6. Varyx
VARYX
N either of us moved. The human in my arms stared at me, her green eyes bright and wide, her red lips slightly parted. She was flustered, frozen, and beautiful, and my heart raced at the touch of her soft, human skin. So delicate, so fragile, and yet she stared back at me without fear.
No. I saw the fear in her emerald eyes, but it didn’t consume her as it did so many others. Instead, it was just one facet of her complicated reaction to my presence, mixed with curiosity and desire and even anger. Far more interesting, especially in a female this compelling.
“I am Varyx Voidbound,” I said, remembering my manners. “And I welcome you to my lair.”
“Lena Morales,” she replied, her name tumbling out in a rush as though she couldn’t wait to tell me. She continued, a little slower. “You’re a dragon? And named after the island?”
Her voice… warm, soft, and as sexy as a voice could be, it coiled around my mind and grabbed my attention. Every word sent a pulse of need through me. It took a moment to process the actual words, and then I laughed.
“The island is named for me, Lena. This entire world is, I’ve been here since its creation.”
She inhaled sharply at that, eyes going wide. Her body pressed against mine, only a thin sheet separating us, and I wanted to tear it out of the way. Both of us did—her heart raced, she bit her lip, her breath caught. We stood in a frozen tableau, a connection crackling between our souls.
Until she put her hand against my chest, pushing me back.
“You can let go now,” she said, breaking a moment which somehow both stretched into eternity and ended too soon. While her words were sharp, they came out in a breathless rush that betrayed her feelings.
I set her down, reluctantly releasing her.
She pulled the sheet she wore tighter around herself and took a quick step back, putting some distance between us.
Glancing down as we separated, her eyes widened, a delightful blush spreading from her cheeks down her neck and across the top of her gorgeous breasts.
“And put on some damned clothes!” That had more bite, though hints of uncertainty remained.
“It doesn’t sound like you’re sure you want that,” I said, enjoying watching her squirm. I waited a beat, letting her glare intensify before continuing. “But very well, if you must enforce a ridiculous nudity taboo, I will respect it.”
Though I wasn’t sure how. I so rarely entertained guests in my humanoid form, leaving me ill-prepared. Frowning, I looked around, trying to remember where I’d left my clothes. If I still had any.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Lena snarled and grabbed a cushion from the scattered pile at her feet, throwing it at me. “Just, just cover yourself, okay? You can find something to wear when you’re not so… exposed.”
I snatched the cushion out of the air and held it before me, trying not to laugh. She’d grabbed at random, and now I hid my cock behind a fluffy purple unicorn’s head with a mane made of bright pink sequins. Lena did a double-take and stifled her laugh with less success than I had.
“Why,” she started, then had to pause and splutter. “Why do you even have that?”
Wordlessly, I gestured to the rest of the bedding she’d thrown to the floor.
Lena tore her eyes from me to look at them properly and spluttered uncontrollable laughter.
She shook so hard that I worried she might fall from the platform and injure herself, but even as I stepped forward to protect her, she fell forward into the soft pile of cushions instead.
I watched, holding my ridiculous covering in place with one hand and massaging my temples with the other, until she finally regained control.
“Sorry, sorry,” she said through the laughter, holding up a blanket lovingly embroidered with a pair of elongated teeth and the words ‘Fangs for the Memories.’ “Just, why? Why do you have this? Or this?”
She flung another cushion, this one bearing a cartoon drawing of a knight holding a dragon’s hand while half-human children raced around them.
Above it, the slogan ‘Sir Morgan was embarrassed to hear he was supposed to slay the dragon, not lay the dragon.’ I caught it out of the air and tossed it back onto my sleeping platform.
“This is my hoard,” I said, as though it explained everything. To another dragon, it would have. To a human without experience of dragons? Unlikely. I sighed, knowing a longer explanation was inevitable.
“Your hoard ? This stuff?” Startled out of her laughter, Lena looked around at the rest of the pile. “I thought dragons hoarded gold, treasure, that kind of thing?”
“Oh, I do that too,” I assured her, sitting down near her. “Gold isn’t very comfortable, though.”
“But… why?” She looked down at the pit of puns and jokes, shaking her head.
“Does it matter? They are keepsakes, gifts, and memories I treasure.”
“Riiight.” She nodded at the unicorn I still held. “What does that fluffy monstrosity remind you of, then?”
“It was a gift from Marisol Tidewater. An expression of her friendship and respect, it reminds me that I’m not alone. Or at least it did. Now, I expect it will remind me of the time an annoying human enforced her foolish nudity taboo on me in my home.”
Lena met my eyes with a glare, an expression that made my heart skip a beat. It was a challenge. Few people were brave or foolish enough to challenge a dragon in his lair.
Meeting an exception was exhilarating, another reason I wanted to keep this human close.
I wrestled down my primal need to claim her immediately, and realized that I had to get her out of my lair.
Around her, I couldn’t keep my composure for long.
My body already burned for her touch, and now I found her able to meet my hungry glare.
Each time she spoke, looked at me, or moved, it got harder to hold myself back.
“The taboo exists for a good reason,” she said.
The flustered expression on her face, her racing heart, and her too-quick breathing told me the truth.
Try as she might to hide it behind her anger, the human felt the same attraction I did.
Like magnets, we were drawn together. “So, these are souvenirs of past conquests? Women you’ve dragged to your lair? A unicorn, a vampire, a…knight?”
I laughed, and her flush deepened, which did not help my concentration. The urge to tear the sheet from her body and see just how far her flush extended burned in me.
“No. Friends give me presents, and I have few enough that I treasure each gift. Marisol gives me a new one each year to commemorate our pact, and some regular guests do the same. Is there something wrong with my collection?”
She frowned, opened her mouth, and closed it again. Her blush deepened, and rather than answer my question, she changed the topic.
“What did you do with my clothes?” She pulled the sheet tighter around herself, as though that would hide her beauty or make her less desirable. Instead, it drew my attention back to her body and made me wonder if the cushion would suffice to hide my reaction.
After a moment of silence, I remembered Lena’s question. Shaking my head to clear it, I answered. “They were soaked through, waterlogged. I hung them up to dry, though I fear the seawater has done some damage. Over here.”
I swear I felt her cheeks heat as I turned to show her the way. Felt her gaze roam down my back, across my wings, and over my ass. Her sharp intake of breath told me she liked the view.
Her belongings waited in a small side-chamber of my lair, where the heat from the volcanic springs would dry them out. On seeing them, Lena rushed forward to grab them off the rock spires I’d hung them from. Then she paused, looking back at me.
“You can go find your own clothes now,” she said. “I promise, I don’t need your help to get dressed.”