him in his perfect nose!

  Why did he insist that she was not human? And what in the name of the damned Gods was he anyway?

  “Shrill,” he sighed. “That may not be a good name for you, my mate, if you keep demonstrating the properties inherent in the name.”

  “I am not…”

  “Brother!” Before she could finish her statement, there was another voice, a cheerfully childish one that made her spin around to see who was now joining them.

  She gasped at what she saw.

  It was another naked male. This one also had eyes of molten gold, but his hair was of the deepest, richest black she had ever seen. His skin was darker than hers and he appeared to be almost blindingly beautiful.

  “Zolamel,” the first naked man groaned, hands akimbo, looking extremely irritated.

  “Zenxian! Is this her? Everyone is talking, you know. They all want to see the female that would take on the ug … I mean, the most unique of father’s sons.”

  The first male, Zenxian, seemed to pale at the other male’s words.

  “I mean…” the one identified as Zolamel stammered. “You know I don’t mean that. I mean … I should have not repeated … I am sorry, brother.”

  Zolamel looked almost ready to cry as her male, Zenxian … pouted?

  “You’re making him feel bad,” she grumbled, looking pointedly at … Zenxian.

  “I am doing nothing of the sort,” Zen crossed his arms, a defensive move if ever she had seen one. “His own words hurt him. I have nothing but love and high regards for my older brother.”

  “I … I know you do, Zen,” Zolamel breathed, walking over to the redhead and gripping him by both shoulders, leaning down to press his forehead against his. “But you must forgive your eldest brother. He is not quick of wit or words. He is but an artisan, not skilled in strategy or social graces.”

  She looked, eyes wide, at the casual contact between the two men, the two brothers.

  For the first time she realized that as tall as her male, Zen, appeared, his self-declared eldest brother was a head taller. Gods, these people were big.

  “Yet the lies you speak roll off of your tongue, Zol.” Zen smiled a little, and his elder brother pulled him into a hug.

  “Lie? Me? No, I do not have the mental power to craft usable falsehoods,” Zol chuckled, releasing his brother and turning to face the only female in the room. “So, this is your mate. Introduce us properly, as we will soon become family.”

  “She has no name,” Zen stepped back from his brother and crossed to his shrill one. “She says that she was never given one.”

  “Unless you call ‘Girl’ a name,” she took a step back, trying to discreetly ogle all the naked male flesh in the room. If some of the males at home, or even the chieftain’s son looked anything like these two, she may have settled for one of them.

  Now that he’d had the little episode with his brother, her male, the one called Zen, didn’t seem too high and aloof. He almost seemed human, which he himself claimed not to be. She sidled a little closer to him, figuring it was safer with the sand demon you knew…

  “And why haven’t you named this beautiful flower?” he asked, arching one ebony eyebrow. “It is up to you to provide for your mate.”

  “He calls me Shrill One,” she added, chuckling a bit as Zen began to look uncomfortable.

  “Shrill? Shrill?” Zol’s voice rose up a little at each repetition. “You named her Shrill?”

  “No,” Zen r
olled his eyes, “I was just—just teasing her. She was sad, brother.”

  “Sad? She has just found her mate, and she is sad? Oh no, no, no! This cannot be!”

  That said, Zol swept across the room and swooped down upon her. Within seconds, she was being hefted in the dark haired one’s arms and carried to the window she had recently stripped.

  Her eyes grew wide as she squealed in surprised indecision. Was he going to toss her out of the window because she had no name? If that were the case, she would make one up! She would even accept Shrill or Girl! She would … how far up were they anyway?

  She was opening her mouth to question him, but instead she parted her lips and she screamed.

  She had gotten a good look out of that window and what she saw astounded her. They were up so high she could not see the ground!

  Beyond the windows was the beautiful blue sky: fluffy white clouds and that was it.

  “EEEIIII!”

  Zol jumped, almost losing his grip on the female as she began to scream and flail her arms.

  “Don’t you let him drop me!” she managed between frightened cries.

  “You are scaring her,” Zen pointed out, looking amused at the shocked expression on his brother’s face.

  “But … scared of what?” Zol managed, shifting the squirming female in his arms so that she wouldn’t accidentally plummet out of the window; not that it would do her any harm.

  “Don’t drop me!” she bellowed almost in his ear. “Zen! Save me!”

  “Now it’s Zen,” he grumbled as he walked over towards his brother and his mate. “Before, it was Oh, you are naked.”

  “And what’s wrong with him being naked?” Zol asked as he almost tossed her into his brother’s arms. “You don’t have any major deficiencies that we should hide away. Our bloodline is pure.”

  “You people are crazy!” she shrieked, clinging to Zen, pressing close to him, not caring that her curtain was slipping or that she had previously done everything in her power to avoid being in this male’s arms.

  “I begin to see your reasoning in naming her Shrill.”

  That comment made her freeze as she turned to face the black haired devil.

  “What did you say?” she hissed, eyes narrowed in mounting anger.

  “I said that I was beginning to see his reasoning in naming you…”

  “My name is not Shrill!” she shrilled.

  “Brother,” Zol began. “Are you sure that this is your mate?”

  “Of that there can be no doubt.” He replied sardonically.

  “Are you people listening to me?”

  “We are not … people!” Zol sounded outraged as his golden gaze dropped to the unnamed female again.

  “You look like people to me,” she insisted, through she kept a tight grip on Zen’s neck. “Well, if you are not people, then what are you?”

  “Dragons.”

  Zen’s words made her look up at the shorter male holding her.

  “Right,” she rolled her eyes.

  “How else would I know that you were in hiding from the bug things?”

  “The scabs.”

  “Yes, a disgusting name for a disgusting annoyance.”

  She froze at that. How had she nearly forgotten the huge, soft-scaled lizards that had brought her to this place?

  “A pet?” Even she knew that her answer sounded ridiculous, even without his brother’s patronizing expression.

  “Have the mating fevers addled her brain?” Zol asked, tilting his head to the side as he examined her with a new, more worried expression on his face. “Nothing like a mad woman to taint the bloodlines, Brother. I would hate for you to be stuck with yet another burden.”

  “She is not addled,” Zen looked down at her. “At least, I don’t think she is. But she was not raised by suitable people, nor was she trained to know what it means to be a Dragonish mate.”

  “And I still don’t believe it!” she shouted, disgusted with the males for speaking about her as if she wasn’t there! How dare they?

  “You will.” Zen glared at her, his eyes glowing faintly red, and the ache in her back and abdomen, the one that plagued her nigh onto death, returned … with a vengeance.

  Chapter 4

  She was amazed that he didn’t drop her. She groaned and curled over into a fetal position; the pain evident on her face as she gritted her teeth and tried not to cry out.

  “The mating pangs?” Zol asked, clearly worried as he stared at his brother’s mate. “You have not taken her and she still suffers.”

  But Zen was too busy to move. Already he was making his way across the room towards the pile of cushions that served as a bed.

  Gently he eased her down, his eyes growing wide as she continued to show signs of pain.

  “You have to take her, Brother,” Zol shook his head, compassion in his gaze as he stared at the female. “There is no pain, save egg laying, which compares to this pain.”

  “No,” she managed to gasp, understanding what the two men were speaking of. “No taking.”

  “The pain will continue to grow…” Zol insisted.

  “No!” she screamed, letting out all of her frustrations and fears and pain in the shout. “No taking!”

  “This pain will consume you!” Zen glared at the female, his manner becoming knowing and aloof.

  “And what do you know of it?” she managed, her teeth gritted, her eyes narrowed into slits, her breath panting as she struggled to retain some dignity.

  “I know, female, because I too have been through the mating anguish. I know because it took weeks for Father to find me. And I know because I too fought against my destiny. You need not suffer needlessly. Go to your mate with a willing heart and when we are all joined, we will create such beautiful children.”

  “Joined?” she gasped as Zen began to stroke her hair and rub her lower back. His contact was amazingly, making the pain ease.

  “Does she not know anything?” Zol asked, looking in amazement at his brother.

  “She was not reared with her caregivers. I found her not far from a human settlement.” Zen spoke softly as she slipped his hand beneath the curtain that still, miracle that it was, remained on her body.

  She started to complain, but the skin-to-skin contact was easing the pain more, and he was only touching her back. She relaxed a bit, unknowingly moving deeper into his warm caress.

  “Joined?”

  She asked again, this time a bit more concerned. For some strange reason, her mind was beginning to accept the idea of having Zen as a mate. She seemed to be drawn to him, and if what he said was true, then he had saved her life. It was more than what any of the men in her village had done. And though he was naked and she nearly so, he did not seek to press his advantage. It showed that he knew something of honor, even if he teased her mercilessly.

  “Joined,” Zol explained. “We are quad. Although you are Zen’s mate, you are our female. Together we will hatch beautiful babies.”

  “Hatch?” she felt her panic rising again. It was beginning to seem that what the men were talking about … well, they made it seem so possible.

  “Father and I are mates. Through him, I achieve my fertility. You and Zenxian will mate and through him, you will achieve your fertility. Together, we mate and our eggs are laid. With your spirit and my beauty, our sons will no doubt rival our king for power and influence.”

  Then he smiled at her as if what he said made perfect sense.

  “So,” she began, uncurling more so she could look Zol directly in his face. “You and your Father mate. And I am to mate Zen. And then I am to mate with you and lay … eggs?”

  “That is why you are in such pain,” Zol explained. “But you will not be laying alone. Any daughters I produce will be strong and brave, a testament to our pure bloodlines.” Again he smiled at her.

  “You are saying that we will lay eggs, after you have sex with your father and he has sex with me? I mean, after we have sex together, of course.”


  “Yes. You understand!” Zol clapped his hands in glee. “And I so have longed for children of my very own.”

  “Keep longing,” she snapped. “You have got to be a mad scab if you think I am so gullible as to fall for some convoluted story like that! You sleeping with your father and laying eggs … what would your mother think?”

  “Well, she passed a long time ago. I am the last of her last clutch. But I think she would be proud of the father I find myself mated to.”

  Her eyes widened in horror. His father? Disgusting.

  “And you claim your blood isn’t tainted? How dare your blood sire…”

  “Who said anything about my sire?” Zol asked, confusion on his face. “My Sire is a proud Father. He will be an excellent sire and will see to it that any and all eggs in our clutch will hatch and our babies…”

  “What are you babbling about?” she finally exploded, then hissed as the pain increased with her agitation.

  “Humans,” Zen explained to his elder … brother? “You have to explain more thoroughly.”

  “I was thorough,” Zol rolled his eyes. “I think the mating pain is affecting her ability to comprehend.”

  “My ability…” she sputtered.

  “Peace, mate,” Zen chuckled. “Be at peace. I will endeavor to explain.”

  “You had better,” she snarled, turning to Zen, her expression all seriousness indeed. “And it had better be good.”

  “Father is the First Commander of the King’s Army. He is the Prime Alpha in our Quad. I am Alpha Secondary, though I was the youngest in the Triad before. Father chose me because of my fighting skills and the power core I possessed when I hatched. After Father trained me to be his successor in all things, he chose his Alpha Pair. Zol is his Alpha Pair, completing the fertility bridge for Father. Through their mating, the essence they create has made it possible for Zol to become fertile. He holds the combined essence of himself and Father, a boon to any Secondary pairing with both Father’s and Zol’s near perfect … countenances.” His hesitation in that sentence told of another story, one that was not merely confusing, but also unpleasant.

  “As Father’s Alpha Secondary, it is my duty to find my mate when she begins her mating fever, and through a mating with her, ensure her fertility so that the Pairs can perform the Fertility Rites and ensure that our bloodline lives on. It is a great honor…”