Chapter 2

"I had to do it, Arno!" Rosa replied tensely, as she gingerly pulled her jeans on. "Do you realize what this means for us?"

"But ... SEX for crying out loud!" Arno almost shouted, "What were you thinking? And why you? Why not me?"

"It can only work with women!" Rosa raised her voice in exasperation, "Arno, I explained this already! I think it has something to do with the intermingling of genetic material."

"Well, why can't we just ride on them, for crying out loud? I mean, what's the big deal? I've ridden horses. Even rode 'em bareback. How different can it be?"

"If you aren't Bonded to the dragon, you can't anticipate his moves, nor he yours. One unexpected air current, one pocket of dead air, and the next thing you know, you're falling, not flying. No, the safest way for men to fly is the same way I started - being carried."

"I still think there ought to be a way for men to bond with them," Arno sounded petulant, even to himself. "Okay, okay, I guess I'm just jealous. I mean, how can I compete with - with a dragon?"

"Well you'd better figure it out, buster, because I'm planning to give birth to a whole gaggle of your kids," Rosa told him tenderly, "besides, you big macho man, I don't see you submitting to The Bond even if it were possible for you to do so."

"Hmmm," Arno agreed, reaching for her, "you've got a point there. Speaking of kids, though, why don't we get started making some of them now?"

"I'd love to baby," Rosa told him, tenderly kissing the tip of his nose, "but you gotta give me a couple of days. That dragon is hung. Besides, I need to talk to the others before they get too nervous. They may have been happy to see me come riding back on top of him, instead of finding my stripped carcass somewhere, but I don't want to leave them in the dark for too long."

Rosa's return to camp astride the golden dragon had created a sensation, and it had only been her plea to allow her to dress herself that had given her this brief respite.

"You think any of the other women will want to Bond with them?" Arno asked, almost petulantly.

"I hope so," Rosa told him. "I don't want to be the only one who can communicate with the Wyrms and it wouldn't hurt to have a few dragon-riders around. Make it easier to explore and such."

"All I can say is, you'd better handle that topic with kid gloves. Men and women alike are going to have problems with it."

This was more like the Arno she had come to know and love, and Rosa wanted to believe that everything would be all right between them.

"Gotcha."

Rosa emerged from the makeshift shelter that she and Arno shared, now clothed, to find the entire group of humans gathered in a semi-circle around the golden dragon. Klyphon's scales shone with a mother-of-pearl opalescence, in which the primary color was gold, but highlights of greens and reds could be seen as he moved. His scarlet belly scales were horizontal plates that had their own iridescent quality. At the moment, finding himself the center of attention, Klyphon was preening - posing for the humans who gazed at him in awe.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," Rosa said, taking a stance beside her Bond mate, "you have all, no doubt, heard tales from long ago of dragons that inhabited Earth. We have pretty much accepted those stories as myths and fairy tales, but I just found out that many of those tales had their basis in truth. The Wyrms, as Klyphon's people call themselves, lived for several centuries in harmony with humans on Earth. It wasn't until the secret of the Bond became known to the Church that dragons were labeled as 'evil' and their riders as witches. Once that occured, and men began finding ways to kill dragons, the Wyrms left Earth, traveling through hyperspace, or Otherwhere, as they call it, to find this place, where they have lived ever since."

"How do you know all of this?" Marion Rodgers asked.

"You all remember the voices I thought I was hearing before I was taken away, right? The ones that had you thinking I was going crazy?"

Murmurs and nods formed a communal affirmative reply as she continued.

"I was hearing their 'Speech' in my head, but they weren't close enough for me to understand them. That was why they took me - I was the only one they could talk to, even a little bit. Since I have Bonded with Klyphon, I can hear every Wyrm on the planet."

"But then, only someone who could hear them in their head already can learn to communicate with them?"

"No, they chose me because it was easier to explain to me what they wanted," Rosa answered. "Almost anyone - any woman, that is, can Bond with a dragon."

"Only women?" Carl McIntyre queried. "Why can't men do it?"

"It's because of the way the Bonding works. I think it has to do with the Wyrms' DNA mingling with ours inside our bodies."

"But how can they do that without making you pregnant?" This from Wendy Som.

"Maybe I'd better tell the story from the beginning," Rosa said. "If you're like me, you'll be shocked when you learn how it works, and I think it needs some groundwork to be laid first."

"We're listening..." someone cracked.

"Okay, first of all, you have to understand that I was up there dangling naked from the claws of a being that, at first, I thought was going to eat me," Rosa paused to shoot Klyphon a 'not a word from you' look when he snorted his disgust at the idea that he would have eaten her. "Imagine my relief when I found out that all they wanted was to do this thing that would let me communicate better with them. I figured if it wasn't fatal, I had to take the chance, so that Wyrms and humans wouldn't start trying to kill each other."

Arno stepped closer and she spared him a look of gratitude as he put his arm around her. It wasn't going to be easy to tell the others what she had done. She just hoped they could stay open minded about it.

"Anyway, I didn't even ask how it was done, even after they warned me that it would be painful. I guess I figured it might be one of those blood-sharing rituals we read about in books back home. I'm not sure I would have done any different if I had known, but I probably would have put it off as long as possible. In the end, though, I think it still had to be done, and I'm glad I went through with it."

"With what?" Victor Kudner asked impatiently.

"As I said, I think their DNA has to mingle with ours in our bodies," Rosa searched for a way to delay the inevitable, but it had to come out. "Wendy asked how they could do that without making me pregnant ... well ... it's kind of the same procedure..."

"You had sex with a dragon?!" this from several voices at once as Rosa stood her ground, red-faced but determined to see it through, even as the follow-up questions began.

"How could you... ?"

"Didn't it hurt?"

"How big is it?"

"Are you sure you won't get pregnant?"

"Weren't you disgusted?"

Finally, Rosa raised her hands to get their attention.

"It is not something I would have chosen to do on my own in a million years," she told them, "but if it means that the Wyrms work with us instead of against us, it was a sacrifice worth making. Believe me, we do not want the dragons as our enemies!"

"Why?"

"What do you mean?"

"Remember those old stories about dragons on Earth - about their primary weapon?" Rosa turned to Klyphon and said, Would you like to give them a demonstration?

Happy to oblige, her Bond mate replied.

A small pile of discarded material had accumulated nearby as they built their little settlement and Klyphon turned toward it and waddled forward until he was within about twenty yards of the rubbish.

Drawing back his sinuous neck, he took a deep breath, then drove his head forward like a striking cobra. From his open mouth spewed a solid stream of blue flame which he played over the pile until it was nothing but ash.

Rosa turned back to the crowd. "Any other questions?"

"Wait a minute!" Carl McIntyre cut in again. "I remember some of those dragon stories. In all the ones I read where humans rode on dragons, the Riders were all men!"

"Well, Carl," Rosa drawled, "you've heard how The Bonding is done, would you like to be the first man to try it?"

The laughter and ribbing from those near McIntyre took a few moments to subside.

"Okay, okay," Rosa finally continued, "all kidding aside, you must remember that when dragons were on Earth, people were much more primitive in their ideas and beliefs. The few women who could even bring themselves to Bond with a dragon, did not advertise the fact. After the trouble between dragons and humans erupted in Europe and England, the 'virgin sacrifices' that we've heard of often became Riders, just to spare their villages from the 'rampaging dragons', but neither they nor the dragons wanted it known that this had happened. The stories of female dragonriders were never told, and those about male dragonriders didn't appear until the twentieth century - long after the Wyrms had left Earth."

"Is ... Can others of us Bond with them?" Rosa had to look hard to find the source of the question. Tiny Wendy Som was almost hidden behind the veil of her long, straight black hair, not looking up.

"I would encourage any woman who thinks she can handle the physical and emotional strain to enter into a Bond," she replied, though she doubted that the shy, mousy Wendy would be one of those, "if for no other reason than to ensure that there's always someone around who can communicate with our hosts."

To everyone's surprise, for the first time since any of them had known her, the small Asian woman straightened, threw her shoulders back, and tossed the hair away from her face. With an expression of determination, but a tiny tremor in her voice, she said, "Then I want to do it!"

"Why don't you and I talk about this after the meeting, Wendy?" Rosa told her. "Are there any more questions?"

There were, of course, but most of them were simply covering ground that she had already been over. Finally, the meeting broke up and Rosa turned to her Bond mate.

Whew! That went better than I thought it would. At least they didn't stone me to death.

Your people have grown since last we met them, Klyphon said. Perhaps there is hope for mutual understanding, yet.

I hope so. I can see that you're hungry, and it's probably better if you don't hang around too much until everyone's accustomed to having Wyrms around. Why don't you go ahead and hunt? Now that we're Bonded, we don't have to be close together to communicate.

I am famished. You know how to get in touch with me, Rosalinda Maria Gutierrez.

With a gust of wind, his wings lifted Klyphon into the air and he soared off in search of prey.

You don't have to use my full name all the time, you know, Rosa thought after him. You can just call me 'Rosa'.

Ah, but 'Rosalinda Maria Gutierrez' is so much more musical! Klyphon shot back, amusement clear in his thought.

Rosa felt the laughter of other Wyrms, too, as she turned to find the diminutive form of Wendy Som still waiting for her.

"Hi, Wendy," Rosa said, and seeing Arno hovering, too, she said, "Why don't you give Wendy and I a few moments, Arno? She'll probably be more comfortable talking about this without you hanging around in the background."

"Sure," Arno replied, though his expression showed a little irritation, "I'll be over at the mess shack."

"Let's take a walk, Wendy," Rosa said, slipping her arm around the girl.

Wendy wasn't that much younger than Rosa, but was gifted with a face and body that seemed to slough off the ravages of time, leaving her looking much younger than she was.

As they moved away from the camp, Rosa said, "You know this wasn't easy for me, don't you? I mean physically, emotionally, or mentally."

"Yes," Wendy nodded, "but I had a heavy-worlder master on Earth who delighted in forcing himself on me, and there was nothing I could do. It was like a draught of the finest elixir when I heard how a woman could Bond with a dragon. Am I right in my assumption that if I Bond, my dragon will defend me against anyone who wants to hurt me?"

"Yes, but it goes both ways," Rosa answered, "I do not want to think what it would be like if my Bond mate were to die. I think I would do everything in my power to keep that from happening."

"That is as it should be," Wendy nodded resolutely. "With my master on Earth, though, I think there is little I would not have done, given the chance, to see his life end."

"It will be very painful."

"Look at me, Rosa," the girl stopped and spread her arms, displaying her short, petite form. "Do you imagine that it was pleasurable when Zoonth had his way with me? He may not have been as large as a dragon, but he taught me how to endure pain."

"Yes, I suppose he did, at that. Okay, Wendy, I don't want to discourage you. I just wanted to be sure you understood what you were getting into. When would you like to Bond?"

"As soon as possible."

"Hmm, very well. Wyrms aren't much for foreplay, but they provide their own lubricant. I'd say just lose the pants and keep the top. I'll see what I can do about getting a volunteer..."

As it turned out, the Wyrms, through Rosa, had been following the conversation, and had already come up with what they thought was the best solution.