Hello again!
Let me remind you that I write erotic gay romance. If you leave a comment on either of my posts, you have a chance to win either a download of this new release or a paperback of Night Train, my collection of vampire novellas.
After my dragon and knight fantasy Tears Of The Dragon was released, a warm nugget of feeling for their unique little son lodged itself in my mother-of-sons heart. It's taken a while, but Time To Be King has finally blossomed, and we meet him now as a man fully grown.
A dying king, a chivalrous dragon prince who may lose his life and his love forever if he makes the wrong choice…
.EXCERPT
…Relaxed and content after last evening’s time with Brom, Arod let his palfrey Morgeena pick her way at an amble through the meadow. He’d risen at daylight to hunt hares for Flynt, his father’s old squire, and his wife, Tira. Six fat, brown ones hung from his saddle. Now he and his mount were heading for the forest on the edge of the meadow to catch a fat puntel to roast.
Earlier, as he’d approached the castle gate while the sky was growing lighter but the moon was still silver, he’d passed Xidel, the mage. He’d never known a man so odd. His skin was as wrinkled as old boots, and his hair stuck out like small twigs sprouting from his head. His black eyes twirled constantly, and Arod thought it a wonder he could see anything. As usual, scraps of dried food and grease stains spotted his cloak, and dirt covered the feet in his dusty sandals. Despite his appearance, the earl believed his weird predictions.
Arod nodded to acknowledge him. Xidel didn’t greet in him in return. Instead, he muttered under his breath without making eye contact. Arod caught something sounding like “mort”—the sound of a horn blown when a deer was killed— and “blood in the sky.” Unless he meant the sky when it turned the color of raspberries, it made no sense. Xidel seldom did anyway.
Arod rode out the open gates, his horse’s hooves clopping on the drawbridge as he crossed the moat. Being ignored was fine with him because he always felt uneasy around the mage. His mother had avoided him for fear he would detect the true nature hidden beneath her human form, and that’s why Arod avoided him, too. If he knew what Arod was, he’d given no sign of it. Or mayhap could have cared less.
Now, the sun was a yellow blob glowing in a turquoise sky. The strong, sharp smell of rosemary scented the air, and the string of fat brown hares bounced as he rode. Earlier, he’d eaten a few, stripping the fur and skin away with his teeth and eating the meat raw. He’d rinsed the blood from his mouth and face in a stream and slaked his thirst.
Without warning, his extra powers sent tiny lightning strikes through his body. With a tug on the reins, he pulled the mare up, ordering her to a motionless stop. He searched the forest around him and saw two mounted figures in deep shadow ahead of him. One of the figures was a man in full armor.
Was this then how war was to begin? With two mounted scouts in the forest? Alert and tense, Arod eased an arm over his shoulder to pluck an arrow from the quiver hanging down his back. His powerful bow was slung across his saddle horn, ready for use.
::It is time.::
What in Hades was this? It was a woman’s voice, mayhap a witch, but Xidel would have warned him this morning if a witch were in the vicinity. Whatever the warning had been, it was not about a witch. Still, his nerves prickled. He had no idea if his other nature would be vulnerable to witchcraft, and Morgeena was whinnying in fear. Trying to whirl and run, she danced as she fought Arod’s strong hold on her. “Steady, my beauty. Steady.” She stopped, but her flanks still trembled.
A shard of sunlight pierced the forest’s thick green canopy, and for a split second, one of the figures shimmered gold, and Arod knew.
Mother.
Not a witch, then. His muscles relaxed. He smiled. She was messing with him again, for she had spoken only in his mind. This trick of hers amazed him. No one quite knew how she did it. Once, she’d told him of using it to soothe his father’s favorite warhorse when it sensed her true nature hidden by her human form. If Xertan hadn’t accepted her, her relationship with his father would’ve been over.
And Arod would have never been conceived.
The man with Mother was Sir Rodick, his father. He wondered why they’d come and how his mother could have been released from duty to be here. She and a foreign knight guarded the sacred cup of hope in the Crystal Castle many strange lands away. His father kept the man’s back. Someone must have taken her place.
No matter the reason, here they were, and he hadn’t seen them for far too long. He pressed his heels into Morgeena’s flanks and they raced across the meadow, hoofs pounding green grasses and tiny white flowers into the dark soil. By the time he’d reached his parents, they’d dismounted.
Arod slid off his horse and would have thrown his arms about his mother, but a stern look from his father, standing behind her as consort, stopped him.
Halting, he stood very straight and placed a fist over his heart, then he knelt before Arondele, the woman, a name his mother had taken when she’d first ventured to the valley in human form. Truly, he knelt before Gloriana, princess royal of the golden dragons. As for himself, he was the son of a knight and a dragon. Like his grandmother, he’d never felt he needed a different name for each form.
My princess,” he said.
“Rise, Prince Arod.” Because he had greeted her formally, her response came in kind, as befitted an heir to the throne, despite their relationship.
As soon as he stood, his mother enclosed him in a tight hug. He returned the hug, not fooled by her slender body. Beneath it, he felt the steely strength of a powerful golden. His father could only greet him in the manner of an armored knight—sliding an arm under his and bending his elbow. Arod flexed his elbow in turn, and they bumped fists together. There was a certain joy in the familiar rituals and in seeing his parents again.
His father was dressed in full metal armor, not chain maille, and his new gauntlets and breastplate were elegantly etched with golden outlines of his wife in her dragon form.
Only when they’d broken the hold did he notice his mother was dressed as a peasant woman, except that the fabrics were expensive. Her full dirndl skirt swirled around her ankles, revealing her golden sandals. Her white blouse was gathered at wrists and bosom, leaving her throat bare. A gold amulet on a gold chain hung against the warm tones of her skin. He knew his father wore the same amulet, but on a sturdier chain and under his armor. Arod had often seen it there when his father’s chest was bare.
Arod also wore an amulet on a strong chain, but it carried his own image, not his mother’s.
He was surprised to see a circlet of flowers around her head. Ribbons of yellow and scarlet streamed down her back over the soft waves of her golden hair. They were his father’s colors.
The colors on Arod’s shield were scarlet, gold and a touch of purple. The gold instead of yellow made sense, but it had taken him time to figure out the purple. When he’d asked Arondele, she’d blushed and told him to ask his father. The battle-hardened knight had stammered, telling him he would explain when his son was older, but he never had.
It hadn’t taken long living in Ahnerion as a human to learn purple ribbons were an invitation from a woman to a man for intimacy. Later, he’d overheard Flynt’s wife talking and realized his mother must’ve used purple ribbons to restrain his reluctant father while she seduced him. The small hint of the color on his shield and in his royal ring no doubt meant he’d been the result of that seduction. He’d thrown his head back and laughed, then clutched his belly and rolled on the ground.
A low laugh broke from him now.
“What, son?”
He shook his head. “Nothing, Mother.” Thank heaven, she can speak in my mind, but not read it, he thought…
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