PRE-ORDER NOW! Scorch My Lips: Dragons of Blood and Bone #4 is coming April 25th!
/Hey there!
Who is ready for the next Dragons of Blood and Bone book!?
I’m thrilled to announce that pre-order is AVAILABLE NOW for Scorch My Lips: Dragons of Blood and Bone #4 on Amazon and Kindle Unlimited.
The official release date is Friday, April 25, 2025.
THANK YOU for supporting this latest series featuring Rikyava from the Royal Dragon Shifters of Morocco series and her mates. Keep reading for an exclusive sneak peek at chapter one of this upcoming release, and be sure to pre-order below!
Enjoy… and get ready for more sexy Viking dragon HEAT!
XO Ava
WARNING - SPOILERS AHEAD!
If you still need to begin book one of this series, GET IT HERE.
CHAPTER 1 – FIGHT
Hurricanes have nothing on a Blood Dragon, as I spar with my drakes in the towering lightning-stone amphitheater, mad with intent. I whirl, clash, and roar, insane with the battle-fury of my people, as they hammer my blows away, strike after strike, blast after blast.
Rage and wrath consume me as I fight inside the gargantuan colosseum here in Chambord, home of the Storm Dragons of France. All around, Storm Dragons watch with eager eyes. My drakes and I are center stage in the massive space, as the uppermost tiers fill with blue, purple, and cloud-grey dragons. Because we’ve sparred the morning away, well into the afternoon.
And we just aren’t stopping—as fury and darkness consume us.
Gripping the highest boxes with massive restless talons, my cousin, King Rhennic Erdhelm’s dragons, growl at today’s spectacle. Others in human form watch in the grandstands below, come to see the Royal Blood Dragon drakaina lose her shit at what’s been done to her.
Because all my memories of home and clan have been stolen, as I rage now to get them back. It’s only been a week since the Black Dragon Knight’s High Council Excommunicated me from my home and took my memories of Sweden and all the people I love there.
But a week is enough time for me to be livid, since nothing the Storm Dragon healers have tried these past days has helped me.
Not one bit.
A bitter taste fills my mouth now, and it’s not just the tang of my own blood from a split lip, as a seething truth roars inside me. That truth is matched by a furious hum on my chest from Aesa’s silver Truthstone embedded in my bones and skin, knowing that my time here has been futile.
I’ve been through tests; I’ve given blood. I’ve endured countless bouts of lightning-storm magic from the Storm Dragon healers coursing through my body to figure out what’s wrong with me.
Just about everyone can see my dragon-aura’s full of holes, where my human memories and my dragon’s instincts concerning my home should be. What no one can figure out is how it was done.
Or how to reverse it.
Fuck my life.
Still, the bastards on the Black Dragon Knight’s High Council don’t know what’s coming for them, as I fight in the amphitheater now, livid. My drakes, Bjorn Magnussen and Ström Eriksson, weather it, because that’s what they do. They support me as my First and Second Bloodmates, even when supporting me means fighting me all morning so I can go ballistic in a safe, controlled space.
We’ve paced ourselves. None of us have shifted into our dragons today in this ginormous amphitheater of alabaster lightning-stone columns and tiers like the Colosseum of Rome, which flicker with opal-blue Storm Dragon magic.
I’ve needed to go at it for hours to diffuse my rage, however; I woke up before dawn with both my inner Blood Magic drakaina and my dark Bone Magic drake seething for war, needing to fulfill it. My dual dragons want retribution on the Knight’s High Council, and so do I.
And I know who’s pushing my need for revenge, as a dark presence now enters the space.
I know my Third Bloodmate, Mikkel Thorsen, has come into the towering lightning-stone hall the moment he arrives. He’s barely set foot upon the blue-white stones of the foyer when I turn towards him with a snarl, hammering a massive volley of devastating Bloodspears at Bjorn and Ström, sending them right to their asses on the white sand floor.
I’m just that strong now with my Third Drake’s incredible torrent of energy rushing through me, thanks to our recent bond. Mikkel’s indomitable power surges through my veins like a hurricane, as I see him settle into one of the most ornate, throne-like stone seats at the lowest edge of the fight ring.
Those boxes are reserved for Storm Dragon royalty, but Mikkel doesn’t care. With power like his, he should be royalty. Not to mention that he’s also the epitome of tall, dark, and handsome, with a runner-lean frame, strong shoulders, and an almost wasp-lean waist.
Fucking hot, he’s a body I want, hard; not just that, but the rest of him is beyond sexy, as well.
His short black hair with its dark auburn hi-lights is always stylish; as he runs a hand through that hair now, I can almost feel it, knowing that soft wave is all natural and not products.
His face is almost more beautiful than a mere mortal; Mikkel has a high-cheeked, full-lipped face like an Archangel, making me wonder if there isn’t just a little Archangelic blood far back down his family line somewhere.
Though he looks like an angel or a demigod, however, his power is beyond devilish, full of poison and darkness. As he stares at me with his darker-than-black gaze now, I feel my inner Bone Magic rush to him in a torrent.
Two of a kind.
Our beasts coil around each other in a towering auric Bloodknot as they greet one another. It’s massive, poisonous, and powerful, as our darkest natures connect, happy to see each other again.
Seething auric ropes of oilslick black magic flow between our dragons, uniting them in our bond. Our dragons get along just fine; the jury’s still out on me and Mikkel, however, as he stares me down in the fighting hall.
We are life-mated now after the events of the past week in Copenhagen, but I’m still not sure where I stand with him, or him with me.
And neither are my drakes; Mikkel’s presence in the gargantuan rotunda stops our fight as both Bjorn and Ström turn. I hold up a hand to my First and Second Drake, though I needn’t have. They’ve already halted our battle as they felt my energy change when Mikkel entered the hall.
From roaring and rageful—to utterly black with wrath.
Because I’m not entirely sure who I am when my inner Bone Magic takes over; and I don’t like it, as Mikkel rises now from this chair, watching me with penetrating dark eyes.
Mikkel’s black eyes spark with a ring of vicious chartreuse green now—the eyes of his dragon—as he feels me dive into my darkest place, a place we both share. Dressed in a black collared shirt and pinstriped slacks with a shiny black belt, he is casual as he kicks off his snakeskin boots and steps down to the main floor.
Then steps to the sand—spiking cold, black fire deep into my heart.
“Your drakes are tired, drakaina.” Mikkel stares me down, deadly teasing as he addresses me like he’s a pirate about to make me walk the plank, a roguish smile on his lips.
A pirate I just want to fuck, and fuck, and fuck.
“They’re fine,” I say as he approaches, hands out at his sides to show me he’s unarmed and not threatening me with any magic.
He’s walking towards me, implacable like a hurricane, however; all around, the Storm Dragons have picked up on our mood. The sky above Chambord’s amphitheater is bruised with purple storm clouds now, though it had been a lovely sunny day. Lighting flickers above; the Storm Dragons can’t hold back their eagerness.
As tension roars through me and my drakes, now that Mikkel’s joined us.
“Fuck! Don’t sneak up on a Blood Dragon when our hackles are up, Mik,” Ström laughs, jovial as he shakes his head.
Standing beside me, my Second Drake is always in a good mood, except when he’s not. Even in his current exhaustion from occupying my desire for revenge with Bjorn these past eight hours, Ström still has an upbeat nature.
I can hear fatigue in his voice, however, as he runs a hand through his short, sandy-blond hair, rucking it up into a sweaty mess, then down his short-trimmed, tawny stubble.
Dressed in borrowed Storm Dragon Guard gear, he wears a white singlet over his lean, mean muscles. Ström’s nearly my same height and looks all of two hundreds pounds soaking wet, but he’s got strength in that tight, honed body. Perfectly proportioned, with what I know is a truly massive cock hiding beneath his pants, Ström is not a drake anyone would want to tussle with.
Though his emerald green eyes twinkle, his chisel-cheeked, handsome face always puckish with a teasing smile, Ström’s got power. It’s wildcard power—even more than Bjorn’s now, with Mikkel pushing his magic. He sets his hands on his hips, chuckling and grinning at Mikkel’s arrival.
Though his vibrant emerald gaze is watchful.
“Fuck off, Mikkel. We’re busy.” My First Drake, Bjorn, growls now as his vivid gold eyes flash hot at my Third Drake’s arrival, and not in a nice way. His long golden hair pulled up atop his head in a sweaty man bun, Bjorn grunts as he rips the elastic from his wild mess of hair and scratches through it with his fingertips.
As his massive mane falls free, Bjorn’s golden eyes blaze. Shirtless and wearing only lightweight storm-grey tactical pants for our duel, barefoot in the sand, Bjorn is simply the most stunning piece of man-meat I’ve ever met.
Built like a Viking god, he has muscles on top of muscles, rippling now as he airs out his hair. His waist is strong but fit, his pecs and arms could crush a Mack truck, and his rock-solid shelf ass and thighs would make anyone swoon—dragon or not.
But it’s his face that has always captured me. As Bjorn snarls at the situation now with the pure gold eyes of his dragon burning out from that strong, almost godlike masculine face, his level gold brows scowl. Beyond handsome, devastating when you match that with his stalwart, protective nature, Bjorn is almost never in a good mood, unless we’re fucking.
Which he and I haven’t been able to do at all these past seven days.
“Mikkel. Did you need something?” I say now, planting my hands on my hips and watching him. I’m statuesque today in my dark grey tactical leggings, a white tank top with a sports bra beneath, and all my long, Swedish-blonde hair done half-back in braids and pulled into a ponytail so I can fight.
Built like a Scandinavian brick house, I’m no slouch when it comes to muscles; I’ve been a career warrior all my life. I see Mikkel’s dark eyes glide up and down my body now as I sweat, flushed from kicking ass for eight hours straight. He’s appreciative—beyond appreciative—as he takes me in.
The subtlest dark and sexy smile on his face.
“I just came because I sensed you three needed a bit more firepower to keep going,” Mikkel says, as he stares at me with his dark gaze and cat-got-the-cream smile. “Or am I wrong that your drakes are wrung out from everything you’ve put them through since sunrise?”
I’m about to protest that we don’t need Mikkel’s added energy boost to keep going when Ström speaks up.
“I hate to say it… but Mikkel’s right, Rikyava. Bjorn and I are done. For now, at least.” Ström gives a wry laugh beside me.
I haul my eyes away from Mikkel, who has stopped fifteen paces shy of us. It gives me a moment to assess my drakes with a clear head.
Ström’s showing signs of fatigue, though he’s doing better than Bjorn, after our entire morning of fighting. Like Mikkel, Ström’s a Bone Mage; since Mikkel joined our Bloodbond, Ström’s power has gotten exponentially stronger, too, not just mine.
All of it is outweighing Bjorn, however. As my biggest, most badass drake growls now that Ström spoke for him, I look at Bjorn. Flipping his mass of wavy hair to one side, he rubs a crazy amount of sweat from his short golden beard. Sweat is everywhere, even soaked through his pants, as I watch the fabric cling to all his burly muscles and his frankly massive cock beneath.
But that cock is far from hard, as Bjorn heaves deep breaths. As his snarling golden gaze meets mine, I can feel how tired he is.
Fatigue beyond anything I’ve ever felt in a dragon.
“Bjorn. Sit down before you fall down.” Mikkel chuckles as he feels what all of us do—that my First Drake is beyond tired.
In fact, Bjorn is exhausted to the max; I know it’s because he’s weathered a severe metaphysical shitstorm lately, which Mikkel’s Bone Magic has caused between us.
As my Mikkel-enhanced Bone Magic went rogue this week, desiring retribution from the Black Dragon Knight’s High Council, Bjorn’s been fighting to balance it all. His power’s been working overtime, Bjorn often waking from a dead sleep just to pour whatever he can through me to stabilize my wrath.
My most stubborn drake will never admit it, but he’s outnumbered and outgunned in our Bloodbond now. He’s the only pure Blood Sage in our bond; the only person balancing our blackest magic, as he trembles now on the sand. It’s a situation that would be beyond almost anyone else’s capabilities.
But they’re not Bjorn—and he doesn’t show fatigue lightly, nor concede defeat.
It’s wearing on him, however, as he struggles now to hold our bond steady against all this dark Bone Magic with my Third Drake so close. Bjorn’s knees buckle; a fast movement from Ström is just enough to prevent him from hitting the sand as Ström shores him up beneath one arm.
As my most furious, most hard-headed drake stares at me, the fire leaves his eyes. He’s toast; bitterness fills Bjorn’s features as I approach.
I cuddle close with my arms around him, kissing his chest.
“Bjorn. You should go rest.” I snuggle in to my burly First Drake, despite his sweat. Inhaling deep of his scent, I let his good smell of pipe tobacco, peat whiskey, and battlefield char envelop me as his powerful arm wraps around me possessively.
Though I note how he hasn’t made Ström stop helping him.
“I’m not leaving. Not while he’s around.” Bjorn juts his chin at Mikkel before kissing the top of my head. He’s just that tall, though I’m not short.
“He’s her mate now, too, Bjorn. Or didn’t you hear?” Ström acts casual, though even I can hear his own biting bitterness that I now have a third mate in our group. Ström stands like an iron rod at Bjorn’s side, however, holding the bigger drake up with ease from the extra power Mikkel gives our Bone Magic. It’s firepower we’ll need if we’re ever going to go up against the Knights Council, or our true enemy.
The Dragon of All Souls—what we call the Black Dragon.
“I’m still not leaving you alone with him.” Bjorn snorts as he looks down at me. His arm still around me, Bjorn is possessive in Mikkel’s presence, in a way he’s not around Ström anymore.
“I’m a big drakaina; I’ll be fine.” I lift up, kissing his lips. Though everything else on him is ultra hard muscle, Bjorn has the softest lips. They whisper like silk over mine before he presses me in a hard kiss that leaves me breathless.
A sudden need to jump him floods me, deep into my veins. He sets his forehead to mine, growling down at me in frustration.
He and I both feel how much his dragon wants to rise to mine, to get on down to pound town, but it can’t. Bjorn’s done—good and done from everything our magic has put him through in the past week.
Fighting my wrath all morning hasn’t helped; though his ardor struggles, wanting to match mine, it can’t. I don’t even feel a single nudge from his cock, though I’m pressed hard to him.
Just like it’s been this entire week.
In the end, Bjorn sighs, then kisses my forehead. I feel him give in as he turns his head, setting his cheek to the top of my head and curtaining me in all his glorious hair. He wraps both arms around me now, standing on his own, though I can feel how much metaphysical energy Ström is sharing with him to keep him upright.
“I think I just need a quick nap. Then I’ll be back in the game,” Bjorn says as he gives me a squeeze.
“Go,” I say, knowing that anything else I might say would impugn Bjorn’s manhood.
Nodding, he pulls back. He stares down at me with bereavement in his far more normal, gold-crimson eyes now. Taking his hand, I grip it. I know why Bjorn is bereaved. Once, he was my strongest drake. Now, he’s my weakest.
When we need his rageful power more than ever.
Bjorn goes. Nothing more needs to be said between us, though he tolerates a solid clap on his shoulder from Ström. Bjorn glares at Mikkel with a scalding heat as he passes my Third Drake, though nothing comes from his magic.
Bjorn stumbles, however, as he gathers up his discarded fighting-singlet from the sand. Ström narrows his eyes on Bjorn, even as I feel Bjorn’s power gutter. He stumbles hard then, slamming to one knee in the sand at the edge of the fight ring.
Ström whips to him in a moment, shoring him back up and getting only the smallest glare from Bjorn.
Go, I tell my Second Drake telepathically through our life-mate bond as he glances at me, lifting his eyebrows. Get Bjorn back in bed; he’s toast. I’ll speak with Mikkel. A little chat between us is overdue, anyhow.
Are you sure? He’s far more genteel than Bjorn, but even Ström worries for me, leaving me alone with my Third Drake. Because although Mikkel and I are bonded for life now, our magic has done disastrous things in each other’s presence ever since we met.
His ability to keep my ripped-open memories sane is far more than Bjorn’s or Ström’s, with all the metaphysical firepower Mikkel’s packing, but it comes with a price.
A dark price, as my gaze flicks to Mikkel’s and I stare now, deep into his eyes.
Still fifteen paces distant, Mikkel’s not looking at Bjorn and Ström as he watches me in the fight ring. Mikkel has eyes like a snake, and I know I’m not wrong when I’ve compared his inner dragon to a deadly black mamba. He doesn’t care about right or wrong, not like Bjorn, Ström, and I do. He’s self-admitted he doesn’t belong in our little band of heroes.
Even though I know he has to be my mate.
I’m sure, I say through my mind now to Ström, encouraging him to go.
Ström doesn’t gainsay me; though I feel his unrest at leaving me alone with Mikkel. We’re not actually alone in this gargantuan amphitheater of vaulted white lightning-stone, however, with all these Storm Dragons everywhere.
Ström and Bjorn finally go, though Ström gives me one last wary glance, and Bjorn gives me a bereft one. It leaves me alone in the enormous sand-ring of the main floor with Mikkel.
We face off like two desperados of the wild west now, hands loose but ready at our sides like we’re about to whip out six-shooters and blast each other. I’m not certain we won’t, as we regard one another across that long, open space.
Waiting.
“Fight me or fuck me, drakaina. Your choice.” Mikkel speaks in his almost hauntingly smooth baritone voice. Though he put no effort into it, I hear his words like a barb inside me, spearing me across the gulf that separates us.
The inner black dragon of my Bone Magic flashes up at that voice, towering over my brighter Blood Magic. My brighter dragon is tired, almost as tired as Bjorn. Settling down, she lets my darker side take over as I feel my blacker-than-night drake stare out at Mikkel with its glittering star-bright eyes.
Black like death in the Void.
“Fight.” I choose suddenly, knowing that’s what I want. Mikkel and I have already mated now, in one incredible, disastrous life-mating that took us both by surprise, but this is what I want.
I want to fight him; I want to rip into him and test his strength. I want to make him best me, if he can.
And earn the right to be with me.
“As you wish.” Mikkel is quiet, though I don’t miss the eager smile that quirks his full lips. His eyes are all hard darkness now, even though their outer ring of dragon-copper flares. He knows this has been a long time coming. We’ve crashed into one another, we’ve torn at each other in our crazy frenzy to unite our power and fuck.
What we haven’t done, however, is prove to each other how strong we both are. He hasn’t proven to me he’s worth being mastered in this bond, and I haven’t proven to him he needs to play by my rules in this life-mating.
Or get the fuck out.
“Ready when you are.” Mikkel’s disastrously energetic mode is online now as he claps his hands, giving me a huge grin with an eager fire in his eyes. But the darkness is never gone, as he reaches up, ripping his nice shirt off over his head.
He casts it to the sand, bare now from the waist up; yet again, I notice an incredible Danish Blood Dragon tattoo on his lean, powerful muscles and perfectly balanced torso.
Ornate, the tattoo curls up over his left shoulder like the ocean, decorating his heart with raiding ships and a sea-monster dragon flowing over his shoulder with water, scales, and wind. Done in black and red, it has some sort of warding ability, as I feel an unknown magic emanate from it, just as I’ve felt before.
For the first time, however, I also notice intricate chartreuse-green lines blossoming out all over Mikkel’s lean, hard body. Those vicious lines are in his dragon’s patterns, deadly, as they course through his veins.
As I see his dragon’s literal poison come out upon his flesh, it raises everything inside me high for a fight. I roar up into my true dragon now, the two sides of my dual energies rushing into my united Bloodwalker power, though I don’t know which of my dragons will be in charge of this battle.
It’s almost always been my brighter crimson Blood Magic drakaina who’s dominated my power. But as Mikkel roars up into his towering black-as-night drake with its glittering lines of chartreuse green poison running through its scales, I know I’ve shifted up into not my red drakaina, but my own black dragon.
The black dragon of my inner Bone Magic, like Mikkel’s.
I’m not united in my power now, as I stand before Mikkel as my inner darkness and roar at him in a seething rush. I’m terrible, blacker than night, blacker than death, as I snarl now and rake powerful talons through the white sand at my feet. The wings I raise to the storm-thundering skies are devoid of color, except for a glittering in my scales like ancient stars, as I stare Mikkel down.
And I let myself be taken now by my inner darkness, rather than my united Bloodwalker power, to match his.
For the first time since we met, I finally see Mikkel hesitate. I feel him see me now—truly see me—as he is stunned by my might.
He’s a powerful Bone Mage, talented and ruthless, but I’m a Bloodwalker. I’m the thing that eats drakes, tearing all their power away to incorporate it into my bond, as I make it do what I need it to.
I finally see him register that as he sees my blackest nature and hesitates. But then the most disastrous, eager smile takes him as his poisonous black and green face cracks in a wide grin and he shows fang. In one powerful slap of his wings, Mikkel’s in the air.
Opening his maw and roaring a seething blast of chartreuse-green poison.
Right at me.
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