Chapter 1

Space Station Andromeda 13 – The year 2390

He was flying, flying… No... His mother carried him... The swoosh of her powerful wings against the wind, her magnificent horns shining in the light of the two moons, her long silver hair flowing in the wind...

He was falling now... Falling, falling...

He heard his mother scream, and then there was fire everywhere...

He lay in a hibernation pod on the ship. His mother stood beside the pod, almost naked and covered in dark blue blood. She was telling him something... something important... He couldn’t hear her... And then she was fading, fading away into the darkness...

Noooooooooooo!

Arathor woke up with a start. Sweat beaded his forehead as he breathed heavily. It was the old dream again. In his two hundred and seventy years, this particular dream from his childhood still haunted him. Sometimes, he felt it was almost like a lost memory. And he never found out what his mother was trying to tell him. He wondered for the umpteenth time when the dream would stop haunting him.

He couldn’t remember much of the night his mother had tried to hide him before getting killed by the rebels. He was just a boy, still half asleep when his mother took him out of bed and carried him to the window. She stepped up on the stone ledge, barefoot. His sleepy gray eyes looked up and he saw his father standing in the doorway.

“Go now. Take him to the ship,” he ordered his mother. She nodded, turned, and jumped off the ledge, carrying Arathor in her arms. He heard the flapping of her large wings as she flew into the moonlit night. His mother was in half-dragon form... Her powerful wings strained against the night wind as his gaze slid over the two magnificent horns on her forehead that swept upward and back, her silver-white hair flowing in the wind. She was beautiful, his mother. He clung to her, tightening his hold on her as she flew higher.

Minutes later, she was putting him in the hibernation pod on the ship as she hurriedly tapped in commands on the control panel of his pod. Her fingers shook, he noticed. She was hurt. Dark blue blood spattered her almost naked body, her clothes burned away in dragon fire. She was telling him something... He couldn’t make out what. All he saw was the fear in her steel gray eyes. It was her piercing scream that still shook him to the core. He wanted to reach out to her as he desperately pushed his hands against the rigid glass, but it was too late. White smoke filled the pod as darkness enveloped him, reaching deep inside him, sinking him into unconsciousness.

Arathor Darthoridan woke up years later to find out that his family, the Darthoridan clan had been long dead, assassinated by the rebels. As rulers of the Slazaryn race that inhabited the planet Trorth, the Darthoridan clan had been a family of pureblood dragons, rarely mating with other clans. For centuries, the fire-breathers had ruled Trorth until that one fateful night. The night when the meteor hit the planet, setting off a chain reaction of events. With most of the city destroyed, the rebels caused an insurgency, killing everyone that stood in their way.

Arathor was the only son and heir, and now the last of his kind, as a new king took over the throne. He was still a boy when he woke up, as staying in hibernation ceased cellular degeneration. He was taken up by the pirate who found his pod on the ship. Sadly, with his parents dead, the ship had never left the planet, and the hibernation pod in which he slept lay forgotten for years until the pirates raided the abandoned ship and found him. The pirates sold him to the slave master who trained space gladiators and sent them to fight battles in the arena on Andromeda 13, the largest space station in the Delta Quadrant. It was only a few years back when the ruler of Trorth hired him as his mercenary, having heard about his unusual skills.

Arathor took a deep breath and reached for his glass of wine. Taking a swig, he tapped in commands on the control panel. After checking the readings, he fired up the viewing station and saw Andromeda 13 come into view. He would need that drink if he were to embark on the mission assigned to him.

A throbbing headache was beginning to nag at him. He raked a hand through his shoulder-length silver-white hair. He took another long swig, trying to drown out any other old memories his brain was adamant on digging up. Another advantage of the wine was that it always numbed him enough to not think too much about the killing that he did.

“Computer, locate the target,” he said in a low voice, draining his glass.

Target is in the North Quadrant. 34766 is the number of his chamber, the electronic voice of a woman replied. There are three people. You are to eliminate them all.

“Initiate docking sequence. Docking Station 11185, North Quadrant,” he added.

Docking sequence initiated.

Arathor was in full human form. His kind could shift halfway, showing only wings and horns on the head. In full dragon form, they were invincible. But the Slazaryn King had not allowed him to shift in any way during the mission. His target was a human emissary, so he had to eliminate him in humanoid form.

Arathor stepped down on the metal walkway, his heavy boots thudding as he made his way toward the target. A scowl marred his handsome features as he checked his sword and the gun. He pulled back his hair and pulled up his hood, checked the breathing clip attached to his nose, and covered his face with a black mask. He wore dark leather pants and a dark shirt.

Arathor got into the elevator, which took him to the North quadrant. He walked to chamber 34766. A man of forty-something stood in the doorway, slightly confused. Without warning, Arathor brought the man to his knees. With one hand on the man’s neck, he drew his sword, the Silver Shadow, and pointed it at the area between the collarbone and the neck.

“Leave them alone,” the man said.

Arathor heard a whimper and noticed a woman cowering in the corner.

“P-please... don’t hurt him,” she begged. Arathor tilted his head and gave her a sidelong glance, wondering whether he should kill her or not. She carried a baby in her arms. He decided to leave them alone.

“Please... d-don’t,” she whimpered. The baby started crying.

Arathor turned his gray eyes, hard as cold steel, toward her. He was getting irritated by the baby’s cries. It was too much of a distraction, and he wanted to get this task over with.

Ignoring her pleas, he vertically slid the sword in the man’s neck. The blade silently pierced skin and muscle, then reached the heart. The man fell with a thud. His body jolted once, twice, as blood poured on the carpeted floor of the chamber. The woman’s screams shattered the silence of the room. The baby cried louder. Arathor turned to walk out before the authorities arrived. But the woman was begging again. He hated that part.

“Kill us too! Why spare us?” she screamed hysterically.

Arathor stopped in his tracks. He suddenly remembered that the target was the whole family. But it was against his rules.

“I don’t kill women and children,” he said in a cold voice without turning. He walked out before she could say more.

He had done his duty. There was no point in killing a woman and a baby. They were not dangerous.

You were supposed to kill them all, hissed his dragon. The King will find out.

“No, he might not,” Arathor silently answered.

***

“Your Excellency, pardon me, but I have grave news,” the old man said.

“What is it?” Lorcan demanded, his tone making the man flinch.

“Lord Luther, the High emissary to Tirron, has been assassinated,” the old man said quietly.

“What!?” Lorcan yelled, rage threatening to surge. “Who’s behind this?”

“We suspect a Slazaryn is behind this,” the old man quickly explained.

The human King’s dark eyes blazed. “Did you capture him?”

“No, your highness. He is still here at the station... We... we have his location.”

“You fool! Take my men and arrest him now!” Lorcan yelled as he brought his fist down, the wine glass that he held shattering to pieces. “A Slazaryn, you say... He’ll be perfect for the pit.” A sinister smile appeared on his lips as the spy left immediately.

King Lorcan Blackwell the IV loved torturing his prisoners. He couldn’t wait to see this dragon fight in the pit.