Dragon-Ridden Read Online Free Page A

ears burn, but
it didn’t make a difference with the tingling. She sighed and sank deeper so
the water reached her nose and blew bubbles.
    She’d give anything to make the
tingling stop. For eight months she’d had to live with it, it came and went and
then came again. She was sick and tired of having an itch she couldn’t scratch.
    She blew more bubbles and watched
them pop. Her skin began to wrinkle, but she wasn’t ready to get out yet.
    Voices carried in from the changing
room, and Tate grimaced knowing that she’d soon have company. With a grumble at
the interruption, she reached for her soap and began to work the lather into
her skin. It would’ve been nice if she’d been able to keep the bath to herself
for a while longer.
    Tate had climbed out and was drying
off by the time the two ladies gossiping in the next room exited wearing
similar towels.
    Avoiding eye contact, she scooped
up her still wet clothes and slipped by them into the changing room. They eyed
her suspiciously as she passed before sliding into the piping hot pool she’d
left behind.
    “Did you hear about that creature
they found at the docks today?” Tate paused just inside the changing room,
straining her ears to catch the women’s gossip. “My nephew was there, and he
couldn’t believe what they found. He said it looked like something out of the
old texts. You know— the ones with pictures of the monsters the ancients
imprisoned. He said it was as blue as the sky on a summer day and had two extra
arms.”
    “My word.” The other woman sounded
scandalized at her friend’s description. “This is the third one they’ve found
this month. Something is wrong. The Black Order had better do something. It
just disgusts me to think of them just standing by, while we are terrorized by
these creatures. We pay the monthly tithes for protection, but when we need
protecting they’re nowhere around.”
    “Shameless,” the first woman
agreed.
    Tate lost interest in the
conversation as the women began to talk of a celebration that night. She moved
away from the door deep in thought. Perhaps the creature they spoke of was the
‘body’ she’d seen being dragged up in the fishing nets that morning. It had
been blue— maybe even the blue of the sky.
    What was the Black Order, though?
Were they some kind of police force? If so, why did they collect money? With a
mental shrug Tate resolved to ask Danny some of her questions when she met up
with the men later.
    Tate pulled on the change of
clothes she’d brought and tied her wet hair back. The water from her hair
quickly dampened the back of her tunic. After slamming the locker shut, she
left before the women finished their bath.
    She was still pondering what she
had learned half a block later.
     
    Too preoccupied to pay attention to
where she was going, she jerked away when her arm was grabbed from behind.
Without thinking, she twisted, pulling her attacker forward. Her knee was
already flying towards his groin when he let go and stepped back.
    “Ryu,” his name slipped from her as
her eyes narrowed threateningly. The inner presence she had begun to refer to as
‘dragon’ after the tattoo on her arm became more attentive.
    “Such violence,” Ryu said mildly
with a raised eyebrow.
    The presence inside her mind perked
up at the sound of his voice and shook itself gleefully. Tate’s eye twitched at
the feeling. That was what always happened when she was near Ryu. It was one of
the many reasons she avoided him. She already felt crazy enough without some
niggling mind thing struggling to get his attention.
    The quirk of his lips said he’d
known exactly what he was doing when he’d grabbed her. Tate struggled to keep
her temper in check. For some reason he found it funny to catch her off guard.
She didn’t.
    Ryu wasn’t handsome as society
would define it, not being pretty or chiseled, but having rugged features. He
had a confidence and charisma that drew people to him, especially females.