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CHAPTERONE
I’m curled on a bed of gold coins, close to slumber, when the next warrior tries to plunder my cave.
This one isn’t as stupid as the last. He tiptoes into the darkness without a torch or lantern. When he draws his sword, blue light glows along the steel. Wonderful. Yet another enchantment, probably an overpriced dragonslaying gimmick he bought from the merchants in town. They’re making a pretty penny, and I can’t begrudge them for it.
The warrior edges through the gloom, his boots scraping the stone. Smoke drifts from my nose, but no more than a snuffed candle. His toes nudge a heap of treasure, knocking down a ruby as big as an egg. It chimes on the gold and rolls across to my claws.
Damn, now I can’t pretend to be sleeping.
Uncoiling to my full height, I snap open my wings and unleash a roar. Too late, I hope he hasn’t pissed himself. The last adventurer soiled his armor, and I couldn’t get the stink out of my cave for a week.
“Dragon!” he shouts. “Your reign of tyranny is at an end.”
“Tyranny?” I force out a scathing laugh. “I have done nothing but fill my belly and protect my gold.”
“You have robbed our kingdom. Slaughtered sheep and men alike.”
“True, you do taste alike.” That’s a lie, since I haven’t eaten a man. Yet.
The warrior grips his sword’s hilt in both fists. “You killed my brother, you scaly bitch!”
“Which one was he? That muscle-bound fool with the shiny ax? Or last month’s coward, who died in a puddle of his own piss?”
His face twists. “You die tonight.”
“Must have been the coward.”
When the warrior charges me, his sword raised, I slither into the shadows. His filthy boots trample my treasure. My heartbeat pounds in my throat, and fear tastes like metal in my mouth.
I don’t know what enchantment imbues his blade. Could be nothing more than a pretty glow. Could be a curse nasty enough to kill a dragon shifter. Even one as powerful as me.
Heat simmers in my chest, building, boiling in my blood. He swings the sword at my neck, aiming to cut off my head. I rear back and take a deep breath. The warrior lunges.
I exhale.
Flames rush from my jaws and billow across the cave. They devour the warrior, cooking him in his armor. The burnt-meat smell turns my stomach. When he sucks in air to scream, the blaze scorches his throat and burns his lungs. He falls, dead, to the floor.
Only dragons can breathe fire.
I can’t leave his charred corpse there, smoldering, in my home. I grip a fistful of chain mail in my claws and drag him out of the cave. Outside, on the cliff, twilight deepens the lake below to sapphire. I push the dragonslayer over, then stare at the fractured reflections of stars.
Will they always send men to kill me? Will I never find peace?
For a time, when I was young and stupid, I thought I could live among them as a human woman without powers, but the dragon conquered me. It always does. I can’t deny who I am.
Monstrous.
My throat aches as I return to my cave. Treasure glimmers dimly in the gloom, my only companion.
“Impressive.”
A man’s voice, gravel-rough, comes from the darkness.
I whip around, searching the shadows. “Who are you?”
I hear nothing. Not even a footfall.
When did he creep into my cave? I can see in the dark, but I can’t see where he’s hiding. I skulk between mountains of gold and gemstones, my tail lashing behind me, betraying my agitation.
