Dragon Marked: Supernatural Prison #1 (2 page)

Yes, they were all exceptional, but if I had to pick
the most exceptional, well, Braxton held a little more of my heart than the
other three. He was my absolute best friend.

I’d die or kill for any of them in an instant and I
knew they felt the same way. I’d never made friends in my pack. Sure, it was
probably because of my sunny personality, but even if I didn’t have an attitude
problem, being the alpha’s daughter inspired fear and respect but not
friendship. I was lucky to have the boys.

Jonathon looked calm, but for the first time his wolf
was peering out of his eyes. The blue had darkened and yellow threaded around
the pupil. “I have to go. Kristoff is calling the council inside.”

Ah, that explained the wolf. He hated taking
directions from that asshole.

Stratford and Vanguard were ruled by the American
Supernatural Council, the very council the boys would take over in a few years.
Kristoff Krass was the current head of the magic users, and as I said, an
asshole. The tall, thin, and slimy sorcerer was hella powerful and totally in
love with his own awesomeness. His daughter, Giselda, was a witch and my BEF,
bitch-enemy-forever. We’d thrown down on more than one occasion. Having Tyson
in my corner had probably saved me from her sneaky ways. Magic was underhanded,
slow moving, and hard to detect. Luckily, wolf senses could detect the stirring
of a spell, not to mention lies when they fell from forked tongues.

I stopped my father as he turned to leave. “Wait, what
did you have to tell me?”

He fixed me in his gaze again. “Right, sorry, I don’t
have much time, but I can’t have you blindsided, your wolf will lose it.”

Great, that sounded promising.

“Your mother has returned,” he finished in a rush.

I stared at him blankly, before a burning hot flood of
lava started in my chest and blew upwards to my brain. By the time the fury
reached my mouth I was ready to explode.

Shouts and curses fell from my lips. “How could you
let her come back here? She abandoned us! I don’t want to see that bitch ever
again!”

She was a wolf, so bitch was literal. Jonathon met my
gaze and more of his wolf peeked out. I was alpha enough to challenge him, but
I never would. Reluctantly – my emotions screaming for further release – I
lowered my gaze.

His hand left my arm and cupped my chin, lifting my
face to meet his eyes. He was giving me equal status with him in this fight. “I
needed her to return. There is much you don’t understand, but she’s always your
mother.”

I was shaking my head violently.

“I have to go, Jess.” He dropped a kiss on my cheek
and took off for the hall.

My hands were trembling as my wolf fought for control.
Just thinking that that woman was close by had me wanting to shift and run far away.
I didn’t care what Dad said, I had no mother.

“What happened?” Braxton dropped one of his large
hands on the bare skin between my shoulder blades. The contact was comforting
and my trembles lessened. But I still couldn’t answer straight away.

“Lienda has returned,” Maximus said. Strike one for
vampire hearing.

“Fuck,” Braxton growled. “What’s Jonathon thinking
letting that bitch back into Stratford?”

You needed council permission to enter or leave our
town. There were many protections weaved around Stratford and the surrounding
forest, mainly to stop humans from entering, but also to prevent any supes from
trying to break out their criminal brethren from the prison.

“He said he had to allow her in for a reason.” My
choked voice was low and growly. “If she’s inside, I think I’m going to need some
help – don’t let me kill her.”

Jacob ran a hand through his hair. “Damn, you ruin all
of our fun, Jessa babe. We haven’t killed anyone for ages.”

I punched him once for being a douchebucket. The five
of us were relatively non-violent, supernaturals almost never died around us.
The occasional rabbit on the other hand … well, that was fair game.

“Come on…” Tyson’s voice was relaxed. “We need to find
some seats, I feel something of a serious nature is going down tonight.”

Wizards found power in nature and from the gods. Tyson
heard
pieces of information from the universe while he was casting
spells. Well, either that or he had an oracle stashed somewhere, because he
often produced little gems of inside information.

We elbowed and shoved each other, striving to be in
front and dominant. In the end, Braxton sent Tyson and Jacob sprawling, and
with growling laughter rumbling his chest scooped me up over his shoulder and
charged through the crowd into the massive town hall. Faces turned toward us
but quickly looked away again. When Braxton dropped me, I wiped a hand over my
heated forehead. It was hot in this room. I was already sweating.

Tyson appeared right behind us. “You’re a dick, you
know that, right?” His jab landed cleanly on Braxton’s biceps; the dragon
shifter barely moved. “You better sleep with one eye open tonight.”

“I sleep with both eyes wide open. No one gets the
drop on me.” Braxton was cocky. He called it confident. It was a bit of both.

The five of us found seats in the center of the room.
We were some of the few that broke race grouping and sat together. Seated in a
higher dais before us were the council leaders. Besides my father who led the
shifters, and Kristoff of the magic users, there was also Julianna Medow, a
six-feet-tall and stunning red-haired vampire; Galiani of the Greenlands – male
fey – with long silky yellow hair, feline features, and a graceful stride that
made me feel like an elephant shifter instead of a wolf; and the demi-fey
leader, Torag of the Eastland trolls. He was four feet tall and the same width.
His skin resembled a newly formed tree, a smattering of skin and hard ‘bark’. His
nose was long and thin above beady eyes. He was a good troll. I’d grown up with
him; he was a long-time friend of my father and had spent a lot of time in my
home.

Wiggling to get comfortable in the padded chair, I
kept my eyes locked on the leaders. They seemed to be discussing something
serious amongst themselves. Jonathon caught my gaze and gave me a warm smile,
but there was unease in his rigid posture. Was this just about my mother’s
return? Why would that be influencing any of the other council members’
behavior? Unless they all hated her too. Wouldn’t surprise me.

And speaking of…

I stood and looked around the mostly-seated crowd. I
didn’t remember Lienda. Funnily enough, no one I talked with really remembered
anything specific about her, but I’d seen a photo of her once. I knew I could
pick her in a crowd. We looked similar, but she had very blond hair. God knows
where I got my hair color from. 

It took no time for me to sight and scent that she
wasn’t in the room, unless she was cloaking herself with the help of a magic
user. I slumped into my chair, and suddenly I was crushed by Braxton and
Maximus sandwiching me in. The brutes always stole my space, their long arms
invading my territory. I was contemplating whether it was worth starting elbow
wars when my stomach decided to make its presence known in the form of a loud
rumble that echoed throughout the hall. I groaned, dropping my hands to my
belly, which of course the boys took advantage of. Now they had much more of
their person on my person, squishing the hell out of me.

Surely the meeting was due to start soon. The hall had
been pretty full when I’d been looking for Lienda. It sat over two thousand, so
about a third of the community attended. I glared up at the council again.
Dammit, hurry up and start the meeting, I was freaking starving. I’d missed
lunch because I was late for weapons class, and dinner was looking like it’d be
too far away. The way my stomach was protesting, there was no hiding it in a
room full of supernaturals.

And then the ribbing started.

Jacob the jackass was first. “Shit, batten down the
hatches and guard your limbs, Jessa’s hungry – every man for himself.”

“Them there are fighting words, fey,” I said as I
released my wolf a little and dived across Braxton. Jacob was going down.

Jacob held both hands up in mock distress. “Damn, she’s
coming at me, Brax! Hand me the emergency snacks.” I let free a growl, followed
by a solid thump to his chest – which probably hurt my hand more than his body
– but I was semi-satisfied with my act of dominance.

My stomach growled again, louder than ever. At that
point Braxton, Jacob, and Maximus were practically on the floor they were
howling so loudly. Tyson had started flirting with the witch seated next to him
and wasn’t paying attention anymore.

It’s safe to say I copped a fair amount of shit over
my love of food. When it came to dinnertime I could hold my own with any one of
these six feet plus men. What can I say, I love food. And I’m a shifter – we
have a fast metabolism. I wasn’t fat at all, but I had plenty of curves and I
liked having curves. I wanted them to stay exactly where they were, so I
figured it was my duty to eat. The male supernaturals liked my curves too. I
might not have many friends, but I was popular in some ways. What can I say,
wolves are friendly.

The boys were still laughing their butts off so I
decided to give back as good as I got. I rarely acted like a chick around them
– sometimes I think if it wasn’t for the boobs they’d forget I wasn’t a man too
– but right now some fake tears were in order.

“You guys are right,” I said in a subdued tone. I even
lowered my eyes a little, which rankled my wolf, but she understood. “Maybe I
could stand to eat less. You know … lose a few pounds.” Their laughter died
instantly as they eyed me with something close to astonishment.

Braxton was the first to recover. “You’re fucking
kidding me, right?” His eyes flashed as he straightened in his chair. “You do
that and I’ll follow you around with a goddamn steak … day and night.” His
voice lowered on the last of his threat.

“And ice cream,” Maximus added. They knew I loved
dessert of any description. Sugar was my weakness. “You lose one inch off that
delectable ass and we can’t be friends any longer.” He crossed his arms over
his chest, which at least freed up some space on his side.

I internally rolled my eyes. Braxton and Maximus’
responses were not a surprise. The predator supes were pretty earthy and
sexual.

I stared at the three Compasses. Their unwavering
attention was locked on me, their faces scrunched-up and all of them frowning.
The morons looked really worried. Then I couldn’t hold a straight face any
longer. My lips curved up as laughter burst from me. I flipped them off.

“Like I would give up food for any man.” I followed
the middle finger with another rude gesture that shifters were fond of.

Their retaliation was cut off as the council members
stood, ready to start our meeting. Braxton leaned in closer to me. “Just for
that, no sharing of my dessert tonight.”

Ouch, that was mean. He always got extra for me, I
could never fit enough on my plate. I turned sad eyes on him, but he just shook
his head. Damn, the girly-act wouldn’t work twice on him tonight. Problem was,
it wasn’t really an act, I was genuinely sad without cake.

Kristoff was center stage, where he liked to be.
“Quiet now,” he said, and the room fell silent. We all knew disobeying your
council leaders was bad news, no matter your own personal power levels. “Thank
you to all that take the time to attend our monthly meetings. We have much to
discuss. You will remain patient until we finish explaining all the details to
you. There is some news that you will find shocking, but rest assured you will
understand … mostly everything.”

Yeah, everything they wanted us to understand. Our
council operated the same way as all powerful groups. Control worked best when
the rest of us were kept in the dark about things. Like where the prison was
that we were supposed to be laying down our lives to guard. And speaking of the
prison system, it seemed there was some news.

Julianna started us off with a bang. “Prisons in
Romania, Greece, Japan and Scotland have been infiltrated in the last month.”
Her beautiful face did not change expression despite the symphony of gasps that
blasted through the hall. “There were numbers of prisoners broken out. The
filtered down information we’re receiving seems to indicate this is a worldwide
strike against our system.”

I shifted forward to the edge of my seat. There was an
entire network of secret supernatural prisons around the world, at least one in
every continent. Supernatural numbers were much less than humans, which is why
despite the size of America we only needed one prison. And like Stratford’s
hidden Vanguard, we knew very little about the different prisons. I had never
heard of a mass break-out like this.