The sound of a scream jolted Noelle from her sleep. She jerked out of bed and launched into a run toward the source of the sound. She’d known who that was and it set her heart racing. Bare feet slapped the ground outside. The door of Dane’s cabin burst open and Liana stormed out.

Noelle felt her sense of urgency stutter at the sight of Liana. The leader’s mate turned burning eyes up to Noelle. The heat in them stuttered for a second, but when a voice sounded from inside the cabin they lit up again. Noelle stepped closer, straining to hear the voice.

It was coming from a laptop set on the dining room table. Dane pushed past Noelle, barely noticing her as he hugged Miri to his chest, hands partially covering her ears. Noelle felt her stomach flip, the rocks from the night before slamming into her all over again. On the small screen was the overlay of a local news station. Sitting across from the regular news caster was a man dressed in business casual, a GOE badge clipped to the pocket of his shirt as if he couldn’t bear to hide it at his hip. He had to show the world who he worked for.

Footage of the nomadic dragons’ reveal played on a small corner of the screen. Lucia Avila wrecked the GOE building on a loop, fed directly to the local citizens. Liana appeared beside Noelle, her arms crossed over her chest. The Welsh fire dragon leaked smoke through her nostrils. Noelle couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Liana made enough to make smoke.

Before Noelle could ask what was happening, the GOE official on the screen spoke.

“We have managed to detain the dragon responsible for the attack on one of our buildings. She engaged in an unprovoked assault on a building filled with innocent lives so the Guardians of Existence took measures to ensure the people in the surrounding areas were safe from this creature.”

The newscaster beside him didn’t miss a beat. “The dragons there with the creature in question claimed a long history of violence on the part of GOE. What do you have to say about that?”

The GOE official shrugged. “It is our belief that the dragons used these accusations to garner the public’s sympathy while they partook in the destruction of public property with a metaphysical being. We have caught and prosecuted the individuals responsible for their claims, although we have found them not to be as severe as the dragons claimed.”

Bullshit, Noelle thought. The word repeated itself on an endless cycle as the man kept speaking. He was so full of bullshit and the people around him were eating it up. How could they not tell it tasted like shit? Now, Noelle understood Liana’s smoke.

“This is only a video on the internet, but the actual footage has been playing every forty minutes on a local station,” Liana informed her.

Noelle felt her own fire surge. It was red, hot, and hungry for a target. She wanted to destroy this man’s life. Noelle was smarter than that; she understood this man was not responsible for every bad thing that happened because of GOE, but he was the face of their lies in that moment. When would it end?

“How close are you to compiling all of the testimonies?”

Liana’s head cocked to the side as she took a mental tally of her work. She sucked in a breath and let it out slowly. “Not nearly close enough to having all of them, but without hard evidence these people are willing to go back to believing the best of these arses.”

Noelle nodded. She understood. No one was going to happily accept these accusations from the mouth of a dragon. The people here were too afraid of the dragons. Fear, here in America, often led to backlash. The people were more likely to push aside their claims in favor of calling the dragons lazy and needy.

“What do we need?”

“The set of files Luc and Anya were given by GOE are nice, but they’re old and half of the information in them is redacted. Sure, the photos make great evidence, but nothing in there states that any of that was against their will. What we need is modern evidence. We need voice recordings. I hate to say this, but we need current photos of the injustice happening.”

Noelle nodded. She could do this. If it meant helping future dragons in the States, then she would do whatever it took. Liana shot her a sidelong glance, trying to surmise what was going on in Noelle’s head, but Noelle turned away. Liana already knew what they were planning; she’d probably guessed what Noelle was now thinking, too.

Liana could do nothing other than let out a heavy sigh. It was laden with the burdens the world had thrust upon her. If Noelle could do even the smallest task to help, then she would. It was high time she started helping those other than herself.

Mary would have been proud.

Noelle turned away from the reporter on the computer when Liana grabbed her arm and turned her back.

“You need to see this, too.”

Noelle’s eyes drifted back toward the screen and felt the world turn sideways. Lucia Avila was on the screen. Her lips were twisted in a near feral snarl. She was strapped down with silver lined grips, struggling uselessly against them. By all means, Lucia looked like an animal.

“What did they do to her?” Noelle whispered. She prayed Marc was nowhere near them. She prayed he never saw this.

“They broke the woman. I heard from Hector that this started early on and he assumed it was something he couldn’t fix.” Noelle could hear the anger in Liana’s voice. “Coming back from trauma like that is hard. You feel like you need to attack the world before it can attack you. I know what Lucia is feeling right now and I wish to the very depths of my monstrous soul that I could help her. She might have been able to come back from this, but now I’m not so sure.”

Noelle hated Hector for hiding this from them. What had been his motives? Sure, Noelle could understand wanting to hide this from her children, but it had accomplished nothing in the end. The boy knew what’d become of their mother. The other family was so intent on believing no one in this family had suffered. They were intent on believing no one here could ever understand what they’d gone through.

Everyone hurts in different ways, Noelle thought. Her beast wriggled inside of her. Its only thoughts were of Marc, wanting to run to him and comfort him with their body. She shook her head to rid herself of the images her beast had inserted.

Noelle spun on her heel and made her way back to her home. She’d throw on some clothes and run out to Norman to see if he could speed up the process any more, but her feet were frozen when she heard the GOE official speak again.

“We are taking extra measures to make sure the creatures are off your streets. They are dangerous and threaten your very way of life and we do not want that. To ensure your safety, we’re cleaning up your streets.”

The words haunted Noelle as she dressed, grabbing a pair of black, ripped jeans and throwing on an equally ripped concert tee with it. She didn’t know what the official’s words meant, but they held an ominous sound that clung to her and whispered in her ears over and over. It told her she’d never be safe. It told her there was no chance of this working.

Marc was still nowhere to be found. It irked her, for some reason that he couldn’t be bothered to show up at a decent time. It was still early by most definitions, so she couldn’t be all that angry with him. Perhaps, she was most angry that she suddenly felt lost and he was not there for her.

Noelle jammed the key into the ignition of her Jeep and turned, scolding herself for wanting Marc to be there when she gave clear indications she didn’t want him to be. She was kicking herself for her indecisiveness all the way into town.

Sliding out of the Jeep made her look around. Everywhere were possible GOE agents looking to grab her. The woman on the bench with her screaming child could be an agent for all she knew. The lady was most likely waiting for the bus, but Noelle knew she could trust nothing. She also knew she was starting to sound like Norman.

Now that the American GOE agencies had practically declared war on the dragons, she had every right to be afraid. Noelle took the stairs up to Norman’s apartment two at a time. The door framed had been fixed with duct tape and some crooked nails, but the door swung open beneath her touch. Her stomach gave a nervous flip.

Pushing the door further, she found the apartment empty. The shitty curb couch and bucket were still there, but the gray sheet hanging on the wall was gone. Things looked helter-skelter, like Norman had grabbed what he could in a rush and hadn’t bothered fixing what he’d knocked over. 

“Norm?” she called out.

There was no response. All that greeted her was the harsh buzz of silence. Her heart stuttered. If Norman had skipped town, that meant he probably hadn’t finished their fake IDs. They needed those if they were ever going to get inside the facility to get Lucia out. Noelle couldn’t bear to go back to the territory and tell Marc their shot had up and disappeared.

Her feet led her deeper into the apartment. The desk sat crooked in the corner, like he’d slammed the drawers shut. She found a small, white envelope sitting on top with an angry, horned face scribbled on it. Air rushed from her lungs.

She knew the angry, horned face had to be her. Snatching up the envelope, she found two finely crafted ID’s waiting for her. They heavy thumping of her heart subsided and she found herself able to breathe deep again. Tucked alongside the IDs was a letter. Noelle’s brows furrowed as she pulled it out.

Quickly, she scanned the handwritten letter. Norm was sorry he’d had to leave, but he’d seen the news segment this morning, too. He knew what it meant for him and that even Mexico was a better place for him than here. He wished her the best of luck on her mission, crazy as he thought it was he thought she was brave.

Norman was smart, she thought. He was getting out of dodge before the sky fell on all of them. He would have been safe in the Territory, but Noelle couldn’t help but wonder how long that safety would last. Would the government allow GOE to erect walls around them? Would they eventually cap the territory with a dome so that they could no longer fly?

Noelle’s stomach flipped and her hand tightened around the envelope. She was being dramatic, that was for sure, but she couldn’t stop imagining the ways that GOE could still hurt them. She knew what she needed to do, Noelle only hoped Norman had left some of his stuff behind.

Feeling like she was going through someone’s personal items even though Norman had clearly up and left, Noelle started to rummage through the drawers of the desk. There were a few scraps of paper tumbling around the wooden drawers and some broken pencils, but not much else. Noelle straightened and surveyed the space around her. Her eyes narrowed as she thought.

Where would he keep that kind of stuff, she asked herself? Considering this was Norman, he would hide anything just about anywhere. He was paranoid to his very bones, even if he had a good reason. Noelle kept her head up and started moving from room to room. She started with the kitchen, just in case he was truly mad, but only found handfuls of mismatched silverware that might have been stolen from restaurants.

It wasn’t until she got to what had been his bedroom, a small room with only a mattress on the floor, and began digging through the closet, that Noelle found what she was looking for. There, in the corner, was a box of electronics and cords Norman had left behind. She chewed her lip. There was a chance it was only a box of old CD players and audio cables. She pulled it closer and began separating the mad tangle of cords.

Nearing the end of the mess, Noelle found exactly what she’d been searching for. She knew Norman would have a wire-tap. He seemed like the kind of guy, but when she found the apartment empty, she’d worried she might not get what she needed. Turns out, the universe was still on her side.

She’d have to wait and see how long that lasted, but for now she was satisfied. The recording device in one hand and the fake ID cards in the other, Noelle ran back down to her jeep.

Stepping outside, Noelle was aware of the car turning onto the street. She didn’t think twice about the slow-moving car as it drifted down the street in her direction. It wasn’t until her hand was on the door handle of her Jeep and the car had passed her that she noticed the crest on the door of the vehicle.

Her heart lurched into her throat. Trying to be as inconspicuous as possible, she resumed opening her door. Each movement she made was carefully calculated to not draw attention, making her slow and probably suspicious in the process. Her heart thundered in her ears.

The car ahead slowly rounded the next corner and disappeared. Her heart didn’t let up. It hammered away even as she turned over the ignition. Since when had GOE sent patrol cars to sweep the streets? What did they hope to even find? They clearly had not marked Noelle as a dragon as they passed by her. It was nearly impossible to know a dragon by sight unless you were a dragon.

She remembered what Isaac and his mate told the two families and felt her gut clench. GOE had dragons working for them. Of course, Noelle wondered who in their right mind would work for GOE, but Quinn and Isaac claimed GOE’s dragons didn’t know anything else. They’d been brainwashed into servitude, either by psychology or neuroscience.

Noelle hit the gas, praying that patrol car in particular didn’t have a dragon behind the dark glass windows. The drive back to the Territory was tense, Noelle’s heart rate only letting up once she passed the border and found herself on an unpaved road leading into the heart of her home.

 

***

 

Marc saw the ancient Jeep skid to a halt beside the tiny home, looking like a behemoth beside the shed sized house made to look like a Victorian home. He found himself suddenly on his feet and moving toward the Jeep. He didn’t know what pulled him until he could see Noelle’s drawn face behind the windshield. He moved around and pulled open her door before she could.

Noelle sat in her seat for a long moment until she slapped the envelope into Marc’s hand. One eyebrow raised in question, he pulled out the contents to find two very well done identification cards. The name beside Noelle’s smiling face, an impossibility if Marc hadn’t been looking at the evidence himself, was Veronica Liu. The head band and the smile made Noelle seem far younger than she actually was, giving her a filter of innocence he hoped GOE would fall for.

The only thing was getting Noelle to emanate that kind of innocence in person. He looked up at his mate and found her face paler than usual. All thoughts of her ability to act were chased away by concern.

“What is it?” Marc reached out and grasped her hand in his. She didn’t pull away. Instead, Noelle tightened her grip on him, if only for a moment.

“Norman decided Mexico would be a nice place to live,” Noelle informed him. The look on her face said that was not what had shaken her, because she was clearly rattled by whatever had happened off the Territory. Her chin rose and she turned to look him in the eye. “Tell me you’ll help me put an end to all of this.”

Marc’s only intention had been to rescue his mother. That was his priority in the moments he was not consumed with thoughts of his mate. Trying to bring down the American branch of GOE seemed like a task larger than the two of them, but the look in his mate’s eyes made Marc want to promise her anything. He wanted to ask what happened, what was truly bothering her, but they found themselves interrupted by another voice.

Dane’s presence could be intimidating when he wanted to be. In that moment, he looked as if he wanted to tear the world apart as he stormed toward them. Marc had the presence of mind to quickly stuff the two ID cards into his back pocket. Liana appeared in the cabin’s doorway behind him, Miri at her feet with a stuffed black dragon.

“I thought the two of you were smarter than some of my other dragons,” Dane began, his voice a bit louder and sharper than he wanted.

Noelle slid out of the driver’s seat and pulled her spine straight. She stared Dane in the eye, unaffected by the man’s presence. They were planning on sneaking into a GOE facility to break another dragon out, all while using false identities. They should have felt a small amount of shame for hiding it from their leader, but Noelle’s mask of defiance showed no regret. All she displayed was resolve. There was no changing her mind.

Marc knew she was doing it for more than just him and his mother, but he couldn’t help the warm feeling in his chest. Perhaps, there was a chance for them after all. Marc hadn’t realized he’d been afraid she wouldn’t love him up until that point. Noelle had always presented herself as cold and emotionless, but in the past few days he’d seen a great depth of emotion in this small dragon woman.

He wanted to consider if there was room for him in her heart, but Dane had other ideas to express.

“Are you trying to one-up your brother? Are you trying to prove who can be dumber? Because I definitely thought his last plan was dumb.”

Marc sucked in a breath. He would not back down. “Luc is a lot smarter than you give him credit for.”

Dane’s hands fisted in the air before him like he wanted to wrap those fingers around Marc’s throat, but held himself back. Marc didn’t blame him.

“I cannot keep anyone safe if they insist on running directly into danger every time I turn around!”

Noelle stepped forward, planting her small frame directly between Dane and her mate. She looked up at her leader, much like a tall person would look down upon someone. How did she manage that, Marc wondered?

“Don’t tell me you want to hide in here like that other family of cowards,” she said, her voice low. “Are you going to tell us not to take action so that you can protect a few lives over one?”

Dane looked pained. He’d been dealing with Noelle’s defiance for decades now and it was looking like it never got any easier. The man pressed his lips together to suppress whatever it was he wanted to say and looked toward Marc for help. Marc only shrugged. He was on Noelle’s side.

Their leader had been frustrated by the other family’s lack of initiative when it came to protecting their dragons on an individual scale. Marc realized the new declarations from GOE had their leader shaken. Dane was truly afraid for his people in the new world GOE was paving through lies.

Marc glanced at his mate and remembered what she’d asked him when he opened the Jeep door. She wanted his help in ending this once and for all. He had no idea what that might entail. With Noelle, it could very well mean burning each and every facility to the ground. The idea was tempting, but the fallout would have been disastrous. He was sure she had other ideas, but he couldn’t read her mind.

“Boss,” Marc said, reaching out to put a hand on his leader’s shoulder. “Let us help you.”

Dane gave his friend a pained look. “You can’t ask me to sit here and do nothing while the two of you are in danger. They’re going to recognize you, Marc.”

Marc scratched his chin. He’d been letting the scruff on his face grow out the past few days. The twins had stood beside Dane for decades, showing their faces whenever Dane did. Marc figured that a little bit of facial hair would help him become the new name on his ID card.

“We have this under control,” Marc told his friend. “Besides, I have the hottest burning fire on the Territory on my side.”

From behind Dane came a rough cough. They turned to find Liana shooting daggers at Marc. The Welsh fire dragon had a problem with pride. Pride was the flame that refused to flicker in the wind. Noelle’s anger at the world, at herself, was the kind of flame that would ravage anything and everything in its path.

Marc had no idea how to temper that kind of flame just yet, but he would figure it out in time to keep the world from burning. At least, that’s what he told himself. Marc would stand between her and the world if it came to that. He glanced at his mate one more time, the small figure standing brazenly between Dane and Marc. He wanted to grab her by her hips and pull her into his body, smothering that angry flame with his love.

Would that be what kept her from burning out? Would Marc be the thing to keep Noelle’s flame tempered? It might have been pretentious of him to think so, but it was all he could come up with in that moment.

“What do I have to do to keep you from doing this?” Dane asked.

“Let the idiots go!” Liana shouted from the doorway. Dane threw a glare at his mate, who was in the process of descending the short steps to join them. She paused at his side, looking up at him with a gleam in her eyes. “They know the risks, honey. They know what is at stake, but found it more important to risk their lives for our family than to stay and hide. Just like you were thinking the other night.”

Marc raised both eyebrows. He wasn’t surprised, he only wished to know what Dane had been thinking. He was the face of dragons all across the country. What could he do? His plan most certainly had to have been a public affair, because there was no way Dane could try to infiltrate a facility the way they wanted to. He would be noticed in an instant.

Dane’s anger deflated into defeat. Marc squeezed his friend’s shoulder once more before letting go. His hand fell to rest on Noelle’s shoulder. She shrugged him off and he felt a pin through his heart at the gesture.

“Alright,” Dane announced, seeing the pain in his friend’s eyes and trying to use his leadership to distract Marc. “Let’s go see what Anya and her father have planned for you. I’m not about to let you walk in there unless I know every little detail.”

Dane spoke about seeing Anya and her father as if they were going to meet them off the Territory, but it was Anya and her father that were coming to them. They pulled up in Nathan’s massive, black SUV. It was dusty from the gravel roads that led into the Territory as no one had been willing to pave the roads for dragons, even if they were a quiet and peaceful bunch.

Luc was only a few steps behind his mate, closer to her than ever before. Marc knew something was up as he watched his twin pull Anya close every time she stopped. Anya, in turn, frowned up at him and inched away from his tight grasp. The human woman looked about two seconds away from slapping his brother and Marc couldn’t blame her.

“What is wrong with you?” Marc asked after pulling his brother aside.

Luc glanced back at Anya, who was rolling her shoulders with the new freedom of space Marc had given her, before responding. Marc raised an eyebrow with impatience. His brother was a clever man, but he was suddenly acting impulsively and almost on instinct. Marc’s stomach flipped.

“Don’t tell me she’s pregnant,” Marc hissed, low so that Anya’s father could not hear them. He couldn’t imagine Nathan Forrest’s reaction if he found out his daughter was barely through her college degree and knocked up.

Luc shrugged. It was a mimicry of his ‘oops’ shrug, the one Luc did when his pranks went awry and destroyed something. There was something off about this shrug, though. Marc could see the lie in it. This was no oops. Luc and Anya had planned this.

“Why now? Dragons are practically criminals in this world and you thought it was a good idea to bring another one into the world?” Marc could barely believe his brother. He sucked in a deep breath and held it, counting to five before letting it out slowly. Calm once more, he met his brother’s gaze. “I’ve been telling everyone they don’t give you enough credit in the brains category, but I may have been wrong in doing so.”

Luc reached out and put his hands on his twin’s shoulders. There was a silly smile on Luc’s face, a mixture of pride and excitement. “This won’t last forever. Liana and the new family are working together to get the testimonies we need to expose GOE.”

“What if that’s not enough?”

Luc shook his head. He refused to listen to his brother’s warning. There was no going back now, anyway. They’d already made their mistake. They were the ones who would live in fear everyday, who would have to worry if GOE would steal their child, who would worry if the humans around their child would turn on them.

“This will end, Marc. We will change GOE here in the States and that change will ripple out across the world. I have hope. Do you?”

“You’re a moron,” Marc muttered before walking away.

He rubbed his hands over his face before falling onto one of the plush couches on Dane’s cabin. Miri saw him and ran headfirst for the couch and vaulted herself into his lap. He was the first one to find the small dragon child. The girl couldn’t be more than four, alone in the forest after her parents had been killed by a vigilante dragon. He’d been struck by lighting and she saved him.

She nestled into the space beneath his arm and he couldn’t help the impulse to wrap a protective arm around her. Across the room, Luc raised both eyebrows in victory, an unspoken I told you so passing between them. Miri was snuggled tight beneath his arm as if she appeared to represent everything Luc had been trying to tell him.

Noelle stood across the room, her arms crossed over her chest and her feet apart. Her eyes slid over to Marc and Miri. He could have sworn he saw a softness in those dark eyes, if only for a split second. Noelle saw him with a child and must have felt her own maternal instincts rise even if he thought she might never rise to that occasion. The loss of her sister and her inability to get her back weighed on Noelle, as far as he could tell, and it might have smothered any thought of bearing children.

Marc wasn’t sure how he felt about the idea, himself. Anya was back to fidgeting beneath his brother’s helicopter hovering. Even Nathan was casting odd glares at Luc at this point. Soon, Anya’s belly would begin to grow and the truth of the matter would reveal itself. As a human, she’d have access to a good hospital and modern technology to tell if she was carrying a boy or a girl.

The idea of having a niece or nephew struck him with an impact he hadn’t expected. It hit him in the heart and made him look down at the child beside him. There was much more to fight for than just their mother. Lucia could no longer stay in the hands of the so-called Guardians, but Marc would not let them get their hands on Miri or his future niece or nephew, either. The very idea of it made him sick to his stomach.

Liana leaned on the back of the couch, hovering over Marc and Miri. He turned his head up to face her with a question on his lips.

“How do you deal with it?”

“Hmm?” she turned to him with confusion knitting her brows together.

He looked back at the room full of people he loved and the potential for life. Each person in the room held a place in his heart that would have made him want to tear the world apart to protect. The beast inside him echoed the sentiment with a rough growl. The desire to protect his mother was strong, but she was barely a memory in the back of his mind at this point. The people before him were very much real and alive and a part of him he couldn’t afford to lose.

“How do you deal with the knowledge that you hold all of our fates in your hands? You’re the link between the American Territory and the government, the one who will end up trying to fight for our freedoms. How can you sleep at night with that on your shoulders?”

Liana’s eyes darted around the room. She took in every person standing before them and her spine straightened. She was an imposing force, a mother figure right down to her very bones. She would protect everyone as long as she breathed.

“I’m not alone,” she responded. “There isn’t a thing I do by myself. I help Dane take care of the family. I help the other family get their terrors off their chest as they help me find the truths. What we’re doing, what we’re trying to accomplish is a group effort. I’m only going to be a voice in the end, the one that rises above the others to grab the country’s attention.”

“I bet this was not what you had in mind when you came to the States,” Marc scoffed.

“Dragons raiding to survive and GOE kidnapping dragons for illegal experiments? Absolutely not, but I can’t say it’s much different than home. We had dragons fighting to take our home away from us while GOE was brainwashing our dragons and kidnapping human mates to start a war. The world is a bloody mess. Every step we take forward is to fix that.”

Marc sucked in a deep breath. His mission to rescue his mother suddenly seemed very selfish. It felt backwards. They shouldn’t be infiltrating a GOE facility as spies. They should be following the proper channels.

But, his mother could not survive their torture much longer. Dane would say that one is all and all is one. He wouldn’t leave any dragon behind. Who knows what he and Noelle could find along the way to help Liana in her fight.

Now, Lucia Avila had a grandchild on the way. Marc would make sure she was there to meet the child. His mother deserved that, at the very least.