“What do you want?” Mira demanded, her voice shaking a little with fear though she lifted her chin bravely. “Why have you been following me?”
The men didn’t reply—only surrounded them in a loose circle, wary looks on their faces. Conrad could feel his heart thudding hard in his chest. It was only a matter of time before the men struck. He knew he shouldn’t shift out here, knew from Lana’s stories that it would endanger every dragon in this world if he was seen… but what alternative did he have? These men were here to kidnap Mira, he remembered, rage flaring in his stomach. Or worse. He wanted to tear them limb from limb… to feel his talons rip and tear through their soft flesh, to inflict on them the fear they’d been so happy to inflict on Mira. The strength of his anger frightened him. He’d always been a peaceful person, always searching for the most diplomatic solution to even the most tense of disputes… but where Mira was concerned, he was frightened by the fire he’d discovered in his belly.
But there was no need for a bloodbath, he told himself. These men, moving together, dressed alike, they were most likely soldiers, following orders. And as reprehensible as those orders might have been, they didn’t deserve a bloody, gruesome death. Wishing he believed that, he took a breath… then let the shift move through him.
It felt good to unfurl his wings at last. The men around him took a few steps back as the transformation took place, and one glance at their worried but unsurprised faces told him that his hunch had been right—they knew what they were dealing with. But one look at Mira told him that she wasn’t with them on that. Her golden eyes were larger than he’d ever seen them, and all the color had drained from her face. She looked utterly terrified, and he had to steel himself against the feeling of guilt that wrenched at his heart. If she was frightened now, it was about to get a whole lot worse.
The men were barking orders at each other, and he looked up to see yet more of them gathered around the back of a vehicle, busily pulling something out of it that glinted in the darkness. Conrad wasn’t going to wait around to see what kind of weapon they’d prepared for use against a dragon. Hoping fiercely that Mira would find it in her heart to forgive him, he leaped aloft… and in the same moment, scooped Mira up as carefully as he could in his razor-sharp talons, careful only to grip her where her denim jacket would protect her skin.
His wings burned as he powered his way into the sky. Aside from one strangled scream when he’d first grabbed her, Mira was silent in his talons, but he knew it was hardly the most comfortable way to travel. If they’d had time, he’d have encouraged her to climb onto his neck instead… not that he had any way of knowing if she’d accept that invitation. He scanned the unfamiliar landscape below them as he gained altitude, acutely aware that they couldn’t stay up here for long. Even in the darkness, they risked being seen. The city below them danced with bright lights, and he found his gaze drifting towards the great dark mass of the ocean to the west. That would simply have to do.
It was cold on the beach, a blustery wind blowing in from across the water that buffeted him as he winged his careful way in to make an awkward landing in the sand. He set Mira down as carefully as he could, feeling her grip the blunt side of his talon as she got her balance. Once she was steady, he lowered his head, making use of his sharp dragon eyesight to check her for injuries. A few rips and tears in the jacket, but her skin, thankfully, was unscathed.
She hadn’t moved away from him, he noticed. She was standing close, her head tilted back to take in the sight of him, golden eyes full of as much wonder as fear. Had anyone ever studied him this intently? Feeling oddly self-conscious, he folded his wings to his back and returned her gaze steadily. It was clear from her expression that his suspicions earlier had been correct. This was not the expression of a woman that had ever seen a dragon before. She murmured a few things in her own language as she stared at him.
“It’s you,” she said finally, seeming to remember herself. “It is you, isn’t it? Conrad?”
He inclined his head, blinking in agreement. In these bodies, they were capable of a kind of telepathic communication, but something told him that the brush of his mind might be a little too much for Mira to handle right now… assuming she could hear him at all. He’d never tried to communicate that way with a human.
“Can you turn back?” she asked, her voice suddenly uncertain. He let the magic rush through him… and then he was standing beside her in the sand, the dark expanse of the beach around them suddenly feeling a lot more desolate without his thick scales to protect him from the chill. “Thank you,” Mira said softly. Then her eyes narrowed—and she thumped him in the chest with a closed fist. The blow wasn’t hard enough to hurt, but it certainly surprised him. “What were you thinking, you idiot? No, you—blastedidiot. No—” She narrowed her eyes in vexation. “Why didn’t you teach me how to swear?”
“I’m sorry,” he said quickly. “I’m sorry I didn’t warn you, but we had to get away—”
“Warnme? I’m fine. I don’t care about that!” Her expression was incredulous. “I care about you, doingthatin the middle of a public street! What if someone had seen you? What if they’d caught you? Do you have any idea what kind of insane science experiments they’d do on you? You’re a dragon!” She clapped one hand over her mouth, eyes disbelieving. “A literal dragon. This is what you meant earlier, isn’t it?”
All he could do was nod. She was pacing up and down in front of him now, the cold air tousling her curls.
“Assuming for the moment I’m not having a complete nervous breakdown, which is definitely not off the list of possibilities… okay. You’re a dragon. You’re a shapeshifting dragon.” She looked up at him abruptly as a new thought occurred to her. “Those men knew, didn’t they? They weren’t surprised when you changed.”
“They knew,” he acknowledged. “They’d brought weapons specifically designed for disabling shifters, too.” It had been a net they were getting out of the van… a net woven with silver. He shuddered to think of what it might have done to him.
“Weapons… how could they know about fighting shifters? Are they from your world too?”
He shook his head. “There are shifters in this world too, Mira. Unlike those in my world, they live in secret among humans.”
She stared at him. “You’re telling me I could’ve walked past a dragon every day of my life and not even known it?” When he nodded, she closed her eyes for a long moment, swaying on the spot, and he moved instinctively closer to steady her. Mira’s eyes flashed a warning at him… but after a moment, she leaned against him instead. He wrapped his arms around her, feeling her shoulders shivering a little.
“You’re freezing,” he told her softly, not liking the way the cold night air was biting into them. “I know you have a lot of questions, Mira, and I want to answer them, but—”
“You’re right,” she said, her voice a little muffled where she was pressing her face against his chest. As worried as he was about her, he couldn’t help but enjoy the feeling of holding her against him. Eventually, she pulled away, taking a deep, steadying breath. He could almost feel her straightening her spine, pushing down the fear and shock that must have been racing through her. “First things first—shelter. Come on. This close to the beach, there’s bound to be a motel or something nearby.”
And with that, they were off. Obediently, Conrad fell into step behind her, feeling his worry for her mixing uneasily with his admiration for her strength. She’d been through so much in such a short time… but his instincts were telling him that the worst was yet to come.
Chapter 13 - Mira
Mira had never been more grateful to have her phone in her pocket. As much as she’d grown to hate the world’s increasing reliance on technology, which seemed more unnecessarily complicated with every passing year, she had to admit that it was good to have everything she needed in one handy place. Her credit card, her ID, her emergency contacts… all stored safely in the device in her hand. Good thing, too. Going back to her house was out of the question right now. As far as she was concerned, everything she owned in the whole wide world was right here in her hand.
Conrad was following along behind her, quiet and implacable as always. Already, she was beginning to wonder whether any of it had really happened. There was no way that any of that could have been real, was there? If it wasn’t for the holes in her thick denim jacket, she might have been able to dismiss all of it as some kind of stress-induced blackout… but she hadn’t blacked out at all, had she? She’d been wide awake when the dragon’s great wings had carried them both over the twinkling lights of the city below. And as if finding the eye of the storm, she’d gazed down at the landscape below her and felt, for just a few minutes, a curious sense of wonder and something almost like joy.
Dragon, her mind kept whispering, as though if she thought about it long enough it might sound a little less ridiculous. Conrad could turn into a dragon. No, she thought, thinking back to the language he’d used. Hewasa dragon. If anything, it was the human form that was the one he could turn into. Was that more or less unbelievable than the part where they’d first met in their dreams, she wondered?
To her relief, there was a motel not far from the beach with a neon vacancy sign flickering its sickly light over the street. Not the classiest place she’d ever seen, and she knew what kind of assumptions the receptionist was making when she looked the two of them up and down, but right now, she couldn’t bring herself to care. Let her judge them if she wanted to. Mira had bigger things on her mind. The receptionist slid a key across the counter and the two of them headed for their room. Mira was aware of the yawning silence between them—neither of them had said a word since they’d left the beach—but she had no idea how to break it. It would have felt a little disingenuous, making small talk after what had just happened.
The room was predictably dingy. A double bed, a sparsely appointed en suite bathroom, and an armchair that looked like it might have been picked up off the side of the road. Mira excused herself to the bathroom, leaned on the sink, and took a few deep, steadying breaths. Then she found her own gaze in the mirror.
“You’ve always said you’re good in a crisis,” she told herself in a low undertone, not wanting Conrad to overhear her talking to herself. “Guess you’ve got to prove that now.”
When she emerged from the bathroom, Conrad was sitting on the edge of the bed with his hands neatly folded in his lap. She studied him for a long moment, that calm blue-eyed gaze, that unruffled mask of confidence. The creature she’d stared up at on the beach, the creature that had snatched her up in its talons and spirited her off into the sky… where was that creature now? Buried somewhere under that handsome face, sleeping… ready to pounce at any moment.