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  Blood Dragon

  Dragon Curse of Lunca

  Alexis Davie

  Blood Dragon

  Text Copyright © 2019 by Alexis Davie

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  First printing, 2019

  Publisher

  Secret Woods Books

  [email protected]

  www.SecretWoodsBooks.com

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Other Books You Will Love

  Thank You!

  About the Author

  Prologue

  2981 BC

  Lunca

  Romania

  Smoke rose up against the spiraled stone ceilings of the Lunca Palace and the smell of sulphur was putrid enough to suffocate even the strongest of men. Frantic orders were screamed over the sounds of explosions, shaking the grounds of the palace, but it did not deter the agile female figure from dashing through the hallways. Draped in a luxurious silver velvet hooded cape, her identity remained concealed only to those whom did not know her.

  To those who did, she was Liris Veskovic, the Queen of Lunca.

  Her heart pounded in her chest as she leapt over a large crevice in the floor, and as the floor crumbled behind her at a rapid pace, she knew what she had to do. There was no other way.

  Out of the corner of her teal eyes, an unnatural movement caused her to turn around and her heart sank. Rhaena the Wicked, was closing in on the royal hatchery, and the Queen knew she had to stop her. There was only one reason – or four – why the witch had caused this much destruction to the palace, but the Queen would rather perish herself, than allow that fate.

  The Queen leapt onto the stone ledge and threw herself into the air, her silver cloak glimmering behind her. As soon as her feet touched the ground, she raced after Rhaena.

  The stone wall of the hatchery exploded into fragments of different sizes, flying by the Queen’s face, but she managed to dodge them every time. The determination and resilience coursed through her veins, and gained on Rhaena.

  The Queen stepped into the hatchery, which was eerily quiet and scanned the cave-like room. Flames erupted from a corner and Rhaena appeared, her staff violently flashing bolts of lightning.

  “You will not take them,” the Queen bellowed, her sharp voice edging through the room, through the echoes of chaos and turmoil which besieged the palace.

  “There is nothing you can do to stop me, Liris,” Rhaena shrieked, as she raised her staff, aiming it at the crystal nest in the center of the room.

  The Queen’s eyes flashed viciously as she leapt towards Rhaena, only to be deflected by the witch’s staff. She fell onto the marble floor but immediately rose to her feet.

  “You cannot do this, Rhaena,” the Queen called out to her, but the witch did not acknowledge her.

  A piercing yellow light spewed from the staff, directly at the nest. The Queen ran towards the nest with complete and utter abandonment, ignoring her sensible thoughts. Her instincts had overpowered her rational thinking, and now she would fight to the death if needed.

  The Queen’s eyes flashed once more, and the stone wall behind Rhaena instantly crumbled. Stones fell onto the old witch and the staff broke in half, vanquishing the yellow ray of evil which descended onto the nest.

  It was quiet for a moment as the Queen carefully and slowly approached Rhaena, cowering under a large rock which pinned her to the ground.

  “I tried to warn you, Rhaena,” the Queen uttered, no emotions on her beautiful face, her golden hair whipping in the wind.

  As she stepped closer, she heard Rhaena muttering words she knew too well, having heard them before many times. “Rhaena, no!”

  Red smoke flowed from Rhaena’s fingertip and whirled towards the nest.

  “Stop!” the Queen ordered.

  With her final seconds of life, Rhaena flicked her wrist, and the red smoke suddenly vanished. Her hand went limp, followed by a low rumble under the Queen’s feet.

  Then silence.

  Deafening silence which shook the Queen to the core. She rushed over to the nest, glanced down at the four dragon eggs before her. Blue, red, purple and silver, they were all there, and unharmed.

  Physically at least.

  Footsteps, which were the same pace as her heartbeats, grew louder in the hallway, and Arlo Veskovic, the King of Lunca, and her beloved husband rushed into the hatchery.

  “Are you all right, my dearest?” he asked as he touched her shoulders and his eyes trailed over her body.

  “I am fine, Arlo,” the Queen insisted. “Rhaena on the other hand...”

  The King looked to where the body of the witch lay on the floor, still pinned to the ground by a large boulder. “You killed her.”

  “She was going to harm them,” the Queen said and motioned to the eggs.

  “But they are unharmed,” the King stated.

  The Queen bit her lip and shook her head. “I had to stop her, but I was too late. She…”

  “She what?” the King asked. “What did she do?”

  “She cursed them.”

  The King glanced at the eggs and his lips snarled in anger, his brow furrowing heavily as he glanced back at the Queen. “There is no need to worry, my love. They will be strong and fierce. No curse can compete with that.”

  The King gently wiped a tear from under the Queen’s eye, but a soft crackling sound made both the King and Queen turn to the nest.

  “It has begun,” the Queen gasped and a tender smile formed on her lips. “Our children are ready.”

  1

  Present Day

  Miami, Florida

  Everyone was enjoying the strobe lights and the pulsating music inside the club, and bodies gyrated to the beat of the incessant bass blasting through the speakers. The air was thick with the scents of alcohol and sweat, and it grew too much for any normal person to handle, although no one seemed to care much about it. Maybe their senses were dulled by the steady rate of alcohol being thrown down their throats, or maybe something was in the air which left a bitter taste in the mouth of one person in particular.

  Finley Cooper should have never come out to this club, but upon the insistence of her college roommate, there she was. She scanned the inside of the club, looking for Tara, but failed to do so. The bass thumped against her skull, causing her to cringe heavily. She eventually spotted her roommate, tongue-deep in an alcohol-induced kiss with a guy she had been eyeing the entire night. Finley had seen him around campus a few times, and she and Tara had passed him in the hallways on their way to their classes, but she did not really know anything about him. Even his name eluded her, much like everything else did that night.

  Tara had insisted on ordering a new drink from the menu, something called the Devil’s Finger, and truth be told, it was disgusting. It burned all the way down her throat, which of course, was appropriate. The person who invented that drink was seriously deranged, or a masochist.

  Finley ran her fingers through her long blonde hair and turned away, heading to the exit doors, marked with big, red letters. Witho
ut a moment’s hesitation, she pushed through the heavy doors leading to the street, her head throbbing. The fresh air on that hot and humid summer night hit her right between the eyes and made her world spin momentarily. She gasped, her lungs burning in the process. Had she just escaped from Hell? It sure felt that way. She took a few more deep breaths and stepped away from the doors. Honestly, she didn’t want to go back inside, not that Tara would worry about her. She was too busy making out with the hallway guy.

  Finley heard laughter behind her and whirled around. A couple walked along the street in casual clothes, the guy’s arm around the girl’s shoulders. They looked happy and content, and Finley was green with envy. Her last relationship—although she wasn’t really sure whether it had in fact been a relationship to begin with—had left her feeling empty and cold, while burned at the same time. Her ex, or whatever he was now, hadn’t been completely honest with her, and it’d turned out that he was in a long-distance relationship with a woman who was the mother of his two children. Finley was nothing more than a distraction, another part of his double life, and she had quickly ended it before it had really begun. She did not want to be the other woman, regardless of how hot this guy was. Some things were simply off limits to her.

  Finley knew the kind of heartache attached to something like that, as her own family had gone through something similar. Her mother had had an affair with one of Finley’s father’s best friends, and it had torn their family apart, as well as the friendship which had been built between her father and his best friend from high school. Seventeen years of marriage down the drain. Thirty years of friendship down the drain.

  Because Finley was a minor, she had to live with her father and couldn’t look her mother in the eyes anymore. Her mother had betrayed her, her father, and had ripped their family apart. Finley still remembered the nights she had spent looking out the window, wondering if there was more to life than all this bullshit. She had been old enough to understand what was going on.

  A few months down the line, her mother had reached out again, and Finley found out that she was now married to this guy, which was probably the ultimate insult to injury. Finley was very bitter about the entire thing, but she soon forgave her mother and had even told both her parents that they were now so much happier than they were when they were together. Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing after all. Of course, it did not justify all the shit they had gone through, or her mother’s behavior, but things were better.

  She was still close to her father, but when she was accepted to medical school at the University of Miami, it was an opportunity she just couldn’t pass up. School was tough, and she regretted taking time off from studying to go out with her friend. She really wanted to go back home.

  Now, standing in the alley, still able to hear the music from inside the club, she wished she was in her apartment, writing notes about virology and how different viruses affected the structures of cells in the body.

  The sound of clattering garbage cans behind her made her jump. Thinking it may have been a cat or a stray dog or something looking for its next meal, she shook off the uneasy feeling and headed back to the door. As she reached for the handle, a strong groan emerged from the darkness.

  “Help me…”

  She froze for a moment, her brain torn at the impending situation. Should she ignore the voice? And if she did, would she be able to live with the guilt of not helping someone who was clearly in distress? She might be able to save someone’s life. Most people wouldn’t go into a dark alley to help someone. People weren’t kind anymore. People didn’t care.

  Not all people. Not her.

  As a student and lover of medicine and research, she was naturally inclined to help people. Even when she was a little girl, she would help little animals, and even her friends at school, or kids she met randomly. She had been a kind, compassionate child, and she still was that same person.

  She stepped away from the door and called out, “Hello?”

  “Help me, please,” the voice croaked from the shadows, and Finley followed it carefully. She stepped out of the light and into a darkened corner of the alley. Her eyes adjusted slightly, and she could make out the silhouette of a young man lying on the ground. There was blood on his shirt, and he was clearly in severe pain.

  “Oh, my god. Are you okay? What happened?” Finley asked, trying to stay calm, and crouched down beside him. He was about her age, and he looked very pale and weak. “Should I call an ambulance?”

  “Can you help me?” His voice crackled, and his breathing was strained.

  “Did you someone attack you?” she enquired, looking down at his bloodstained shirt. He coughed, his chest wheezing, and Finley started to panic a little. “What do you need?” she asked again. “I’ll call an ambulance.” She briefly searched for the source of the blood, but she couldn’t find any. “Where are you hurt? Can you tell me?”

  He motioned for her to come a little closer, and she did, although very reluctantly.

  “If you could just show me—”

  Her sentence was cut short by his hands grabbing her shoulders and throwing her onto the ground. He crouched down on top of her, his knee pressed down against her chest, holding her in place. She tried to scream, but his hand was over her mouth within an instant, and her screams for help were merely muffled cries. The guy’s eyes flashed a deep red hue, which alarmed Finley, her own eyes widened. He yanked her head to the side, and before she could struggle, she felt his teeth sink into the soft skin of her neck. She gasped against the palm of his hand, struggling against his grip, but it was no use. This guy was so much stronger than her, and he had his teeth sunken into her flesh.

  The dark alley began to spin, and the dark colors swirled in front of her eyes. Everything seemed to move in slow motion. The guy sat upright, blood running down his chin, his fangs glimmering in the dark and his eyes glowing like those little lights Tara had on her wall. He smirked at Finley, licking his lips, but she was too weak to respond. She watched in horror as he brought his wrist up to his mouth and bit into it. Blood streamed from his wrist, and he held it out to her. Some of it dripped on her shirt, and she turned her head away. He grabbed her hair, close to her scalp, and forced her lips against his bloodied wrist.

  “Drink up,” his voice chimed.

  A droplet of blood dripped into her mouth, and all kinds of sensations exploded inside her. It increased with every passing moment. Finley felt everything. The concrete against her back, the softness of the fabric against her body, the iron taste of the blood in her mouth. Her blood began to heat up, setting her ablaze from the inside, but she couldn’t move. She couldn’t stop it. She cringed and held her hand out at the guy in front of her, but he offered her no assistance. He simply stared down at her with an emotionless expression.

  “You’ll do nicely,” his sinister tone echoed through her mind.

  The alley began to spin once more, and pain burst inside her, forcing her to lose consciousness.

  Finley was awoken by desperate cries being dragged through her unconscious mind, and she wasn’t sure if those sounds were real. She didn’t even know if what had happened in the alley had been real. Had it all been a terrible nightmare? Would she wake up in her bed, safe and unharmed?

  She opened her tired eyes and realized that would not be a possibility at all. She pushed herself into an upright position and felt the grips of terror seize every cell in her body. She was inside a metal cell hardly big enough for one person, but then again, cells weren’t luxury accommodations.

  A narrow bed rested against the concrete wall behind her, and the other three walls were bars, like a prison, just a lot less clean and much darker, with a strange stench that lingered in the air, and the faint sound of water dripping somewhere.

  A dungeon.

  Finley crawled to the front of the cell and placed her hands on the bars, her breathing ragged. A snarl came from beside her, in the next cell, and she turned her head towards it. A young blonde woman, maybe in
her early twenties, similar to Finley, glared at her, her red and ominous eyes glowing in the darkness. Finley was frozen with fear as the woman dragged her nails along the vertical bars, a spine-curling sound echoing through the dungeon. When the young woman hissed at her, Finley caught sight of the long and sharp fangs protruding awkwardly out of her mouth.

  Finley’s blood froze in her veins, and she turned her head to the other side, but she was met by the same sight. There was a young brunette woman crouched in the corner, her fangs gleaming in the dimly lit cell.

  It suddenly dawned on Finley, although not a single part of her wanted to believe it. It was impossible, but the truth was staring her straight in the eyes. They were vampires.

  Her brain attempted its hardest to deny what her eyes witnessed. Vampires didn’t exist, and this had to be some kind of mistake. Scientifically and biologically, vampires were not real. They drank blood, they were technically dead, and they had fangs like an animal. It just wasn’t possible, yet Finley sat in a cell, with two malicious vampires wanting to rip her limb from limb. Unless…

  Was she still human?

  Finley’s gasped as she remembered what had happened in the alley. She could barely see anything. Why were they snarling and growling at her, then? She carefully reached up to her mouth and ran her finger across the occlusion of her teeth. She didn’t have fangs.

  She really wasn’t a vampire, or at least, not yet. As long as she was human, there was no possible way that she would get out of here alive.

  Finley closed her eyes for a moment, but they opened abruptly when she heard two male voices in the distance. Grabbing the metal bars, she pressed her face against them, trying to see any movement. Their voices grew louder until she saw them. One of them held a flashlight, which gave off a strange color of light. The other carried a large bag. They were both burly men with short dark hair and spoke with an accent Finley didn’t recognize.