Page 5 of Captured By the Dragon Warlord (Fated Mates of the Sarkarnii Warlords #2)

T he female has urinated, the scent of it thick in the air. It is like a scent from the ancestors. Everything about her smells incredible. I huff out as much smoke as I can before I suck her down deep into my lungs.

“Lights,” I growl.

The lights within the aquium and my quarters lower and my headache eases. It’s always worse in the nova-hours after my time in the mines in full Sarkarnii shift. I stomp past the female and undo my pants, pull my cock from its pouch, and piss.

The female squeaks with alarm and shoots out of the door.

I admit, my cock is large, even in its sleeping state, although I did not expect her to be frightened of it. Sarkarnii females always want to inspect the goods closely before any mating takes place. They have certain standards they hold a male to.

I find it hard to believe the little female could find my cock too small or not fit for its purpose.

But then, I have not met a hoo-man before.

I fill my aquium with several growls and plenty of smoke as I consider sluicing the dirt off my scales.

They itch, and the water looks inviting, but the Paralnyi has left food for my female, and I am required to feed her as she has not yet eaten, as is the way of my clan.

I am determined to do things right with this female. To ensure she doesn’t envenomate me.

Maybe, somehow, she will give me relief from the headaches, from all the noise. Even from the desperate need to shift to stay sane.

I hear the Paralnyi’s thoughts. As usual, they are a grumble about the amount of work the Sarkarnii make, but something else too. She is concerned for my female.

She is concerned the female doesn’t understand how dangerous I am.

And she is not wrong.

The door to my aquium slides open, and I catch the female with her hand halfway to her mouth. She has a slice of meat folded into a small, sweet kifyli.

“Stop,” I snarl.

But she does not. Instead the female stares directly at me and bites down on the strange concoction, her blunt little teeth slicing into the food in a way which makes my cock tingle and my hips twitch.

I don’t want to imagine how painful her bite will be without fangs, but at the same time, I am already thinking about it.

Wanting it.

Providing it is a claim, not a rebuke.

She chews the food. Glaring at me. Her mind a complete blank.

“Did you not hear me?”

“I heard your growl just fine,” she says, taking another bite.

“And yet you do not stop,” I rasp.

She swallows. I watch the bobbing of her throat, and my pants tighten further around my crotch.

“No,” she says. “I figured if you’re going to abduct me, I don’t need to do anything you say.”

“You belong to me. Darax should not have kept all the females to himself,” I fire out, full of smoke and embers.

She snorts, picking up another kifyli and another slice of meat.

“I think you’ll find Darax was only interested in one female, and we decided to stay on his ship for convenience.”

“You would only protect him if you wished to stay with him,” I retort.

“I can tell you now, I’d rather be on his ship than here, with you,” she snarls at me, a flame in her anger which has my cock poking from my pouch.

“You don’t have a choice.”

“I thought so.” She takes a bite of the new meat and kifyli combination. “Then don’t expect my co-operation.”

It takes nothing to pin her up against the wall. Her scent is intoxicating, surrounding me, making my head spin briefly. I pluck the remains of her strange parcel from her fingers and stuff it in my mouth.

Food stopped being of much interest to me since we ended up on Vorostor, but the flavor which bursts over my tongue is absolutely not what I was expecting. For a few nova-seconds, all I can do is savor it, chewing slowly and never wanting it to end.

“Good.” I swallow the food down. “I don’t want a compliant female.”

“You’re not going to get a female at all, not with that attitude. Darax agreed with the other warlords. We were going to visit each ship…”

She shoves at me with her hands. Her touch feels like fire on my scales. I capture her wrists and pin them above her head, my tail curling around one ankle and jerking her legs apart.

She pants rage in my face, breath hot, sweet, no smoke. Her eyes are wide and filled with hate.

“I don’t wait for anything, let alone for one warlord to parade my female around all the others,” I snarl.

“Let’s get one thing straight right now, Dexx.” She spits my name, and I’m pretty sure if she says it again, my cock will burst from my pants. “I don’t belong to you. I am not yours and you don’t get to hold me.”

I look the tiny spark of a female up and down. I have one hand around her wrists, one around her neck, and my tail around her ankle. She is bound by me and to me.

But she denies it.

And her mind is still a blank. I get no thoughts at all. All I have is the rage which rolls off her like water from scales. Her glare which tells me she will kill me in my sleep.

Something I will enjoy very much in resisting.