Then, with a sinuous undulation of his serpentine body, the dragon lowered himself until he was crouched mere inches from where I stood. An unmistakable invitation, one that raised a breathless surge of pure yearning and childlike wonder within me.
I drifted closer until I could reach out and caress the elegant ridges lining the leading edge of one wing. The ethereal appendage fairly thrummed with primal power beneath my exploratory touch, each iridescent membrane blazing with an otherworldly incandescence that made my eyes ache with sublime wonderment.
When I glanced back at Keldor, I found his slit-pupiled gaze trained on me with an intensity that should have scorched me from the inside out. Yet all I felt was a profound sense of belonging and certainty flood through my being.
With a breathless inhalation, I gathered my courage and clambered up onto Keldor's back, straddling the powerful ridge between his wings. I leaned forward and wound my arms around the sinewy contours of his neck, reveling in the scorching heat that seemed to radiate from his very core in pulsing waves.
Keldor turned his head slightly, angling that piercing amber gaze back toward me in silent query. As if ensuring I was properly anchored before we embarked on our journey.
I offered him a tremulous smile, my entire being suffused with a bone-deep thrill of pure, unrestrained exhilaration and rapturous wonderment. "I'm ready, my dragon," I whispered in a breathy rasp laced with naked yearning. "Fly with me."
Keldor's only response was a low, rumbling purr of clear satisfaction that resonated straight into my core. Then, with a flex of those sinewy haunches, he launched us skyward in an explosive burst of preternatural strength and majesty.
I gasped aloud as the ground fell away beneath us in a dizzying rush, the wind whipping through my hair as we climbed higher and higher into the heavens themselves. Instinctively, I tightened my grip around Keldor's neck, clinging to him with the desperation of a lifeline as the ground shrank into insignificance.
When at last the dragon leveled off his trajectory, we soared in a graceful, undulating glide high above the landscape. I could only gape in breathless awe, struggling to fully absorb the vistas sprawling out to the endless horizon in every direction.
A tremulous laugh of pure, unbridled euphoria escaped my lips as the full magnitude of the moment crashed over me in a breathtaking rush.
From such dizzying heights, it was easy to forget the harsh, unforgiving origins of Reazus Prime far below. Up here, adrift among the clouds and endless azure, the planet itself was a breathtaking vista of rugged, unspoiled beauty sprawling to the curved horizon in every direction. Utterly sublime in its primal, untamed splendor.
Chapter 12
Keldor
The thrillof soaring high above the landscape of Reazus Prime with my mate on my back was a rapture unlike any I had experienced, even in my long centuries on this wretched planet. Her soft gasps of wonderment, the melodious laughter that seemed to reverberate straight into me - it was the sweetest of ambrosia, igniting an inferno of pure adoration within the primal depths of my being. This was as it was always meant to be - two souls spun from the universe's first fiery dawn, fated to intertwine for all eternity in a searing tapestry of cosmic union.
All too soon, however, the celestial freedom of our aerial odyssey had to conclude. With a subtle adjustment of my wings, I angled us into a gentle descent, my haunches coiling as we alighted amid the lush flora once more. Ella sagged against me with a breathless giggle of pure euphoria, her fingers trailing along the elegant ridges of my throat in a path of hushed reverence.
"That was... amazing," she said in an awed murmur, those quicksilver eyes shimmering as she gazed up at me in open wonderment. "Thank you, Keldor."
I rumbled in clear satisfaction, nuzzling the crown of her head in an intimate caress as I fully appreciated the breathtakingvision that was Ella. An inferno now roared through my veins, scorching and primal in its intensity. I yearned to experience her splendor from an entirely different vantage, one that would allow me to lavish every inch of her prismatic scales with the reverent devotion she deserved as my mate, my anislah in every sense.
Making my choice, I stepped back and unfurled my wings in one slow, sinuous sweep, allowing Ella to dismount from my back. The dragon's time was at an end. Now, it was my turn to fly with my beautiful mate. Once Ella stood on the ground, I stepped back, watching her.
I held her spellbound in my gaze as I allowed the change to come over me. The air itself shimmered and undulated as my metamorphosis took hold, reality itself warping and bending until my humanoid shape stood tall in a violent implosion of power.
Ella's breath caught in her throat as she drank in the full magnitude of my transformation, her fingers drifting up to trace the line of my jaw. I rumbled in clear satisfaction at her exploratory caress, reveling in the rapture of having my mate's undivided attentions.
The moment that lush, feminine form came into full contact with my own, it was like the universe itself exhaled a breathless sigh of pure, rapturous relief. With a low, rumbling purr of pure masculine satisfaction, I launched myself skyward in an explosive burst of strength and power. This time, however, my trajectory angled toward the balcony of my lair rather than the open skies.
Ella clung to me with unrestrained delight, her laughter ringing out in breathless peals of pure euphoria as the wind whipped through those lustrous crimson tresses. All too soon, we were alighting on the ornate balcony adjoining the lavishbedchamber that had become our inner sanctum. I placed Ella on the bed and stepped back, divesting myself of my leathers.
"My mate," I rasped in a voice laced with pure, undisguised hunger and sheer masculine possession. Before Ella could respond, I surged forward and crushed that lush, feminine form against me, kissing each inch of her as I removed her clothing.
With Ella's clothing discarded in a shimmering trail across the bedchamber, I drank in the full, breathtaking splendor of her form with undisguised reverence. My calloused fingertips trailed along the feminine curves now accentuated by that prismatic mosaic of iridescent scales, committing every nuance to memory with fervent devotion. Here, the elegant flare of Ella's hips transitioned into a hypnotic tapestry of burnished crimsons and smoldering violets that seemed to blaze with an ethereal inner incandescence. There, the lush swell of her breasts was adorned with a breathtaking iridescence of silvery luminescence that fairly danced with each shallow intake of breath.
She was spellbinding, a harmonious melding of human allure and draconic majesty. My mate, my Ella - the other half of my soul made exquisite flesh at long last.
"Magnificent," I rasped in a low, smoldering timbre laced with naked hunger and sheer masculine appreciation. "You are the embodiment of perfection, my daring mate. A true vision of radiance that defies all comprehension."
Ella shivered deliciously at the undisguised intensity of my words, her eyes shimmering like molten starfire in the dim illumination. When she spoke, her voice was a breathless, ethereal rasp that resonated straight into my core.
"You are everything to me, Keldor," she murmured ardently, trailing those slender fingers along the sinuous scales adorning my chest and shoulders. "My destiny, my truth, my whole universe spun into one magnificent."
I captured that exploratory hand and pressed a lingering kiss to her palm in a path of searing reverence. Then I held her transfixed in the blazing depths of my gaze, allowing the full weight of my devotion binding us together.
"I love you, Ella," I said in a low, fervent rumble that was more dragon than Dragonian. "You are my everything - the missing half of my soul."
