Page 1 of Riding My Dragons

CHAPTER 1

Elliot

With eyesight sharper than a human’s, and a good eye for anything that’s pretty and female, I spotted her right away from across the street.She wasn’t my usual type, but she was interesting.

I was sitting on the outdoor patio of a pub with my friends, Byron and Cade.We were having drinks before it was time for Byron to go over to the front courtyard of the Pendrake City Museum of History to give his opening address for Reconciliation Week.The three of us were talking about the wrestling match where I’d be competing tomorrow when I stopped for a moment to let my friends talk about how much they’d bet on me pinning my opponent.The girl across the street pulled my attention away from how much they had dropped on me and how I’d better pay off.She was an unusual kind of distraction.

Being a Scaler and a fairly well-known athlete, I was used to the company of women of a certain kind: “model” types, very obviously hot.This girl was hot, but not obvious.She was about eighteen, maybe nineteen, as far as I could tell.Her build was gently curved, not the thin-waisted, broad-hipped type.She was slender, trim, healthy, but not the “exotic dancer” kind of woman that I knew so well.The dark-eyed brunette with hair tumbling over her shoulders had a dreamy sort of look on her face, as if she might be looking at someone but her mind might not exactly be right there with them.And just now, she seemed as if she would rather be looking at anyone besides the three guys who had come up to her.

Scanning the whole scene, I sized up the situation.There were other people of about her age gathered nearby, and someone older, probably in his forties or fifties, standing with them.They were waiting near the stage area where Byron was going to give his talk.This, I guessed, was a group of college students who’d come to see Byron light the fire pit; the older guy must be their professor.School groups often showed up for things like this before their classes went on break for Reconciliation.The brunette must have come with her class and either lagged behind them or gotten cut off from them by these guys, who from the look of them were just plain obnoxious.They were grinning at her and leaning into her space, and from the way she wouldn’t look them in the eyes and kept trying to back off from them or maneuver around them, she didn’t appreciate that.

I frowned at the scene.She shouldn’t have to put up with that.

My decision made, I forgot my drink and got up from our table and started towards the sidewalk and the curb.Byron and Cade looked up, surprised, from their conversation.“Elliot, where are you going?” Byron asked.Leaving their drinks as well, the two of them started after me.

On the pavement, I paused to let some cars go zipping by, zipping over the pavement on the Ambience energy fields of their undercarriages.Cade said, “Byron’s talk isn’t for another fifteen or twenty minutes yet.What’s going on?”

Pointing to the girl, who was looking more and more uncomfortable with these idiots around her, I simply said, “That.”

There was an opening in the traffic, and I quickly stepped out into the street; Cade and Byron following me.We got to the other side of the street, where the damn pests just were not catching on to the brunette’s disinterest in them.With myfriends just a couple of steps behind me, I walked up to where these morons had her surrounded, and asked the brunette, “Is something the matter here?”

Whatever rude, stupid banter the three fools were bothering her with stopped as soon as they saw my friends and me.Their eyes, and the brunette’s, went right to us.

“No, man,” said one of the idiots, a kid with a ring through one side of his lower lip.If I’d been in my other body, I could have pierced the other side for him with a claw.“We’re just trying to get to know our new friend, here.”The look on his face was more gross than friendly.I narrowed my eyes at him.

Then I said to the brunette, “Are these guys friends of yours?”

“I’ve never seen them before in my life.”She gestured beyond us to the school group.“I’m here with my class for the Reconciliation ceremony.”

The ring-lipped moron said, “And we were just asking her what she was doing afterwards when her class goes on break.”

“Yeah,” said one of his friends, who had a brown complexion and frizzy black hair.“We wanted to invite her someplace to go hang out, didn’t we?”

The third idiot had a more husky build and smelled of something that told me what these three liked to do when they “hung out.”The brunette’s disgusted look suggested that wasn’t her kind of pastime.She was scared and sickened by them.The husky, smelly guy said, “Yeah, it’s her break–time to get loose, right?”

I wouldn’t have minded “loosening” the teeth of all three of these slimers.They were like jackals, picking off their chosen prey from the rest of the herd.Meanwhile, the girl had mostly kept her eyes on me.I asked her, “What’s your name?”

“Jenna,” she said.

“Hello, Jenna,” I said, careful not to offer her my hand or try to touch her.These bastards had made her skittish enough.“I’m Elliot.”I gestured to my friends.“This is Byron,” I said, indicating my well-shaved friend with the slit-backed suit.

There was a flash of recognition in Jenna’s eyes.“Byron Ledger?The one who’s giving the speech and lighting the fire?”

Byron gave a gentlemanly tilt of his head and smiled.“The same.”

Gesturing to my other friend, with the scruffy goatee and the open-backed leather vest, I said, “This is Cade Taisce.”His name was pronounced tash-ka.

“Hi, Jenna,” said Cade.

I put a hand on my chest, in my form-fitting, slit-backed athletic top and slacks.“Elliot Ladon.It’s nice to meet you, Jenna.”

At the mention of my full name, the jaws of the three twits dropped open as if their face muscles were in sync.They stared over and up at me, realizing just who it was that they were dealing with.

Ring-through-the-lip stammered in a hushed and awestruck tone that I was glad to hear, “E-E-Elliot…Ladon?The Elliot Ladon?”

“The one and only,” I replied, and for emphasis, I let just my face go to my other form.The skin turned to scales as my face became a reptilian snout and horns began to bud from my forehead.At either side of me, Cade and Byron did the same.Just like that, the three idiots all took a step back.It was one thing to harass a shy brunette, but they had just enough working brain cells among them to know better than to get on the bad side of a champion dragon wrestler and his buddies.

The ring-lipped guy was suddenly nervous, which was a healthy way for him to be at the moment.“L-look, Mr.Ladon,” he stammered further, “we didn’t mean to bother her.Honest, we were just trying to talk her up a little.”

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