Page 47 of Nine-Tenths

"That's why I was being followed? Because they were checking to see if I was in love enough for them to stop torturing my boyfriend ?"

"And to protect you from the worst of the gossip mongers."

Fuck.

"You're new to this world," Laura says, taking my shoulders in her hands, trying to soothe. "You can't understand—"

I don't want to be soothed. I shrug her off and she lets go, thankfully. Good. I didn't want to have to punch a war hero. "This is all completely fucked up."

"And yet," a voice by the door sneers, and Laura and I both whip around to find Simcoe leaning against the closed door, smirking. Just how long has that jackass been there, listening in on a private conversation? I hadn’t even heard him come in. Asshole. "You accepted Alva’s token."

"I didn’t know, " I snarl at him.

"That’s hardly my problem," Simcoe jeers.

"Frank," Laura tuts. "There’s no need to scare the boy."

"Colin!" I hear Dav shout from the other side of the door. There’s a thump, and I realize it's locked. I’m trapped with people who are trying to convince me that my lover is a murderer. "Let me in, or I swear I'll—"

"You'll do nothing but stand there and wait!" Simcoe hollers back. "Know your place!"

Dav doesn't reply, doesn't thump on the door again, or break the lock, or any of the things he's strong enough to do. Simcoe waits a few seconds, to confirm he's cowed Dav, and then turns back to me with a smirk.

"Will you give us the room, Mine Own?"

Laura cuts a glance at me— no, don't leave me alone with him !—but curtsies and heads for the door. I want to beg her to stay, because I can't… I'm scared.

"I'll soothe the Marquess," she tells him as she passes Simcoe. "And assure him of his Favorite's safety?" She says it like a challenge, and when he doesn't answer, she cocks an eyebrow at him. "Frank?"

"Of course, my pet," Simcoe simpers. "More than assured."

"See that it is," she bites out politely.

Holy shit.

She's mad .

When she opens the door, I expect Dav to barge in.

But he stands on the other side of the threshold like a forcefield is keeping him out.

His hands are balled into fists at his side and he's significantly more draconic looking now than an artful splatter of scales.

His tail lashes back and forth behind him with a graceful fury that warms my heart.

I'm fine, I mouth at him, even though I have no idea if it's true.

I'm here , he mouths back.

Which does, actually, make me feel better.

"She's not a pet, she's a person," I grind out, once the door has swung closed again and Laura's out of hearing range. She may be complicit with this pseudo-slavery; it doesn't mean I have to like it.

"Good lord, you sound like Alva," Simcoe scoffs.

"I'll take that as a compliment."

"Of course you will. Listen well to me, boy. It is time you also learned your place. Humans domesticated wolves, and now you have dogs," Simcoe sneers. "And dragons domesticated humans."

"Fuck you," I snap. "I’m not a dog!"

"And still you snarl at me."

I bite back the rest of what I want to say and just bare my teeth at him.

"You can come in now, Alva," Simcoe says softly, once he’s sure I’ve been leashed.

There was no reason to keep him out. It was just Simcoe proving that he's the one in power. Dav opens the door, the clicking door handle loud as a gunshot in the tense, thick air. Dav enters, makes a small bow to Simcoe, and walks to my side slowly, elegantly. His tail winds around my ankle.

"You are both too young to know this, but if you continue to rock the boat, you will capsize us all," Simcoe sighs.

The tight, horrible feeling of being caged rushes back, settling like permafrost in my bones.

"The Gift," Dav says. Simcoe nods like a melodramatic stage villain. "All this time I was told that it was… it was exclusive. But that's not true."

"Of course not. Do you really think we didn't already know everything your little friend discovered in that lab?"

"It’s mutually beneficial symbiosis," I say.

"It surpassed mutually beneficial centuries ago," Simcoe snaps. "Humans breed fast enough that they'll overwhelm the world if we let them."

"I thought the more humans the better, right? That's what all this Empire-building bullshit is about."

"There is being wealthy," Simcoe allows. "And then there is being greedy to the point of endangering society. Just as the human One Percent is taxed heavily on their excess money, dragons must also pay for excesses."

Dav scoffs. "So we're taxed by being denied our natural desire to serve and uplift, for the greater good?"

"Just so," Simcoe says. "We voluntarily deny ourselves in order to protect our territories, and our rule."

"I see," Dav chokes out.

"I don't!"

"Humans live for a long time in our care," Simcoe explains patiently, as if I'm the village idiot. "It is our duty to ensure that it is the right humans. And not so many of them that they endanger the management of the climate and environment."

I don't like this second revelation of the evening any more than I liked the first.

They're letting humans get sick.

They're letting us die.

It's not concentration and labor camps. But they have the means, the ability, and the instinct to help and heal.

And they are deliberately choosing not to .

They are dividing the world into the desirables and the undesirables, and letting the latter category, the larger category, suffer needlessly. It's…

…it's so goddamned stupid.

"And what are the right humans?" I sneer. "White, upper-class, attractive?"

"Preferably," Simcoe agrees. He looks me up and down like a show pony. "At least you're white, and… Alva certainly seems to consider you attractive. We can work on the rest. We have decades."

I'm going to puke.

I'm going to puke up champagne and candy-corn hors d'oeuvres, and I'm going to aim for his face .

"Don't speak to my Favorite like that!" Dav snarls.

"Your temper, Alva," Simcoe singsongs, and Dav immediately draws himself in, crunches up. "Now, I have other guests to see to. Avail yourselves of the library and calm down before you rejoin the party. Welcome to The Great Confidence. You will keep it."

Dav, seething, only offers Simcoe a low, slow bow. Not knowing what else to do, I follow suit, hand fisted over my heart, loathing every microsecond.

By the time we look up, he's gone.

"I find," Dav growls, "That I am no longer in the mood for dancing."