The Dragon's Charm

by Emilia Hartley

  Chapter Two

  Morgan’s feet were heavy as she walked home. She’d taken on a second shift when a co-worker called out, not thinking what it would mean for her body. All Morgan had thought of was the extra money in her paycheck and the extra tips in her pocket. Unfortunately, not even turning off the trial on the screen above the bar made her customers any nicer that day.

  She dragged herself down the street and back to the small house she called her own. It was barely more than one room, a space at the back of someone’s home that they’d made into a studio. Her keys jingled in the door, but before she could turn the handle, it swung open.

  Her heart stopped.

  Her first thought was the stash of money she’d hidden beneath her mattress, but she didn’t make it that far. One step into the apartment told her why someone had broken in. There were rips through her sheets and mattress as if someone had dragged their hunting knife through it. Her belongings were thrown about the room, most of it smashed into small pieces.

  Morgan choked back a sob and stumbled back out of the room. Beneath her feet, pieces of ceramic crunched. She bent to pick up a shard, realizing it’d been the small, porcelain cat on the high shelf. Her chest tightened. Nothing was sacred. Nothing was safe.

  Morgan forced herself to enter the room even as her heart thundered. She would not be frightened away by whoever did this. She would not be intimidated, even if her trembling hands told her otherwise. She reached beneath the shredded mattress to find the bundle of cash she’d kept hidden. A sigh of relief escaped her when her fingers closed around it.

  Clutching it to her chest, she found herself backing out of the room. She did not want to be frightened away, but it was not safe to stay here. Not if they’d been willing to do this. She knew why.

  She knew this was all her own fault. The words she’d spoken at work had ignited something evil inside Vic and Jack. As old as they were, she was sure their families agreed with their limited view. Not everyone did, not everyone feared the dragons.

  Her lips twisted into an angry scowl. No, only those afraid of change hated the dragons. She straightened her spine. In a moment, she knew where she would go. If the locals thought they would try to frighten her, try to intimidate her into believing what they wanted, then she would fight back.

  ***

  Morgan lingered in the lobby of the Dragon Embassy. Her nerves made her stomach dance back and forth. Her eyes kept returning to the door while her fingers fiddled with the purse in her lap. All she had left was what she carried on her person. She couldn’t afford to replace everything they’d broken. Mattresses were expensive.

  So were the things she needed to start her ceramic’s business. Her jaw clenched. She looked down at the bag, wondering what her next move would do. She knew, while she sat in the Embassy lobby, that she would be safe. The people who’d trashed her home wouldn’t come here.

  There was a television in the corner, still playing the trial. It was close to closing, the jury deliberating while she clutched her purse.

  The door to her right chimed and a tall figure strode in. Morgan found her lungs seizing. She couldn’t breathe as she realized the man before her was the dragon man she’d seen on the TV screen earlier. He was incredibly tall, taller than her five foot ten. His hair was a mass of black that stood on end to reveal the marble cheekbones she seemed so infatuated with.

  He paused, his head turning toward her while his nostrils flared. Before he could say anything, a reporter appeared on the television screen and declared need for their attention. Both sets of eyes tore apart from one another and migrated toward the sound of the voice.

  A woman with strawberry blonde hair held a microphone up to her lips while the courthouse loomed in the background. Her words were not what Morgan needed to hear. The world tilted sideways. It rocked back and forth, her own words from earlier echoing in her ears.

  The Guardians won the trial. They’d been found innocent of everything the dragon accused them of.

  Morgan let go of her breath, head clearing for a moment. Of course, they’d been found innocent. The Guardians of Existence were there to protect humanity from the dragons. The organization had always done right, done what they could to make sure peace remained throughout the world. It was one of the things that helped people sleep at night when they knew there were such things as dragon shifters in the world.

  The Guardians did what they had to do to protect the world. Whatever the dragons thought of the organization or whatever they accused the organization of doing had been completely unfounded.

  Motion caught her eye and Morgan turned to find the man beside her vibrating with anger. The sleeves of his button down had been rolled up, revealing white scars that ran down his muscles.

  Morgan felt her chest tighten. Was she really in the right place? Her eyes flicked back to the television where a pair of GOE officials were smiling and waving at the camera. They held their hands to their hearts as if everyone could feel their relief.

  Morgan’s eyes fell to the floor. She prayed the dragon man standing beside her would not see her. She wanted to slink out of the room, to get fresh air and reclaim her overwhelmed mind. She didn’t want to consider Vic might have been right, but what if he was? What if the dragons had only claimed injustice because they had ulterior motives?

  Morgan shot up from her seat. She turned her whole body toward the door and lurched forward. This wasn’t where she was supposed to be. This wasn’t right. She didn’t know what truly was right, but she knew she wasn’t there yet.

  Outdoors, the sun was nearing the horizon. The air was growing cool and there were tiny droplets of dew gathering on the well-kept grass. She sighed, wondering where her day had gone. She had hopes of getting into the studio that night, to make a few pieces to sell at a craft fair, to make a little extra money for her own future.

  Instead, she was standing outside the American Dragon Embassy while her apartment was completely trashed. This was not in her plans, she thought as she looked around helplessly. Her mind was a mess of confusion. Morgan didn’t know what to believe. She didn’t know who was right. All she knew was that she had nowhere to go.

  Actually, she realized, she had somewhere. Her feet finally led her down the steps. She would go to the studio for the night, find a place to rest her feet before her next shift and then she could salvage what she could from her studio apartment. Yes. That seemed like a plan.

  Or, at least, that was the plan until she passed between two parked trucks. It hadn’t occurred to her at all that the trucks looked familiar. It hadn’t occurred to her the trucks she’d seen before didn’t belong in the Dragon Embassy parking lot.

  Not until two figures hopped off their perches on the truck beds. Their work boots made thumping sounds on the pavement. Morgan found herself looking into two familiar faces while her heart echoed the thumps of their boots.

  “Gramps was right,” one man said. She knew exactly who his gramps was. Vic. “The lady does seem to have a thing for the monsters.”

  Morgan’s foot slid backward. Vic’s grandson, a boy with sandy hair and an undercut, held a bat in one hand. The other boy, one she’d seen come in with Jack Beaty a few times, held out his hands like he might catch her. She could run, but where could she run to?

  “Are they better lovers than us?” Vic’s grandson asked. “Do they make you beg for more?”

  Morgan thought she was going to throw up. This wasn’t happening to her. It couldn’t be. This was the kind of thing she’d only ever seen on TV, on the kind of shows where the girl’s body turned up later. She couldn’t believe her own neighborhood could be this vicious.

  ***

  Kenji’s eyes followed the woman out the door, her long, dark hair a wave that cascaded behind her. His nostrils were still filled with the scent of her, even after the door closed. Turning back toward the screen, he felt his stomach churn. These weren’t the results they’d wanted. They weren’t even close to what they’d expected.

>   It made no sense.

  Everything they’d presented, the audio files, the digital files, and the testimonies of dragons who’d lived through the horror, none of it had mattered. The jury had looked into the crowd and seen beasts. Kenji couldn’t wrap his mind around why they couldn’t see them for who they were. All any of them wanted was a chance to find their mate and live a long and happy life.

  Again, Kenji glanced toward the door the woman had stepped out of. His brow furrowed as he wondered what a human woman had been doing in the Embassy lobby. Fueled by the frustration of the trial loss, Kenji marched toward the door. Did she think to come here to harass them after their loss? Did she think to lodge a complaint?

  He poured into the parking lot, his eyes scanning the area for a sight of her. Why was she so interesting to him all of a sudden? Why did he feel compelled to find her? He knew anger still boiled inside of him. It didn’t reach the point that Marc or Noelle could reach, but he could still feel it like a lid about to burst.

  Distantly, he heard the sound of something hitting the ground. Footsteps followed, heavy footfalls. Kenji felt something reach inside of him and wrap a hand around his heart to tug him forward. He flowed down the steps and into the lot. He crept between parked cars, recognizing some of them, until he caught sight of two unfamiliar trucks.

  The scene unfolding between them was the thing that made the lid on his anger burst. He couldn’t contain it anymore. Two human boys, perhaps no more than nineteen a piece, were backing the woman between the trucks. One boy held a bat. What did he think to do with a bat?

  Thoughts of their intentions made Kenji angry, made his hands curl into fists and his teeth grind inside his jaw. A roll of his shoulders pushed some of the anger back, pushed it into a place where he could focus on the task at hand.

  “As far as I know, she’s never slept with a dragon,” Kenji declared, with no small amount of curiosity in his chest. “I could be wrong, but that shouldn’t really matter. You can’t be mad at a woman for wanting better for herself. You can’t be too upset when you can’t offer her much of anything.”

  The boys blanched. It only lasted a second before the boy with the bat realized what Kenji insinuated. His face warped into a visage of anger and the bat reared back.

  “You don’t scare me,” the boy tried to growl.

  The bat whistled through the air toward the woman. Kenji darted forward, sparing a split second to be impressed as the woman moved in the opposite direction. She spun herself behind him in one smooth motion. Kenji’s hand flung upward and caught the wooden bat. He heard it groan as it slapped his hand, felt the impact in his bones, but ignored it.

  A jerk of his hand yanked the bat from the boy’s grip. He tightened his fingers around it and stared the boys down.

  “You can keep her,” the boy on the right said with a sneer.

  The boy who’d swung the bat agreed. “Don’t come back to town if you’re going to kneel for him.”

  Kenji fought the urge to give chase, to teach them a lesson in manners. Yet, he held still as he reigned in the jumble of anger and frustration roiling inside of him. He felt like an ocean, pulling away from the shore only to come back with a vengeance. He could contain it for now, but the tsunami was inevitable.

  The woman behind him let out a stifled groan. He heard a soft thump as her hip hit the truck beside her. The boys would be back for them later. Kenji would have to call the tow service soon to have them haul the trucks away. Perhaps he would have Anya, the young intern, do it for him. The company would probably enjoy hearing from the young human woman.

  “Thanks,” the woman behind him breathed. He turned to see her hand over her now unkempt hair, letting it glide down her frazzled, black braid as her eyes watched the direction the boy had run off in. “You didn’t have to do that, but… thanks.”

  It was as if he was seeing her for the first time. He took in the heart shape of her face, her strong jaw and her upturned eyes. There was something about her, likely her heritage that gave her an elegant look, even if she was a little harried. He could see, through her ever-tan skin, the forming of dark circles beneath her eyes.

  Concern rose inside of him, like a python around his heart, around his lungs. The urge to go to her and pull her into a tight embrace filled him, but before he could look at the impulse too closely, Liana pulled into the parking lot. Kenji’s lips pressed together at the sight of the manipulative dragon woman. He knew she was trying to do her best by him, but he wasn’t sure he appreciated the sentiment.

  Liana poured out of her car, her eyes flicking between Kenji and the human woman while reading the situation. In an instant, the dragon woman noticed the bat in Kenji’s hands and a question formed on her lips.

  It seemed the woman beside him recognized Liana as he noticed her slowly backing up until her back hit the truck beside her and she jumped in surprise. The woman’s eyes flicked between Kenji and Liana once she realized she was trapped. The panic on her tired face made Kenji push past her. He approached Liana and opened up a pathway for the woman to run if standing too close to two dragons bothered her.

  To Kenji’s surprise, the woman held her position. He couldn’t blame her as the two boys had run off in the same direction. He looked back to her, wondering what happened for her own people to turn on her the way they had. He was grateful he’d arrived to stop them from doing any damage, but it made him want to tuck her away somewhere no one could hurt her.

  It wasn’t that she looked frail. If anything, she was taller than any woman he’d dealt with before. The height and her strong shoulders gave her the look of someone who might not be pushed around too easily. It was the dark circles under her eyes and the way those strong shoulders hunched in on themselves that made Kenji worry.

  “What’s happening here?” Liana asked, taking on her work voice.

  “Nothing. Don’t worry about it,” the woman decided.

  Kenji shot her a look. Something had definitely happened. Why was she trying to brush off the near assault?

  Liana scrutinized the situation, hands on her hips. What else was the woman about to do with his life? Could he ignore her commands? Or, was he now under her control, demoted from his seat on the council after merging with the Territory family?

  “Inside. Both of you.”

  Kenji wanted to argue. He sucked in a breath, felt it pushing behind his lips, but Liana darted forward and grabbed the woman’s wrist to drag her toward the Embassy doors once more. The woman protested, but her words fell on deaf ears. Kenji rolled his eyes up to the skies and asked which god bore this woman and how Dane managed to deal with her headstrong ways, before following them inside.

  Once inside, Liana glanced through the glass windows as if she, too, expected someone to give chase. Once she was satisfied there were no stalkers creeping up the stairs, she turned around to face Kenji and the woman.

  “What happened? You are safe inside here, I promise.”

  The woman’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. Kenji watched her shoulders sink further in on themselves. Before he knew what he was doing, he’d reached out and took ahold of her hand. He squeezed it gently and it seemed to reassure her as he watched her shoulders pull themselves back into place.

  Still, she didn’t speak. So, Kenji took the lead.

  “Two locals tried to jump her in our parking lot. She was inside when I arrived.” He turned to the woman now, speaking directly to her. “I’m sorry if I startled you or scared you enough to make you leave.”

  The woman shook her head, brows tucked together in confusion. “You didn’t scare me,” she said, finally. Her free hand tightened around her purse strap, knuckles going white for a moment. “I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”

  The words the boys said to her tumbled through his mind again, like weeds with barbs that stung every time they landed. “You were attacked for loving a dragon. Is that why they had this?” He raised the bat.

  “No, I just…” the woman seemed to stru
ggle to find the right words. Her voice grew hoarse. “I’m not fucking any dragons.”

  Liana’s voice softened. “What does it matter if you are or aren’t? That’s no reason to corner a woman with a bloody bat.”

  The woman let out a choked sob that she tried to cover up as a laugh. Kenji saw through it. He watched her raise her eyes to the ceiling in an effort to fight back tears of frustration. Still, he held her hand. He’ she wasn’t sure if it was for her benefit or his at that point.

  “I slipped up,” she began. “I said a few dumb words at work and dug myself a hole. The men… they must have called their grandsons. I don’t know if they asked them to do this or if the boys took it on themselves, but they trashed my apartment. Everything…” He watched her throat work, trying to pull the words up from her lungs. When she spoke again, her voice was tight. “Everything is ruined. I don’t… I don’t feel comfortable…”

  Liana’s gaze met Kenji’s a second before it slipped to where he held the woman’s hand. He didn’t even know her name, yet he clung to her in this moment.

  “You aren’t going home,” Liana declared, summoning her boss lady voice once more. “Tonight, you will stay on the Territory. There’s a free place, even if it only has just enough room to sleep. At least, we’ll all know you’re safe.”

  Chapter Three

  Morgan’s eyes widened. She took in the two dragons standing before her. One held her hand. Once she realized it, she tugged it back from his grasp. She couldn’t believe what they were trying to tell her.

  “Oh, hell no,” was all she could manage to say.

  The female dragon’s brows dropped. She didn’t like being told no, it seemed. That was okay, Morgan reminded herself. She glanced toward the doors behind the dragon woman. She could make a run for it. She could scream. She could do anything other than this. It was madness.