Dragon Treasure by SJ Sanders

Chapter 24

Tania paced restlessly, scowling at the walls of their quarters. This isolation thing was getting way out of hand. Although there was no denying that keeping her safe was his priority, it chafed. What was worse was that Drathnor had become more paranoid.

He lurked around their quarters like a gargoyle, often reclining in guardian form on their larger balcony, filling the entire space up while insisting that she stay isolated in their rooms. Since Tania wasn’t eager to repeat any terrifying close encounters with nightmares, she hadn’t objected at first. She had been comforted by Drathnor’s watchfulness. Even when he disappeared for hours on end, attending to things he refused to speak of, he set enchantments on their rooms so that no one could enter. Spells to guard her when he wasn’t present.

In those early days, although she knew it wasn’t foolproof, the fact that it kept out sizeable pests had provided some relief. Shaken from her experience, knowing that nothing could slither into her room and catch her unawares again , she had clung to that security. Although it couldn’t keep out the pesky midnight visitors that she dubbed crawlers which entered the room from nooks and crannies, it was still reassuring that the crawlers were the only thing they had to contend with. Truthfully, even those creatures might have worried her all the same, but since Drathnor never failed to return before sunset, she had felt safe in their rooms during the day.

Yet as days passed, and she was able to put some distance between herself and the events of the baths, the net of safety Drathnor provided turned into confines that had her pacing restlessly. She didn’t feel it during the hours he was there. She enjoyed listening to the resonant growl of his voice as he spoke to her and at times read to her. Each day, however, when her dragon left, being caged within their rooms felt more like a prison than anything else.

It didn’t help that her sleep was interrupted nightly by terrible noises and the strange shadows of the crawlers moving over the ceiling. They watched her, and she was certain that if Drathnor hadn’t been curled around her every night that they would have ventured closer. She wasn’t naive enough to believe that they were harmless, only that his presence kept them at bay while she caught what little sleep that she could manage. She certainly couldn’t sleep during the day. Even knowing that the wards were up and that nothing would venture into their rooms during the day. Just being there alone made her feel restless and on guard.

Perhaps when Drathnor returned she would be able to relax enough to nap before the hour grew late. She stared off at the darkening blue sky near the peaks, searching for any sign of him.

Rubbing a hand over her face, Tania froze when she saw a shadow of movement on their balcony. As it was nearing the lunch hour, it should have been the droid, but the shadow that fell over the balcony was far larger than what was ever produced by the squat mechanized being.

Dropping her hand slowly, she schooled her expression as she stared at the priest standing at the other side of the doors. With the spell, the regular coming and goings of the droid, and their own comfort with the cold mountain air, there was little need to close the door, but now she wished she had.

How had he even found their balcony? The high cleric had assured them that it was private and no one else knew how to get there. She squinted at the gaunt man. She didn’t recognize him either, but that wasn’t saying much since she hadn’t met many of the clergy since arriving. Still, there was an air of something not right about him that made her skin prickle in warning.

His head tilted, his ashen sunken skin almost seeming to move over his skull in a disturbing manner, if the deep grayish tinge around his eyes and mouth weren’t disturbing enough. She stared at him, her saliva thickening in her mouth as her stomach roiled. She wanted more than anything to look away from the vacant gaze of the priest staring back at her with a void-like hunger that made her skin crawl.

His mouth gaped open obscenely in what might have been intended to be a smile, but when he began to speak, his voice skittered over her as if a bucket of centipedes had been dumped over her skin. She shuddered and backed away toward the desk at the opposite end of the room as he continued to leer at her.

“Little female,” he sang out in an oily voice. “Why do you back away? It is the meal hour, and I have been sent to fetch you. Come out, female, so that we may feast. We are waiting for you.”

A dark slick tongue slipped between his teeth, the unnaturally long length of it swiping along his lower lip and curling around his chin. His nostrils expanded as if scenting the air like a hound. Tania’s eyes widened. She had seen the husks of corpses revived by necromancers slaughtering everything with the ceaseless drive of the dead, and even confronting those—albeit with a team of skilled fighters—was nothing like the creature now facing her. It wasn’t merely a reanimated corpse following directions. A twisted sort of darkness seemed to cling to it.

She shook her head, her fingers clutching tightly to the desk behind her. She sure as hell wasn’t fool enough to go anywhere near that thing.

“Thanks, but I’m good,” she shouted back with some vain hope of deterring him, or whatever had taken over the priest and consumed him from the inside out. “I will just wait for the droid if it’s all the same to you. You will have to take my apologies to your… ah, brethren.”

The priest frowned, his head twisting even further to the side at an angle that couldn’t be possible for a human. Raising one stained-dark fingertip, he tapped on the air in front of the door. Sparks of blue light shot off, radiating out with each tap. His mouth gaped open, revealing numerous jagged teeth, his long tongue lolling out to slither in the air just before the magical barrier. A second and third tongue slipped out as well, and the tongues vibrated with the deep growl that he emitted.

His palm smacked the barrier, sending a wide shock of energy and plume of sparks large enough that Tania jumped despite herself. Her fingertips scuttled along the desk, looking for anything sharp. They immediately curled around a letter opener, the iron satisfyingly heavy in her palm. It wouldn’t do much, but it could give her an edge if the thing managed to get through Drathnor’s wards. Whatever it was, it was more powerful than anything she had experience with before.

She was so out of her league.

His jaws snapped against the barrier, his tongues whipping and lashing in a frenzy as he clawed. She could feel the magic wavering against the assault. Although he was using his teeth and claws, they gave off their own black and deep violet streams as he attempted to chew his way through the barrier.

The wall of magic shuddered again, the energetic booms ringing in her ears. Her fingernails bit into the heel of her hand as she clutched the letter-opener tighter. With another shocking bang, the priest stopped. Tania blinked, wondering what could possibly have caught his attention when she heard it—a familiar soft whirr.

Mouth contorting into a smile, he peeled away to face the service droid. It stopped within sight of the priest, several mechanical arms uncurling from hidden chambers, the three-fingered talons on each hand sparking with electricity.

“You are not authorized on this level. Return to where you came from immediately,” the droid intoned authoritatively.

Tania allowed herself to sag slightly with relief. With the droid there mounting its defenses, the priest would have to leave.

She stilled as the priest turned his head back toward her, a lascivious grin stretching his mouth wide again. She wasn’t given an opportunity to wonder what that look meant as he suddenly spun around and stalked toward the droid, his body barely jerking beneath the electric blasts that it was bespelled with.

Before her horrified eyes, he seized it and began to rip its arms off, each sparking limb punctuating the shrill alarms the droid sounded. And each limb afterward thrown right at her barrier. He snarled, his mouth widening and a second row of jagged teeth descending with his fury, when the dragon’s magic continued to hold. With a bellowing roar of anger, the priest yanked the droid up and sent it, too, crashing directly into the barrier.

It shrieked, its round metal head jerking, as its systems fried. Whatever consciousness that was woven around the mago-tech spell was torn apart by the wards even as the metal casing burst apart. Chunks of metal hit the balcony, scattering over the surface as assuredly as the body of the priest would have splatted in wet globs should he have attempted to force himself through the barrier.

Another bellow of rage left the priest, but a triumphant smile flickered on his face. Tania knew why. Shifting to her other vision she could see the trace magic of the wards slowly failing. They had managed to take a punishment, but they wouldn’t continue forever and were now on the brink of collapsing.

A cold sweat broke out on her skin as she met the eyes of the thing inside the priest’s husk of a body. Tania brought the small blade up in front of her slowly, her body tightening in a defensive stance. It laughed and lunged at her.

A blast of wind shot down, knocking the priest back as if flicked, and the monastery shook just before the pale head of a dragon snapped down with an angry bellow. The priest-creature screamed in fury and likely equal parts fear, but the sound was lost as Drathnor’s mouth closed around it. He swallowed the priest from head to mid torso before his massive teeth tore the flesh and bone, ripping the body in half with a wet popping sound of bones and muscles separating.

Tania gagged as dark blood flooded over the dragon’s teeth and muzzle, but she was eternally grateful that he didn’t bolt down his mouthful as seemed to be his natural inclination, his held tilting up to allow the meat to slide down his throat, before he stopped, and with a savage whip of his head, tossed the upper half of its body into the ravine seconds before the other half of the corpse followed.

Dropping down carefully onto the balcony, he fanned his wings aggressively and bugled in clear warning before allowing himself to finally revert to his regular size and form. His wings continued to vibrate anxiously but he stalked forward with the poise and intensity of a predator at the top of the food chain. The black blood smeared over his muzzle and dripping down his chest did not detract from the pull he had on her so that when he barreled through the entrance, she was already meeting him halfway across the room.

Bodies colliding in their rush to get to each other, Drathnor’s muzzle dragged across her cheek and neck, burrowing lower as he scented her and reassured himself that she was well. Tania shivered against him, clinging to him with eagerness, needing his every touch just as much as he did. Her need to reassure herself that he was truly there with her was just as real and persistent as his.

Gradually, his panicked movements slowed, and he sighed against her collarbone, his body finally stilling so he could hold her firmly against him. She could feel the small bite of his claws against her backside, and his wings partially curved around them still trembled.

Brushing the strands back from her face, he finally lifted his head and tipped hers back to meet his eyes.

“You are well?” he rasped worriedly.

She nodded, her lips twisting in a faint smile of bravado.

“Yeah. I’m guessing he never heard of the Three Little Pigs, or else he would have known that ‘let me in’ is a dead giveaway that it’s going to be bad for your health.”

Drathnor’s plated brow lowered in confusion, and she giggled, loopy with the sudden rush of adrenaline. She gave his chest a pat.

“Never mind. It’s just a children’s tale.” She cast a sad look toward the door and grimaced. “It killed the droid. I can’t believe I feel sorry for that mechanical menace, but it tried to protect me…”

Her mate nuzzled her in silent comfort.

She bit her lip as another thought occurred to her. Something that the priest-creature had said before it gleefully destroyed the droid. That they would no longer be able to hide there. With the droid gone, did that mean the end of their seclusion from the rest of the monastery?

While she was going crazy being stuck in their rooms at all times, the idea of being forced into the monastery if they needed anything made the small hairs on her skin stand on end with apprehension.

“Do you think they will send us another droid?” she whispered.

Drathnor stilled and then sighed against her neck before giving a small shake of his elegantly wedge-shaped head. “No. As far as I know, this was the only one.”

She licked her lips. “What if you got it?”

He shook his head. “I am away too much as it is driven by necessity. Hunting would drive me even further in search of prey and significantly delay any escape of this place. And the townspeople, now aware of my identity, will fear me too much for me to purchase from them. A large, imposing male is frightening enough, but not as much as a dragon,” he observed,

Latching on one word, she looked at him with the first bloom of hope rising within her. “Escape? We’re going to leave this place?”

He gave a reluctant nod of and dropped his muzzle closer to hiss in her ear.

“I did not wish to speak it. I must move the hoard so that we do not fall ill, but it has already begun. As soon as it is finished, we will leave this place. Be silent on this, though. They will stop us if they know.”

She swallowed and nodded her understanding. They had to delay and make it look convincing. “Great. Breaking bread with potentially possessed clergy exactly as that thing wanted. Sounds fun.” She rolled her eyes over to meet his. “I guess they are waiting on us then. If we want anything to eat, we will have to move.”

He studied her expression silently. His wings slid up her sides in a whispering caress.

“I will protect you,” he growled. “Whatever this thing was, it will not threaten you. Nor will anyone or anything in this monastery. If any attempts to harm you, I will relish tearing them apart bit by bit.”

Her lips curled in a real smile as she brushed her fingers against his jaw. “So brutish,” she murmured.

“I am a dragon,” he rumbled, his tongue snaking against her neck, drawing a sigh of pleasure from her.

She needed that. The contact reaffirming that she was still alive. She needed to be held down and surrender completely to bliss and so be allowed to forget for a moment.

Tania shivered at the second pass of his tongue, a delighted murmur escaping her when his teeth nipped at the side of her breast through her tunic. When she felt his claw hook into her collar, she moaned, her nipples tightening.

“I need,” she choked out.

His purr vibrated through her as he brushed his cheek against hers. “What do you need, little mate?”

“To be free from my own mind and worries. Just for a little while,” she replied, her voice barely above a whisper as she admitted it aloud.

He rumbled with approval, his claw tightening further on her collars.

“You wish to surrender to my care?”

“Yes,” she moaned at the touch of his claw dipping low, hooking around her tunic to draw it up and over her head. Her skin quivered at the erotic sensation of claws and shifting fabric, even as she bemoaned the brief absence of his grip on her collar when he was forced to release it.

“I’ve always had to think one step ahead of everyone and everything to survive. With everything that’s happening, I don’t want to think,” she admitted. “I just want to feel good. And to feel safe.”

Tania felt him nod against her shoulder.

“Very well,” he rumbled, and she felt the rope thread once more through her collar. “You are mine.”