You guys have no idea how excited I am to show you Quinn, let alone the first few chapters. I hope you guys enjoy it!
Edit: Hey guys, I just wanted to say that @AlisRajput wrote to me and brought up a really good point about this series. Right now, Norah should be 22 years old which I accidentally overlooked while planning/writing this book. So sorry about this little mix-up, and I'll be going through book 3 to try and correct this but it might take a bit a time. So if you're reading this and notice that I mention Norah being 19 or younger than 22 it's a mistake and I haven't fixed it yet. I just wanted to come on here and let you guys know what is going on and hopefully I can get this resolved pretty quickly : )
Quinnlyn
Quinnlyn pinned him against the wall, giant hands pulling her closer. Their tongues danced, flicking against the other in a game of dominance that she was winning. She pulled away, to tease, to get a reaction, savoring the pleasure as his lips tried to follow.
He tried to bring her mouth back but she clucked her tongue, running a finger around her mouth.
"For a big strong dragon rider, you're huffing and puffing and we haven't gotten to the far part," she purred, her voice slow and melodic like molasses poured from a jar.
Xavier panted, eyes wide, pupils dilated. His hands drifted down her curves, then slid up her black skirt.
She smiled and leaned in to his ear, whispering in just the right way to make him shudder and feel the bulge between his legs turn rock hard. Seducing was an art form Quinn wasn't built for but made for. Every man had a weakness, like the confidence of a woman until that confidence was turned on them. Then it became ego. Attitude.
"So eager." She traced a long nail down his neck, careful to scratch him in just the right way to make him wince. Everyone liked a little pain with their pleasure, but she added a dash more for hers.
She pressed her black lips against his ear, flipped a lock of pale pink hair over her shoulder and let her intoxicating scent of berries and pears brewed in sweet, dark wine engulf him.
"What would you do for me?" She coaxed, unbuttoning his shirt that was nearly black in the dark room, and traced little red marks across his muscled chest.
"Anything," he breathed, cupping the area between her legs. Already wet.
It made her shriveled heart pound, her insides throb in anticipation.
Quinnlyn's lips peeled into a sharp, awful smile. "Then scream."
She plunged her nails into his shoulder, long and sharp enough to hit bone.
Xavier's face contorted, and Quinn crashed her lips onto his, drinking in his scream. She dug in one of her blades into his thigh, her nerves lighting into a storm of explosions as the man groaned and quivered.
Quinnlyn shuddered, moaning.
He blinked at her, his pupils tightening as her embrace wore off. Xavier took one look at her nails, her slitted gold-orange eyes that glowed in the dark like a predator. He noticed and the two tails on the small of her back, arcing through the air and into body parts.
His fists moved, away from her body and to her beautiful face.
He was fast, but she was faster, a blur of purples and pinks and black. The blades at the ends of her tail pinned his hands to the wall. She yanked out her nails, dripping red and sunk it between his legs.
He screamed, legs buckling and Quinnlyn pulled her tails out from him, letting him crumble between her legs. He was a big man, a typical dragon rider, corded with muscle so his fall was clunky, like a dresser tipping over. But even that was muffled over the music.
Quinnlyn closed her eyes, rolled her head back in bliss as her tail struck again.
No one would hear the fun they'd have. Not with the band's music blaring so loudly it shook the tavern, and if they did, it was late enough that everyone below stumbling through the streets were too drunk to tell a scream from a shriek of laughter.
Gracefully, she tilted his head up and hers down. She dragged her claws up his neck. Flesh split, spilling red down his bronzed skin and onto her brown nails; the color of dried blood.
As if the lives she had taken had stained them.
Her tail coiled around his throat, flexible like a flag in the wind but strong as steel and unmovable when she needed it to be. It shimmered in the dark room, a hollow graphic purple that glistened gold when it caught the light. Quinn's insides turned molten as she pushed the diamond end of her tail, the metal gleaming as she sliced his jaw.
Xavier drew in breaths, maybe to speak, maybe to build up another fruitless attack, but she could see it in his eyes--the pain. The pain.
Oh, gods.
Quinn shuddered again, heat flooding between her legs.
The man was panicking now, thrashing against her tails, clawing at them like he could rip her to shreds. But Quinnlyn's skin was hard, her bones stronger than any mortals.
She wasn't going to kill him. Not yet. Not until she'd had her fill.
"You know what they say," she sighed. "The bigger they are, the more places you can hurt."
-------------------------
Xavier didn't last long before the room fell silent and the bland grey room was splattered in blood.
Quinnlyn clenched her teeth, dug her nails into the blood-soaked bed she bent over and fought to tip that blaze between her legs over the edge.
But it faded, snuffed out like a candle underfoot.
She growled, yanking her nails back, shredding the red sheets in the process. Quinnlyn swallowed, head tilted to the speckled ceilings and calmed down.
There would be another one tomorrow.
"Another woman left unsatisfied," she sighed, wandering over to the kitchen sink to wash the blood off her hands. She straightened her skirt and black, leather top that showed more stomach than most women cared to show before going to the mirror, her heels clicking on the tiles.
She grabbed her purse on the way, took the bags of makeup out as she wiped the blood from her face.
Quinnlyn was beautiful. People told her that every day as if she didn't already know. They complimented her glowing eyes that she said were contacts. Never noticed the claws she kept skillfully hidden or the tails.
She padded a fresh layer of bright blue eyeshadow, sharpened her eyeliner using the end of her tails as a stencil. Quinn dabbed the blood out of her pale pink hair, careful not to ruin the two knots on her head or the locks of hair she had left down. She straightened her bangs that came to a gentle point between her eyes before sniffing and glaring behind her to Xavier on the bed.
"You could have been polite and waited to shit until I left."
His dragon would be here soon, Quinn thought and strode over to the body shredded to ribbons. She plucked off the silver band on his left finger, tucked it in her bra before rummaging through his jacket she'd left on the floor. She took the cash, stuffed that away too before tilting her head at the photo of Xavier standing arm in arm with his wife and two daughters with his pale hair and dark eyes.
You'll get over it, she thought to the picture. The demi-god had been around long enough to see people who thought they were happy with their perfect families and perfect and perfect jobs and perfect everything. But no one was ever truly happy, breathing her in was enough to show them that.
Her tail looped around her waist. A belt to the naked eye, but a weapon hidden in plain sight.
She grabbed her pristine, white jacket, draped it over her nails and left for someone to find.
Not his wife, though. No, Xavier was away on a business trip and Quinn had known he was his next victim when she'd seen the wedding ring and picture in his wallet when he paid for his drink.
He hadn't looked at her. Hadn't seemed content with his drink while half-naked men and women danced. So she had to make the first move, had to go up and take a seat next to him until wine and berries and pears washed over him, making his mind hazy until suddenly she was the most beautiful person he'd ever seen.
Quinn was in the brick streets, striding over the sidewalk and halfway to her apartment when a roar had split the air.
But his dragon, with blinding loyalty, would tear apart the hotel to find his rider dead and her sweet scent all over him. The dragon would hunt her scent until berries and pears disappeared and Quinn would be on her couch, eating chicken wings bathed in orange, hot sauce.
She hummed, added a sway to her hips as drunks stopped to wets their lips or whistle as she passed. She flashed her finger at a few of them, made a mental note to find them tomorrow.
The demi-god turned into another street, empty of people when the cold breeze pressed against her back. Her nostrils flared, heightened smell and hearing picking up scales and large heavy steps of someone who wanted to be noticed.
With immortal grace, the hunter turned, claws tucked beneath her expensive, and new jacket.
A dragon glared down at her.
She cocked her head. Several thousand years to hone her practice and no dragon had ever found her. Not that she wouldn't mind hurting a dragon. Screams were screams, even if Quinnlyn only found pleasure in human ones.
"Yes?"
"You killed my champion," says a deep, smooth voice inside her head. But it wasn't male like the dragon's scent indicated.
Quinn studied the silver scales, the color Xavier had said his dragon was, and then the black slits of pupils against yellow bleeding into red. Oddly, it reminded her of a setting sun. When death came for daylight and everything turned into the most beautiful crimson and orange and blacks-
Quinn's stomach sank, realization dawning. She had eons of training to keep her scent from the goddess. Hunters smelled fear in prey like blood in water and Quinnlyn was not prey.
"You need better help," she said, bored even as her heart raced.
"He's my champion," she snapped, each word searing the soft tissue in Quinn's mind. She bit back a wince. "Now you will take his place."
Quinnlyn almost laughed but had the sense not to. She had grown up in times were gods were still real and sacrifices were made in their honor. She knew the gifts they could bestow and the pain they could rain if tested.
And she knew that this was not Khalixis in the flesh, only possessing the dragon to speak to her, but the dragon goddess could still kill her in the blink of an eye.
"Appealing offer, but no," Quinnlyn said and normally would have walked away.
Normally.
The dragon stepped forward, looming with a growl and Quinn hated the way her muscles stiffened. "You don't have any choice in the matter. By killing him, you automatically created a bond that places you in his stead."
Quinn glared at her, imagining shredding the goddess apart. She was no one's tool. But she wasn't stupid either and considered her options.
Attack and die. Run and die. Taunt and die.
None of them were appealing.
The hunter grit her teeth. "What do you need me to do?"
Khalixis hummed, pleased, even as her lethal gaze narrowed.
"Kill Norah Crimson," she said. "And there is more required of you."