Fire Dragon's Baby (Dragon Shifter Scifi Alien Romance) (Elemental Dragons Book 1) (2 page)

“As it is with all things,” the others repeated.

“I suggest we each return home and prepare our seed to be sent to our females. We will wait for our samples to arrive before we enter the mating lottery. It will help shorten the mating impulse,” Elait said.

“Agreed,” Shay said. “We will enter the lottery when our samples arrive.”

With that decided, the princes rose from the stone table, and walked through the exit that represented his own land. Salvatt walked through the obsidian door, facing the south and his world of fire.

He strode across the landing platform, looking out into the windswept distance. The borderlands, where all elements touch, glistened in the light of the twin moons. Salvatt’s black eyes flashed as he opened the exit ramp of his speeder with the holocom on his wrist.

He took the pilot's seat and flicked his fingers over the holographic screen. It took to the sky and headed south from the borderlands, across the tropical forests that covered most of his domain. He sped closer to the center of his realm, where the great volcano rose from the molten core of Galaton. Its constant lava flow spread out in the lava beds that surrounded the volcano.

When the Obsidian Fortress, his home, came into view, Salvatt angled his speeder onto the landing pad and landed with ease. As he descended the exit ramp, he was greeted by the crimson skinned Admiral Ikoro, his second in command.

“How was your meeting?” he asked, falling into step with Salvatt as they walked towards the glittering double doors to the fortress.

Both men wore the heavy armor of a Galatonian warrior. Their breast plates were emblazoned with a red dragon against a yellow sun that was the brand of the south. Salvatt considered his answer as they crossed the threshold and veered into the nearest private sitting room; a room filled with shining battle trophies and huge glass windows facing the pluming volcano in the distance.

“We have come to an agreement with the Mating Council,” he said, his faraway look betraying his anticipation. “I must prepare for my bride.”

2

C
eleste Dawes looked down at the holographic communication device on her wrist and sighed when it still came up with nothing. She still hadn't been mated with a Draconian. She’d dreamed of being with one of the sexy has hell, seven-foot-tall, saviors of the galaxy as long as she could remember.

She’d first been allowed to enter the ‘mating lottery’, as they called it, at her high school graduation. She had been ready and willing to settle down with a handsome alien husband and start a family. But seven years later, still no luck. One of these days she would be forced to settle for a boring run-of-the-mill human husband!

They had learned all about it back in school. Because of a genetic predisposition towards male offspring, Draconians slowly bred females out of their population. The dragon shifters needed to breed with another species’ females every five thousand years or so to save their race from extinction. It was thirty years ago that the aliens had first come to Earth to mate with human women. Celeste had always wanted to be chosen. She loved to imagine the thrill that came with having a Draconian man on her arm.

She skimmed her finger across her wrist, closing her holocom, and continued across the skywalk to her biotech lab. A clear panel entrance swished open as she walked toward it, and she continued through the door. Inside, the windows of the lab looked out into the surrounding forest and city, a landscape that would have been unheard of thirty years ago. Flying vehicles passed outside as they moved along the skyways.

Like most people her age, she'd completed both primary and secondary school. She'd graduated college and moved into the workforce. Celeste was well-suited for her job at the government biotech lab. It was interesting, utilized her degree in bioengineering and she felt she was helping the world with her work.

But Celeste longed for more.

She pressed her thumb to the ID pad and entered her laboratory. Her work station was already set for her. She'd been tasked with cataloging samples from distant galaxies for use in the newly-integrated human and Draconian sciences. In the last thirty years, laboratories like this one had cured cancer and cleaned Earth's ecology. A senior work colleague of hers had recently made a serious breakthrough concerning the common cold.

Celeste began working through her research, analyzing each sample. Every so often, as habit, she checked her wrist holocom for news from the mating lottery. Still nothing. She'd been in the lottery for seven years now, but lately she'd become practically obsessed with checking her mating app. Not that it made any difference.

As exciting as all this scientific progress at the lab really was, Celeste wasn't fulfilled by it. She'd dreamed of her mate and secretly fantasized about the Draconian mating ritual when she was alone at night. Most of the girls who entered the lottery found their mates the same day. Not seven years later.

She knew several girls who'd been matched with Draconians back on their home world of Draconia. Human women had been traveling to Draconia for twenty years. The wormhole between their world allowed for quick passage between the two galaxies. The two species had become strong partners both on Earth and in the old world.

An entire generation of Draconians had been born on Earth and many were already adults; in fact, Celeste had gone to school with both male and female Draconians. The two races had become intertwined.

But Celeste hadn't found a mate on Earth or on Draconia. She’d had a chance with a few human men, but she hadn’t found the right one. At the ripe old age of twenty-five, Celeste was afraid she'd end up dying alone.

She continued to work through her stack of samples, noticing there were a few rock samples from a planet called Galaton. She'd never heard of the planet before so she opened her lab desk holocom to research it further.

“Galaton: an ancient colony of the Draconian Empire established five million years before the common era. While the Draconians of Galaton are genetically identical to those of Draconia, they do not share a culture or government. Galaton is an independent planet ruled by a monarchy based on inheritance and combat for power. Currently, Galaton is ruled equally by four princes, representing the elements: fire, water, earth, and air. Each section of the planet has been terraformed to conform to the element of its ruling prince. Galaton was inducted into the mating lottery March 25, 2046.” Just last week!

Celeste sat back in her chair, reading the information over several times. What a strange world. Galaton culture predated everything Celeste knew about Draconians, by millions of years, and they were very different from the dragon shifters she knew. They sounded more barbaric and brutal than those on Draconia.

She wondered what it would be like to be mated to one of them. These princes had to fight for their power. A cold shiver went up her spine just thinking about it. She'd hate to be mated with one of those men. She wanted a sweet, safe Earth Draconian. The guys who liked to play basketball and hang out at the flying range on the weekends. She also wouldn't mind traveling to the pristine world of Draconia, where human females were treated like queens. She couldn't even imagine being mated with a barbarian or visiting that dangerous-sounding planet.

At the end of her work day, she pressed her thumb to the ID sensor on the way out. She strode across the skyway to board the hover bus that would take her home. As she rode along the skyway, she looked down at the silvery-gray buildings and roads and thought about her world.

It was incredible to think that even with the sizeable population of New Detroit, everyone had an education, a job, a home, and food to eat. Each person was given work that suited them for twenty-five hours a week. The rest of the time, humans enjoyed swimming in floating pools, hover skating, watching holo-movies, and reading the new internet. Life was good.

She got off the bus and walked into her high rise building to take the elevator to the two hundredth floor. As she entered her apartment, she looked around at the rounded corners and pristine white walls, and felt bad for feeling sad. Even if she never ended up mating with a Draconian, she had everything she needed.

But it didn’t feel like enough.

She wanted a child to love. After her parents had been killed in the Mulgor invasion twenty-five years ago, she'd grown up in an orphanage in New Detroit, longing for someone to love. Even when she'd turned eighteen and transitioned into college housing, she had still felt something important was missing from her life.

The orphanage had been good to her. There were loving teachers and caregivers, but it was hard to shake the feeling that she didn't belong to anyone. If she had a family of her own, she would belong to someone then. Her children would love and need her as only children could. She longed for children with her whole being. The yearning was so intense she’d considered finding a donor or a one-night stand. But even in the new world, raising a child alone was not what she wanted. She wanted love; a family.

She longed for a mate who would sweep her off her feet and show her the universe through his eyes. She dreamed of the day they would meet and suddenly realize that they were meant for each other. Their hearts would overflow with love, and she would finally belong. His caring and tenderness would erase the past, and she would be reborn as someone who was capable of being loved.

Kicking off her comfortable but fashionable shoes as she walked across her shaggy carpet, Celeste made her way to her kitchen to pour herself a drink. She undid the top button of her jumpsuit and took a sip of raspberry gin. Drink in hand, she walked across the fluffy rug and gazed out the bank of windows across her wall, taking in the view. With a sigh, she pulled her long tresses out of her work bun. The thick auburn locks waved down her shoulders and curled around her curves.

The world continued on outside her apartment. People finding love. Achieving their dreams. Living the good life.

“TV on,” she said to her home holocom system.

The screen appeared against a wall of her apartment. A Draconian basketball game was playing. It had become a popular sport in the post Mulgor era. She let out a long breath and strode across the room to sit on her couch. Almost all the DNBA players had found mates. There was even a popular reality TV show starring one of the players and his mate. The whole world got to watch as they went through the mating ritual. The naughty bits stayed behind closed doors, of course.

Celeste tapped the holocom bracelet on her wrist to check her mating lottery app. Still nothing. She really needed to stop thinking about it. Maybe she should ask for a promotion at work. It was getting to be about time for her to move up in her career. It would mean greater responsibility, like being able to head projects to discover more about genetic abnormalities in babies, and greater compensation.

Celeste took another long sip of the strong, sweet pink drink, and curled her feet up under her on the couch. She liked her job, and she wouldn't mind moving up. She just felt lost. Surely there was someone out there for her. He just hadn't found her yet. With every day of waiting she lost a little more hope. She put down her glass and leaned her head against her hand, watching the DNBA players fly around their Draconian basketball arena. Slowly her eyes began to close.

Her wrist holocom chirped with a message. She slid her finger across flesh to bring up a message. Her heart lurched.

You've been mated!

A torrent of excitement and terror spiraled up inside her, and she felt flushed and numb at the same time. She flicked her finger across the three dimensional hologram to read the details. The first thing she saw was his face. She gasped and dropped her arm. He didn't look like any Draconian she'd ever seen. His eyes shone pure black like two jet stones. His skin was rugged and tinted red. Celeste had grown up seeing the seven-foot-tall, devastatingly handsome, broad-shouldered Draconian soldiers and generals on the holocom. They were all clean cut, organized and dreamy as hell. The expression on this man's face was harder and darker than anything she'd ever seen on even battle-hardened Draconian soldiers in the ongoing confrontation against the Mulgor.

He had a sharp handsomeness that reminded her of the Draconians she knew. But there seemed to be a kind of raw power inside this man that jumped out of the holocom and grabbed her at her core. She bit her lip, looking at him again. She scrolled down, reading on.

His name was Salvatt Dorr, the Fire Prince of Galaton. Galaton? That far-flung planet with those barbarians who killed each other for positions of power? This couldn't be happening. All she wanted was a mate and a family. She didn't want to be transported to the other side of the universe to live with this terrifying dragon. She'd always imagined living the good life with a DNBA player like that girl on TV. Staying here on Earth or visiting the exotic Draconia. She'd never dreamed of anything like this.

She stood from her seat, walking to the window. Anxiety coursed through her veins. Her heart raced. Was she having a panic attack? Celeste leaned against the window wall and looked out at the city beyond. She'd wanted a change. Didn't she? She'd wanted a family, but maybe she'd also wanted something more.

The glitz and glamor of the DNBA wasn't as exciting as traveling through space. She would see the Draconian system. She would travel to Galaton to mate with a prince. Her life had to be safe. The Draconian Mating Council would ensure it. Right?

Her holocom chirped with a new message.

Report to your nearest Draconian consulate tomorrow morning.

3

C
eleste contacted work and let them know she'd be going to the Draconian consulate to meet her mate. She wore her prettiest dress with the sparkling emerald green fabric that shimmered around her curves and complemented her red hair. She chose sexy shoes and glossed her lips with deep red. Celeste wanted her mate to see her at her best, even if he was some kind of barbarian warrior prince.