Eternal (Dragon Wars, #2) (3 page)

“Oh she’s okay with us.” Dougal patted the ground next to him, although he had to agree with Brett’s statement. The scents she brought with her were too precious to let drift off without savoring them.

Not to mention he wanted to know about his brother.

She wasn’t pretty, not in the traditional sense of the word. Her older sisters had been. Before he left home, the Knox family boasted seven daughters, no sons. Maybe there were more since the war. They’d been considered great beauties of their pack.

The three older than Caitlyn had been downright gorgeous. All of them possessed the same streaked-blonde hair and light eyes. Brett had been lucky to have seen at least one, maybe two, naked.

Dougal didn’t know what Caitlyn would have looked like if she hadn’t been burned. He didn’t know if she would have been considered pretty. Her nose was a little too long for her face and her chin jutted out with a small cleft. She had long shapely legs she covered modestly in long pants and beneath her loose blouse were large breasts he suspected would fill his hands if he ever got to see them.

She sat next to him while Brett placed himself on her other side, flanked by the males who should have been her pack. Something moved inside of Dougal and he didn’t know what it was.
Familiarity
?

“It’s cold in the tent. The commander is sleeping, snoring actually. I’m not tired. Too wound about tomorrow, I guess.” She put her hands in front of the fire. They were small, at least compared to his, only they didn’t look dainty. Her fingers were solid and steady. Working hands.

“Which is exactly why you should be sleeping.” Brett’s voice irked him like ripping paper. He’d always hated rough sounds. Dougal rubbed his forehead. He’d never had such a strange reaction to Brett before.

“Hey, Brett. I think the lady could really use a drink, as could I. Want to be a sport?”

His friend eyed him for a second before he rose. “Sure. Not sure where I’m going to find any. I guess I’ll look for it. Might take a while.”

“Take your time. No rush.” If he wanted to spend all night searching, it would be fine with Dougal.

Brett scuttled off to find alcohol. Dougal could practically feel his silent grumbles. At the moment, he didn’t care.

He looked at Caitlyn as she stared at the fire. Her eyes were blue, but not like the hateful ocean. No, they were more akin to the skies back home.

“Are you sure you want to do this tomorrow?”

“No. To be completely honest, I have absolutely no interest in going to dragon baby land. I guess I’m the right person for the job. Out of the whole lab, I’m the most appropriate Werewolf to go.”

She shook her head and some of her blonde hair fell around her shoulders. With a sigh she shrugged and what he could only describe as a disgruntled smirk crossed her face. It was...adorable.

“The whole conversation moments ago, with the Miss versus the Ma’am thing? I couldn’t help except wonder if the word Doctor wouldn’t be more appropriate given your level of expertise to be sent here.”

Caitlyn lifted her gaze to meet his. “Female Werewolves don’t get to have such a title.”

“I know.” He cleared his throat. “Are we honorary brother and sister? Since my brother mated...which one of your sisters?”

“Lena. She would have been five when you left. She was the baby.”

“What?” He couldn’t keep the shock from his voice. “My forty year old brother mated your baby sister? “

“She’s twenty-three.” Caitlyn laughed and it made the night brighten. He sat straighter. “We were all surprised. Not unhappy. Shocked, yes. The mating chemicals want what they want, right? She told me she knew when she was seven.”

“Well, color me shocked. Good for them.” Devon mated. At least one of his brothers should enjoy the privilege, and to the girl next door no less. Stranger things happened, he supposed.

“He saved her from a dragon.”

Devon’s bravery didn’t surprise him in the least. “He lived for five years in a dragon prison. Saving his mate from a dragon? Must have seemed like a boring day.”

His little brother who had tagged after him with skinned knees as a mated Werewolf, it was difficult to reconcile. He’d been benched from the prison rescue, which freed Devon. When possible, Werewolves weren’t sent on missions with their direct kin. Of course, with their dwindling numbers, the rule would have to be changed soon.

“Why were you the most qualified to do this?”

She jumped when he spoke as though her mind had been elsewhere. He’d do almost anything to know what she thought about.

****

C
aitlyn supposed she could lie. She didn’t owe him the truth. For all intents and purposes, with her silly mating feelings and new familial connections aside, she didn’t know Dougal Owens at all. How would he know whether or not she was the most scientifically qualified member of her team to go on the trip? If she told him it was work related, he’d believe her.

Yet this was likely the only time she’d ever really get to speak to the man who captured and held her thoughts and sexual fantasies for the whole of her adult life. She didn’t want to diminish their precious few moments together with falsehoods.

“We’re all equally able to evaluate the fields—nests—whatever you want to call them. I’m going to take a few pictures and then the whole lab can see what I saw anyway. They believed I would be the least likely to be molested by the soldiers I encountered.”

Her heart beat too fast and she forced it to slow. Nothing miraculous would come of her confession. He’d likely not give her words another thought, never know the cost of her confession. Or the way she stupidly cried herself to sleep after the meeting about why they all felt she should be the female to visit the fields.

She was the least likely to mate someday, therefore if she did die, she’d be the smallest loss to society. Gods, sometimes she hated female Werewolves.

“Why would they think something so ridiculous?” A growl rumbled in the words. He stood. She half-expected him to abandon her, but instead of striding away, he went still.

“Um, the obvious?” She pointed to her cheek. “An injury no amount of shifting will heal. It makes me much less likely to mate, ever. A flaw in my shifting capabilities, subconsciously recognized by potential mates, which therefore stops the mating gene in them. In other words, should I feel it, but he won’t.”

“You were burned.”

Dougal must like to state the obvious. Did he want a response? “Yes.”

“You weren’t born with three legs. I don’t see how it’s a gene flaw which would trigger a subconscious anything.” He didn’t look at her when he spoke

“I should have healed when I shifted. After the initial injury was managed, the shift should have removed all trace of the injury. It didn’t then and hasn’t since.” She wanted to change the subject.

Finally, he stared at her again. “If you think a little thing like a burned cheek is going to stop any of these men from being interested in sex, you don’t know what it’s like to have not seen females in decades. Mating is the last thing on their minds.”

A sound filled the air and it took her a moment to realize what she heard. “Dragon?”

He looked toward the sky. “Yes. I guess so. Tenth one today.”

She shivered. Caitlyn studied the remnants of dragons—their eggs, the secretions they made, and how they were being used in manufactured drugs. Despite studying dragons and the effects of their war, she’d never seen a live Dragon before. Her home wasn’t part of the region occupied by the dragons. So far, the winged creatures hadn’t become part of her day-to-day life.

“I...”

Dougal craned back his neck to stare upward. “Why aren’t the alarms going off?”

“Should they be?”

“Five minutes ago.” Dougal grabbed her arm. He pointed at the burned out trees behind the commander’s tent. “Shift. Run there. Don’t stop. Don’t look back.”

With his head thrown back, he howled at the sky. She stopped for a moment to watch him. Not every Werewolf could present a full on howl outside of his shifted body. Dougal looked at her. “Caitlyn, go.”

She nodded and ran in the direction he’d pointed. Calling her wolf onto herself, she let her body splinter and reform into its animal shape. She’d never much cared for the process or the resulting wolf when it was over. Others loved their animal, craved the time spent on all fours. Caitlyn had always been too invested in what her human self was doing to want to waste time running around living on instinct alone.

Still, when the shift came she did what she’d been born to do. She became a wolf. The strong male, whose scent she craved and could not have, told her to make for the woods. She obeyed.

The dragon smelled foul, like garbage or the scent of something spilled in the lab. And it drew closer. She skidded to a stop to see how far the creature was behind her and then wished she hadn’t.

With a whimper, she realized the stuff of nightmares hovered right above her. She stared behind her. Why had it followed her? There was an entire army of Werewolves in her wake who would be much better foes. Why did the dragon target her?

Four large Werewolves barreled toward her and she supposed that had to be a good thing. If her nose proved true, one of them was Dougal, another Brett. She didn’t know the other two, but if they proved to be her saviors, she’d promise to learn and never forget their names. Ever.

The dragon dove toward her. She snarled. Caitlyn might not be an Alpha wolf, but dammit, she wasn’t going to sit around and let herself be killed by a dragon either. Of course, sometimes the smart move was to run like hell.

Maybe she could hide in the woods. They didn’t have great noses. If she could find a way to disguise herself, maybe she could survive.

The dragon darted in front of her blowing fire in the direction she’d intended to run. What little trees remained, no more than kindling really, exploded into flames. She skidded in time to be hoisted into the sky by two claws. They dug into her skin and she cried out.

By the Gods, the creature had her. She was going to die, it would eat her or maybe lock her up to torture her in a prison as her brother-in-law had been.

Four simultaneous growls filled the air when the four Werewolves leaped higher than she’d ever seen Werewolves jump. They landed on the wings of the dragon, and the creature bellowed.

“Werewolves. I will eat all of you.”

It talked
!

She wasn’t sure what happened next. Maybe she lost consciousness. The world kind of tilted on its side. Everything went blurry. She knew the feeling, having experienced it once before when she’d been a young girl, when the boiler had exploded.

There had been heat...
dragon heat
...and then nothing.

“Caitlyn?” A voice called to her, and she tried to surface from the black nothingness sheltering her with safety. “Time to come back.”

She opened her eyes and stared at at least a dozen male Werewolves, including Dougal Owens. She’d wanted to wake to Dougal for more years than she could count. Where the hell was she, and what the hell was going on? It took her a moment to orient herself to the present and remember why she was still laying on the ground in her wolf.

Before she did anything else, she had to be back in her human form to speak with the dozen Werewolves staring at her as though she were some kind of foreign object they’d never seen before.

When her body finally shifted, probably less quickly than any of the males staring at her, she looked at them. Her cheeks heated. Embarrassment wasn’t a new emotion for her, just one she wished she could do without.

Speech came a few seconds later. “Did I pass out?”

Dougal squatted in front of her. “You did.”

“It’s to be expected.” Brett spoke quickly. “Females have no business being around dragons.”

“Shove it. I’ve seen grown male Werewolves fall over at their first glance at dragons. Half of you lot vomited, and I wanted to go run and hide. She got scooped by a fully grown female who could speak. I’d say she did pretty well, right until the end.” Dougal extended his hand to her. “Come on. Stand up.”

She did as he’d asked and rose to her feet, taking his strong hands in her own. A jolt of electricity passed through her body and for a second she couldn’t breathe. Dougal seemed unaware, so she tried to play it off as though it hadn’t happened. As nonchalantly as she could, she took her hand from his and shoved it in her pocket.

“I assume you got it.”

Dougal moved out of the way and she could see the downed dragon being torn apart behind her by at least ten wolves. It was dead.

“She’s fine.” Dougal spoke over his shoulder. “Everyone get ready for tomorrow. Let’s let the Miss Caitlyn do the same.”

There were some nods of agreement and the group who had been staring at her intently moved off. She was able to take a deep breath.

Except for Dougal, he didn’t move.

“I’m sorry I said the things I did to you earlier, about how the other males would behave, about them not mating you and the things they would do.”

What had he said? It took her a few moments to remember. “Oh, your words were nothing I haven’t heard before.”

“Every capable male close enough jumped the dragon to try to rescue you. Rather than making them nuts, your presence here seems to be bringing out the hero in all of them.”

“I don’t know if I’ve ever provoked such a response in anyone before.” Her head hurt. Dougal’s suggestion of bed sounded really good.

“As for me.” He laughed. “I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

“What?”

“When it pulled you off the ground, I thought I might explode from the inside out. I don’t know Caitlyn. I think I might be losing my mind.”

He ran his fingers along her bad cheek and her body vibrated. What was he doing? Why was he touching her?

“Dougal.”

“Get some sleep, Caitlyn Knox. Tomorrow I have to drag you out of the fire and into the flames. You’re going to want to be well rested.”

She nodded. Words had long since fled her.

D
ougal hadn’t lied to Caitlyn when he’d told her he might be losing his mind. The dragon’s claws closed on her, and he had lost his mind. She’d gone limp and he’d seen red. His wolf’s emotions mixed with the man’s and before he’d known it he had ripped open the purple monster’s neck all on his own. He’d never attempted the feat previously, and wasn’t sure he could make a mid-flight neck kill again if he tried.