Sleeping Dragons Book 1: Animus Read Online Free PDF Page A

a man and a woman, engaged in passionate coitus with two dragons. Though she had to blink a few times to register the shapes of the dragons. Sometimes they looked like scaled, long-tailed beasts, but if she shifted her eyes the right way, they looked almost human.
    “What the hell did you put in our food, anyway?”
    “Some spices I cultivated myself known to awaken the senses. Other than that, nothing but the water here. It’s been steeping in their magic for hundreds of years. Their need to awaken is very present. This is the time.”
    He seemed so earnest, but his need wasn’t enough to sell her. She stood up and straightened her shirt.
    “I think you’re playing us somehow. I have no idea how, but I’ll figure it out. Put your fucking pants on.” Before I go nuts.
    As she was walking back toward the doorway to the main chamber she heard behind her, “Erika. You can’t leave this place until you’ve completed the ritual. I didn’t trap you into this.”
    “Oh? Then why does it feel like I have no other options?” she shot back over her shoulder.
    “I’m more than just a guide, so I know it was always your quest to be here. This is where you belong—where we both belong. You know it’s true, deep inside. Just translate some of the text and it’ll be clear, I promise.”
    She paused for a single step and clenched her fists. If he was playing them all for his own ends, she’d figure it out, but he wasn’t lying about her quest. Still, Kris’s words were too much fantasy for her to reconcile. She’d found it. That was enough. All she needed to do now was catalog the artifacts and transport the pieces suitable for study and display. Then write her dissertation on the entire expedition. After it was published she would reap the rewards and bask in the professional limelight. End of story.
    Except deep inside she knew there was so much more to the story than that. Her father had never been after glory, but his research had led her here after all. Maybe there was more for her to find besides artifacts. Maybe Kris was the key to uncovering the deeper secrets of this temple. Before she’d walked through those doors at the surface she would have argued that only science could convince her of the truth. Now, she wasn’t so sure. With each step further away from the doorway she’d just left behind, the weaker her hold was on her own convictions until what she wanted had shifted entirely.
    She raised her hand up to fondle the small jade figurine at her throat. It was a childhood dream come true. More than that, it was her life’s work realized in spectacular fashion. Her entire body buzzed with the understanding that this was what she really wanted. To awaken the dragons.
    And Erika was used to getting what she wanted.

Chapter Four
    C amille’s breath finally steadied and she rested her head back against the solid stone behind her. A narrow band of light seeped in from the crack in the doorway leading to the main chamber, illuminating her boot-clad feet where they rested on the stone.
    She could still hear Erika’s low voice asking questions and Kris’s even replies. When she’d followed Erika to the pool, she’d been sure she would catch the two of them screwing, but what she ended up witnessing was so much more interesting. She couldn’t quite process it all. She’d stayed far behind and snuck through the open doorway to the rear corridor behind the dais without them noticing, then stayed in the shadows, listening to them talk. If she tilted her head forward a tiny bit she could see them, and ended up rubbernecking while Kris stripped and challenged Erika to touch him.
    Her mind reeled at all the implications, and she was even more eager to get to translating but just needed a breather after watching the two of them together. They hadn’t even come close to having sex, but she’d never seen such a tense, sexual exchange. And when Kris had divulged the secret of the temple, she had to test it