SOMEWHERE IN THE SHADOWS
The dream came again and Vespera stood in a field of glowing flowers. The sky above her was purple streaked with gold. And before her, golden scales gleaming under the strange light, stood Kayden.
He was in his lizard form. Tall, powerful and every handsome. His eyes burning like suns.
She looked down at herself and gasped. Her scales were dark again. She looked so sleek and her body was lithe, muscular, nothing like the sagging flesh she woke to every morning. Her frills stood tall and proud, jeweled with natural color.
She was beautiful.
Kayden stepped closer and his claws reached for her throat.
"You are mine," he said. His voice was deep. Rumbling. "I claim you."
His claw traced the spot where a mating mark would go.
She woke up gasping.
"That's stupid dream!" Vespera, the lizard queen hissed. "Always making me to feel like I have something that I don't."
*********
