Read The Dragon's Vamp for Free Online

as they closed with a sigh.
    “I’m sorry, Mari, but I agree with Triton and Rhys. It almost got the both of us. Any blood will do, not just a Vampire’s, but she needs it in order to shift fully.”
    Mari lifted her gaze, meeting Rhys’.
    “It’s not secure here!” Triton bellowed. “Go now, back to Beven Manor. Now, Mari, go!”
    Mari caught one last glimpse of Rhys before she took off running. She glanced to her left and saw him quick-stepping to keep up. She stopped short of the door to his home, waiting for him to appear. Her chest rose with the deep breath she inhaled, letting it out slowly through her nose as Rhys appeared with Triton.
    “Since when can you run like that?” Rhys asked.
    “That was nothing, just a walk in the park,” Mari replied as she stepped into the manor and went to Rhys’ study. When Triton closed the door, leaving just them inside, she knew it was time. “Rhys…”
    “Are you embarrassed that you’re a blood drinker?”
    “What? No! It’s just that when I shift…when I shift, I need a lot of space and most people run in horror.”
    “You’re not a Medusa are you?”
    Mari chuckled. “No, and she’d take offense to that. She’s actually a very nice woman. Just because men turn to stone when she looks at them isn’t her fault. Rhys, I’m— I’m a fire dragon. My father is a full-blooded fire dragon. Alston is his sleeping ground, the entire Eastern United States are his territory.”
    His eyes widened. “That’s crazy, Mari. Full dragons have been extinct for thousands of years, before my birth even.”
    “Not extinct, sleeping. A dragon can sleep for eight to ten thousand years and to them it’s like eight to ten hours of sleep.”
    Rhys shook his head. “If what you’re saying is true, then you are the rarest of Other Kin alive.”
    “I know,” she whispered. “That’s why I haven’t shifted for centuries. I’m not the only one. Every dragon has a child or guardian to help watch over them and their territories while they sleep. We just choose to keep our shifts on the low down.”
    “Just how old are you?”
    Mari smiled. “I feel like I’m robbing the cradle with you. I was born around thirty-five hundred B.C., right here on what you now know as Alston.” His gaze faltered from hers and that spiked her nervousness. “But so help me, Rhys Beven, if you call me an old lady, I’ll kick your ass.”
    Rhys snorted. “Yeah, bring it on, sweetheart.” Quick-stepping to her, he took her in his arms, lowering his mouth to hers passionately.
    Mari moaned, her arms going up around his neck as he lifted her off the floor, groaning when a knock sounded.
    “Hey love birds, the Elder Council want to see us.” Triton grinned.
    “You have the worst timing evvvveerrrrr ,” Mari growled.
     
     

 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 3
     
    “Mari, we’ve come across some rather interesting news,” Druid Elder Morgan Suibhiue stated as Mari and Rhys stepped in. “Rhys, we’re going to ask you to remain on that side of the table for now.”
    “Meaning what?” Rhys stated as he stepped forward. “I am a member of this council.”
    “And from what we hear, Mari’s life mate,” Noela Carme, Elf Elder said softly and with a smile.
    “It’s nothing bad so tame the fangs,” Gavril Beven grinned.
    Mari glanced up to see Rhys’ fangs disappearing back into his mouth. “What’s this about?”
    “You, Mari,” Gwill Roven of the Lyken clan replied as he laid a large leather book on the council table. “The Roven historians found something very interesting in our history.” Flipping to the page he’d marked, he motioned them forward.
    Mari frowned as Triton burst out in laughter. There in front of her was a picture of herself staring back. Obviously one of the original Roven Clan had thought it a good idea to put to paper who had led them to Alston. “Damn Lykens,” she muttered.
    “Hey now,” Evan Roven chuckled.
    “What the—you’re the one