by Eva Chase
West didn’t look happy, but he didn’t argue either. Aaron nodded. “That sounds like the best we can make of the situation.”
“Then I’d better get out there before it’s too late to stop them anyway.”
We loped together through the halls to the main entrance. I glanced toward the guest wing, but I didn’t want to wake up Kylie for this. I had the feeling there’d be plenty more fighting where she could pitch in.
On the front steps, I undressed and shifted as smoothly as if I’d been doing this my entire life. My body expanded up into the air. With a heave of my taloned hind feet, I was swooping up toward the sky.
I kept my word. As the alphas and a few of the guards West had brought along gathered in the courtyard, I hovered above the estate with vast, steady flaps of my dragon wings. Fire itched to unfurl up my throat. I couldn’t help remembering that past dragon shifter’s comment about the fae trying to steal those flames from her mother.
I didn’t have time to puzzle over that idea further. Movement caught my eye in the distance between the rolling hills.
The vampires had left their headlights off, having perfectly good night vision and no interest in giving us any warning. But the moon was bright enough for my shifter vision to pick out the shape of the vehicle cruising toward us down the road.
It must also have been bright enough for the vampires to see me, waiting against the starry sky. The truck had only crossed about a quarter of the distance between the hills and the estate buildings when it started to slow.
I braced myself, my muscles bunching. With a few broad flaps of my wings, I soared closer. The second the vamps stopped or showed any sign of disembarking, I had to dive. I had to burn them up before they could turn their guns on me.
The truck didn't stop, though. At my movement, it swerved around in a U-turn. As soon as the vehicle was pointing away from me, they hit the gas. The truck shot down the road the way it'd come.
I hurtled after it, tucking my wings tight as the wind warbled over my scales. The itch in my throat deepened into a furious burn. In the back of my mind the echo of gunshots rose up, the jabs of the bullets' impact, Nate's body as he'd crumpled the other night.
The vampires were stretching the distance between us. Almost at the pass between the hills already. No, I couldn't let them escape. I smacked my wings through the air, fangs scraping together in frustration.
A tickle of sensation broke through my rage. A tug. I tried to shake it off, but it wrapped all through my awareness. Abruptly, the meaning of it hit me.
My mates were calling me home.
My muscles twitched, rejecting the idea of retreat. I could keep going, fly harder, farther. I could feel it.
But that wasn't the point, was it? I'd promised them. And the last time I'd gotten carried away with vengeance, I'd burned most of a forest down. As soon as the truck veered out of sight into the pass, the vamps could stop and get ready for me with their guns.
That might even be what they wanted—for me to keep chasing them.
An ache formed in my chest. I didn’t want to let them just leave. I wanted them all burned into cinders. But I forced myself to bank on the wind and wheel around.
The smell of clover filled my nostrils again as I glided over the property I'd inherited with my role and landed in the estate's grassy yard. I let myself shift back when my feet touched the ground. The grass pressed soft and cool against my tender human skin. Then an arm slid around my shoulders, pulling me into a tight, pine-tinged embrace.
West. The last of my anger fled as I buried my face in his shoulder. He'd never been the one to come to me after a shift before. But everything was different now.
Everything was different.
He helped me up, keeping his arm around me. I didn't need his support to stand, but it felt kind of nice having him there anyway. And I liked being able to see up close the faint embarrassed flush that had crept up his neck.
My other mates had gathered around us. "The vamps left," I said. "They saw me and they took off. For now."
The last words fell from my lips with an ominous weight. We all knew they'd be back tomorrow, with larger numbers or a more thorough plan.
"Then we get ready for them," Nate said, but I heard the thread of worry in his voice. It wasn't just this estate but so many other kin all across the country we needed to protect.
It was too much for one dragon alone. I could admit that. Maybe it was too much for even me and my alphas and all the kin who stood with us.
If we could summon powers beyond our own kind, I had to find that out.
I took a deep breath and raised my chin. "As soon as it's light, I want to talk to the fae."
Chapter 16
Ren
“I don’t know about this, Sparks,” West said as we pushed through the brush in the dense forest. Twigs crackled under our feet. My alphas and I were making our way through the woods on the other side of one of my hills, not far beyond the property that belonged to the dragon shifter estate, toward a pocket of fae land. The sky had clouded, but a few streaks of sunlight pierced through, bringing the summer heat with them even this early in the morning.
“For any reason other than the hundred or so complaints you’ve already made?” I asked the wolf shifter.
West narrowed his eyes at me. Then his expression gentled as he wiped away a cool drop of dew that had dripped onto my cheek. “You haven’t had many dealings with the fae yet. I’ve never seen a sign they have the slightest friendly feeling toward us. Even the history fanatic back there hasn’t heard of any warm relations between our communities.” He jabbed his thumb toward Aaron.
That sounded pretty similar to his earlier objections. “Okay, but I know they worked with the dragon shifters before. You all saw the carvings on that pedestal in the mountain. I listened to a dragon shifter from almost two hundred years ago talk about how great the fae are.”
“Two hundred years is a pretty long time,” Marco pointed out.
“I know,” I said. “And obviously relations have gone pretty—incredibly—sour. But…” I touched West’s arm with what I hoped was a reassuring caress. “We need allies. The vampires are almost overwhelming us. The fae used to be willing to stand by our side. I’m not saying we let them off the hook for the things they’ve done wrong. I just have to find out if there’s anything I can do to mend that falling out—at least enough that they’ll help us push back the bloodsuckers.”
“You always want to see the good in people, don’t you?” he said with a baleful look.
I raised my eyebrows at him. “A quality I think you should be particularly thankful for.”
Nate gave a cough that might have been covering a laugh. West glanced back at the bear shifter with a growl, but it was more playful than menacing. He elbowed me. “Point taken. And I do think the fae probably hate the vampires at least as much as they hate us. Possibly more. If it’s more, we might be able to work with that. I just don’t want them anywhere near my kin.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“You really are an overachiever, Princess of Flames,” Marco said teasingly. “A few weeks ago we grab you and tell you you’ve got to unite the kin-groups—surprise! And you’ve already moved on from that to uniting entire paranormal communities.”
I smiled. “Well, I don’t think I’m exactly finished uniting the kin-groups yet. And I don’t know if I’m going to manage to unite anything at all with the fae. We’ll just have to see.”
“West is right about one thing,” Aaron said. “You can play to the idea of their own self-interest. The vampires could easily decide they want to exterminate the fae when they’re done with us.”
“Just that one thing?” West grumbled, cocking his head.
Aaron chuckled. “We’ll see about the rest. I doubt Ren’s ancestors recorded events that never happened. But I agree that the fae haven’t shown much indication of friendliness in my lifetime.”
Well, that seemed to be par for the c
ourse for me these days. Taking on the Impossible: The Serenity Drake story. Who would I want to play me in the movie version?
Nate paused, touching a mark on one of the tree trunks. “We’re coming into the local fae leader’s domain now. Maybe we should keep the negative comments quiet from here on?”
“Good plan,” I said, with particular emphasis at West.
He held up his hands. “I’m not going to ruin your peacekeeping mission, Sparks! But I also don’t promise I won’t say ‘I told you so’ if this goes sideways.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “As long as you say it while you’re making better use of those hands, I promise I won’t mind.”
His gaze heated up in an instant. “I’ll take that deal.”
There, now I had him grinning. Maybe that thought would keep him in a better mood until we were finished with this mission.
The fae weren’t expecting us like they had been when I’d met with their monarch not that long ago. I stopped a few steps down the rough path by the edge of their territory and propped myself against a tree to wait. The last thing I needed was to start this impromptu parlay off on the wrong foot by barging deep into their lands. I could show proper respect. I just wanted them to notice I was here.
It only took a few minutes. A slender, elongated figure slipped from between the trees. Her entire form shimmered with a glow that made it difficult to tell if she was even wearing clothing—or if she wasn’t, how human her body was.
“Shifters,” she said, with a slight bob of her head. “Dragon and alphas. These are our grounds.”
I straightened up. “I know. I’d like to speak with the one who rules over you in this territory.”
The fae woman’s eyes gleamed with an even deeper sparkle, like a silver coin under sunlit water. “On what matter?”
I remembered Aaron’s suggestion. “A major threat that could affect both our peoples.”
The woman pursed her lips, but she bobbed her head again. “I will see if he is willing to meet with you. Stay here.”
There was a slightly accusatory note to her last words, as if she thought we’d want to go gallivanting around fae territory the second we had the slightest opening. “That’s fine,” I said, leaning back against the tree.
“Oh, yeah,” West said under his breath after she’d vanished into the woods. “I’m bowled over by that warm welcome.”
I stuck my tongue out at him and then really hoped no fae were still watching us. “I haven’t had a chance to make my case yet.”
He sighed. “Well, if anyone can convince them, it’s you.”
That was the greatest vote of confidence I’d ever gotten from him. I’d take it.
“So the fae have leaders based on where they live?” I asked Aaron, figuring the eagle alpha was the one most likely to have in-depth knowledge on this sort of subject. “I guess there aren’t different types of faeries like the shifter kin-groups.”
He nodded. “The fae have a unique equilibrium with nature. When one is born, they come into being alongside a plant or natural spring or something of that sort. They sort of sprout up in colonies, with all their connected trees and so on nearby.”
A chilling thought struck me. “What happens if they’re forced to leave the place where their connected thing is? Like if humans move in?”
“I’m not sure,” Aaron said. “Speculation is that they would wither away after a certain amount of time if they were forced away. We have a few reports of fae dying if their connected object is outright destroyed. The tie is very strong.”
That meant human encroachment affected the fae even more than it did us. Shifters could get up and move, as long as there was empty land to move to. The fae didn’t have that luxury.
A glossy whisper carried through the breeze, raising the hairs on the back of my neck. I pushed myself completely upright. A second later, a glinting fae man appeared in the middle of our glade.
He wasn’t as impressive as the fae monarch I’d encountered near Aaron’s estate, but I guess that was to be expected. He was just the local leadership. The fae man still shone brighter than the lesser fae who’d directed him to us. He held himself with chin high and shoulders squared. Like all the fae, his body was tall and slim, but he was taller than most, that knobby chin of his nearly level with Nate’s forehead. I’d have bet the bear shifter had a hundred pounds more muscle on him, though.
“My name is Cerimon,” the fae man said. “I tend to this part of the woods. What is your business here, dragon shifter and alphas?”
He didn’t bother with any sign of respect, but the fae monarch hadn’t bowed even slightly to us either. It didn’t really matter to me. I’d rather just get down to business.
“I don’t know how much you’re aware of what’s going on outside this part of the forest,” I said. “But we shifters have come under attack by the vampires. They’ve already slaughtered everyone they could reach in several villages. They nearly killed one of my mates. They’re using guns of the worst kind, and they seem determined to keep at us until they’ve destroyed all of us.”
Cerimon made a tiny dip of his head. I couldn’t tell whether it was acknowledgment that he’d heard of this happening or that he was hearing me now. “And how does this matter concern us?”
I suppressed the urge to grimace at him. “I’ve learned that the dragon shifters and the fae were once allied.” I touched my throat. “I hold the power that my kind and yours created together. I know in the last century relations have been… strained between us, but I was hoping there might be room to at least talk about working together to tackle our enemy.”
“Your enemy, it sounds like,” the fae leader said.
“Likely to become the fae’s too, if you stand by doing nothing,” Aaron said evenly.
“Do you really think you could defend yourselves if the bloodsuckers took a mind to rid the country of fae too?” Marco asked.
I waved at my mates to stand down. Cerimon was frowning.
“You can say that,” he said. “But we’ve had more troubles with your kind than with the vampires in recent years.” His gaze slid to Nate. “What of the group of your kin that set up new homes at the edge of our territory in New Mexico and cut down one of our trees for firewood?”
A shiver ran down my back. Nate spread his hands. “The fae in that area hadn’t appeared to my kin at all. They didn’t realize the tree was special.”
“It was marked,” Cerimon snapped. “A life was lost.”
“And we did everything we could to make reparations.”
How did you make up for a life cut short? My stomach was starting to churn. The fae leader’s gaze shot to Marco. “And your feline kin. I can’t even count the mentions I’ve heard of your kind snapping branches and trampling bushes while they roam around, without concern for whose land they’re venturing onto.”
“Believe me,” Marco said dryly. “I know just how frustrating my kin can be. I’d keep them on a shorter leash, but cats don’t take well to leashes in the first place. I do what I can. And we’ve offered compensation as needed too. I promise you it was only carelessness, not malice. There was no intention to harm you.”
“And you.” Cerimon’s attention moved to West. “Your people took over an entire stretch of forest that had been ours not far from your estate, and attacked us when the fae there tried to take it back.”
West’s lips drew back to bare his teeth. Uh oh. “The fae there tried to ‘take it back’ by blasting every shifter they saw with their magic,” he said in what was close to a snarl. “And it was land that the last we’d heard you’d abandoned. If the fae had come to speak with me about it peacefully, I’d have seen the new village moved. Instead you killed eight of my kin.”
“And how many of ours do you think we’ve lost to your ‘mistakes’ and your ‘carelessness’?” the fae leader retorted. He turned back to me. “I know you are new to your position among the shifters. I will not blame you for what was done before you had any command over
your kind. But I have every reason to feel you shifters can no longer be trusted.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, meaning it. I didn’t know exactly what had happened in any of the situations he’d talked about… but I could see how it had looked bad to the fae. My alphas trusted that their kin had good intentions and that the fae must be at fault. How could I blame the fae for assuming the same thing? I was starting to suspect that if we looked at any of those incidents carefully, it’d turn out the truth was somewhere in the middle.
“All I can do is appeal to our history,” I went on. “We’ve clashed, we’ve fought—but we also appreciate the same things, don’t we? Life, roaming around in nature, lands where we can be ourselves away from human beings. From what I’ve seen, the vampires don’t care about any of that. They probably want more cities, more people, so they have more victims to feed from.”
Cerimon’s jaw twitched. His eyes had clouded. No, he didn’t like the vampires at all either.
I felt a brief burst of hope. Then the fae leader spun on his heel, giving me his back.
“This is what shifters do,” he said over his shoulder as he moved to leave us. “They ask and they take and they take, but when do they ever give to us? If you want a compromise, any sort of collaboration, I can tell you one thing for certain. It’s going to require more than talk for us to believe in you.”
Chapter 17
Ren
“Stubborn bastards,” West muttered as we headed down the hall of my estate to the main dining room. It was early for lunch, but we’d eaten breakfast at dawn, so I was more than ready to dig into whatever the cook had prepared. Even if my stomach seemed to be mostly made out of knots at the moment.
