About Dragon Hatching
by JB McDonald
57 pages / 15600 words
ISBN: 978-1-61040-534-8
Ebook zipped file contains -
html, lit, Adobe and Sony optimized pdf, prc, epub
Becoming a host for a parasitic dragon wasn't part of the plan.
Actually, there wasn’t really any plan to begin with, but when the dragon
egg hatches, Ashe figures it's time to come up with one.
Katsu's plans are failing miserably. His vast medical knowledge isn't
helping Ashe's dragon situation, he's having problems staying detached, and
the other mercenaries are concerned about their lifeforce being sucked dry
and want Ashe to leave. Katsu is determined that if Ashe leaves, so will he.
First, though, he has to make sure that his people aren't killed in
battle... something they seem determined to do.
Sample
Ashe stood under the rising moon, face tipped up to the sky. Dusk painted
his bare skin in pinks and glowing yellows, blue shadows spilling along his
lean muscles. The land was rocky, the vegetation thin. Cropped grass and
small bushes clung to the soil and lingered under small, thin-leafed trees,
gathering near the trickle of a stream where groups of mercenaries camped.
Boulders rolled up from under the earth, showing only their tops, fringed by
pale earth.
It was on one of these natural platforms that Ashe stood, arms outstretched,
eyes closed, naked.
Katsu watched from the edge of the trees, quiet camp noises reaching him
from all sides like the murmuring of leaves. The mercenary groups had
stretched out along the riverbed, leaving Ashe alone.
A breeze ruffled the short grasses, sending Ashe's unbound hair, almost
waist-length when it wasn't plaited, fluttering to one side. It curled in a
braid-pattern, a dusty blond that seemed to anchor the elf to this world,
while the full moon cast glowing light on him to lift him into an ethereal
realm.
The sun sank completely, and the rose blush to Ashe's skin vanished with it.
He moved liquidly, moonlight flowing over his flesh and making it glow. It
was a dance to music, but not music audible to any human ear. It lasted only
moments. The world around him seemed to respond, as if trapping the
moonlight within itself before releasing it with a sudden burst, sending
light racing away from the now-still form, soaking into the ground.
Slowly, Ashe's eyes opened. The breeze stilled, letting his hair fall down
his back, brushing along his skin. He turned slowly, and though Katsu hadn't
made any noise and stood in the shadows under the trees, pale eyes found him
unerringly.
Ashe smiled, slightly pointed canine teeth bright with a lingering bit of
moonlight.
Katsu stepped out of the brush. "That was... I didn't know you could work
magic like that."
With a lithe shrug, Ashe bent to scoop up his trousers and shirt, though he
made no move to put them on. "I thought you said that it wasn't magic. It
was chakra." He grinned, a little impishly. "That it couldn't go through the
boundaries of skin and bones."
Katsu frowned, waving the words away with his uninjured arm. "That's
personal magic. This is -- well, humans can't do this. Not full humans,
anyway. It's world-magic."
"Of course." Amusement was clear in Ashe's tone.
It made Katsu simmer, his eyes narrowing. "There are different kinds of
magic, you know. Just because elves lumps it all into one--"
Ashe started laughing, slinging his free arm around Katsu and pulling him
close, cutting the words off with a kiss. It started out as the simple press
of mouths, but deepened rapidly. Ashe dropped his clothes; they landed with
a rustle by his feet, drowning out his inhalation as he skimmed his palms up
Katsu's arms, moving carefully over the splint on one forearm. Ashe had
graceful hands, with one finger less than a human's, pale against the dark
cloth of Katsu's tunic. The moonlight blessed them, seeming to shine down
brighter for a moment before the clouds scuttled across the moon, hiding
them in shadow.
Still, Ashe's skin glowed with magic. He pulled Katsu's tunic off, letting
it drop to the ground on top of his own clothes, exposing the twists and
bends of inky dark tattoos. Ashe traced them with pale fingertips, down
Katsu's muscular chest and stomach, back up across his shoulders, and down
his arms. His forearms were bound, wrapped around and around with lengths of
tan cloth, hiding the tattoos where they would have become visible beyond
his sleeves.
Methodically, Ashe untied the knots that held the cloth in place on Katsu's
good arm and unwound those strips as well.
Once free, Katsu ran callused hands, broad compared to Ashe's but still slim
for a human, gently over Ashe's shoulders and down arms too slender to be
mistaken as anything but elven. The ends of the wraps, partially undone,
that bound Katsu's forearm skimmed over the rest of Ashe, catching the light
breeze and fluttering against Ashe's flank.
Ashe nuzzled in, face brushing under Katsu's jaw, ribs expanding as he took
a deep breath. "You smell nice," he murmured on an exhalation.
Katsu licked his lips. "Nine hells, you feel--" He cut off, pressing his
hands against Ashe's flesh again and closing his eyes tight.
"It's the magic," Ashe all but purred. He rubbed his face on Katsu's
shoulder, tongue lapping out to taste firm skin. There was a moment when
Ashe moved away and everything went silent, and then his mouth returned much
lower to warm the skin on Katsu's abdomen, tongue licking slowly along the
line of a tattoo. "It makes everything feel good," he continued quietly.