Page 13

Chapter Thirteen

“ Z oe, Zoe, wake up.”

Zoe Watson tried to ignore the voice, hoping she could just go back to sleep. But then someone shook her, and her eyes shot open.

While she vaguely noticed the bars and stone walls that denoted an old jail cell, it was the person sitting next to her that garnered her full attention—her cousin, Rebecca Watson.

The cousin who’d gone off with her parents to join the rogue, clanless dragon-shifters.

But how was she here? Why?

Even though her brain was a little foggy, Zoe glanced around and noticed another female dragon-shifter in the same cell, and then more across the way.

And even if she didn’t remember everyone’s names, she never forgot a face. They were all in the file of UK clan traitors, the ones everyone thought had gone to live with the clanless dragon-shifters in Cairngorms National Park.

Even if she didn’t know where she was or how she’d gotten there, she had to tread carefully. Rebecca might be her cousin, but she’d disowned Zoe and her family the day she’d left Lochguard.

Slowly, she tried to stand, but her body was heavy, and she could barely lift her head.

Rebecca said, “No, don’t try to get up. You’ll be weak for a wee while yet.”

Doing her best to sit up and lean against the wall, she tried reaching out to her dragon.

Silence.

Fuck. She only hoped it wasn’t permanent.

Focus, Zoe. Rely on your training and don’t give anything away. She studied her cousin’s shorter form. Her skin was a lighter brown than she remembered, and her reddish-brown hair was shorn close to her head. She’d also lost some weight.

Deciding now would be a good time to get information—she needed to keep focused on anything but the fact she was now a prisoner and work would do that—she asked, “How long have you been here?”

Rebecca shrugged. “I don’t know. There aren’t any windows, and no one tells us anything.”

The other female dragon-shifter in the room spoke up. “It’s been over a week, at least judging by my leg hair.”

Her accent was Welsh. She was older than Zoe, with dark hair that had a sprinkling of gray and blue eyes. She tried to recall the name, but couldn’t. So she asked, “Who are you?”

The Welsh female raised a dark eyebrow. “A bit demanding, aren’t you?”

Zoe didn’t blink an eye at the female’s tone. “I don’t know how much my cousin shared whilst I was unconscious, but I’m a Protector.”

And I’m the best chance we have at escaping , she left unsaid. For all Zoe knew, the place was bugged.

The Welsh female tilted her head. “That just means you’re happy we’re stuck in here so you can interrogate us, right? Since we’re the enemy?”

Another female voice from the cell across the way said in a Northern English accent, “At least listen to what she has to say, Bethan. She might have ideas to help us.”

Bethan glared at the other female. “Thanks for sharing my name. Let me return the favor, Chelsea.”

Chelsea rolled her eyes. “She might already know our names. I’m sure they keep a list of us all.”

Zoe decided a wee bit of honesty might help her get more information. “I know all of your faces, but not your names. My cousin, aye, I know her. And anyone from Lochguard, like Rosie in the cell with you over there. But not the rest.”

Chelsea studied her a second before replying, “My mate was a Protector. I listened and learned a few things.” She glanced down the row of cells. “But I don’t know where they put him.”

Bloody hell, they didn’t know.

Zoe debated telling them. But false hope was cruel, even to clan traitors, and it might give her more of an in with these females. “I don’t know for certain who, but half of the rogue dragon-shifters are dead. We found them in a mass grave near your settlement.”

Rebecca asked, “How do we know you’re telling the truth and not just playing on our sympathies?”

She met her cousin’s gaze. “Believe me, or don’t, aye? But I’ve seen some of the autopsy pictures, as well as video footage of the mass grave. Someone killed most of the male dragon-shifters living in Cairngorms, and it wasn’t me or any of the main clans who did it.” She nearly reached out to her cousin, but held back. “Your father was one of the dead, Rebecca. I’m so sorry.”

Her cousin shook her head vehemently. “No, you’re lying. Dad was one of the strongest. He can’t be dead. He just can’t.”

The main reason Rebecca had left Lochguard was to follow her parents. She was barely twenty, still young, and Rebecca hadn’t held the same hatred for humans as her mother and especially her father.

Still, Zoe didn’t know if Rebecca had been brainwashed or conditioned to hate humans even more since the last time they’d talked. Which meant she couldn’t let her guard down. “Despite everything, I wish I were. I remember Christmases with our families together, when we were kids. I never wanted my uncle to be murdered, no matter our differences.”

Rebecca paced the room, clenching and unclenching her fingers. “I don’t believe you. For all we know, the regular clans are behind this, all of this, and they put you in here to get us on your side. To tug at our connection and somehow make me forget that your mother is human.”

And there it was—the reason Zoe never understood how her uncle, who was her father’s brother, could’ve grown to hate humans so much. He’d seemed fine around Zoe’s mother while she was still alive. It was only long after her death that he hadn’t been.

She leaned more heavily against the wall, hating how weak and tired she was. However, during her Protector training, she’d learned how to push on a wee bit longer, when necessary. And she needed to know more. Much more.

So she did her best to keep her voice strong as she said, “Aye, my mother was human, and I loved her. That is something I can never change. But I would never kill anyone because they felt uncomfortable around her, or around me. Bloody hell, if I did that anytime I go into a village, when they stare at me as if I’m some sort of unicorn because of my skin color, I would’ve been a serial killer by now.” She leaned forward a little. “I vow that Lochguard, or any of the UK clans, had nothing to do with what happened to you or the males in the mass grave.”

Even though vows were extremely important to dragon-shifters, it might not be enough. So Zoe also willed the truth to shine from her eyes.

Eventually, Rebecca turned away from her and said quietly, “If I find out that you’re bloody toying with me, Zoe, I don’t care if we’re related, I’ll make you pay. Maybe hand you over to the dragon hunters myself, once we get out of here.”

Did that mean it was someone besides the dragon hunters who had captured them?

Zoe wanted to push, to see if there was some sort of connection between the rogue dragon-shifters and the dragon hunters. However, Bethan’s voice beat her to it. “She might believe you, but I’m still skeptical. How did they die? Who is behind it all, if not your clan members? Where are we, even?”

As she’d been talking, Zoe had casually scanned the surrounding cells without being obvious. And everyone was female. And still in childbearing age.

Back at Lochguard, Cooper and the other Protectors had discussed why only males and older females had been in the mass grave. At least now she knew where the younger females had gone.

She wished she could reach out to her clan and see if they’d found out anything else. Her last update had been before she’d left Lochguard to meet with the DDA liaison in Inverness.

Inverness. She’d made it to the city, had gone to meet the DDA liaison, and then nothing. Had the liaison drugged her? Why?

Aware everyone was staring at her, she decided to work on getting her memories back later. “I can tell you we didn’t murder anyone until my dying breath, and you still wouldn’t believe me. So let me ask you something else—who looks after you in here? Anyone you knew from before?”

Silence.

Zoe resisted a sigh. “Aye, well, then I’m not going to share any more information if you won’t do the same. I’ll remember this later, when we get rescued.”

Bethan snorted. “Who would rescue us? They might come for you, maybe. But I doubt Rhydian would care if I lived or died, now that he’s mated to that human of his.”

Rhydian Griffiths was the leader of Clan Snowridge in Wales, and his mate was a human named Delaney. The Welsh leader had banished some clan members after they’d tried to hurt his female.

Zoe replied to the former Snowridge female, “What do you have against humans, I wonder?”

Bethan said, “Maybe everything is full of fairy stories about humans and dragons getting along in Scotland. However, the humans in Northern Wales have never wanted us there. And not even your celebrity human’s book helped change that mindset.”

No doubt she was referring to Melanie Hall-MacLeod’s book about dragon-shifters, one that had changed the minds of a lot of humans when it came to dragons and their fears.

Chelsea, the female dragon across the way, growled. “That book just gave them more ammunition to use against us. Bram has a human mate, too. One who worked for the DDA, the agency that has kept us as second-class citizens. I despise her, and he’d probably rather see me in that supposed mass grave you found than ever try to help me.”

Even though it would probably be fruitless, Zoe had to try. “Evie, Bram’s mate, has helped us many times over. And the current DDA Director has been working with us more and more, trying to influence politicians to grant us more freedom.”

Chelsea sneered. “Right, more freedom, but not true freedom. It should be us who rule over them. But no, the gutless leaders have continued to bend the knee toward the weak humans instead.”

A new female dragon in Chelsea’s cell spoke up, her accent making her from the south of England and probably from Clan Skyhunter. “Having a so-called strong leader who believes in dragon-shifter superiority isn’t the solution. Marcus King was that way, at least before I left. Eventually, he became corrupt and worked with the humans. But he wasn’t always that way, and instead took joy in punishing his own people.”

Zoe zeroed in on the Skyhunter female. “Why didn’t you go back, once Honoria and Asher took over?”

The pair were Skyhunter’s new leaders and had been working on healing their clan after Marcus’s reign.

The female hugged her arms around her body. “I don’t want to get into it.”

Chelsea shook her head. “Marcus King was greedy and not a true believer. I’d make a better leader, one who’d never give up trying to conquer the UK and then the rest of Europe.”

Zoe replied, “Right, because you’d win against their anti-aircraft and anti-dragon artillery? I was in the military, remember? Dragon-shifters wouldn’t stand a chance. Maybe before World War I, but not after.”

Chelsea stood tall. “A great cause requires some sacrifice.”

“Aye, well, then let’s play along—what would you do once you supposedly conquered the UK, after all those casualties? You sound like a purist, which means you’d never let someone like me, of mixed human and dragon blood, to have any children. Will you put all the pureblood females into breeding camps and make them pump out bairns until they die of exhaustion or complications?”

A few more of the females moved to the bars of their cells, clearly paying attention now.

If she could push Chelsea a little more—and have her go too far—it might give them all a shared enemy. While a long shot, it might make them trust Zoe a wee bit more. Maybe enough to answer simple questions about who took care of them and anyone who worked in this facility.

Chelsea glanced around, the area eerily silent, as everyone waited for her answer. She finally said, “I would never imprison anyone who shared my vision. But surely there must be others who wish to expand pure bloodlines. Even if we have to recruit other dragon-shifters from Europe or Africa, we can make it work.”

Bethan raised an eyebrow. “Most of us have a human somewhere up in our family tree. So, what? Will you sterilize all of us that do? For something we can’t control?”

Zoe wanted to point out the hypocrisy—the female wanted forgiveness for having human blood and yet hated all humans, which were the key to her existence—but it was getting harder and harder to keep her eyes open. The verbal sparring had taken its toll, given how she was still fighting the aftereffects of being drugged. So she merely listened.

Chelsea said, “We’ll do our best to dilute the human blood as much as possible. It might mean forgetting about true mates or love to accomplish it, so pureblooded dragons are mated to those of mixed ancestry, but it’ll be worth it in the end.”

Some of them are truly lost , she thought to herself.

And as the females started to grumble and argue, Zoe’s exhaustion weighed heavier and heavier until her eyes closed and the world went black.