To Seduce a Dragon Read online

  To Seduce a Dragon

  Venys Needs Men

  Poppy Rhys

  Contents

  Blurb

  Warning

  Venys - Land of the Comet Map

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Venys Needs Men Collaboration

  Also by Poppy Rhys

  About the Author

  Copyright 2020 by Poppy Rhys

  Edited by Mandi B.

  Proofread by C.L.S.

  Cover Art: Cameron Kamenicky & Naomi Lucas

  Cover content is for illustrative purposes only. Any person depicted on the cover is a model.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Created with Vellum

  Blurb

  My name is Jaya, a dreamer, bola slinger, and one of ten guardians in my tribe. I was content to live out my days keeping watch on the village, hunting, and batting away insects that flew too close to the prissy women chosen to birth the next generation.

  My life was nothing like theirs. I spent way too much time burying my secret in the dirt, over and over, to make sure of it.

  Gods no. That wasn't my future...

  Until the sky lit up and an angry star sent all the Mist tribes into a desperate frenzy for the beasts of legend to bleed new life into our people.

  It wasn't supposed to turn out this way.

  I didn't mean to touch him, but what's done is done. Do I have what it takes to seduce a dragon? Don't know, but hold my bola--I'm about to find out.

  Warning

  This story contains a non-human hero, mature content, graphic language, and violence.

  To Tiffany, Naomi, and Amanda. You guys never fail to make me laugh. (You too, Rob!)

  Here’s to many more years of friendship!

  To Nate and your predictable, yet dependable, “I liked that.”

  1

  I’m next.

  Jaya looked down at her nails, still dirty from digging last night. She’d been so tired she collapsed into bed without washing up. She was lucky her mother didn’t demand to know why she was filthy this morning.

  She didn’t want to lie, but she couldn’t tell her the truth either.

  Sometimes she wondered if her mother knew. Thing was, the other girls—Remmy, Ferin, and Sersha—were much prettier than Jaya. Better physical genes to pass on. Remmy with her thick golden hair, Ferin with her dark skin, and Sersha with her formidable height.

  The only thing Jaya had going for her was her thick brown hair and its natural waves. And she liked to think she had more brains than those three. Everything else about her was… painfully unremarkable.

  If anyone knew what she buried every month, no one said anything. Maybe all this time, her mother was doing her a favor by turning a blind eye.

  Jaya’s mother had been one of Priora’s maidens in her youth, after all. She knew better than anyone what the life of a fertile woman in the Mist Lake was like. She’d been one of three wives herself up until three summers ago when her husband, Jaya’s father, fell sick and died.

  The trainer’s cabin loomed ahead as she was dragged along by her eager mother like a boar to slaughter. She’d be offered up so they could one day send her to her fate.

  This is what I wanted, right?

  There was still time to change her mind. Come clean. Confess.

  But they weren’t real, the beasts they spoke of. Just legend. Myths to give people hope and lift their spirits. And this would save Jaya. She wouldn’t end up like the others…

  Stuck on her back, popping out babies to carry on the species.

  “Stop dragging your feet, Jaya,” her mother chided, her bone-bead necklaces tinkling with each step. Jaya always knew whenever she was near—those sounds had been a comfort throughout her life.

  Today they grated.

  They reminded her she wouldn’t hear them every day. She’d be stuck in this place, with this sacred trainer of the Mist tribes, far away from everything she’d known.

  Jaya felt a little guilty. Others wanted nothing more than to be one of Priora’s maidens, be one of three wives to a single man, and pray for sons. And here Jaya was, squandering the gift by choosing the life of a guardian.

  The sky swirled gray with the coming storm and there, across the overgrown meadow of freshly bloomed pink and golden flowers, stood a squat cabin made of dark, bark-covered logs, and a woven roof the color of soot. Trees four times its height, heavily laden with their green needle-like foliage, towered behind it and encircled the clearing.

  Any other day she might revel in the moment, spread her arms and twirl among the weeds and flowers, dance for the storm that would bring more rain and, with it, warmer weather.

  Others were there, also led by their mothers as offerings. She counted five total, from four different Mist tribes, their colors proudly showing who they represented. Red, green, blue, and two yellow.

  Absently, she stroked the excess length of her belt along her thigh, the soft leather dyed purple and twined with matching feathers and small animal bones. Village colors were worn with pride this far north, and a way to speak of where a person traveled from.

  Jaya’d never met anyone who wasn’t from Mist Lake. She’d only heard stories from others of Venys’s vast and varying landscapes. It shook her to her core to think there was a place where the sun grew so hot it threatened to kill people. Or a place filled with year-round greenery, never seeing a flake of snow.

  Closer they strode until they were all standing outside the lodge. Its crude wooden door swung open and out came the most intimidating woman she’d ever laid eyes on.

  She stood taller than anyone she’d met in her short seventeen summers. Her shoulders broad, her medium-length brown hair streaked with glinting lines of gray, and her angular face tanned by the sun. Her leather pants were tight around her muscular thighs and tucked into furred boots, much like the ones the rest of them were wearing.

  Her shrewd blue eyes squinted, assessing every tribute here.

  Various animal pelts hung off her shoulders and draped over her chest, proof that she was a skilled hunter and would never want for clothing or meat.

  Jaya stood straighter when the trainer’s eyes fell on her and her dread mixed with new anticipation.

  Jaya wanted to be her.

  She’d bet no one looked at her and only saw a womb. Someone who might produce sons instead of daughters and save their people—or grow old and weary trying over and over.

  When people looked at that woman, Jaya imagined they saw what she did—a guardian.

  Someone who protected others, provided for the tribe, and had real substance between her ears.

  “I am Kelso,” the trainer spoke, her voice femini
ne, but deep and commanding their attention. “Have you come here willingly?”

  “Yes,” she heard herself offer up first, echoed by the other girls. She’d been fearful, but after seeing Kelso, she was sure of her decision now.

  This was what she was meant to be.

  A guardian.

  Home Village

  Ten summers later…

  “It stung me! What good is a guardian who can’t do her simple job?” Remmy huffed, her forest green eyes brimming with tears that Jaya knew were all for show. She’d been pulling that same stunt since they were kids. For some reason, when a pretty girl cried, everyone bent over backward to fix the problem. Remmy figured it out early in life and used that reliable trick often.

  The others, Ferin and Sersha, circled Remmy and brow-beat Jaya—as if she were the one who stung the blond—while they softly crooned at Remmy, stroking her thick, golden hair to soothe.

  Gods, Remmy was dramatic.

  “I’ll try to do better next time,” Jaya offered tightly, proud of herself for not telling Remmy she hoped her face swelled. Knowing how often these birthers—not what they were really called—liked to admire their own reflections, it was satisfying to imagine Remmy absolutely wrecked if her face was anything shy of perfection.

  “Get out!” Remmy shouted.

  Without a backward glance, Jaya left the log structure and inhaled a deep breath of sweet spring air once she was outside again. The atmosphere could be suffocating in the birther lodge.

  I should probably stop calling them that.

  One day it would slip, and she’d never hear the end of it from Kelso any time she visited, which happened a lot these days.

  It was the legend again. Their elders were whispering about a star. The kind of star that every tribe across the land would see.

  That it would burn for many days and many nights and bring with it dragons.

  She laughed to herself as she wandered around the village’s perimeter, the newly grown grass cushioning her footsteps as the afternoon sun shone down on her skin, darkening it. She welcomed the change. Her brown coloring always faded in the winter months, but once the sun stopped hiding, it came back.

  Jaya loved and respected the elders of the village, but part of her thought they had nothing better to do but come up with fantastic tales, each one even more outlandish. Visiting elders from other villages spoke of beasts turning into men and seeding new blood into their people. One even claimed to have met one of these beast-men long ago, when they were a child, but no one in all the Mist tribes had captured one since the last died.

  That was the story, anyway.

  She stared to the east, the snowcapped mountains in view. The whole idea sounded questionable to her.

  Yet a small part wondered what was out there…

  “What are we looking at?”

  Jaya startled and swore. “Chrishfa, you scared me!”

  Grinda, a fellow guardian—all willowy bones and wild red hair—smiled, a hint of mischief in her honey colored eyes. She was always sneaking up on people. Her stealthy gait was unnerving, even if it made her one amazing hunter.

  Kelso had sent her to their village just two summers ago to help with the seasonal hunt, but Grinda decided to stay. Jaya didn’t complain. It was nice having another guardian near her age, and her archery skills were extremely valuable.

  “Wondering about the legends the elders chatter about?” she prodded.

  “Legend is right.”

  “Mhm… yet you stand here staring at the exact mountains they claim the dragons come from.”

  Jaya didn’t like the accusing, if playful, tone. Mainly because she was guilty. And she didn’t ask for Grinda’s input.

  “It’s a pretty view.”

  Grinda snorted, and Jaya pressed her lips together to keep her smirk hidden.

  “You know Remmy’s out to get you?”

  Jaya rolled her eyes to the twilight sky, imploring the gods for patience. Her lower back pinged with a familiar ache, as if they were answering her pleas to be far away from Remmy and her fellow birthers.

  “I think it’s time for a hunt. The meat supply is low, don’t you think?” Jaya side-eyed Grinda, her gaze narrowed and lips tilted. She understood.

  Getting out of the village while Remmy simmered down was the best way to settle the tension Jaya’d no doubt cause. All over a bug. Grinda didn’t need to know Jaya would’ve made up any excuse to get out of the village for a few days, even if Remmy hadn’t provided a good one.

  Her secret was still her secret. Luckily, her menses were like clockwork. Every twenty-eight days, they showed up, and every twenty-eight days Jaya made sure she was on a hunt or supply run.

  Alone.

  She’d head out at first light after a good night’s rest.

  “Think you’re right. I’ll let the others know. Be safe out there,” she warned. “There be dragons, dont’cha know?”

  Dragons.

  Yeah, right.

  2

  “Jaya, wake up!”

  Her body jerked and she sat up, her ram’s fur blanket pooling into her lap, vision blurred from sleep and heart racing. The glowing embers in the hearth outlined Grinda hovering over her.

  “What’s wrong? What is it? Are we under attack?”

  “It’s here,” she blurted, grabbing Jaya’s wrists with her cold fingers and pulling her out of bed, away from the warm skins.

  “What’s here?” She wasn’t making any sense.

  “The star!”

  Breath heavily seesawed in and out of Jaya’s lungs, her body and brain still trying to comprehend the rude awakening and make sense of the chaos. It was the middle of the night—when only a rotation of guardians should be awake—yet the whole village, forty-five people, were gathered outside their wooden lodges and pointing up at the sky.

  She turned her gaze upward, the vast expanse of the darkest blue lit up by sparkling stars she’d seen every night since she could remember—they weren’t alone anymore.

  A fiery burst with a tail of red shone brightly, large enough to see without squinting.

  The star.

  The one the elders whispered about, the one she’d doubted the existence of since she first heard the legend.

  That doubt wasn’t washed away, even as she watched it burn in the night sky. Maybe she was too skeptical for her own good. Her brain wouldn’t let her believe the giant beasts of myth and legend were real. She’d never seen one with her own eyes, and neither had anyone in the village.

  It was too fantastical.

  Granted, there were giant creatures in the White Wastes—spear-limbed, man eating, ravenous, and lethal—but they were creatures. They didn’t mystically turn into a man with a single touch.

  “It’s real,” she heard a villager say.

  “We could be saved.”

  “There is hope.”

  Jaya looked down at Grinda and she could see a flicker of something there—optimism? Her eager, wide-eyed gaze made her face appear child-like, so different from the sarcastic, playful glint her eyes usually held.

  “Gather the others,” she whispered. “Kelso wants a meeting.”

  Jaya’s brow knitted into a frown. “Kelso’s here?”

  “She arrived not long before the star appeared.” Grinda’s forehead wrinkled in contemplation. “As if she knew it was coming.”

  “How could she know?” No one in Mist Lake understood the stars, or what they prophesied. They were simply a faithful guide at night.

  Noise started in the forest, a pack of wild hounds yipping and howling. So close to the village. Too close.

  “Weird chrishfa’s been happening around here tonight,” Grinda murmured before slinking away without explaining what she meant.

  Jaya made her rounds, waking the few guardians who hadn’t been disturbed by the commotion. Beyond a cabin, she spotted the telltale feathers of her hunting companion, Hurk.

  Strange… He never ventured that close to the village.

/>   Within a handful of moments, all ten guardians were gathered around Kelso at the edge of the dark forest and away from prying eyes and ears, the only light emanating from the burning torch Grinda held.

  “Is it true?” Cernik asked, her harsh features made even more acute by the glow of the fire. “Are there dragons?”

  “It’s true,” Kelso replied in hushed tones.

  “But how do you know?” Jaya blurted, immediately regretting it as she felt the chastising eyes of her fellow guardians. Kelso didn’t lie—her word was solid—yet she questioned her.

  When she eyed Kelso next, prepared to be reprimanded, there was no animosity there. Only understanding that she’d naturally be curious about the validity of something so outlandish.

  Jaya exhaled a relieved sigh.

  “Long ago when I was younger than all of you, younger than the youth of this tribe, I saw it. A dragon.” Her voice wistful, something Jaya’d never heard from their trainer—ever. Kelso was blunt, always. Sometimes she didn’t think Kelso had dreams or desires at all—only the urge to protect, hunt, be the pillar of ice the rest of them leaned on.

  “What did it look like?” Grinda asked. The circle grew tighter as they listened.

  “I’ll never forget it,” Kelso explained. “Its white body, magnificent wings, and a tail as long and thick as that of a fallen tree.”