Bride of th Dragon King -Now published through Lulu.com. Sample only!!!

Chapter Nine: Animalistic Desires

Constantine had awoken from his nightmare. He had been reliving the night he watched four armored human men slaughter his own mother. She hid him in the caverns, and told him not to come out of hiding, no matter what. His father was killed by another dragon, before he was even born. Then, when he was just a small hatchling of three, he watched his own mother beheaded by human filth.

For the most part, he hated human males. Though dragon males could be just as bad. His parents had already been mated. He, and his siblings, hadn't even hatched yet. But the other dragon had the urge to mate. Just as there could be evil in the heart's of men, the same could be said for dragons. His father died tryin to protect the eggs.

His mother had gone gathering food, when the other dragon attacked. After it killed his father, it made its way into the rookery. Of the twenty two eggs, that his mother had laid, the rival dragon had eaten all but one. She roared in anger at the sight of her dead mate. Then to her horror, she saw what it had done to her hatchlings.

The other male dragon, was still exhausted form fighting his father. He was no match for an angry mother dragon. Before he had gotten to the last egg, she pounced on him. Then with a great roar, she clamped her teeth on the front of his neck. In one quick move, she ripped out his jugular.

"FILTHY CANNIBAL!", she cried. To her horror she looked around to see what was left of her hatchlings. She was about to give up all hope, when she heard a loud cracking sound. She walked over, to the sound, and saw a tiny claw working it's way out of the only surviving egg.

To her delight, a small male dragon had made it's way out of the cracked shells. She picked up the tiny male hatchling, and licked it clean. As she gently held her son, in her talons, it looked up at her and cooed.

"Don't worry, little one.", she told him, "I would die to protect you." Unfortunately, just a few years later, she did.

This was why Constantine decided to be a herbivore. There was too much unnecessary killing in the world, he was not going to be a part of it. However that didn't mean, that those who wronged him, would get away with it. The human males, that killed his mother, each had a different repugnant human stench. After becoming a full grown dragon, he hunted them. He found them one by one, and ate them. The taste was just as bad as their stench. He was glad that it was an acquired taste.

He never craved human flesh again. Well, not until he saw what Addrick had done to his Elsbeth. But even then, the taste was still bad. It was just the symbolic sweet taste of revenge that he savored. He had learned over the years that most dragons also hated the taste. He had often wondered. How could one species could have lovely smelling females, but repugnant smelling males? Of course a dragon's hunger, for a human female, had nothing to do with eating.

He looked down, and saw his Elsbeth peacefully sleeping in his coiled tail. She had actually preferred it to the bed. It was very relaxing, and she felt warm and safe. That was the irony of it. The coil of the tail was used for hunting. Once a dragon wrapped it's tail around it's prey, the victim would be soothed into sleep.

Since Constantine never really hunted, he never used it. Not until the night he brought Elsbeth home. He knew her capture had been traumatic for her. Coiling her up in his tail, helped her sleep trough that night. After falling in love with her, he felt guilt for just snatching her from her home. But it was the first time he had the uncontrollable urge to take a mate.

His lust for her trumped any morality. Although, he did save her from a monster, he probably even saved her life. Though he wondered about the queen. She to was a mother, and probably mourned the supposed death of her daughter. He knew someday, he was going to have to make this right.