Dragon Beloved: A Reverse Harem Dragon Mythology Romance (Dragon Gladiators Book 3) Read online

  Raiden let out a laugh, I was glad he developed a sense of humor but not when it came directed at me.

  “I’m the captain of this team, the team you are on, all of your well-beings are my responsibility. When we get home, yes, you are your own person but right now you are just a part of the team and for our team to run efficiently, all of the parts of our team need to be in the best condition they can be. Azar has a broken leg, Cobalt is still suffering from the banshee sucking out his life force and you have a broken arm, the last thing I need from you is to have you collapsing from hunger alright? I might seem like a prick but everything I do is to get us out of this alive and I think I deserve a little respect,” Raiden snapped.

  “Alright,” I nodded. “You are absolutely right. I’m sorry, I know you just want to do what’s best for us, and you aren’t trying to boss me around.”

  “Exactly,” Raiden nodded. “No need to apologize, I know I can be an asshole sometimes.”

  “Sometimes?” Nevada asked, his voice innocent.

  “Most of the time,” Raiden shrugged, side glancing at Nevada before looking back at me. “You don’t need to worry about your dice hurting your stomach though.”

  “Why not?” I asked, confused. “The magic feels so very alien to me, it turns my stomach.”

  Raiden chuckled, his features softening into a genuine smile.

  “Don’t you remember when you started using your cards? They hurt your stomach then too.”

  I had no memory of that, a lot of my childhood memories focused on my four Aurelius dragons rather than myself. Raiden was older than me by seven years, it made sense for him to have more substantial memories during that time. After they disappeared when I was fourteen, the only parts of my memories I focused on were them and now that was all I could recall.

  “Really?” I asked.

  “Yes, after you flooded our living room you had the worst stomach ache but wouldn’t let us call your parents because you didn’t want them to get mad at you thinking you ate too much sugar,” Raiden looked away, his face wistful. “You made me sleep next to you that night, I grumbled and complained the whole time you laid on my shoulder and whined at me.”

  “Sounds like us,” I laughed, I loved hearing about things from our childhood, and happy idyllic times before everything came crashing down.

  “All I’m saying is that I think your upset stomach is how your body adjusts to the flow of magic,” Raiden explained, he curled his fingers into my wayward hair, twisting the strands between his fingers, against his tan skin my hair looked more champagne than chestnut.

  I nodded. “I guess it makes sense.”

  My stomach growled loudly again.

  “The old girl doesn’t sound upset now, let’s go eat,” Azar laughed, hobbling out of the training field on his bad leg. Raiden’s hand dropped and grinned down at me and I smiled back before turning to run after Azar.

  The sexual tension, well more like sexual frustration, had skyrocketed from mildly hot to electrifying between Raiden and me.

  I wasn’t a virgin by any stretch of the imagination and I was attracted to Raiden so fucking much but they both were still having trouble leaping over the hurdle of a childhood friend to lover. It didn’t help his case that he was a total asshole most of the time. Sometimes it was an endearing trait but most of the time, I wanted to strangle him.

  We were destined to be together, we already loved each other and were very attracted to each other but still, we just couldn’t burst through that final barrier. I didn’t know the issue for him, perhaps our seven year age difference but for me, Raiden had always been my hero, my protector almost like an older brother figure. My attraction to this adult Raiden felt so strange but so wonderful, almost like how my newfound use of dice felt.

  I followed the guys back to the castelli, Nevada waiting for me and hooking my hand through his.

  I had always been much closer to Nevada and Azar, the three of us were the same age and in the same grade of school as kids. Starting in junior high, Azar had been separated from Nevada and me who went into a few advanced classes but the three of us were still the closest. Cobalt was a few years older than us and Raiden was seven years older than us, as adults, the age difference was no big deal but as kids, Raiden and Cobalt avoided us like the plague around school not wanting to be seen with us. Raiden and Cobalt had always been the loner type, Raiden as the cool, calm leader lusted after by the entire female population of our town. Everyone had always been terrified of Cobalt and avoided him, they crossed the street when they saw him coming down the sidewalk. By fourteen, he was driving a motorcycle around town, no one batted an eyelash, most kids in our town drove mopeds around at fourteen but Cobalt had a Harley with ape hangers. My parents had practically locked me in my house to keep me from going over to their house for a week when they saw Cobalt drop me off at home after school, of course, it didn’t work.

  Cobalt had always picked on me as a kid but him putting his helmet over my head, buckling it under my chin and helping me onto his motorcycle for the first time was one of my fondest memories of him. I had squeezed him around his waist tightly and he had started a slow drive around the lake and winding rivers that surrounded our town, I remembered passing fields of corn and soybeans, completely at peace. Until the jackass had decided to do a wheelie and scare the life right out of me.

  I squeezed Nevada closer to me, enjoying the cold he radiated.

  Ancient Rome was hotter and more humid than Iowa in August, up in the air had been nice and cool but back on the solid Earth, the heat was already getting to me and hugging Azar sure hadn’t helped. How the fire dragon never got heat stroke I would never understand.

  Nevada’s body was like my own personal air conditioner and he sure didn’t mind being used.

  “What does man love more than life? Fear more than death or mortal strife? What the poor have, the rich require, and what contented men desire, what the miser spends and the spendthrift saves and all men carry to their graves? What is it?” Nevada asked, his smoky voice going through me like a caress. Nevada’s physical proximity always seemed to affect me the most out of the guys, probably because he was the most classically handsome with his midnight curls, sapphire eyes and dark stubble tracing his chiseled bone structure.

  This was a new game we were playing, a little mental stimulation for the two bookworms of the group. The first fourteen years of our life had been a competition between the two of us for the best grades and test scores. While I had been able to go to high school and eventually college, poor Nevada had been forced to participate in the Dragon Gladiator Games at fourteen and had been forced to further his own education through reading the very limited selection of books the Concilium allowed them. I think he enjoyed our riddle battles, giving him a chance to use his brain rather than his brawn.

  “Nothing?” I answered, glancing up at him through my eyelashes.

  “Correct,” Nevada nodded, determination in his blue eyes. He always got very competitive with me. While Azar and Raiden seemed to buttheads, Nevada and I were the same when it came to academics or brain teasers. “Give me one. Try to make them harder this time.”

  We had been upping the ante with our riddles while the other three guys just about died of boredom every time. It was the perfect way to kill the long walk back to our castelli, like road trip games in a car.

  “All about, but cannot be seen, can be captured, cannot be held, no throat, but can be heard,” I recited. “What is it?”

  “That’s easy, wind,” Nevada scoffed, wasting no time he jumped right into his next riddle. “My life can be measured in hours, I serve by being devoured. Thin, I am quick. Fat, I am slow. Wind is my foe. What am I?”

  “Hmm,” I tapped my chin. I serve by being devoured? That was a tough one.

  “A candle?” I answered.

  Nevada nodded, giving me a sharp grin. “You’re really good at this.”

  “Thanks!” I smiled. “Okay, glittering points that downwa
rd thrust, sparkling spears that never rust.”

  Walking ahead of us Raiden burst into laughter, he looked over his shoulder at me. “If he doesn’t get this one, we’re getting his head checked out.”

  “Icicles,” Nevada grinned. “You spoon fed me that one, how about a challenge this time?”

  “You want me to go again?” I grinned, ready for the challenge. “You want a hard one huh? Here you go. I build up castles. I tear down mountains. I make some men blind. I help others to see. What am I?”

  “Stone?” Nevada immediately replied.

  “No,” I shook my head and scoffed. “I’m shocked, Mr. Confidence. You don’t know it?”

  He tapped a long, finely-boned finger to his chin, he looked away momentarily lost in deep thought. We continued walking and I waited patiently. Not even a minute had gone by when he met my eyes again, his full of a devious confidence.

  “Sand,” He answered with a cat-like grin that sent chills down my spine.

  “Yes,” I bit my lip and looked up at him through my eyelashes.

  “Not bad, I was almost stumped,” Nevada shrugged. A not bad from Nevada was more than most people got.

  “Thanks, I can’t remember where I originally heard it,” I looked around us, we were almost through the marketplace. I waved my hand at Nevada. “Give me one last riddle before we get back.”

  “This thing all things devours. Birds, beasts, trees, flowers. Gnaws iron bites steel. Grinds hard stones to meal. Slays king, ruins town. And beats high mountain down. What is it?” Nevada recited.

  The fine hairs rose on the back of my neck, this riddle was more than just eerie, it was straight up creepy. Gnaws iron and bites steel, rust? I thought. No, rust doesn’t devour birds and trees. Beats mountains down? Not sand again because that would be too easy.

  “Time!” I yelled far too loudly, making Nevada jump next to me.

  He chuckled lightly. “Correct.”

  “Alright, alright, enough of that you two, we’re home,” Raiden grumbled, knocking on the slab of marble that would lead to our castelli. A golden bumblebee glowed to life on the smooth stone and a doorknob appeared. Raiden grabbed it and turned it and led us inside.

  My cheeks ached from smiling so hard. Looking back, even with my broken arm and Azar’s broken leg, these were the happiest times I experienced during the Dragon Gladiator Games.

  Too bad it didn’t last.

  Chapter 2

  The next morning we sat around the table after a hard morning of training. I had just showered after a hell of a workout that Raiden put me through. With one arm weak, he was having me do extra sprints, one-armed push-ups, and one-armed planks. My abs and shoulders burned with exhaustion and my body cried for rest and relaxation but my mind was set.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Raiden asked, sounding more irritated than concerned. It had been his idea, I couldn’t fathom what his problem was.

  I needed to go, scout, the Atrium Libertatis, the largest and most well-stocked library of Ancient Rome to see if I could find any information on what my powers truly were. I had always thought I was maybe a witch or a superhuman mutant from X-Men but seeing the powerful warlocks of the Concilium during our last tournament made me realize that my magic was completely different from theirs.

  My powerful cards were nowhere near the exaggerated hand and finger signs that allowed the Concilium warlocks to use their magic. Whatever I was, it was not a witch and I was determined to find out what it was.

  One of my biggest regrets was not coming clean to my parents about my power. It haunted me daily, that my parents died before learning my secret and that they may have had information for me. Living with regret was like having an annoying little itch at the back of your mind. Constantly nagging you day after day with what could have been. I refused to live like that anymore, after gaining my Aurelius dragon’s back into my life after being separated for ten years.

  If there was anyone I had been dying to talk to during the games it was my mom. My mom was my rock, non-judgmental and always had my back. If I had told her that I was destined to be with my four Aurelius’ brothers (she didn’t know they were dragons or not really brothers). She would have laughed and told me that she had known that for years and then would’ve winked suggestively at me.

  A wave of sadness passed over me before I realized the guys were trying to talk to me. I zoned back into the conversation just as Cobalt had walked over to me with one eyebrow quirked up.

  “Do you really want to take Nevada, he means,” Cobalt sneered at the older blonde Aurelius dragon.

  I scoffed. “Yes! He’s the quickest thinker and the least impulsive. This is just a scouting trip.”

  “Looking at you there, Azar,” Raiden snapped.

  Azar raised his hands in surrender, a faux-innocent grin on his tanned face. “Hey, I’m not impulsive!”

  “Funny how you brought that up, how did you know what we were going to accuse you of?” Raiden asked, making Nevada throw his head back with a loud laugh.

  “Okay, everybody calm down,” I rose my voice over all of theirs.

  All four of them devolved into loud bickering and I had an odd flashback of being a child again and watching them beat each other up over the last ice cream sandwich one hot summer.

  “Hey!” I yelled. “You big, muscles instead of brains idiots! Shut up!”

  All of their eyes snapped to me.

  “Oh good, I have your attention,” I quipped with my angry librarian voice. I glared at all four of them, letting my eyes linger on each of them for a minute for maximum effect. They all looked down guilty. “I’m taking Nevada because he is the most inconspicuous. I can’t take Azar because his leg is broken and he had a penchant for lighting things on fire. I’m not taking Cobalt because he is just as destructive as Azar if not more so. I’m not taking Raiden because you’re far too recognizable. Nevada is calm and rational, one of you with the least likeliness to cause trouble.”

  “That very well may be but Nevada is also at the most disadvantage elementally in Ancient Rome. For six months of the year back in Iowa, his ice and snow reign supreme but so close to equator we get year-round sunshine, his element is not at its best here,” Raiden grumbled. “Neither of you will be safe.”

  Nevada scoffed. “I’ve been doing just fine.”

  “You’ve been doing just fine but the heat and lack of cooling technology have severely limited your feeding abilities, honestly, you aren’t at the level that say Azar and I are on right now. I’m not saying you are weak all of the time, I’m saying that due to the weather, your element is at a particular disadvantage,” Raiden explained to Nevada.

  “It doesn’t matter, all of this assessment is a just in case, we’ll be using my cards to remain invisible and intangible,” I told them.

  “Your arm is broken,” Cobalt grumbled.

  “And that has to do with what? We’re scouting while invisible and I can still use my cards either way,” I waved my good arm around. “Seriously, I took out Tefra, Grayling and those Viking dragons. I got this.”

  Raiden sighed, defeated. “Okay but the second it gets too dangerous, you and Vada get out of there alright?”

  “Aye, aye Captain Prick,” I grinned and Nevada, Cobalt, and Azar burst into laughter.

  “Dammit, I thought you guys forgot about that!” Raiden growled cyan bursts of electricity sparked all over his body with hisses and pops.

  “The opposite actually, we even brought Cobalt up to speed on the whole Captain Prick story,” I grinned at Raiden, I poked him with my finger, feeling a jolt of static electricity rush through me. I could feel my hair stand on end.

  “Thanks,” Raiden grumbled, glaring at me but I could tell he was trying hard not to smile.

  “It’s okay, Ray, you’ve always been a prick to me,” Cobalt nodded at the elder Aurelius. “A big one.”

  Raiden ran a hand through his light, disheveled hair and sighed in defeat. “At least I’m a big prick, size matt
ers you know.”

  “It’s not the size, it’s how you use it,” I wagged my pointer finger at him and he burst into laughter before catching himself again, raising a hand to scratch at his jaw.

  “Alright, prick jokes aside, you two should probably head out before they return from their midday gathering outside of Rome,” Raiden explained. “Every third week on the third day they return to the Concilium headquarters and leave the Atrium Libertatis in the hands of low-level warlocks to card it, counting on their magical wards to protect the information within. I’m fairly certain that their wards work like a motion detector and your Alpha of Shields should protect you perfectly. If for whatever reason they do not, you need to get the hell out of there, don’t draw them right back to our castelli.”