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Pierce

“Are you sure we aren’t already in an alternate reality? Another planet? One of those Marvel multiverse things?” The locals were all so strange. “There are clowns everywhere.”

“I don’t know.” Frowning, Wren shrugged. “Um, they’re all kind of weird, but I’m pretty sure we haven’t gone through a portal.”

Since we were in the crazy town to figure out what was happening with the portal, I hoped we hadn’t gone through it accidentally.

But with the number of clowns I was seeing, anything was possible.

Clowns.

Not even just stupid people running around asking weird questions…they had clowns.

“They go well with all the sparkly white decorations, though.” Wren probably only liked it because he was little and loved anything sparkly, but he wasn’t exactly wrong. Reality-bending choices aside, it was beautiful…but he was just accepting the insanity at face value.

He wasn’t even questioning why some of the flowers had a very magically manipulated vibe to them either.

Did carnations naturally come in glittery white?

I’d seen any number of oddly dyed flowers at the weddings I’d been dragged to over the years, but something was off with perfectly sparkly flowers that didn’t seem to droop even when half the vases were dry.

One of the clowns had clearly been in charge of watering them.

“It’s…how did we get dragged into coming to a wedding reception again?” His sigh at my question said he knew whose fault it was.

“But everyone is so nice.” Barely pouting, Wren aimed wide eyes at me, looking very much like the bird he’d been named after. It wouldn’t work, but he liked practicing on me since he hadn’t found his mate yet. “And they said we’d get cake.”

I’d have bought him the fucking bakery if it would’ve kept me out of the strange party.

“I’m pretty sure half the room doesn’t understand why they’re here.” I wasn’t exaggerating either. Someone had already come up to me asking if I knew when the baby was due and several kept looking at the clowns like they were aliens. “This town is odd.”

And it wasn’t the mix of human and other that mingled so easily.

“I think it might be all the people from the different councils.” Wren liked to see the bright side in everything. How we were related I’d never know. “The locals seem to understand why we’re here because they’re very angry they didn’t get to go to the wedding.”

“How did you hear that?” The only thing I’d picked up was that the couple was a mixed pair and true mates. There’d also been something about bugs, but I couldn’t decide if they meant listening devices or actual insects.

And asking hadn’t gone anywhere either.

“I go to the diner more often than you do.” Wren shrugged, having happily thrown himself into the town chaos. “The gossip’s hot there, not the bakery.”

That explained why he’d picked up a passion for diner food since we’d gotten to the ridiculous town.

“The men at the bakery don’t ask me nearly as many strange questions as the ones at the diner.” I still couldn’t decide why I should tell anyone if I was Team Pony or Team Binkie.

I’d gotten the distinction more quickly than several other newbies in the diner had at that point, but it wasn’t anyone’s fucking business if I wanted a pony or a little. Unfortunately, my refusal to participate and maybe my frown at the whole ridiculousness put me in something they were describing as Team Badass.

I hadn’t asked what that meant since the men kept frowning and nodding like I was an interesting science experiment.

Pressing his lips together to keep from laughing, Wren was saved from my frustration by a hush coming over the crowd. He’d happily announced binkies were the best and then explained I was his cousin and still believed in the quaint notion of privacy.

Quaint.

He’d actually used that word.

“They’re coming. Shh.” I couldn’t place the voice but they weren’t terribly old and everyone quickly obeyed. “Quiet.”

Half the room looked very confused and the other half were vibrating with excitement. Even the clowns looked ready to explode in a shower of glitter as the door started to open.

“ Surprise !” The excitement finally burst out of them and the sound was thunderous.

The men at the door were clearly mates and obviously faking their surprise, but everyone else seemed to believe it, so I decided to keep my thoughts to myself.

“Oh wow.” The human gave wide eyes and looked around the room like he’d never imagined anything like it. “This is…”

Horrifying.

I was starting to understand why they’d gotten married in secret.

“ Congratulations !” Another random round of excitement rushed through the room, and I was pretty sure I heard several people saying, “Happy birthday,” and that one old woman who seemed to think we were at a baby shower called out, “It’s a boy,” which made the two men try not to laugh.

I had no intention of going up to rush the men who’d just gotten back from their wedding adventure, but the rest of the town didn’t have any reservations about mobbing them. The two men took that in stride, but the dragon was shaking his head and I could see him talking to his mate. “We’ve got clowns.”

Wren must’ve seen it too because he giggled as they were swept out of our view. “There’s a story with the clowns. I can’t wait to hear it.”

Bouncing off with barely a wave, he wiggled his way into the mass of people even though he couldn’t have known any of them.

Wait.

Had he just asked someone about their son’s mate?

How many of these people had he gotten to know?

We’d only been in town three days.

“Someone is going to get hurt.” The quietly mumbled words coming from behind me came with a sigh I completely understood. “Oh, don’t do that. You’re going to… That’s going to…”

“At least the tall clown in the corner hasn’t dropped the balls on anyone else?” Looking over my shoulder, I had to fight a smile at the way the small man went wide-eyed. “Oh, you missed that part? The tall one with the sparkly hat was showing off and they went flying. They’re surprisingly heavy.”

At least, based on the thud they’d made and how quickly one of the mages had hurried to heal what looked like a concussion.

It was good to see they could do practical magic and not just fuck with shit, but I’d mostly just seen the fuck with shit variety.

“I think he might actually be using painted Skee-Balls from that arcade game where you roll the ball down the bowling alley-looking lane.” The sound they’d made as a couple of them hit the floor had echoed through the room and had brought back memories from my childhood.

But how any human in the entire state didn’t understand the town was filled with dragons and mages was something I’d never know.

They should’ve outed us all years ago.

“Is everyone okay?” The way he immediately started searching the edges of the crowd instead of watching the newlyweds get the third degree made me think he wasn’t a local either.

“Yes. From what I could tell, they were healed fairly quickly, by one of the visiting council members possibly. The more I think about it, the more I realize that he was too functional to be local.” There was no way the man next to me was human—there was just an extra spark in him that most of the people who were indigenous to the planet didn’t seem to have.

Looking relieved but not happy, the man nodded. “Thank you for filling me in. I was supposed to be with the medical team here but I got delayed by a slight problem.”

He looked fine, so it was definitely a locals are a menace kind of issue.

“I hope whatever the locals did in this case didn’t involve serious injuries or the news.” My dry response got a flicker of a grin from him as he tried to keep up the professional appearance.

“Well, mostly, but they do need to work on putting together an immediate response team that can handle…let’s call them interesting problems.” Looking around, the medical team visitor frowned and his voice dropped slightly. “They don’t even have a mage on their EMT crew. It’s just two dragons and a human who’s playing dumb.”

That didn’t surprise me at all.

Half the town was highly proficient at playing dumb.

“They don’t have a PR team or a lawyer on retainer either.” How every human in a hundred miles didn’t know about them was amazing…some kind of miracle actually. “The human over at the police station takes care of all of that. He’s mated to a local but he’s known about them less than a year. Months, I think.”

Getting anyone to lay out timelines and give clear explanations was difficult.

But I could tell a jury what he’d eaten for dinner the night before and that he called everyone “fucking aliens” when they pissed him off.

I liked him.

My new acquaintance did his best not to sigh, but the breath he let out was very long. “I heard a rumor that the federal government will ask for help once in a while, but the area is considered off-limits. There was something about a standoff and I think I heard moonshine was involved. Either way, the Feds think they’re more trouble than they’re worth and just leave them alone.”

Good grief.

“That actually cleared a few things up.” No wonder I couldn’t get anyone to give me insight into the locals. “Thank you.”

He flashed me a grin that had a bit too much happy innocence to it to be anything other than his little side peeking out. “They’re kind of fun, though.”

Rolling my eyes had him trying not to giggle. “Just remember that sentiment when the men at the diner are asking you if you’re Team Pony or Team Binkie.”

And the giggle escaped.

“They’re very curious.” And had clearly already cornered him judging by how funny he found that topic. “They didn’t like being told it was none of their business either.”

“They need a more productive hobby than guessing everyone’s kinks.” I’d even caught a glimpse of some kind of list they’d printed out. “They also don’t hear the word no nearly often enough.”

“Um.” Doing a poor job of holding back a grin, he rocked back and forth on his feet. “That’s because they weren’t taught to stop with the word no.”

For fuck’s sake.

“Do not tell me the town’s busybodies have a safeword.” Shaking my head got a snicker out of him. “I refuse to hear it.”

“Are you safewording?” The cheeky question and grin made me think I was seeing his little side peek out even more strongly. “I didn’t hear a special word .”

The singsong tone to his sentence had me glaring at him. “Being cute is not going to help you get your way. I’m going to bury my head in the sand and ignore their nonsense.”

Pressing his lips together, he nodded and seemed to be trying to look innocent. It didn’t work, but I appreciated the effort. “You think I’m cute?”

His act over the safewords was manufactured to tease me, but this question felt more genuine, so I answered that way. “Yes, I think you’re very cute and I think you like playing and all the mischief around here.”

Littles generally did, which was how they seemed to be getting away with so much insanity.

Nodding eagerly, he seemed to sink deeper into his little side as he stepped closer to me and whispered. “They’re nice. They have toys at the diner they’ll bring out if you tell them you’re Team Binkie and the lady who runs it will give you special desserts too. They think you can be little and a good grown-up too.”

Clearly, the people he normally lived around did not see things the same way.

“Well, they’re insane but they’re not stupid.” That got a snicker from him. “Being little is a wonderful way for some people to relax. It doesn’t mean they aren’t good grown-ups when they’re big.”

Understanding that seemed to be the only thing I liked about the town so far.

“Being big is a lot of work and stressful .” The way he dragged out the word made me smile and that got another excited wiggle from him. “Do you have ways of being happy and not being boring big? Some of them think you’re always boring big, but I know you’re not.”

Good grief. They were already gossiping about me.

“I don’t want to know what the men at the diner said about me.” Not yet anyway. “They’re naughty.”

He nodded but his excited grin said that was what he liked about them. “But I’m a good boy.”

And one who’d clearly needed to de-stress.

“So far all I’ve seen is a big who worries a lot and a little who likes the naughty men in town.” My stern glare and raised eyebrow had him shaking with barely suppressed laughter. “But yes, I have ways of being happy and I’m never boring.”

I just wasn’t going to share my personal life with the overly nosy locals.

“What kind of happy?” Wiggling back and forth again, his gaze darted over to the dessert table that was quickly being raided now that the guests of honor had arrived. “I like cake.”

He was wonderfully subtle, but luckily for him, I was good at reading cues.

“I saw a couple of different kinds. Let’s go check them out.” And being the intuitive Dom that I was, I caught his swinging hand and started moving us in the direction of the goodies. “Do you want a couple of different kinds of cupcakes or one big piece of cake?”

When he aimed wide eyes at me, I lifted one eyebrow. “I saw the size of the cake. Don’t even try it. I don’t care how big a piece the lady at the diner gives cute littles.”

Oh, that got me a pout.

“You know about little cake?” My new friend’s adorable glare distracted me for a few seconds from what he actually wanted to know.

“I’ve seen little cake. Yes. It comes with sprinkles. My cousin came with me on the council trip. He’s little and he’s been having fun manipulating the men at the diner and getting entirely too much dessert.” Sighing dramatically, I rolled my eyes. “I mistakenly assumed he’d stay big in town and I let him run off without supervision.”

That had been a strategic error I hadn’t figured out the consequences of yet.

“Oh.” Scrunching up his face, my new little friend took a few seconds to think before he nodded. “Okay.”

That was it?

Well, it wasn’t the most dramatic reaction he could’ve had, and I had to admit I completely approved of having a possessive mate.

“Then let’s go find my sweet boy a treat.”

And then I’d figure out his name.

And where he lived.

And why he was part of the visiting councils.

And if he had a boyfriend he needed to break up with.