Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 46156 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 231(@200wpm)___ 185(@250wpm)___ 154(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 46156 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 231(@200wpm)___ 185(@250wpm)___ 154(@300wpm)
Dragon-blind was the term their horde had adopted to describe how society had failed to notice them in the last three hundred-ish years. The dragons had never stopped flying or hunting from their herds. They’d continued to find mates and carry them back to their lairs. Especially in recent years before the tech failure had changed everything, people had paid more attention to their phones and less to the skies.
“There have always been a few who were aware of us. Perhaps that is the reason she attracted us,” Oldrik suggested.
“You picked up on something as well?” Ardon pounced on his statement.
“Yes. Perhaps she is a rare human, the likes of whom we’ve never met,” Oldrik suggested. “You are meeting her tomorrow?”
“Yes. At noon. Want to join me? She seems to have an affinity for sketching dragons,” Ardon told him.
“You want to see if you feel the same thing when there’s competition,” Oldrik guessed.
“Keres was there today. He transported them. The black dragon would never have let me get close if he’d detected any type of attraction to him,” Ardon said.
“Only if you were dead. Keres is hanging on by a thread.”
“No one’s talking about it, but I think the entire horde knows he’s in danger if his mate doesn’t show up soon,” Ardon said.
Oldrik nodded and changed the subject. “So tomorrow at noon. We chat with the young woman together?”
“Be ready to step back if the mate bond clicks into place,” Ardon warned.
“I may be the senior dragon, but I have a few tricks up my sleeve. Be sure to take your own advice if our bond emerges.”
The blue dragon put more force behind that statement than Ardon liked. Had he made a mistake in discussing this with Oldrik? Tomorrow would answer that question.
Chapter 3
“The dragon doesn’t want to see you,” Amelia, Skye’s mother, stated firmly.
“I’ll return quickly then.”
“Really, Skye. You just got home. Don’t you want to spend some time with your father?”
Skye looked at her father, who gathered his tools to go work in the public gardens. It seemed everyone had a purpose now. She walked over to kiss her father’s cheek before he left.
“We missed you, Skye,” he said to her with a wink.
That gesture told her so much. Her mom had always fussed around her. Her mother meant well. She’d tried to fix Skye. Unfortunately, her efforts hadn’t worked. Well, at least not to her mother’s goals of making her fit in with everyone else.
Grabbing her sketchbook and some pencils from her room, Skye headed for the door. When she was several blocks from the town square, Skye wanted to stop there first to draw the statue from a distance. She forced herself to keep walking, not allowing herself to be distracted.
Amusement bubbled inside her. She’d sketched thousands of images of this dragon over the years. Today would be the same but different. The light and shadows would play over the polished stone with its small patches of roughness. She’d always pretended those were scales instead of weathered spots.
The square bustled with people scattered here and there in clumps. Eavesdropping, she figured out what was happening. Some people called guardians were meeting with people who needed them. Citizens of Wyvern, still missing family members, could enlist a dragon’s aid in searching for them from the air. Her mother must have given these helpers her last known location. Alerted that she was missing, Keres must have widened the search for her. That extra effort had brought her, Brooks, and Derek home.
She settled into a quiet spot at the side of the raised dais and opened her sketchpad. Life flowed around her like a river as she concentrated on capturing something elusive inside the stone creation. A rush of energy brought her attention back to the present.
Two handsome men stood before her. One was older, with a bit of silver at his temples. His eyes were deep blue, reminding her of the magnetic orbs she had gazed into before. The other was his opposite. Dark where the elder was blond. He viewed the world through amber-colored eyes.
A fantasy of these men pressing kisses to her neck and shoulders ignited a heat inside her she’d never felt before. She imagined the sensation of their close-cropped beards brushing across her skin. The resulting arousal flowing through her body shocked her. Normally, Skye didn’t like people touching her. Flustered, she stared at them, trying to understand her reaction.
“I don’t think she recognizes us, Ardon,” the massively built blond suggested.
“And she forgot to come meet me. Now I know why, Oldrik.”
These were dragons. Their names etched themselves into her brain. Ardon. Oldrik. When they each reached to help her up, Skye did something completely out of her norm. She voluntarily placed her palms on theirs. Fire burned through the top of her hands, stealing her breath away as they lifted her to standing.