The Shifter's Gift

by Haley Weir

  Crylaine nudged his Lord gently with his wingtip. His teasing was a welcome distraction. “Of course. I didn’t disrupt the sacrament of a place of learning. You know how we hold such places in high regard. I would never…”

  “I am only playing. I am glad someone has caught your eye. I do hope you will find someone like my Claire. It takes the sting out of the homesickness a little,” Drake said.

  Crylaine could understand that. He missed home so much it ached some days. “She might be. She’s certainly different from the other women I have been around lately.”

  “That is good to hear,” Drake said. “I hope to learn more about her soon.”

  “Me too. I am meeting her again tomorrow evening,” Laine informed Drake.

  His Lord chuffed with approval. Both dragons started circling to return home for the night when a fight broke out. Two Serpentina flew hard and fast in their direction. Crylaine felt a third slam into his side, knocking him off his flight pattern. He felt himself fall from the sky and toward the water below. Drake turned in the air and swiped with his huge claws, catching one of the Serpentina in the belly. Fire and blood rained down alongside Crylaine as he fell. Just before he hit the water, he ruefully thought about how unfair it was that he would never see his home again, and that he wouldn’t get to see the way Jennifer’s face lit up as he gently teased her. Fate was such an ass sometimes.

  Chapter 3

  Jennifer waited half an hour the next night before deciding to get up and go play her choosing game. She anxiously awaited Laine’s arrival, and for the first time since she had started her nightly ritual, hadn’t immediately chosen a book. Instead, she sat perched on her chair waiting for him. Then, 10 minutes went by. Then 15. Was he standing her up? She looked at her phone. Now it had been 20 minutes. At the 30-minute mark, she was getting frustrated. She needed a distraction. All night and all day during her classes, she couldn’t focus. She thought about all the clever and witty things she wanted to say to him. She thought about all the possible ways she could pry information out of him about his personal life. She would alternate between cool intellect and her best seductress act. She had little interest in listening to the committee members after class, bitching about how the rally yesterday had been a disaster. She could care less today. She just found herself smiling stupidly whenever she thought about Crylaine, and nothing could ruin her mood…until now.

  She stomped to the middle of the stacks, forgetting to trail her fingertips over the spines of the books. She stopped somewhere in the middle of the aisle and squeezed her eyes shut. Somehow the whole ritual didn’t seem as magical today. She spun in irritable circles. After 22 spins, she stuck out her hand and pointed. She marched straight forward, deciding that this would be the last time she deviated from her ritual for a man. As she reached out, her finger slammed into something rock solid. Whatever it was flinched, and her eyes popped open to find Laine standing there.

  “Oh my God!” Jennifer clamped a palm over her mouth. She had not meant to shout in the library. She looked around to apologize, but no one else was that far back in the shelves. The way Laine looked finally registered. He had been beaten within an inch of his life. His jaw was particularly black and blue, and there was a cut just under his left eye. His right eye was almost swollen shut, and she saw three red welts on the side of his neck. “What happened?” she breathed.

  Jennifer reached up with shaking fingers, but pulled them back before she touched his face. She imagined the injuries were quite painful. “Just doing my job,” he said simply. She reached out again and cupped the cheek that wasn’t swollen. He sighed, turned his face slightly, and planted a light kiss on the base of her palm. Heat raced up her arm and through her body.

  “No job is worth this,” she murmured, trying to get a grip on herself. She looked up into his eyes and noticed that they weren’t green today. They appeared to be amber, with the dancing flames in them.

  “You said you are an activist. Is there no cause that you wouldn’t fight this hard for?”

  Jennifer thought about that a moment. “There are things worth fighting for, but you also have to fight for and protect yourself, too. Your employer should respect that your safety as much as their own.” She could not explain why she felt so passionately about this. It hurt her heart to see this man battered and bruised.

  Laine searched her face. Then, he leaned down and brushed his lips over hers. She wanted to melt into him immediately, but when she let her hand trail down his chest, he winced and sucked in a breath, clearly in pain from an injury hidden under his shirt. She let her hand drop and took a step back. She wanted to kiss him again so badly, but suddenly, he turned and walked back up the aisle. She chased after him, wanting to protect him from whatever caused him so much pain. Jennifer watched as he pushed through a gray door in the corner of the library. She waited a few moments before slowly opening the door herself. She assumed she was going to find him looking out over the streets and brooding, but what she found was a large black and silver tipped dragon.

  Jennifer opened her mouth to scream, but no sound came out. She tried to cope with what she had just seen. One moment, Laine was standing with his back to her, and the next, his human form erupted. What he transformed into was the stuff of legends. She saw the same amber eyes with the dancing flames from a few minutes ago downstairs. The fire she was staring at was real. Jennifer shut her mouth again, opened it, and shut it once more. As quickly as the dragon appeared, it was gone, and she found herself wrapped up in Laine’s arms and pressed against his naked chest.

  “How? Why? How? What are you?” Jennifer stammered in disbelief.

  “Jennifer, you are smart enough to understand what I am,” his voice was infuriatingly soft. “The how is are a bit more difficult to explain. It’s science, anatomy, physics and all that.”

  Jennifer tried to push away from him, but he held her tightly. “What I just saw cannot be explained with physics,” she cried.

  “Not with human understanding, no.”

  “It wasn’t real. I must be hallucinating. You drugged me, or...or...I’m dreaming,” she reasoned. She gave herself a quick pinch, hoping to wake up, make a cup of coffee, and start her day. But everything stayed the same. He was still standing there, holding her. She had not pulled away from him.

  “Do I need to shift again and prove that I am real?” he asked and kissed her forehead, and she cursed herself for relishing the comfort it provided.

  “No, please don’t.” She began to shake as shock fully set in. She could not accept this or change it. She could not use logic or historical evidence to ground this in her reality. It was all so unbelievable. “Why? Why did you show me? How do you know I won’t run to the police as soon as you let me go?”

  “Because they wouldn’t believe you even if you did. That, and I have not stopped thinking about you since we met last night. It’s the reason the Serpentina were able to attack me at all. Thinking about you distracted me. I am intrigued by you, and want to know everything about you. Last night was the first night in a very long time I was excited to wake up in the morning, because I knew it meant I got to see you. Even though I was a little late,” he explained.

  “That still doesn’t answer my question. Why?” she tipped her head back and looked into his eyes. They were emerald again, but there was an amber ring around them. She knew he was keeping the inferno at bay. It explained a lot about why his skin was so hot, and the intensity she felt rolling off of him in waves. Somehow the fact that he was a dragon the most rational explanation for his odd behavior.

  “My kind has been hiding for so long…from the world, from the Serpentina, and here in this city where everyone is supposedly so open and carefree. But everyone here has secrets, so my fellow dragon warrior brothers and I blend in well. I decided wanted one person to see me. All of me.” He let her go and Jennifer took a step back.

  “Well, uh, I certainly do see all of you,” she responded as her cheeks reddened. She looked away.


  “I am what I am, and I am not ashamed of it.” He shrugged. She folded her arms across her chest trying to remind herself that this was still real. She looked back up at him, and she could not help but notice the sincerity in his eyes. “I won’t hurt you, Jennifer,” he said.

  “No, I don’t think you will,” she decided, unfolding her arms. She reached out and put a hand on him. He was incredibly hot to the touch, like he was constantly burning up with a fever. “It must be very difficult to keep all of this trapped inside of you with no outlet. Also, how does no one else know about you? There are millions of people in the city and yet no proof that d…d…”

  “Dragons exist?” he offered. “We do, but we are good at staying hidden. As I told you, it is my job to protect precious things. I keep my brother and his wife safe.”

  “Is she a dragon too?” Jennifer asked.

  “No, she is human. She goes to the same university you do.”

  Jennifer took a step back. “How do you know which university I go to?” she demanded.

  “I flew overhead last night to make sure you got home safely,” he replied. “There are many shadows in the night who mean you harm.”

  “Says the dragon with the largest shadow of them all,” she scoffed.

  “Touché Jennifer, but again, I will never hurt you.” He reached for her once again, but suddenly felt shy and wanted to defuse the tension. She made a joke about Laine putting on some clothes, and he recoiled.

  “Does my body bother you that much?” he asked. Jennifer had to admit that his nudity was quite distracting. She wanted to jump into his arms and feel the heat of his body all around and inside of her. Regardless of all of the fear and uncertainty she felt, what she wanted most was to be ravished by him right here and now. She was lost in dirty thoughts when she heard him speak up again, interpreting her silence as discomfort. “I could change back to my other form if you would like.”

  “Alright, do it. Then fly away and find clothes. Once you do, then come back and talk to me,” she suggested.

  “I would gladly do that. The only problem is, the library is now closed, and you have no way off this roof without my help.”

  “Huh? Shit!” she exclaimed when she saw the time on her watch. She ran to the edge of the building and looked over, only to see the dizzying lights of the city below swirling in a kaleidoscope of colors. “How am I supposed to get down?!” Panic rose inside of her. Her voice raised an octave and the tingling feeling along her skin intensified. She whirled around to him and glared. “You kept me up here on purpose!”

  “I did not.” He held up his hands and looked affronted. “You followed me up here, remember?”

  “Yeah, but you knew I would!”

  “How could I have possibly known that?” he asked.

  “You’re a dragon,” she stated. “You, I don’t know, you read my mind or something,” she put her hands on her hips and glared at him again. She wasn’t sure why, but his nostrils flared when he looked at her. She didn’t think she was in any danger, but she was certainly walking a fine line of something.

  “Jennifer, I didn’t read your mind. Why do you argue so much, anyway? You never told me why you do the things you do,” he said, and glared right back at her.

  “Oh, come on, you can’t tell me rallying for social causes is the same thing as reading minds and fighting other dragons for a dragon lord?”

  “Is mine not a social cause just because it does not impact you and your kind directly?” he responded. Jennifer huffed. Last night she read that dragons were clever creatures, and Crylaine was no exception.

  “Fair point. So, I guess now is as good a time as any to ask: what else was true from that book? What are dragons really like?”

  He grinned at her again. “Well, I do like gold, and I have lots of it. But nowadays, we keep our money in banks like the rest of you mere mortals.” Jennifer couldn’t help but laugh. “And I’ve been with a few virgins, but I did not kidnap them. I find that they are sweet, but kind of a pain in the ass because they are so delicate. I have a great deal of patience, but I have a preference.”

  “And your preference is?” the question slipped out before Jennifer took a moment to think. He baited her hook, line, and sinker.

  “Women who wholeheartedly enjoy being in bed with me, and can hold their own.” Jennifer felt the swell of heat rise in her belly. He liked a challenge, and it just so happened she enjoyed being challenging, in bed and otherwise. The men she slept with hardly had any complaints, but for some reason or another, things had not really worked out for her in the relationship department. She would also never let herself be controlled by a man, which is what made her current predicament particularly frustrating. There was no fire escape ladder in sight. She could not just climb down and escape all of this, even if she wanted to.

  Jennifer decided if she couldn’t get down, maybe there was a reason for it. She sat down stubbornly, letting her back rest against the stone wall that circled the top of the roof. “Well, you’re not going to fly me down there. No way.”

  “Are you going to stay up here all night then?” he asked.

  “Yup. I’m all set. I will leave in the morning when the library reopens,” she answered.

  “Jennifer…”

  Jennifer closed her eyes and wondered if he would still be standing there when she opened them. Sure enough, when she did, he was now sitting down beside her. He folded one leg over the other as casually as if he were wearing a pair of sweatpants, relaxing on the couch.

  “You don’t have to stay,” she pointed out.

  “No, I don’t,” he agreed. “But I at least partially responsible for getting you into this mess, so I figure it’s only polite that I stick it out with you.”

  “Even if it’s all night?” she asked.

  “Sure. In the morning, we can go on a real date. Maybe get some coffee.”

  “New York coffee shops sort of frown on nude people strolling in and ordering a cup of java,” she joked. She changed the subject, wanting to take this time to learn a little more about Laine and his other dragons-kind. “So, where did the dragons originally come from? Surely all of the dragons in the world are not hiding here in New York,” she asked.

  “No, there is a large population in Europe. We seek the wild places because they provide freedom. In empty, secluded areas, we are free to be what, and who, we are.”

  “So why are you here? Is it to escape from the...what were female dragons called? The Serpentina?”

  “Sort of. Yes, we are hiding from the females. We are actually hiding Drake’s mate from the females. We do not cower before the Serpentina. They turned vicious, but we have maintained control,” he answered with defiance. Jennifer opened her mouth to say something, but Laine continued. “It isn’t a gender biased thing, it is simply the way it is with our species. Speaking for gender, that is the second reason why we are here.”

  Jennifer thought back to what they book had said about how the dragons adapted after the Serpentina turned against them. “You need mates,” she offered. Laine glanced over, impressed, but she continued. “It’s a natural order of things. Biology is a force in itself. I speak out on behalf of feminists sometimes, but survival is what is most important for all species.”

  “Yes. This is true. My Lord’s mate is named Claire. Sometime, I would like you to meet them, as well as my other brothers. If you are willing,” he said.

  Jennifer thought about this. Meeting the family was kind of deal. She also was not sure how she felt about being actively pursued as a dragon’s mate. How could she trust that he was not just using her as a way to pass on his seed, like those breeding dogs her activist group had once rescued from a puppy mill? “I’m not sure yet.”

  “What is it that I need to do to make you sure? It is a strange calling, but dragons feel in our blood when we find a mate that we truly connect with. I want to be with you, but I also want give you time, if you need it. At least I didn’t do what our Lord Drake did when he
met Claire.”

  “And what was that?”

  “He kidnapped her and brought her to our home in the Hudson Valley,” he replied. Jennifer inched back and stared up at him. She wondered: if she refused him, would he kidnap her too? “But there was extenuating circumstances. The Serpentina attacked Claire and Drake. He had no choice but to protect her. He was honor-bound.”

  “I’m not a damsel in distress, Laine.”

  “No. You most certainly aren’t. Which is why I am trying to explain everything to help you make your own choices,” he said.

  “Well, I don’t know about the whole meet the family thing yet. But what if we start with…” she trailed off, rising to her knees and cupping his face in her hands. He froze, not daring to move. She relished the power she wielded over him. If she told him to remain frozen like that for the rest of the night, she was pretty sure he would. She kissed him slowly at first. She felt his muscles twitching under her as he attempted to remain in control. It must be sweet torture to succumb to the advances of a mere mortal.

  Jennifer felt a rumble in his chest when she deepened the kiss and began darting her tongue in and out between his lips. When she broke off the kiss, he was panting underneath her. His eyes were no longer solid emerald jewels, but flaming green portals of fire. He groaned and leaned towards her, but she moved her head away. As he stilled, she dipped her mouth and kissed him quickly. When he tried to maneuver his own tongue into her mouth, she nipped his lower lip and his whole huge body jerked and spasmed in anticipation and arousal. Jennifer let her fingers trail along his chest. He watched as she explored his torso like she was imagining all of his scales, and traced where the white tips met the ebony armor. Her fingers traveled lower, and she heard his jaw crack from grinding his teeth so hard. But she skipped over his cock, which drove him wild. He wanted to mate with her in every sense of the word. She knew it not just by the warm wetness she had felt growing between her own thighs, but how rigid his body had gone under her. He was tight, hot, and as ready for her as she was for him. But she needed to stake her claim. She was outspoken, bold, and not the kind of woman to fall into circumstances idly. She was telling him all of this with her fingers. She would decide when she would act on what he was offering. His offering throbbed as she traced a single manicured nail up the inside of his thigh, coming dangerously close to what he wanted her to touch.