Dragon Archer

By Lisa Blackwood

When a fierce huntress adept with a longbow meets a fire-breathing dragon, enough sparks fly to start an inferno.

Warrior-Priestess Rhavana of High Rock owes her freedom to Seira of Blackstone and Crown Prince Toryn of the centaurs, so when duty requires them to journey into the homeland of the dragons in order to discover how deep the soul-mage conspiracy runs, Rhavana joins them.

Trouble meets them at the border in the form of a big red dragon calling himself Kolaith.

He demands one of the warrior-priestesses stay behind and aid him in tracking and reclaiming his sister's soul from the soul-mages. Otherwise, he'll chase them all out of dragon territory before they can carry out their mission.

Rhavana suggests a centaur for their superb tracking skills, but Kolaith won't be swayed. He wants a warrior-priestess.
Sensing how stubborn the dragon is and knowing they don't have time to do a lengthy political dance with a dragon, Rhavana volunteers to stay behind and help track the soul-mages even though she knows the dragon is omitting something.
It isn't until the rest of the party moves deeper into dragon territory, leaving Rhavana with the dragon, that she discovers what else Kolaith didn't say.

It's not just his sister's soul he wants to save—it's her clutch of soon-to-hatch eggs.

The big red dragon is determined to reclaim the eggs and raise them himself. But the dragonets will need a mother's magic and love, and Kolaith has decided Rhavana will make a perfect mate for him and mother to the little ones.

Rhavana likes her newly restored freedom too much to simply capitulate and become a mate or a mother at the snap of some big scaly lizard's fingers. That he shifts into one of the comeliest men she's ever seen won't influence her resolve at all.

Not at all.

And once they've hunted down and destroyed the soul-mages, rescued the clutch of eggs, and freed the soul of Kolaith's sister, Rhavana plans to return to her own land.

But unbeknownst to Rhavana, Kolaith is in love, and a dragon in love is a very dangerous thing.
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lisa Blackwood
• Release date: Oct 22, 2021
• ISBN: 9781777600723

Book preview

Chapter 1

Kolaith

---

The winds blew in strong from the ocean, each gust attempting to push him off course. A storm was coming. Sheets of torrential rain already sliced down from the dark skies out over the turbulent water.

The wind buffeted him a second time in as many heartbeats.

Tiny adjustments of his wings and tail corrected his flight and kept Kolaith on his trajectory along the coast. Winter was coming, and the warm thermals of summer would soon be a distant memory.

Not that the cold truly bothered a dragon.

His fires would keep him warm even in the coldest and harshest of winter storms. Alas, the cold air and vicious crosscurrents meant he had to work harder to stay in the air.

He grunted with mild humor.

It was probably for the best. With so few dragons left after the plague loosed by the soul-mages had decimated the population of his people, prey was abundant and hunting easy.

Without winter’s harsher workouts, he’d likely get fat.

And a plump border guard might not be in top condition should the soul-mages ever return.

The stories of the past were known to him, especially those of that great battle over two and a half centuries ago when the five kingdoms had come together to defeat the soul-mages. While the island home of the mages had been destroyed, the dragons and their allies had not been able to capture or kill the soul-mage king.

Other mages had likely escaped the destruction of their kingdom and scattered across the ocean.

If the elders were correct—and they usually were about most things—it was only a matter of time before the soul-mages grew in number and became a threat once more.

His thoughts about increasing numbers had his mind turning toward happier thoughts—Sorantha’s first clutch of eggs.

Perhaps he would visit his sister’s nest again after he’d finished his patrol.

He was fascinated by the pearlescent, gem-like eggs and the sparks of life in each one. He’d never met such young, new souls before.

With a disgruntled huff and a puff of steam hissing between his teeth, he admitted he hadn’t met many souls at all, never having left his territory to explore. To do so could open those he had sworn to protect to dangers. While his lands had never come under attack—not many beings were foolish enough to attack a dragon—there was always the possibility of an attack from the sea by soul-mages.

Kolaith would never put Sorantha, her family, or the two-dozen male dragons hibernating in his assigned territory at risk to appease his curiosity.

He especially wouldn’t endanger his sister’s clutch by abandoning his duty just to explore.

Those five new eggs represented the future of his species. With the gods’ blessing and Sorantha’s constant mothering of the eggs to keep them evenly hot at all times, most or all of them would be borne female.

At least that was the hope.

Their species needed as many females as possible.

As it was, there were so few surviving females, most of the older, unmated males were ordered into hibernation by the elders. There they’d stay, dormant and ageless until a female dragon seeking her soul’s mate came to wake the male.

Kolaith and the other males his age or younger were assigned to guard the dragon kingdom. The elders deemed them young enough that they would still be within prime breeding years when the first of the post-plague hatchlings matured and sought out mates.

Which was wise and well planned on the elders’ part, but female dragons didn’t mature until well into their third century. And all the mature females who had survived the plague had already found their soul’s mate long before Kolaith had matured.

Sorantha, one of the oldest of the adolescent female dragons to have survived the plague, had only laid her first clutch this past summer.

Although, she was far from new at raising hatchlings, having finished incubating Kolaith and his brothers after their mother had succumbed to the plague.

His sister was the only mother he knew, and he was happy for Sorantha now that she had her own clutch to raise.

But Kolaith still huffed dejectedly.

As for himself, he would have to wait for one of the other females to clutch, and then wait and hope that most of the eggs hatched female. Then with luck, in another three hundred years, he might be able to find his soul’s mate.

The only benefit in such a long wait was that the added delay should give him lots of time to learn more about the world. He’d then be able to impress his soul’s mate when she eventually sought him out.

Maybe it was a good thing he’d have to wait another two or three hundred years. With his limited social interactions, he’d be lucky to be able to string together an entire sentence the first time an unmated female approached him.

As it was, the only social interactions he got outside of family were the few brief meetings with his fellow border guards stationed at the east and west end of his territory. Both males were younger than him and knew even less about life.

His brothers—the only other dragons he interacted with in any great capacity—had recently been stationed farther away, in the southernmost part of dragon territory.

While he looked forward to seeing his sister’s brood hatch and grow, he was also envious of his brothers. Being stationed in the south meant they would get to watch the comings and goings of the centaurs.

Here in his territory, even when he flew the farthest point inland that was still part of his assigned patrol, the most his sharp eyes ever glimpsed was the occasional silhouette of a migrating centaur family or one of the more elusive huntsmen.

He would have jumped at the chance to speak with one of their scouts. But those males never came closer than the forests at the base of the foothills.

Perhaps he would ask his sister what she knew about the centaurs when he visited her later. Both she and her mate were older than him and remembered the world before the soul-mages destroyed two-thirds of civilization.

She might even know tales from other lands he hadn’t yet studied.

He flew onward, an extra surge of eagerness powering his wings despite the cold rain pounding down upon his scales and the fierce winds trying to drive him into a mountainside.

Below the familiar landscape sped by, the heavy rain making everything hazy even to his sharp eyesight.

He was sailing over a mountain’s summit when a whiff of smoke, heated rock, and a dragon’s elemental fire filled his nostrils.

Kolaith tensed.

Those were the scents of battle.

Chapter 2

Kolaith

---

Snapping to attention, he scanned the landscape below, and then the sky around him. Nothing moved through the air, not so much as a lone bird. Below the forests were still. No animal life was visible.

Even in this pouring rain, that was unnatural.

Everything had gone to ground.

He dipped lower, searching for whatever threat had sent all the wildlife into hiding.

If it were a fellow dragon on the hunt, they would have touched his mind and asked permission to enter his territory. But no one had called out to him.

And no dragon hunted using their fire.

It tended to reduce one’s prey to ash. And ash did not make a good meal.

Who is here? he called along the non-verbal pathways all dragons could use to communicate.

No response echoed back to him.

He hadn’t expected one.

Something was very wrong if a dragon was using his elemental fire in battle. There was always the risk of a dragon setting entire forests on fire.

For a dragon to battle using fire meant there had to be some foe great enough to justify the risk.

Sorantha, where are you? he called along a mental link to his sister. There is evidence of a fight. There may be an intruder near the nest.

He waited a moment more.

Sister, answer me!

Only silence greeted his mental call.

He switched tactics, reaching for his sister’s mate. Ruhorn, can you hear me? Something is wrong. There is danger. Answer me!

Heart pounding in his chest, Kolaith waited for an answer he already knew in his gut wasn’t coming. He crested another peak and swept into the next valley.

This one showed more evidence of battle.

Fires had scorched the slopes, some still smoldering even in the heavy rains. The smoke was being driven inland in a north-easterly direction, which was why he hadn’t smelled it sooner.

The broken and burned trees. The scorched mountain slopes. The smears of ash upon the surrounding trees. It all spoke of a great battle.

But where was the enemy?

He waited three more beats of his mighty heart and then put out a general call to any border guard close enough to hear. Be warned! There has been a battle. An unknown enemy has invaded my territory. My sister and her mate are not responding to my summons…

He didn’t finish that thought, too unwilling to give voice to his fears.

The other border guards responded, their voices flooding into his mind in an excited and chaotic torrent, demanding to know what was going on.

Quiet, he ordered them. I shall tell you more once I know.

He slammed up his mental barriers, needing to concentrate on his surroundings. A distraction could get him killed.

Dead, he’d be no help to his sister or her mate.

He glided over the next ridge. At first his mind refused to acknowledge what his eyes were telling him.

Then his heart began thumping painfully in his chest and breath froze in his lungs. Grief washed over him.

Below, on a patch of barren rock two-thirds of the way up a mountain slope, Ruhorn, the only father he’d known, laid broken and unmoving, one wing trapped under him, the other at an awkward angle, broken by the crash.

Even from the air, Kolaith could see the older male’s chest no longer rose or fell.

Rage and grief battled in Kolaith’s heart and mind, but he forced those emotions aside. He needed to discover what enemy had managed to bring down such a mighty warrior as Ruhorn.

Kolaith dipped lower, sweeping over the site, searching for danger. Over the scents of smoke, ash, and newly drenched burnt wood, another odor coiled, overpowering the rest to clog his senses.

The new smell mixed with the miasma of other odors, but they could not wholly disguise the scent of old blood, rot, and a taint that reminded