The dragon's harem

Arriving at the Flame Temple Mountain, the carriage stopped at the side of the road, and both Neil and Alcott jumped out, looking around the area to scout for any nearby monsters. Briders usually keep the area clean of other monsters, but the aquatic monsters still show up from time to time. And they can even make it pretty far from the frozen shores.

”I see nothing.” Neil called with a calm, quiet voice. ”No Claw Walkers, no bunnies, no bears, and no briders around. It is safe.” He smiled and waved at the carriage. ”It is safe to get out.” He was at the same time thinking that safety doesn’t matter to Kayden and Kali, who could probably survive anything.

”Wait!” Alcott lifted his hand. ”I found something.” The moment Neil heard him, he signalled for Kayden and Kali to remain in the carriage as he rushed toward Alcott. ”What did you find?”

Alcott lifted a bit of the snow that looked a bit weird, smelled it, and then threw it away. ”I’m not sure; this isn’t enough evidence.” He looked around for a few seconds, and then jumped into the sky. He needed to get a view from above of the terrain to be able to tell for sure.

The way the snow was arranged, the way some of the trees were broken, the smell, the nature of this location, the mountain and forest nearby, the lack of monsters, even the dominant briders, and what drew his attention the most, the extreme cold that suddenly became harsher.

As he landed, Neil immediately approached him. ”What did you find?”

Alcott looked a bit worried. ”Bad news, we’re in the territory of a pretty aggressive dragon. He pointed at the snow. There are clear signs of a struggle between two dragons here, one much larger than the other. I guess a dominant male that owns this territory and a female that came inside. Judging from the smell of the snow and the damage... I’d say we’re dealing with an Ancient Red Dragon and a Young Adult White Drakaina.”

”What is a red dragon doing all the way up here? I though they preferred the warmer southern mountains.” Neil growled, and Alcott shook his head. ”Red dragons don’t care about the temperature. Most mountains they live on have frozen peaks, and the dragons always set their lair up there. The point isn’t living in a mountain; it is to have a high vantage point where they could survey their territory.”

Alcott looked at the mountain behind them. ”Doesn’t this place have something called a Flame Temple? I bet that dragon made its lair there.” Alcott waved his hand toward the carriage. ”We’re inside the territory of a dragon, and he should be pretty aggressive. Leave it to me; if he shows up, don’t fight.”

”What should we do now? Retreat and wait for you to deal with the dragon?” Neil growled, and Alcott shook his head. ”No, this could go one of two ways. The dragons know who I am and they won’t get in our way, or he doesn’t know me and we’ll get blasted the moment we get on his nerves.”

”Is there any dragon that doesn’t know you?” Neil sighed, and Alcott laughed. ”You’d be surprised at how many of them don’t know me. Dragons usually hibernate for decades, sometimes even centuries. There is a good chance this dragon was asleep for as long as I was alive. Metallic dragons usually communicate important news among them, but chromatic dragons are less... communicative with each other.”

Merlin, who watched everything through the pigeons, immediately started searching for the dragon’s lair. She was certain that the dragon was already aware of the Alcott and his group by now, so she had to be a step ahead of the dragon. But there was one problem with that: outsmarting a dragon is always hard because, unlike humans, they spend literally centuries plotting and planning for thousands of scenarios.

Just as Alcott said, there were countless traces of dragon activity around; one belonged to a massive red dragon, and the other to a far smaller white drakaina. Judging by size alone, Alcott was also right to expect that one was an Ancient and the other was a Young Adult. But Merlin couldn’t fully count out the possibility of the dragon being older, since the same way all humans aren’t the same size, dragons can be smaller than their age, or bigger.

First, she sent the pigeons ahead to scout the Flame Temple in the frozen mountain and also set a whole flock to search the entire forest for more traces and possible ways to peacefully communicate with the dragon. They would rather not have to fight and kill him if they could help it, since even if Alcott was called the dragon slayer, he wasn’t out for blood and was a Mediator first.

A white pigeon landed on Alcott’s shoulder, and from its beak, a voice rang out. ”I’m looking for the dragon’s lair so we can easily avoid it. Careful, we’re only here to track the orcs; if you communicate that clearly to the dragon, he would probably let us remove the intruders hiding in his territory.”

”I know that.” Alcott poked his ear with an annoyed face. ”You don’t have to tell me how to do my job. But just so you know, the red ones are really hard to talk to. They would much rather breathe fire in everyone’s face.” He smiled, ”They remind me of certain people who wear robes and stupid hats, always spamming fireballs without thinking.”

Merlin smiled on her throne. ”I mean, it’s fun to burn things down.” She giggled. ”Just be careful around that dragon. Even if you can slay Great Wyrms and even Elders, you know well how dangerous a dragon can be.”

The Red Dragon was indeed watching, and he had already spotted, counted, and marked all of Merlin’s pigeons. He was asleep until the blast from Samantha’s batteries woke him up, and the first thing he saw after the giant mushroom cloud was a young Adult Drakaina that had set her lair above his, not knowing he was asleep at the molten core of the mountain.

He was massive, over five hundred meters long from head to shoulders to hips, had a massive pair of wings, large muscles, and enough firepower to melt the entire Arctic if he wanted to. A human, a werewolf and vampire hybrid, and two demons... what a strange group. The two demons were the biggest problem, and especially the little girl, who reeked of the smell of a dragon far nastier than any dragon he had ever smelled before.

It didn’t take the dragon long to rank them in terms of danger, and he was pretty accurate. He counted Kali as the most dangerous, Kayden right after her, followed by Alcott and then Neil. Now, he had to decide what to do with them. If they are just passing through his territory, he won’t bother them at all since it’ll be a waste of his time and needless risk. But if they were here to undermine his authority and dominance, then he would need to fight.

There was only one problem, and it was the draconic smell on Kali. It was a clear warning. The dragon behind her won’t just get mad; he’ll snap and go on a catastrophic rampage. Most dragons who dominated their partner won’t care that much; they’ll leave a warning, but not to the level of what Arad left. It was clear that he was the dominant in the relationship, but was also ready to fight to the death against anything that would look at Kali the wrong way.

He couldn’t smell Violet on Alcott only because she was skilled enough to fully hide her scent and presence. If he did smell her, he would’ve packed away his hoard and fled immediately. One thing was clear from Violet’s smell if he managed to catch it. She doesn’t take mates; she eats them. If a dragon dared show his face to her, they would be eaten alive.