Serpent's Kiss: A Dragonfire Novel (32 page)

He teased her and tormented her, making the pleasure last as long as he could. He wanted her first time to be amazing. Chandra was incoherent in her arousal, flushed and so far from her usual commanding self that Thorolf was entranced.

He chose his moment with care, then pressed his thumb hard against her to launch the explosion. Silver sparks flew in every direction as Chandra cried out in delight. Thorolf watched her climax with pride, his eyes widening in wonder as she once again rotated through a thousand forms. He watched, fascinated by all that his mate was and had been.

The show must be linked to pleasure. She’d done this shifting the first time he’d kissed her, he recalled, that first hot sweet kiss.

Maybe being overwhelmed made it impossible for her to hide this truth. Thorolf didn’t much care. He watched in wonder as she shifted and knew he’d lost his heart completely.

Her hair was dark, fair, chestnut, red and every shade in between. It was long, short, straight, wavy; her eyes were blue, grey, brown and green, her lips were full or thin, her face changed shapes, her breasts were larger or smaller, but it was Chandra each and every time, Chandra in all the glory of what she had been and would be.

Until she took a familiar shape.

Ulrike?

Thorolf blinked as Chandra continued to shift, but then she again assumed the guise of Astrid’s closest friend. She cried out as she came, then fell back, flushed and exhausted, her breath coming quickly.

What was that about?

Whatever it was, the sight was enough to trash the mood.

Thorolf had forgotten all about Ulrike, but now he remembered how she’d always seemed to appear at the most inconvenient times, to nearly catch him and Astrid in intimacy. He’d wondered then how much his beloved’s friend had known about the two of them.

About his true nature.

He hadn’t worried about it too much. But if Chandra was Ulrike, it couldn’t have been unimportant. Something twisted in his gut, an uncertainty he could have lived without. He distrusted this revelation, just as he had instinctively distrusted Ulrike then.

Goddesses didn’t take mortal guise and walk among humans for nothing.

“Now it’s your turn?” Chandra murmured. She braced herself on her elbows to look down at him and smiled, clearly unaware of his reaction. She was the blond Viking again, her hair having worked loose from her braid to flow over her shoulders. Her eyes twinkled with a satisfaction that should have pleased him. It was as if Thorolf had imagined what he’d seen.

But he hadn’t.

Thorolf eased away, letting the firestorm dim so he could think.

She’d tried to have oral sex, which wouldn’t satisfy the firestorm. She’d allowed him to please her the same way, but no one conceived a son like that.

Maybe she hadn’t yet decided to surrender to the firestorm.

Maybe she just wanted to take the edge off.

Maybe she had some other plan.

“Is something wrong?” Chandra reached after him, her fingers landing on his shoulder. The silver heat of the firestorm burned there, a simmering spark that challenged what Thorolf had just seen. Was the firestorm right about his mate or not?

“I’m not sure,” he said, needing to be honest no matter what she’d done. He looked around them and saw the temple where she’d first taken him, the temple filled with skulls.

The ghosts had shown him Chandra’s truth before. Maybe they would again.

There were three skulls hanging from the Valkyrie’s discarded belt, perched on their tangled clothing. Before he could think too much about the wisdom of his choice, Thorolf seized one of them.

“Show me Ulrike!” he said, hoping to command the ghosts.

“No!” Chandra cried in obvious dismay, but the snow had surrounded them again. Lightning cracked across the sky, taking the firestorm to a white heat, then icy rain pounded down. Thorolf gripped the skull tightly, refusing to let go despite the onslaught.

The rain stopped.

He smelled a wood fire burning.

And he heard Astrid’s whisper in his ear. The sound of her voice brought a tear to his eye, one he blinked away before he opened his eyes to look.

* * *

Chandra couldn’t stop the vision. Even knowing that didn’t stop her from trying. It was the worst possible moment for Thorolf to learn what she’d done, and she knew he’d see it as a betrayal.

The irony was that now she’d see it the same way. Then, she’d had no idea how it felt to be mortal and at the whim of gods. She’d given no consideration to the limits of a single short life, to the loss of hopes and dreams. She’d never imagined that Thorolf could have loved this mere mortal woman so deeply.

She knew it now. She regretted her choice. But she feared it was too late to make amends.

When the swirling snow disappeared, they were in the village again, that hideous primitive village. Chandra was Ulrike, a human guise she’d created with care. She’d pretended to have been from a nearby village that had been burned to ash by the dragon shifters they’d ultimately come to call
Slayers
. She’d pretended to be a sole survivor, a widow and a bereaved mother. The villagers had taken her in, feeling compassion for her plight.

In truth, there had been no survivors of the attack, but that meant there had been no one to challenge Ulrike’s story.

Except the dragon shifters who had hunted and destroyed every soul in that village.

In those days, in that valley, the humans knew only of dragons. They didn’t know the truth of the
Pyr
and their shifting abilities, much less that of
Slayers
. They had no real understanding of the battle being waged, the debate as to whether they were themselves treasures of the earth to be defended or a scourge to be removed. They certainly hadn’t guessed that dragons could walk among them, disguised as mortal men.

They knew only that dragons periodically attacked their villages, seized their maidens, devoured their livestock and burned their homes. The dragons came out of the mountains without warning, as majestic and beautiful as they were cruel and bent on destruction. The villagers feared the dragons, reasonably enough, and sought ways to win their favor.

Knowing that Astrid had to be removed, Chandra as Ulrike had suggested a way.

She felt sickened now by what she had done.

The village had always looked the same, at least until its final destruction. The mountains had framed the valley the same way, and the villagers had followed their routines the same way. It could have been any day that they arrived, but Chandra could have named the precise moment. She knew what the ghosts would show Thorolf.

She as Ulrike was in the forest, creeping closer to a hidden lover’s nest. Thorolf and his lover Astrid were nestled in a hollow in the forest that was thick with furs, whispering together after their lovemaking. The trees were in spring leaf, arching high over them, and the sunlight was golden yellow.

Astrid’s father pretended to oblivious to the encounters, but the truth was that he admired Thorolf. He would have welcomed him into his household and his family—because he didn’t know the full truth of Thorolf’s nature. He thought him a warrior and a good one. He had no idea Thorolf was
Pyr
. He had advised his wife to let their daughter conceive a child. He was sure that a man like Thorolf would be responsible.

Chandra as Ulrike had hidden behind a large tree, close enough to eavesdrop on the lovers. She endured the sounds of robust lovemaking and the nonsense of lovers’ whispers, hoping that this would be the day that Astrid took the bait so carefully presented.

“My friend says that you are uncommonly strong,” Astrid whispered and Thorolf chuckled. Ulrike straightened with hope.

“I thought you liked that,” he whispered, cupping her breast in his hand and kissing her nipple. Chandra recalled all too well how good that felt. She couldn’t see his eyes from this angle, but she guessed that they were vividly blue and filled with humor.

“I do,” Astrid sighs. “But she wonders if you are more than a man.”

Thorolf stilled. “What is this?”

“She says they had a story in their village. The seer insisted that there was a man in this valley who was dragon, as well. He said the man could change his form, and choose to be either dragon or man.”

Thorolf, Chandra saw, was motionless, his attention fixed upon his lover. Little did he realize how that very stillness and focus revealed the truth of his nature.

Astrid smiled up at him. “Their seer said that this man is the only one who can stop the dragons from destroying villages. She said that if you were that man, we would be so lucky.”

“And you hoped I might be.”

“I love you, just the way you are.” Astrid kissed him sweetly. “But you are stronger than most and taller than most, and it wouldn’t surprise me if you were that man.”

“It wouldn’t frighten you?”

“I love you. I know you would never hurt me, no matter what you can do.”

Thorolf studied her for a long moment and Ulrike held her breath in the shadows. When she saw the pale blue shimmer of light, Ulrike smiled, knowing that he would step into the trap she had set.

But Chandra’s gut churned with guilt.

“Let me show you something,” Thorolf whispered. He kissed Astrid’s eyelids one after the other, even as her fingers lifted toward the blue light. “Close your eyes until I bid you open them, and then you will see all of my truth.”

“Oh, Thorolf,” Astrid whispered, her delight clear.

Thorolf stepped from the bed, his nude body magnificent. The blue shimmer grew brighter as he threw his head back, then he shifted shape in a brilliant glow of light. A large and muscular dragon took his place, a dragon with scales of moonstone and silver. He gleamed in the sunlight, his scales like a coat of polished mail, or one made of moonlight, and Chandra blinked at how much he had changed. “Look,” he whispered to his lover.

“I knew it!” Astrid cried and leapt upon him, planting a thousand kisses on his chest. “I knew that if there were such a man, he would be you.” Thorolf lifted her in his claws, his touch protective and careful, even as Ulrike leaned back against the tree to keep herself hidden. She felt his attention sharpen. She heard him inhale, and feared she would be discovered.

The village wasn’t far.

She decided to risk it.

She broke and ran, darting toward the meadow that could be seen from the village. She heard Thorolf roar and Astrid beg him to let whoever it was flee. She raced through the forest, holding her hood over her head and ducking low. To her delight, there were boys in the meadow with their goats. She ran into the sunlight, knowing she looked distraught.

“What is it?”

“What is the matter?”

“Are you well?”

The boys surrounded her immediately, their concern providing her the perfect opportunity to close the trap. She easily feigned horror and dismay. “I saw…I saw…Astrid making love with a dragon!”

And then it was done. The story took on a power of its own with startling speed. The boys told other boys, who told fathers and brothers and mothers and sisters, and by the time Astrid came back to the village, smiling with contentment and pleasure, her fate had been sealed.

She was allied with the dragons.

She would be the human offering made to them, in the hope that she would be enough to sate them.

When she protested, she was over-ruled.

When she fought, she was bound to a rock outside the village.

When she begged for mercy, her father called her a whore before he threw the first stone.

Chandra turned away, just as Ulrike had done, looking up in time to see the first of the marauding dragons appear in the sky overhead. The difference was that this time, she regretted what she had done.

If only she could turn back time and never become Ulrike.

If only she could give Thorolf back the lover who had claimed his heart. She watched him relive the pain of that last parting and felt her own tears fall. She had believed not that long ago that the firestorm was a purely biological act of survival. Against all odds, she’d fallen in love with the passionate and troublesome
Pyr
who was her mate. She wanted him to be happy, no matter what the expense to herself.

She owed him a debt for stealing his true love away.

And she was going to have to find a way to pay that balance.

No matter what it took.

* * *

The snow swirled around them, even as Thorolf’s thoughts churned.

Chandra was the woman who had betrayed Astrid.

She’d done the dirty work of disposing of his “distraction”.

The snow faded away, leaving them facing each other in Myth again. The firestorm’s light burned silver between them, tempting Thorolf’s body to fulfill its promise, but he felt only disgust. He wanted Chandra to deny what she’d done, but saw the look in her eyes and knew she wouldn’t.

It was true.

This firestorm was tearing him apart. It was messing with him now, its heat and light turning his thoughts in a very earthy direction. He was well aware of Chandra’s appeal, that she was his destined mate, that he had an obligation to his kind to seduce her.