by Lauren Smith
Mikhail held up a hand and brushed his palm down her nose, smiling as the female dragon huffed softly. Her eyes were like quicksilver as she gazed at him. The wild beast gentled at his touch because she recognized her mate. She nudged his chest with her snout. Fine-boned, yet strong. She was exquisite. His dragon rumbled in pleasure.
“My beauty,” he said, and meant it. She was glorious, and she was his. His heart swelled with an intensity he’d never thought possible. There was no desperation, no fear that this would end because she was human. Piper was one of his kind now.
Piper gave another snort, then lifted her head to stare at something over his shoulder. He turned to follow her gaze. The distant sight of a retreating SUV made him suddenly grin as he looked back at Piper.
“What do you say? Are you ready to fly?” He stepped back and stripped out of his clothes, his dragon rushing to the surface as he transformed.
Piper stared at the dark green dragon. He was beautiful, and she knew him. He was hers. Her dragon wanted to dance and nuzzle against him. But the sight of the car—Mikhail’s car—driving away grabbed her attention. That car needed to be stopped.
Her mate nudged her shoulder with his snout, urging her to follow. He took a running start and leaped skyward, his wings flapping hard enough to create a small windstorm. Piper ignored the flutter of nerves at thinking this was her first flight; even her dragon was nervous. It had been asleep for so long. But she did exactly what she’d seen Mikhail do. There was a second of gut-wrenching panic when she lifted into the air, and then she was shooting even higher, her wings catching the wind, and she was flying.
Their wings pulled them forward through the night air like twin bolts of lightning, until they were alongside the retreating vehicle. Mikhail angled his wings, making a sharp turn back toward land, and she copied him. They flew toward the car, and Piper flew ahead of her mate, drawing her mouth open. Fire exploded from her jaws as she swooped in front of the SUV. The car skidded to a halt, dust mixing with the flames she released. The pair landed on either side of the vehicle and watched closely as the man in the car stumbled out.
“No!” Conrad shouted, his arms already beginning to bulge. “It’s not possible! I killed you!”
Piper sensed the coming transformation. Fury took over. Her tail lashed out like a whip and slashed him across the chest, sending him crashing into a large rock fifty feet away. He didn’t move. The scent of blood reached her nostrils, and she hissed, satisfied by it.
Piper prowled up to Conrad, nudging his body with one clawed front foot. The wound to his abdomen was deep. He still didn’t stir, and there was no heartbeat. His neck lay at an impossible angle, limp as a ragdoll. She turned to look at her mate and froze.
On the horizon, silhouetted against the setting sun, were more dragons. She tensed and made a low growl. Mikhail also noticed them and put his body in front of hers as they waited for the others to land. There were six of them, all deep red in color.
There was a long moment of silence. The new dragons stared hard at Mikhail and Piper. Then they started to shift. Piper cocked her head, amused at the parade of naked men who now bent over to open small duffel bags of clothes that had been roped to their back legs. She saw no threat from these men, especially not while they were in human form.
Next, Mikhail transformed back to his human form, and she grew nervous. Wanting to protect him should the others try to harm him, she started to push him back with her front foot, but he shushed her and patted her neck. Then he caught something one of the men tossed to him, and he started to dress.
“We were afraid we wouldn’t reach you in time. My father knew Sinclair from the old days and said he was one nasty dragon to battle with. We thought you may need additional assistance,” one of the men said. “But it seems you handled the situation on your own.”
The dragon part of her didn’t recognize the man, but the human certainly did. Randolph Belishaw. Had he brought the others?
“We’re fine. How did you even know we needed help?” Mikhail replied, embracing the other man.
“I was afraid you didn’t get my message. It’s my fault Conrad found you. The bastard drugged me and got it out of me. He had some serum that kept me from—”
“Transforming? He used that on me too,” Mikhail growled.
“But…you were in dragon form just now. How?”
“It’s a long story.”
Belishaw looked at Conrad’s corpse with a scowl. “It seems we missed out on the pleasure of ripping him to pieces.”
“I’m afraid my mate was quite upset with him. The bastard didn’t stand a chance.” Rather than showing horror at her actions, Mikhail sounded proud.
“This is Piper?” Belishaw stared at her, eyes wide. “How is that possible?”
“I promise to explain it all to you over drinks.”
“And I look forward to hearing it. You’ve found quite a mate, Mikhail. I envy you.” Belishaw approached Piper, but she sensed he was teasing her by the way his eyes glinted. He knew who she was, but she couldn’t get her dragon to calm down, not after her first transformation. Not after her first kill. The beast was edgy and still full of energy.
Mikhail chuckled and stroked her frill, which lay flat back against her neck. She shivered in pleasure at the tickling sensation.
“Come now, little dove. It’s safe. Come back to me.” He continued to run his hands down the edges of the sensitive frill. Her nerves and fears evaporated. Before she could stop herself, her body was changing. Suddenly she was being held in Mikhail’s arms.
“Anyone have a spare set of clothes?” he asked.
The men around them chuckled, and Piper flinched. She was completely naked.
“Here.” Belishaw threw a long black peacoat to them, and Mikhail helped her into it. She shivered, but she wasn’t as cold as she expected to be.
“I’m not that cold,” she whispered to him, completely mystified. She should have been freezing.
“It’s your dragon blood,” Mikhail said before he pressed a lingering kiss to her lips. “You’ll run hotter from now on.”
She realized Belishaw was eyeing her with a mix of awe and concern. “I cannot believe she’s a dragoness. There hasn’t been a transformation like that for our kind in centuries.”
Mikhail hugged her close. “She’s nothing short of a miracle.”
Belishaw nodded at the five dragons behind him. “They’ll take care of the body. My family will smooth over the situation with his disappearance. A tragic accident I think, perhaps on a fishing boat near Cornwall.” He shot a dark glance at the cold corpse. “He had dark designs for this country, and being a braggart he couldn’t help but boast about them.”
“Who is he really?” Mikhail asked. “I’ve been this man’s bane for centuries, yet I don’t even know him. Just a vague sense of having seen him before in Elizabeth’s prison.”
“His name was Conrad Sinclair. He was a member of the House of Parliament, very influential. He planned to run for prime minister next. He’d have won, too. Both because of his dragon charms and the alliance he wished to strike up with what is left of the Drakor family.”
“And then?”
Belishaw huffed. “As Prime Minister he planned to treat this country as his personal plaything and ultimately destroy it. It is good he was dealt with now.”
“Agreed.” Mikhail walked over to his car, his arm still around Piper’s shoulders. “Why don’t we meet at my house? Come as soon as you finish here.”
“See you soon.” Belishaw waved at them before Piper climbed into the car and Mikhail began the drive back to Cornwall.
Piper didn’t speak the entire way. When Mikhail parked the car outside his home and came over to her door, she was still staring off into space, her mind stuck on all that had happened.
She had turned into a dragon. A dragon.
“Piper, love, are you all right?” Mikhail reached into the car and helped her out.
“Yes. I’m just… It�
�s a lot to take in,” she said in a dreamlike state. She’d died in his arms, then came back to life as a dragon. And she’d killed someone. How did one process all this?
Concern shadowed his eyes. “I know you didn’t ask for this. I know I bonded with you without asking permission, and that’s why you didn’t want to stay. I’ve royally screwed things up.” She saw pain deep in his lovely green eyes.
“You’re wrong,” she said.
He raised his brows but remained silent.
“I didn’t know we’d bonded. I wanted to stay, so much that it hurt me to leave. But I didn’t want to shorten your life…to effectively kill you because I had a short human lifespan. I would have given anything to stay with you.”
He was speechless, and before she could react, he lifted her up in the air, holding her tight as he spun her around.
“Mikhail?” She laughed, unsure what he was doing. When he set her back down, she was biting her lip because it hurt too much to keep smiling.
“You’ll stay? I won’t lose you?”
“No. I’m yours,” she vowed.
She didn’t want to think about the details, where they would live, what they’d tell her parents, let alone her job or the police. Right now she had him in her arms, and that was the only thing that mattered.
“Let’s get you inside,” Mikhail said, seeing her shiver. “You’ll freeze. You may be a dragon, but you can still get cold.” He tugged her back to the house and set her on the couch. She giggled as he removed the coat and kissed her naked body before wrapping her up in warm blankets.
“I’ll put some tea on, and then we can talk.” He vanished from view. She watched the snow begin to fall. Snow? She thought the weather forecast had called for rain. She was too busy staring at the landscape along the coast to notice the car coming until it was almost in the driveway.
“Mikhail, there’s a car headed this way,” she called out.
He reappeared with two mugs of hot tea. Mikhail frowned as he stared at the car.
“That’s not Belishaw,” Mikhail said, setting the mugs on the table. “Why don’t you go upstairs and change into some clothes. I’m afraid our talk will have to come later, after we deal with these visitors.”
“Is it trouble?” she asked.
“Hopefully not.”
She slipped upstairs to get dressed, trusting Mikhail had the situation under control. By the time she returned, she heard voices—both male and female.
“Piper, we’re in the kitchen,” Mikhail called when she reached the bottom stair. Once in the kitchen, she found a handsome blond man and a pretty woman with dark brown hair standing close to Mikhail.
“Piper, this is my brother Grigori and his mate, Madelyn.”
Piper stared at Mikhail and the man beside him. The family resemblance was there, the proud features, the beautiful eyes, only Grigori’s were blue rather than green.
“Hi,” Madelyn said, her eyes bright and her smile warm. She was American like Piper, something that made Piper relax instantly. Madelyn held out a hand, and Piper shook it.
“Belishaw mentioned you might come,” was all she could think to say. She’d learned much about Grigori from the sketches with the small notes, and yet she still felt shy around him, afraid to make eye contact.
“Belishaw, eh?” Grigori said with a chuckle and shared a smile with Mikhail. “Good man…for an English dragon.” Grigori spoke in the same soft, slightly rough, and yet irresistible Russian accent as Mikhail.
Madelyn spoke up. “Why don’t you guys go out to the living room? Us girls will have some tea and see what’s in the kitchen to make for dinner.” She shooed the two men out of the kitchen and turned to Piper. “I can’t cook to save my life. I just needed a way to let them have a private talk. It’s been almost two hundred years since they last spoke. Besides, I’m dying to hear all about you.”
“Me?” Piper swallowed. “Well, you probably heard about the jewel heist…”
Madelyn grinned. “Not that. Don’t you realize you are the first human in a thousand years to turn into a dragon? At least, that’s what Grigori says. This is huge.”
Piper sighed. “It really hasn’t sunk in. I just… I mean, my old life is over, isn’t it? I’m still thinking about… I mean, I don’t know how to…” She couldn’t finish, and she suddenly felt like crying. Madelyn was there in an instant, hugging her.
“Hey. It’s going to be okay. I’ve been exactly where you are. I spent my life thinking I was human, but then I met Grigori and learned I was a Thunderbird. My whole life got turned on its head.”
“What’s a Thunderbird?” Piper wiped her eyes, curiosity outweighing her confusion.
“Sort of like a phoenix,” Madelyn explained. “A mythical bird that can kill dragons. It summons storms and can create sonic booms with its wings.”
“Wait, you kill dragons?”
Madelyn bit her lip and nodded. “They’re supposed to be my mortal enemy. It’s a long story, but being with Grigori changed the way I saw things. And being a part of the Barinov family… It’s amazing. You won’t regret being mated to Mikhail. Change this big is always scary, but it’s going to be okay. You’re meant to be one of us. We’ll help you get through this.” Madelyn gave her another warm hug. “Now, let’s find something to cook. Surely between the two of us we can make something edible. Dragons have big appetites. So do Thunderbirds, for that matter.”
Piper chuckled as she touched her stomach. She was definitely hungry.
She followed Madelyn to the fridge and realized she could actually hear Mikhail talking in the other room. Her sense of hearing had improved. How cool was that? She was dying to know just what other abilities she’d picked up now that she was a dragon shifter.
Hopefully she’d have the next several millennia to find out.
18
It is time to end a story that began in sorrow and ordeal and has ended in a deep and lasting happiness. May it be so for others.
-Anne McCaffrey
“It’s been a long time, brother,” Grigori said.
“It has indeed,” Mikhail replied. A hundred things he’d longed to say simply faded. He pulled his elder brother into a fierce hug. Two hundred years had passed since he’d seen Grigori, and in that embrace he felt every single day fade away.
“Now that you have the jewels back, tell me you will stop this exile nonsense and come home. Rurik and I miss you. Besides, now that you shall be an uncle soon…”
Mikhail’s lips parted in shock. “You mean you…”
“Madelyn and I are expecting a drakeling. Should be here in eight months. Can you believe it? I’m going to be a father.” Grigori’s blue eyes sparkled like diamonds. He’d never looked happier.
Mikhail slapped his brother’s back. “Congratulations.” But then he sobered. “But how? Madelyn isn’t a dragoness.” Belishaw was sure Mikhail’s brother had mated a mortal. He’d thought that Grigori wouldn’t want to have to watch his mate die, and children wouldn’t be possible.
Grigori’s expression sobered. “No. Madelyn isn’t a dragon, but she’s not mortal either.”
Mikhail was confused now. “Then what is she?”
“She’s a Thunderbird. I think that dragons can mate with other supernatural creatures because of the way our ancestors bonded to spirits in the same way.”
That wasn’t possible. The Thunderbirds were extinct, weren’t they? Their father had made it his life’s mission to kill them to avenge the loss of his own father. But if there were still Thunderbirds alive, and one was here…
“Piper.” Mikhail’s gasp sounded more like a hiss than he meant it to. His brother tensed as he barred the path to the kitchen.
“Easy, brother, she’s not going to hurt you.”
Mikhail curled his hands into fists. “She’s in the kitchen with my mate.”
“And Piper is perfectly safe,” Grigori promised. “Sit, and let me tell you all that’s happened since you left.”
Mikhail reluctantl
y sat down and listened as his brother shared an almost unbelievable tale of how he’d met Madelyn when she’d discovered James Barrow’s old journal in a library in Russia. Then he explained what had happened that fateful night when their parents had died. Only Mikhail’s mother had survived the battle, and she’d lived long enough to tell Grigori and Rurik what had happened. Mikhail had known their father wasn’t perfect, but to learn that he had tracked down and killed the last mated Thunderbirds on earth, when they hadn’t even wanted to fight, left him feeling cold.
“It was Mother. She found Madelyn, who was just an infant at the time. Mother took her to safety before she died. It’s all connected. Don’t you see?” Grigori asked, his voice full of awe. “It was fate that bound our lives together. First as enemies, and now as mates.”
“How did Rurik take the news?” Mikhail knew how hotheaded their younger brother could be. It was a trait in battle dragons to act rashly and without thought. It usually kept them alive.
“He was hesitant at first, but when we had to face the Drakors, Madelyn killed all of them. You should have seen it. They were all circling around this high mountain and coming out of these caves. Madelyn came screaming down from the heavens in her bird form and created a sonic boom that crushed the mountain down on them. I’m just glad that battle was in rural Russia or else the damned Brotherhood of the Blood Moon would be knocking on our door.” Grigori chuckled as though recalling some memory. “After that, Rurik became a fan.” It pained Mikhail to know he’d missed out on so much of his brothers’ lives.
“So,” Grigori said, focusing on him again. “Will you come home, brother?”
It was what he’d hoped to hear from his father, but he never would. Forgiveness from a dead man was not something he could ever get.
“I still need to talk to Piper. She’s only just become a dragon. This is all new to her. She’ll need time to reorganize her life. She might not want to move to Russia. So until she decides, I’ll go where she goes.”
