Dragon Conjurer 6, page 1
Would you like to see chapters of my books before they come out? Do you want to see cover art sketches and vote on which poses should make it to final production? Would you like to see even sexier versions of my covers? Would you like to get my audiobooks at a deep discount?
Of course you would! Join my Patreon here to get all these awesome benefits (or search for my name on Patreon.com).
You can also join my Facebook group right here. Then you’ll know when my books come out before anyone else.
Chapter 1
It was early in the morning as my team and I walked toward the hangar bay to board our jet to Tanzania. I walked a little slower than usual and felt a little sluggish this morning. The excitement of going to another Academy on another continent wasn’t enough to shake off the lack of sleep, and I was close to running on fumes. The last several days had been intensely full of missions and surprising new information, and I could have definitely used a double shot of espresso to get my brain going.
Less than a day ago, we’d been knee-deep in a swarm of seductive lady spider monsters and their horde of slithering snake soldiers deep in the forest of rural Tennessee, and now we were about to board a flight to the other side of the world.
Almost immediately after we’d returned to AIMM from our mission, my team and I had been summoned to Headmaster Burkhard’s office.
I thought back to our brief meeting with the headmaster last night. He’d informed us there was a displaced monster from our jurisdiction causing havoc in Tanzania. Burkhard had made it clear we were the best-equipped to eliminate the threat. I wondered about the urgency of the mission. We’d been sent to handle the hydra last month because it would have taken AMIE cadets too long to arrive on the scene. Our flight to Tanzania was definitely going to be even longer. Clearly, the threat of the displaced monsters was a big issue, but I guessed it wasn’t an immediate problem.
“You and your team will depart for Africa first thing in the morning,” Burkhard had said.
A quiet hush fell over the headmaster’s office at the news.
“What about us?” Phoenix had finally asked as he glanced around at his fellow Japanese cadets.
“Your headmistress has approved for you and the other MAJK cadets to remain here with us at AIMM for another three weeks to foster continued cooperation between our Academies,” the Headmaster had answered. “I’m sure we will find plenty for you to do while Mr. Cooper’s team is away, don’t worry.”
The Kingpin look-alike had seemed preoccupied and quickly hurried us away to get some sleep after that.
I left his office feeling a little frustrated. I’d tried again to tell him about what we’d found in SEEKR just a few days ago. The information about a long history of possible monster cooperation had plagued me since Ronin and her twin brother had shared their discoveries with us. I knew it could be vital data for the headmaster to have, and I’d been trying my damndest to bring it to his attention.
Unfortunately, Burkhard was an incredibly busy man. Which was to be expected of the person in charge of such a huge multinational institution with the mission to save the world from monsters. I was determined to speak to him about it before we left for Africa, so I’d stopped by his office earlier in the morning. The Kingpin look-alike hadn’t been in there, and I was starting to think I wouldn’t get the chance to speak to him before we left.
On top of that, Dr. Hastings wanted to know more about the Jorogumo queen and her nest, and I was eager to spend as much time alone with the sexy doctor as possible. However, that conversation could wait until after our return from MIA.
I thought about the hectic energy that had hovered around Dr. Hastings yesterday. She’d been excited about the Jorogumo specimen my team had managed to bring back alive for her, and I knew she was plenty distracted by everything else that was always happening around here. It seemed like there was more to it than that, though, and it lingered in my mind.
I’d only been with the Academy for a few months, so I had little frame of reference, but it felt like things were getting worse way faster than ever before. When I’d first arrived, all the cadets seemed to be able to handle missions fairly well. Now, more often than not, cadets were coming back with a lot of minor bruises and cuts, and an increasing number of more serious injuries. Last I counted, there were at least four cadets in various casts, and that didn’t even include the injured team Dr. Hastings had rushed off to help with last night.
There wasn’t much to be gained by dwelling over any of this at the moment, so I shoved the thoughts aside. I turned my attention to preparing for our international mission instead.
“What do you think the African Academy is like?” Nick asked.
My blond best friend was dressed casually for the long flight ahead of us. He wore well-fitting dark jeans, a green t-shirt that matched his eyes, and comfortable-looking leather boots.
“I don’t know.” I turned to look at my best friend. “It’s going to be awesome, though. It’s so cool to see how the other Academies operate.”
“I’m so excited I get to come with you guys this time!” Steffi bounced and clapped her hands excitedly as we walked.
Steffi was a ball of giddy energy this morning. Her cotton-candy-pink hair was half-pulled back into little pigtails behind her ears. She wore black shorts that rode up high on her narrow waist, and a loose-fitting, hot pink sweater hung off her shoulders like a 1980’s pop star.
“Me, too.” Nala smiled brightly and spun a little circle. “Japan was great but it would have been better if you were with us.”
The dark-haired girl wore tan pants that strained across her toned thighs. Her sunny yellow shirt was cropped just above her navel, and it showed off a distracting strip of her taut stomach.
“I’ve never been below the equator before,” Elisabeth said.
The French beauty had tied her long coppery hair up in a braided crown around her head. Little baby hairs escaped the careful knotwork and danced around her face like a halo. She wore simple dark pants that hugged her ass perfectly and a long-sleeve blue shirt with a low wide scooped collar.
“I beg to differ.” I smirked.
“Dylan!” Elisabeth blushed profusely as she slapped my arm playfully.
“Gross, man,” Nick chuckled.
Steffi and Nala giggled at my innuendo as we strolled the rest of the way toward our destination.
“Mr. Cooper, good morning,” Headmaster Burkhard greeted us as we walked toward Silva’s jet in hangar bay three. “May I steal you away for a moment?”
“Of course, sir,” I said with a little surprise.
It was unusual for the Kingpin look-alike to see cadets off on missions, and I wondered if he had more information for us before we left for Africa.
Maybe I could finally tell him about what we’d found in SEEKR.
“Good morning.” Burkhard nodded at my teammates as they walked slowly into the jet.
“Good morning, sir.” Steffi smiled politely.
Elisabeth and Nala nodded, and Nick held his hand up in a casual wave.
“Did you have more information about the mission for us?” I asked the headmaster.
“Yes, Mr. Cooper,” Burkhard said. “Your request to bring Ronin along on your mission has been approved.”
“That’s great.” I grinned at once and then cleared my throat to try and rein in my obvious excitement. “Thank you, sir. She’s an important asset to our team.”
I’d put in an official request late last night to bring Ronin with us. It just didn’t feel right to leave her behind, especially since all of the Japanese cadets would be staying at AIMM for at least a few more weeks. Ronin felt like such a part of our team to me now, and I was really excited she’d be coming with us.
“There is one condition,” Burkhard declared with all the authority he had. “Ronin is an official diplomatic liaison from MAJK. It would be disastrous for our newly-formed relationship with their Academy if she were injured on our watch. I am entrusting her care and safety to you. Do you understand, Mr. Cooper?”
“Yes, sir.” I nodded seriously. “I promise, I will not let anything happen to her.”
“I’m sure you won’t.” Burkhard smirked. “She should be along in a few minutes to join you.”
“Thank you.” I grinned, and then I hesitated.
“Is there something else, Mr. Cooper?” Burkhard asked.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “Do you have a moment?”
“Ah, yes. I know there was something you’ve been trying to talk to me about,” the broad-shouldered man began. “I must apologize, my available time has been extremely limited lately, but I do have a few moments now. What was it you wanted to share?”
“My team and I, and Ronin and Phoenix,” I started. “Well, we stumbled onto something in SEEKR’s databases.”
“What was it you found?” Burkhard cocked an eyebrow at me.
“Photos,” I said. “Ancient images of what look like monsters working together.”
“Like the photo you and your team brought to my attention a few weeks ago?” Burkhard looked at me with intense curiosity.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “We assumed you had shared that file with MAJK’s headmistress. Ronin and Phoenix said she’d spread it widely around their Academy just before they came here, and that she’d made sure all the cadets were aware of it and its importance.”
“Yes, I did.” Burkhard nodded.
“Well, after that,” I continued. “They went digging in their Academy’s database computers and stumbled o n a bunch of examples of what looks like monsters working together throughout the centuries. I’ve been trying to tell you about it since then, but like you said, things have been really busy.”
“And these files were in the Japanese database?” Burkhard asked.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “Phoenix said a few of them had been misplaced in the archives, and he thought maybe that’s why they hadn’t been studied before.”
“Interesting.” Burkhard nodded and absently scratched a hand over his chin. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention, I’ll get a few of our best scientists on it right away.”
“You’re welcome.” I nodded. “It just felt like something big. We wondered if, maybe, monsters have been working together all along.”
“It very well could be,” the headmaster agreed solemnly. “Ah, here comes Ms. Ronin.”
“Dylan!” Ronin called out.
My Japanese lover was wearing a tight-fitting, white cotton shirt that was perfectly tucked into pleated, navy blue shorts. Black socks came up to just above her knees, and vintage-looking saddle shoes completed the look. Her hair fell down over her shoulder in a single fishtail braid and bounced as she jogged up to wrap her arm around my waist.
“Hey.” I smiled and squeezed her against my side.
“Thank you for letting me go on this mission, sir,” the Japanese girl said to Burkhard and dipped forward in a little bow.
“You’re welcome.” The Headmaster smiled. “Perhaps you can initiate some cooperation between MIA and your Academy as well.”
The bald man looked almost smug at the idea that maybe he could be the starting point of more cooperation between the competitive and secretive Academies.
“I shall represent my Academy and yours with honor, sir.” Ronin bent forward again.
“Very well, off you go.” Burkhard grinned. “I know you will all be excellent representatives of this fine institution.”
Burkhard nodded once more before he turned to walk off and attend to whatever important business required his attention.
“Thank you, sir,” I called after him.
My shout was drowned out as the sleek jet’s engines roared to life behind us.
“Africa!” Ronin whispered-shouted as she clung to my arm. “Oh, this is so exciting.”
“Come on,” I chuckled and waggled my eyebrows at her. “Let’s get on board before Silva leaves without us.”
Ronin and I walked up the ramp and found seats toward the back of the jet.
Steffi was seated toward the front, and Elisabeth had claimed the row behind my fairy-girl. Nala sat across the aisle from my French beauty, and Nick had sprawled out behind Elisabeth. It was a little odd to have so much room for ourselves without Phoenix, Kitsune, Wisp, and Doppelganger to fill in the seats.
“Ronin! You’re coming with us?” Steffi bounced in her seat like a little kid.
“Yes.” The Japanese girl grinned at me. “Dylan made a special request. He said I was a ‘vital asset to the success of the team.’”
Ronin and I slid into the row of seats behind Nala and tugged on our headsets.
“Well, he wasn’t lying,” Nala chuckled. “That’s great.”
“It wouldn’t have been the same without you,” Elisabeth said.
“I gotta agree.” Nick smirked. “You really round us out as an effective monster ass-kicking machine.”
“Thank you,” Ronin said with a polite nod. “I agree with you.”
“Buckle up, kids,” Captain Silva’s voice crackled over our headsets. “We’ve got a long flight ahead of us. There’s plenty of food in the storage compartments, and I threw in some blankets and pillows for you guys, too. As always, thank you for choosing Silva Airlines. I know you have no other options, and if you have any complaints, you can go fuck yourselves.”
“Blankets and pillows?” Nick laughed. “Silva’s getting soft on us.”
“That’s actually really sweet of him,” Steffi said. “It’s a pretty long flight from California to Tanzania.”
“Yeah,” Nala agreed. “It’s going to take probably twice as long as it did to get to Japan.”
“Wow, really?” I groaned. “That was a really long flight.”
“Yeah, but you have to remember,” Elisabeth said. “Japan is only an ocean away. Tanzania is literally on the other side of the world.”
“It’s summer there right now, actually,” Ronin said.
“Oh, yeah!” Nick smirked. “That’s right, that’s so weird.”
“There’s a more detailed brief packet here,” Steffi said and held up a manilla folder. “Should we go over it now, or wait until later?”
“Might as well do it now,” I said.
“Passing it back,” Steffi said in a singsong voice.
My fairy-girl passed the folder over her head to Elisabeth who then passed it back across the aisle to Nala.
“Here ya go,” my curly-haired girl said as she handed the folder over the back of her seat to me.
“Thanks.” I smiled at my ladies. “Okay, let’s see.”
I opened the folder and scanned over the information for a minute.
“Looks like they have an issue with a monster called a Slide-Rock Bolter,” I announced to my team.
“What’s that?” Nick asked.
“It’s an enormous monster that lives on mountain peaks,” I explained. “I learned about them a little bit in one of my folklore classes at Berkeley. They’re huge, like bigger than a school bus huge. They have these weird, hook things in their tails that they use to hang onto the peaks and ridges of mountain ranges. The monsters hang out there for days, even weeks, waiting for animals or people to stumble into their path. Then the Slide-Rock Bolter unhooks its tail and slides down the mountain slope, scooping up anything in its path. They mostly live on really steep slopes, so they can use their immense momentum from one slide to go right up the opposite ridge and do it all over again.”
“What do these things look like?” Elisabeth asked.
“Sort of like a gigantic slug with a mouth like a fish,” I said. “They’re really hideous.”
“And it’s in Tanzania?” Nick asked. “Because MIA is in Egypt, so are we not going there first?”
“No.” I shook my head and glanced over the paperwork again. “Apparently, MIA has a secondary outpost in Tanzania, the Slide-Rock Bolter is on Mount Kilimanjaro, so it makes more sense for us to stay at the Tanzania location while we handle this.”
“Is there anything else in there?” Elisabeth asked.
“Not really.” I shook my head. “But it does say we’ll be going to the main MIA campus to meet with the headmaster after we deal with the displaced monster situation.”
“Sounds good to me,” Nick said. “I’m going to grab a snack, anybody want anything?”
“No, thanks,” I said.
The ladies all shook their heads at the blond nymph as he unbuckled his restraints and walked down the aisle to the storage compartments.
“I’m really glad you got to come with us, Ronin.” Nala turned over the seat to look at us.
“Me, too.” Elisabeth smiled. “You really feel like part of the team.”
“And you’re definitely one of Dylan’s girls now,” Nala giggled.
“That is certainly true.” A soft blush spread under Ronin’s adorable freckles. “It’s very interesting to be part of such a unique group dynamic.”
“I thought so, too,” Elisabeth giggled. “It is unlike any relationship I’ve known before. It feels very… American.”
“Well, Dylan is a special guy.” Ronin smiled softly at me.
“So true,” Nala murmured.
“You girls are the ones who are special,” I said. “I love how we work together as a team, and that you all get along so well. It’s really fantastic.”
“And we love you.” Steffi blushed softly under her pink hair.
“We do,” Elisabeth agreed.
“And we love each other, too,” Nala added as she looked around at Steffi, Elisabeth, and Ronin. “You guys are the best friends I’ve ever had, and I love that we can all share Dylan the way we do.”
“You do?” Amazement washed over me at their words.
Steffi and I had said the three big words a few times, but I hadn’t quite reached that step with my other girls.
“Of course, we do,” Nala murmured and a soft blush spread under her chocolatey skin.
