His little body bounced along the floor. I watched him, his eyes so full of light, and tried to remember a time when I had ever felt such a way. I must have, surely, at one point. But it felt so far gone now. Such a distant memory that I couldn't place it, and the effort left me further depressed than I had already been feeling.

He was bending his tiny knees. His mouth open, blowing spit bubbles.

“Okay, I'm letting go now... One, two, three– “

And the hands wrapped around his minuscule wrists suddenly vanished. It was what the child wanted, but it was quickly clear by his eyes that he might have gotten more than he'd bargained for. He tottered uneasily, his negligible weight nevertheless too much for him to withstand. He creaked forward, and I readied for the child to land on his cushiony bottom, and for the tears to spill instantly.

But then something happened. Short of hitting the floor, it was like he froze in midair. Then the baby's body began to ripple. Golden scales flickered along the course of his little body, shining beneath the overhead light of the room. He let out a little scream as a tail pushed out between his legs, and wings sprouted from his back. These he flapped wildly, and was airborne in a matter of seconds. He began to laugh– or make a high roaring sound, that could be confused for nothing but a laugh– his head craning back and forth, amazed at his own abilities. Then however, as though he didn't think he needed to keep fluttering to stay aloft, he stopped. He seemed to hang in midair for several seconds like a cartoon character just run off a cliff. Then he fell, plopping down to the floor on his behind, though without any of the tears that might have come had he done so in his human form.

Instead he began to laugh again, clapping his front legs together with excitement. His body shrank back down again, and no sooner was he human than the same set of hands from before was reaching down, pulling up on him beneath his arms.

“Oh, Keo– that was so good! Alicia, can you believe it?”

“He's a natural, just like his father!” cooed Alicia, my brother Nol's lovely wife, the two of them staring into my nephew's face like he was their masterpiece.

I didn't blame them. As I'd been watching the little guy toddle around the living room of Nol's trailer, I'd swollen with pride just as the two of them had done. Thinking that here was a young man truly worthy of carrying on the name of The Protectors.

Now, though. Now I felt empty. Cold. Like I was peering in through a window into a life that would never be mine. And a little bit jealous for that fact.

I sighed quietly, and turned my head to the window. I stared out at the full moon, which was brilliant and glowing tonight. A glacier of clouds was slowly heading in its direction, but at the rate they were going, it seemed a while still before they would make their way clear over and obscure the light.

“Something wrong, Fri?” said Nol, having handed Keo over to Alicia for nursing, and caught the wistful look in my eyes.

“What? Oh... No,” I lied. “Just reminiscing...”

“Missing home, you mean?” he asked, and I shrugged.

“I mean, there isn't a lot there to be missed. But yeah... A little...”

Nol gave me a nod. “I understand. I miss it too, myself. Even being surrounded by the Dark Ones, at least there we were with our own kind. Ideological differences aside, ours was still a common struggle. We could understand one another, on some level. I miss it too, sometimes...”

“I thought there might be more of us out there,” I said, shrugging. “Dad's old map... The one we took to get here. It said that there were allies in this part of the country. I thought if we went in this direction, there might be some chance that we would run into them. We could at least have some support, seeing as how our own people have turned on us. But I guess not...”

“Yeah,” said Nol, sadly, but not seeming to want to indulge this line of thinking much deeper than that. “Things aren't all bad out here, though, are they? We're safe, and we're together. And isn't that all that really matters?”

This was rich, I thought, but I didn't say anything.

“I guess so,” I said, and was silent for a moment, staring out the window once more. “You know,” I said at length, “I think I could use a drink...”

“Want me to pour you something?” asked Nol, rising from his chair. I shook my head, and rose as well.

“No, that's alright. I think maybe I'll go out for a while. Clear my head. If that's okay with you.”

Nol twitched his mouth to one side. I knew he wasn't offended, but worried for me. He nodded, though.

“Whatever you want to do, my brother.”

I moved over to him, and we wrapped our arms around each other.

“Dinner was wonderful,” I said. “Thank you. Please pass my appreciation along to Alicia, as well.”

“We're happy to have you, any time,” he said, smiling at me.

I moved toward the door, and turned back as I reached the threshold.

“And say goodnight to Keo for me as well! God, he's growing up fast...”

“Don't I know it?” said Nol, watching me as I made my way off into the darkness.

I sat stooped over at the bar, staring into a glass of amber liquid. I couldn't decide whether I'd come here to be around other people, or to be alone, but if it was the former, I sure as hell wasn't presenting a version of myself one would be in any hurry to come over and cozy up to...

We'd been in this town for several months now. A tiny little blip on the map called Ashburn. We had left from the east, in quite a hurry, on my brother's behalf. He'd gotten our asses into serious trouble, rebelling against the prominent dragon family in control of territory that was once ours. The Dark Ones, they were called, and they hadn't taken at all kindly to the fact that Nol had gotten himself entangled with a human lover– his now-wife, Alicia. Even less well-liked had been the fact of our killing several prominent Dark Ones over the course of making our escape. Including the brother of Ryl, King of the Dark Ones, an unpleasant piece of work known as Madro, who'd been sent to track down and kill the two lovebirds.

Naturally, from that point onward, we knew that we simply couldn't remain there any longer. And so we'd headed west, in search of a new life. At first I hadn't begrudged Nol for being the reason for our leaving. Indeed, he had spent much of his life insisting that we should rebel against the Dark Ones, and fight them to the death. So the fact that he had, in the end, chosen a far less fatal route of escape had left me feeling optimistic. Making me think that maybe, two of the last Protectors on Earth could still have some hope of a life, of a future in peace, without fear of oppression.

It was ironic, to me, to see Nol adjusting to this new life of isolation so much more readily than I was. I knew that Alicia was at the root cause of this adjustment– her, as well as their lovely baby boy, Keo. And don't get me wrong, I was happy for them. Ecstatic, really, that there was another shifter in the world to carry on the name of the Protectors, aside from the two of us, and our estranged eldest brother, Ynder.

But as the months went by, I had begun to feel myself envying what Nol had. Love. Offspring. A family. I at least had him by my side, and I was grateful for that. But it wasn't the same thing, really. As having your own life. A legacy to leave behind when you were gone.

I longed to know the kind of love I saw in their eyes. And though it was true, I would never have been allowed a mate from among the shifter population in the place where we'd lived before– the Dark Ones had seen to it that we Protectors remained as alone and as isolated as possible– at least there, I could take some solace in being in the company of my own kind. I didn't feel quite as alone, as lost in the world, with other dragon shifters around me, even if they were Dark Ones.

Out here, I didn't know anyone. Nol and I had gotten jobs as steelworkers upon moving to Ashburn, and for the first time in my life, I found myself spending the wealth of my time around regular, non-shifting human beings.

I hated it.

It wasn't the fault of the people themselves, so much. I just felt like so much of an outsider in their presence. Nothing they talked about was of any interest to me, or anything that I could even begin to relate to. The culture of dragons was the only one I had ever known, and I found myself resisting its abandonment at the drop of a hat, trading it in for a world that meant virtually nothing to me.

But what could I do about it?

Nothing, I knew, and sat sulking there at the bar, eyes bleary, thinking I would do anything at that moment to go out and transform– to spread my wings, and soar beneath the full moon. It would be far too dangerous to actually indulge such a fantasy, of course– the risk of being seen by humans entirely too high.

But I had transformed recently for the first time in quite a while, in the process of helping my brother escape the Dark Ones, and since then I had felt a burning desire to experience the thrill of it again. To indulge my true nature to its fullest. Leaving the constraints of this world behind, and forgetting, at least for a short while, as I soared across the sky, the extent of my loneliness.

I sat there toying with this notion– trying to convince myself that surely, a single flight of fancy couldn't hurt anything... When something quite unexpected happened.

“Dragon's Blood cocktail, please,” said a female voice down the bar, and suddenly my ears pricked up. And not just my ears, either– my nostrils flared, and my heart beat a little bit faster.

Surely, it couldn't be–

I turned in the direction from which the voice had come. A woman was sitting there at the bar– an absolutely beautiful woman. Her skin smooth and radiant. Her figure trim, but curvaceous and agonizing. She had dark red lips, and silky black hair, glistening under the lights of the bar. I watched her as the bartender handed her the cocktail she'd ordered, then drew it upward, nearly bringing it to her lips. But then she paused, the rim of the glass hovering just below her mouth. Aware of the interest I'd taken in her, her eyes flashed up at me. They were a very dark, very rich umber color, like the color of coffee beans.

For a moment, my interest in her seemed mirrored right back at me. She gazed at me, and I felt acutely aware of myself– puffing my chest out just a little bit more beneath my leather jacket, flaring my jaws at her. Wondering whether she liked men with beards, or whether my considerable brown main was a turn off for her.

There was a look of desire in her eyes– an unmistakable one. But far short of indulging it, she turned back away from me after a moment's consideration. She sipped her drink as planned, and sat with her eyes down at the bar, her body language unclear. It felt like a door being closed, yet I sensed a hesitation there. Like she couldn't make up her mind, and wasn't sure that shooting me down was what she truly wanted.

I didn't want to bother her, and had my interest in her been purely physical, I would have left her to her cocktail in peace. There was something else entirely beside that on my mind, however, as beautiful and as enticing a woman as she may otherwise have been. I fought with an impulse of my own as I sat there watching her, trying to decide how to play this. Before much time at all had passed, I decided that the need to know was too urgent– that there was no point in delaying that which I so desperately longed to know.

I rose up from the bar with determination, and strode in the woman's direction. The woman, however, seemed prepared for this, and not at all welcoming of my approach.

I'd no sooner made it halfway to the spot where she sat when she threw out a hand, palm facing my direction, and a golden band clearly visible on her ring finger. She kept her eyes down for a moment, sipping briefly once more on her cocktail. Then she sat the glass down and looked up at me, her intense brown eyes now harsh and punitive.

“Stop before you go any further,” she said casually. “I'm just here for a drink. As you can clearly say I am engaged...” She flipped her hand around to show me the diamond on our ring. “And to a guy who doesn't take kindly to other men coming up to me, trying to take what he thinks is his...”

My heart sank at this. I came close to losing my nerve, but I held on.

I straightened up, and gave her a long look.

“Forgive me for saying so, miss,” I said, “but you don't really strike me as the kind of woman who could belong to anyone...”

I had a difficult time gaging her reaction to this. Her eyes slowly shut and open again. It was either a look of weariness, or an indication that I'd impressed her, however mildly. I thought I could detect a hint of a smile on her lips as she spoke again, and I supposed that this couldn't be a terrible sign.

“Be that as it may...” she said, sliding a pink stirrer around the rim of her cocktail glass.

“Be that as it may,” I echoed, “I didn't come over here to- for that reason...”

She raised an eyebrow at this.

“Oh?” she asked, perplexed. “What, then?” she seemed genuinely curious.

I hesitated. I felt certain I was right about this, but I knew how insane I would look in this girl's beautiful eyes if I was wrong– and that, furthermore, could have repercussions on all of us...

“Well, um... I'm not exactly sure how to ask this,” I said, scratching my neck, perplexed by the issue at hand. “But are you– erm...”

She writhed uncomfortably on her stool, still looking at me, trying to figure out what I was getting at.

“Am I what?”

I cast my eyes around the bar, and all the people standing around.

“I think– maybe– it would be better to talk about this outside?” I said as a question.

She scoffed, shook her head, and turned back to her drink. “Look, I don't know what kind of plan you've got cooked up– whether you plan on throwing me in the back of your car and driving me to some weird serial killer basement, or what... But I am telling you, pal, you are messing with the wrong girl– especially after the night I have had. Now if you don't get out of my face and leave me– “

“You're a dragon shifter, aren't you?” I blurted out, trying to keep my voice low.

The woman had gotten her lips halfway to her drink when I said the words, and froze there, staring wide-eyed at me. She clonked the glass down at the bar, and wildly threw her eyes around, checking to see if anyone had overheard the remark.

Then in a hurry, she leapt up from the barstool, and grabbed me by the arm, pulling me with a force that seemed disproportionate to her tiny little body– particularly considering how large I was by comparison.

She dragged me out of the bar and a safe distance from the doorway, our breath rolling in clouds from our open mouths against the chill night air.

“Who the hell are you?” she spat accusingly, glaring daggers at me, her nostrils flaring. “How the hell do you know– “

“I could smell it on you,” I said, and she gave me a funny look. I sighed. “Okay, I know that sounds weird...”

“Yeah, a little bit...”

“But I've always had a knack for that. Detecting one of our own kind, I mean. It's subtle, but I knew the instant you sat down there at the bar. I was just positive!” She was still giving me a freaked out, mistrusting look, and I tried to think of how to assuage her doubts. “And my name is Fri, by the way. Prince Fri, of the dragon family once known as the Protectors...”

Her eyes widened, and her jaw slackened.

“The Protectors? But I thought that they– I thought...” I prepared for her to say she thought we'd gone extinct, that our lineage had met its end with the death of my father. She trailed off before arriving at this idea, however, and her features suddenly hardened. “Prove it!” she demanded.

“What?” I said, confused.

She grabbed me by the arm again and started pulling me once more, this time around to the back of the building.

“Quit doing that!” I demanded, and she stepped away from me breathless once we'd made it around.

“Show me!” she said.

“Right here?” I asked, pondering the prospect of being discovered in such a public place– as well as tearing through my clothes in front of this very beautiful, very engaged woman, whose name I had yet to learn.

She nodded. “I need to know you aren't screwing with me. Trying to trick me or something. Right now I believe you, but I need to know you aren't just bullshitting me. I come from an important family myself, and I don't want to be taking any unnecessary risks here.”

I thought about the request, and decided it was reasonable– after all, I was already sure about this girl, and I wanted her to feel the same certainty that I did, that I was who I said I was.

“Okay... But can I take my clothes off first? This is an expensive jacket...”

“Fine, go ahead,” she said, her eyes remaining in place upon me.

“Um– could you look away?”

She rolled her eyes at this, as if to say, it's nothing I haven't seen before... But then turned her back anyway.

I pulled out of my clothes, and threw them excitedly onto the ground, thrilled at the prospect of meeting a fellow shifter in this place, after all this time. Then, once I stood buck naked and shivering in the cold, I collapsed onto my hands and knees. My body twisted, and rippled, and I felt my skeleton rearranging inside me– a sensation I found that I never totally got used to, no matter how many times it happened.

Moments later, I was towering over the woman, looking down on her from above. I let out a small grunt for her to turn around, and she did so. Her wide eyes narrowed very slightly, her brows lowering, considering me carefully. She reached out, and placed a hand very gently against my side, feeling my scales. I could see my golden, hovering body reflected in her dark eyes, wings gently pressing the air around me.

“Shit...” she said, pulling her hand slowly away again. “...You weren't kidding.” I shook my head playfully at her, and she stepped back, taking in the sight of me.

She studied me for a long time, and then said, still sounding on her guard, “My name is Endia. Princess Endia. Son of Idra, King of the Earth dragons... I apologize for my suspicions. Our people have been alone out here, sequestered in their isolation for as long as I can remember. I knew that there must still be other shifter colonies in the world– pockets of our kind, who survived into the present day. But we're all so scattered, and keep so quiet about our existence, it makes it impossible to find one another. I thought for certain you must be trying to pull one over on me, telling me you were a Protector...”

A silence hung in the air at this implication. The same thing seemed to flit through both of our minds for a moment. A sad thought, which I didn't need her to express more directly with words.

Thankfully, however, she avoided such tactlessness. Instead, her face suddenly seemed to light up, like a thought had just come to her out of nowhere.

“My father!” she exclaimed. “He'll want to know about this, right away! You have to come and meet him– well, um, I guess, assuming that you aren't busy or anything... I guess I don't know exactly what you were doing out here, or if– “

I shook my head slowly at her to let her know I wasn't already preoccupied. She beamed up at me, looking thrilled to hear this.

“You'll come and meet him then? He might be asleep by now, but he'll want to know about this right away... He'd scold me if I waited until morning to tell him.”

I nodded slowly at her. I knew the potential pitfalls of doing what I was about to do– following a strange woman who I'd never even met, into a situation whose outcome I couldn't possibly determine with the information at hand. Nevertheless, I was absolutely thrilled at the discovery of a fellow shifter– particularly one as drop dead gorgeous as the one now addressing me, even if she was engaged to be married. Still, though, there had to be more of her kind– I vaguely remembered my father making mention of the Earth dragons, and discussing a potential alliance between our people and theirs, just before his death. The scratching of an itch I'd been living with since moving to Ashburn now felt imminent, and like Endia, I was in no hurry to delay it a moment longer.

“Excellent!” said Endia, and she was already reaching for the hem of her blouse, pulling it up along her gently curving belly. “Just follow me then, and I'll show you to our castle! I know maybe we shouldn't be flying, but it's quickest that way. We'll just stay close to the treetops... And anyway, the forest should be secluded enough that no one will notice us. Sound good?”

I nodded, and struggled to avert my eyes from her as she undressed. For someone with a fiancé as protective as she'd claimed hers to be, she seemed to harbor none of the shyness I had at getting naked in my presence. I tried to glance away, but ogled her shamelessly from my periphery as she peeled out of her bra and panties. Her nude body was like fine art as it glowed in the soft white haze of the moonlight. White light and shadows tracing out her beautiful features, every contour of her lovely body. Her perky, full breasts. Her thin, bony shoulders. Her taut belly, and the beautiful fleck of her navel, and those long, smooth legs...

I felt a fireball rising steadily up in my throat, and felt steam issuing from my nostrils at the sight of her. I swallowed down the flame, however, and shivered as the smoke bellowed upward. I stopped myself short of the space between her legs, which appeared to be covered in shadow anyway, and was shortly covered by the stacks of folded up clothes in her hands, much to my relief. Finally, she slipped off her engagement ring, and slid it into the purse she'd been carrying– its absence from her person making me feel instantly more comfortable in her presence.

She stared up at me for a long moment, a curious look in her eyes. Then she said with a smirk, “It's a pleasure to meet you, Prince Fri. I'm glad we ran into each other. Now, just follow me. And try to keep up if you can...”

Dragons don't smile particularly well, but I felt a playful grin forming around my jagged rows of teeth. Endia turned away from me, presenting me with a salacious view of her round, perfect backside that I could not possibly avoid gazing at, the moonlight sending shadows down along her spine, rounding out the plump, glorious hills of her buttocks.

An instant later, this picture still seared into my brain, the woman I'd been lusting after was gone altogether. Her body exploded from its form, and I floated there in awe, staring with wide eyes at the most beautiful dragon I had ever seen, my entire life over. Her body long and slender. Her wings sleek and refined. Her scaled were a deep, crimson red, gleaming beneath the full moon, and her eyes seemed to possess a glow of their own– shining blue orbs, as opposite the dark brown irises of her human form as anything, yet possessing a rival intensity.

I'd felt an attraction to this woman the moment I laid eyes on her, but I later decided that it was at that moment, before I knew the first thing about her, aside from the fact that she was already spoken for, that I knew I was in love with her...

She didn't even bother taking a single look back at me as she fluttered her wings, and pushed off from the ground. She lifted into the air, and shot off like a rocket, leaving me lost in my stupor of admiration for a moment. Then, coming to my senses, I doubled back, grabbed my shed clothes from the ground in a rear talon, then set off after her, racing to keep up.

The two of us sailed over the treetop. The full moonlight continuing to shine down on us, emphasizing her unmatched beauty with each new angle at which the rays hit her, and my heart aching as I followed her along.

And suddenly, I felt I understood exactly what it was. What had driven my brother to rebel, to seek a freedom that had been denied him for so long. The freedom that was his birthright, and that was mine as well. A freedom, for the first time, felt as though it was at last within distance of being reclaimed.

And all I had to do, was to reach out and grab it...