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LENGTH: Category Novel/Borderline Mid Novel
SENSUALITY: Spicy

Cover art (c) Kat Richards 2006
ISBN 1-58608-871-8
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Stryder is the demon keeper of a deadly dragon. For centuries his dragon has been protected by an age-old agreement, and he'll do whatever it takes to keep his beloved pet safe. Rayne is a sacrifice, a ritual gift to the dragon when she wrongs the King. Headstrong and determined to change her world, she must endear herself to the dragon and his master before time runs out. Fortunately for Rayne, she's no stranger to playing with fire…

Rating: Contains violence, graphic sexual content, and adult language

HELLCAT

By

Desiree Gelsi

© copyright April 2006, Desiree Gelsi

Cover art by Kat Richards, © copyright April 2006

ISBN 1-58608-871-8

New Concepts Publishing

Lake Park, GA 31636

www.newconceptspublishing.com

This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.

CHAPTER 1

The young woman crouched low in the undergrowth, listening for signs that she wasn’t alone. She was painfully aware of the risk that she was putting herself in by being here, and there was no such thing as being too cautious. Reflexively she gripped the dead wild rabbit tighter in her hands, slowly drawing it to lie flat against the back of her leg and out of plain sight. She waited, patiently biding her time until she was certain that it was safe to venture out from under the protective shadows of the forest that skirted the base of a towering mountain.

This was a planet of danger; all children born under the mountain’s obscurity knew this. It wasn’t just dangerous because of the various inhuman races that lived here, although many of the beings were indeed deadly, but at the top of the mountain laid the real danger of living here, chiefly if you were a young woman.

There was a monster known as the Death Drake, a deadly dragon seldom seen up close. Those that did get a good look at him never survived long enough to tell of it, and they weren’t meant to. But there was one thing that could offer solace here. As long as the King’s held up their part of an agreement to offer the dragon four human sacrifices during the year, the beast would be confined to the mountain where he would be unable to wreak the carnage that he was fully capable of.

There was also a horse, not the deadly threat like the dragon, but he was a legend in his own right. The young woman had never met anyone that had seen the animal, nor had she ever heard of anyone seeing it firsthand, but it was spoken of as if it were a myth born of an ancient tale by now. She had heard the story many times, and the story seemed to grow bigger and more unbelievable with every telling.

Supposedly the creature had wings like Pegasus, with three enormous spiraling horns that it would use to gore potential attackers, and it was black, blacker than the night sky during an eclipse. He could breathe fire from his nostrils, and flames poured from his feet. He was also reputed to be huge, nearly as large as the dragon, but with twice the temper. The stallion was said to be so wild and aggressive that after it succeeded in killing anyone and everyone who tried to tame him, a band of angry hunters forced him to retreat to the top of the mountain, where he had not been seen since.

Of course, there was also the dragon’s rider, the Death Drake’s keeper. Said to have wings just like the dragon and the stallion, but the rider’s face and body were never revealed, always shrouded by a hooded black cloak. The few that had lived to hear him speak could say only that he was a man, and that his eyes were such a garish sapphire that they commanded attention even from under his cover.

The young woman continued on her way, still careful to keep her quarry obscured behind her back as she followed a snaking river. The water was clear and blue in the forest, untouched and pristine from the mountain where it had run off, but the nearer she came to the village the darker it became. The bubbling ripples began to chortle with grime and human waste as they churned their way to the sea, flushing the filth out into a vast expanse of water that none had ever dared to explore.

She finally reached her destination, a small mud hut that lay off to the side of the murky stream. She paused and looked upward at the mountain before going inside. She wondered how anyone could survive up there, alone on the top of the summit. The summer wasn’t so bad, in fact the mountainside was brilliant from the spring thaw on into fall, but when winter came the mountain became an icy peak, covered in snow as the temperature dropped.

There was a point of darker shadow about three fourths of the way up the mountain where the crest jutted outward, becoming so steep that it was impassible … unless you had wings to fly over it, and that was where the dragon rider and his dragon, along with the winged stallion were said to live. The woman shivered in the fading light. She could see only darkness and shadow, lined with trees and brush that climbed the mountainside in an attempt to defy gravity.

“Where have you been, Rayne? I was worried sick!”

The young woman adjusted her eyes to the darkness of the dimly lit hut. She could see her mother limping toward her as she spoke.

She didn’t say a word but held the hare up in response, proudly displaying her prize. Her mother shook her head in consternation.

“I know where you have been, Rayne. You’ve been hunting on the King’s land.”

Rayne looked away, “It’s not the King’s land. It never was.” Her mother flashed a warning glare in her direction, and Rayne set her jaw in reluctant acceptance, “It’s the only place to find game anymore, Mother.”

She looked down at the dirt floor, nudging the soil absentmindedly with an earth-caked toe. It may be the King’s land now, but it hadn’t always been.

“Rayne, there are other places to find food … safer places.” Her mother scolded as she took the rabbit from her daughter’s hands.

“There may be safer places, but the land has been hunted dry. The King has claimed most of the public land for his own, he’s forcing us to hunt closer to the sea … there’s no game near the sea, Mother.”

“Then we go without, Rayne!” Her mother cried as she whirled around, bracing herself against the wall before she could stumble forward and fall. She was weak, even with her back turned Rayne could see the weariness in her frail body and the slight tremble in her shoulders as she gasped for breath.

Rayne took a step forward, “How can you say that?” Her violet eyes were moist with tears that were on the verge of spilling forth.

“You know what will happen if you get caught hunting on the King’s land!” Her voice lowered to a soft hush, “You will be killed, Rayne … just like your father.” She swallowed hard and kept her back turned, keeping her daughter from seeing her eyes welling up with sorrow.

Rayne was silent; she took a deep breath to gather herself. She didn’t need to see her mother’s pain to hear it in her voice. There was no use in arguing with her. Her mother had resigned herself to the way things were, and her only priority now was protecting her children and keeping them safe, and Rayne trespassing on the King’s land was hardly staying in safekeeping.

Rayne’s eyes found her younger sister leaning against the side of the hut while holding their little brother on her lap. Her sister was only two years younger than she was, barely a woman at her young age, but hardly able to enjoy her youth. She should have been out with friends, flirting with boys and having the time of her life. But instead she was here, caring for her little brother and a mother with failing health.

Her sister smiled weakly and Rayne snapped out of her stupor. They were poor. Nearly everyone on the island was. Internal war had ravaged the four segmented villages years ago, and while the other quadrants were slowly rebuilding, the fourth quadrant was left to sully in the wreckage of the past. King Desoto would have it no other way, keeping his people poor and hungry kept them tightly under his thumb. If you didn’t work for the King you had nothing, and if anyone ever challenged his way of doing things he wouldn’t hesitate to threaten breaking the agreement with the Death Drake’s rider. No one was brave enough to find out what would be worse: living in poverty under an unjust King, or living in fear of a hungry dragon with the freedom to kill and destroy at will.

Somehow though, despite her failing health, Rayne’s mother found a way to work in the King’s fields. The pay was meager and the job itself would never bring honor, but it paid for what they needed and it kept a roof over their heads.

Rayne watched her mother as she skinned the hare on a long flat wooden slat near the fire. She was weary and weak from working, and her thin frail body shook with effort as she dressed the rabbit. The knife that she was using was a simple piece of sharpened triangular stone, and her blood-slicked palms struggled to hold the dull edge of the rock as she carved the meat from the bone.

Her mother suddenly stopped, letting the knife slip from her bloody hands as she began to wheeze. Her sister set her little brother down and stood to her mother’s side, helping her to a small cot against the wall. Rayne could only watch in a numb trance as her mother gasped for breath, drinking from a cup that was handed to her by her sister.

Her sister turned her attention to the rabbit and without hesitation she began where her mother left off. Every day it seemed that this was becoming the norm, with each passing day their mother became weaker, sicker, and tasks that she normally did without even thinking about were becoming impossible to complete.

Rayne felt a tears tugging at the corner of her eye as she watched her little brother climb from the floor into their mother’s cot, curling up beside her. He had only seen seven years … he was much too young to lose his mother. His cheeks were dirt stained, and his deerskin tunic was torn in several places. His hair was as white as snow, a sharp contrast from his bronze skin. His indigo eyes blinked sadly toward her. Rayne swallowed. He was so thin.

The smell of smoke and fat drippings drew her from her trance and Rayne shot her eyes over to her sister once more. Willow was cooking the rabbit on a spit over the fire, too busy to notice that she was being watched.

Rayne stepped forward, “Willow, let me do this.”

Her sister backed away to allow her room in the tiny kitchen space. Her eyes were troubled. “Rayne,” She whispered to keep her mother and younger brother from hearing, “What are we going to do? If there’s no food, and with Mother being sick … what’s going to happen to us?”

Rayne’s gut tightened and she took an uneasy breath, “Everything is going to be fine. Mother will get better.” She looked away, unable to look her sister in the eye.

Willow shifted slightly, and she threw her sister an irritated glance. She knew that she was being lied to. Their mother was dying.

Rayne lifted her eyes, softening when she saw the quiver in Willow’s lips. She took her sister’s hand for reassurance, “Even if we have to leave this place, Willow, I promise that it will get better, you have my word.”

Her sister nodded, and something sparkled in her eyes that Rayne thought to be optimism, “I hope you’re right, Rayne.”

Rayne shouldered her playfully, “I’m always right, Willow.” She turned her attention back to the cooking rabbit. She didn’t want her sister to see the worry in her eyes, or the fear that she could be wrong.