Prologue - Kaius

The air bites at any exposed bit of skin. Even the layers covering my legs and arms allow enough of the cold to sneak through. It's absolutely frigid at this elevation. Light flakes of snow waft down from the thick, gray clouds hanging low in the sky.

Our steps are muffled because of the magic that Orion is weaving around our team as we move through the woods and the dusting of snow covering the forest floor. We are closing the distance between us and the target we are tracking up the valley.

Couldn't this guy have run somewhere sunny? I could use the beach right now. Sand. Sun. A margarita.

The tension in the air feels like it should be almost visible. I feel the urge to shift, hiding just below the surface of my self-control. This cold would be less punishing behind protective magic scales, and I would feel far less exposed.

The order is to stay in our human forms until there is a confirmed sign of trouble, an absolute necessity. Freezing my nuts off isn't really an emergency. The goal is to avoid any humans who may be out on the trails or passing by from seeing six wyvern-like dragons hiking in the mountains.

This forced existence blending in with the humans of the town we now live in is a challenge. Necessary to avoid the secret of our species getting out, but on days like this, when the tradeoff is freezing to protect that secrecy, it's a much harder sell.

What's the worst that could happen if humans learn that there are magical shape-shifting dragons living among them and that most magical creatures really exist?

We end up in a lab, strapped to a table being prodded and poked.

I scan my eyes back and forth across the trail in front of us, senses on high alert. Orion, with his expert tracking skills, is ahead around the bend out of sight with Evander, our navigator. Cyrus, our Alpha, and his brother, Milo, are up ahead of my partner and me in the middle of the trail.

The woods feel too muted with the falling snow. No birds and no animals are stirring in the quiet, as if Orion's magic is drowning them all out. A body crashes into me from behind, and I register my partner Rufus struggling to remain standing as someone collides with him as well. There's no noise, no warning. They are masking their sounds just as well as we are.

I try to pivot as my balance shifts and keep my feet under me, but I just barely manage it as my body shifts with a ripple of power. My bones stretch, wings erupt from my back, and scales ripple over my entire body. Seems like a necessity to me now.

The change takes over in a breath, and my larger dragon body makes countering easier. I block a blow with my arm, and where my fingers flexed against the attacker's arm a moment before, claws have replaced them and I can feel the telltale crunch as scales give way under my grip.

I dig my claws in against his scales, which makes a grating sound that shivers through my body. Shifted, my legs are stronger than his, and it's almost too easy for me to shift my weight and get an arm around the smaller male's neck.

I squeeze, cutting off his airflow as he flails in an attempt to free himself. He may as well be a whelp. Trying to come at me from behind, just screams of their inability to face us head-on. I drive him into the ground as his attempts grow more frantic, my knee driving hard into his back.

Air whooshes out of his lungs from the weight of my body slamming into him. I squeeze my arm tighter, but his serpentine head tries to twist around to see me. His light, ice-blue eyes flare. I can smell his fear, thick and palpable in the air. I ram a fist up into his jaw, and his eyes flutter as he loses consciousness.

I turn and see Rufus pinning the dragon that attacked him under his large, green-scaled shifted dragon form as well. I push off the smaller body beneath me, and my eyes survey the rest of the Candara team. This isn't even a fight. Seems about on par with the attacks that we're dealing with daily.

I use one clawed foot to turn the arm of the unconscious body underneath me over, revealing the tattoo for the Eclipse clan. Of course it would be Eclipse. Their clan is still crawling all over the valley, searching for the relic that is rumored to be here. We moved here, to Greyson Ridge, Colorado, to secure and protect the relic, but we still cannot find it.

Cyrus, our Alpha, approaches with the rest of the team, his steps crunching in the snow now that Orion has dropped his spell. There's a shift in the energy between us as the group circles up, staring down at the bodies.

"Slimy little shits. Trying to ambush us," Rufus snaps as he kicks the body beneath his feet in the stomach.

"Only way they'd stand half a chance," Cyrus shrugs as he surveys the scene.

"Did we catch the one we were tracking?" I ask as Orion joins the rest of us from up the trail.

"No, he's gone. He slipped away as soon as they jumped us. I think that he definitely had one key on him. I could feel it as I got closer," Orion comments with a shake of his head.

Eclipse having one of the keys that safeguards this relic we're after is problematic. The presence of the keys and the relic is drawing the most ancient of creatures, like the Naga, from the shadows. A power-hungry group like Eclipse having a taste of that power will not bode well for our clan.

Great. Considering the attack on our home a few months ago, we aren't exactly in a position to be losing any more power.

Cyrus is giving directions, splitting us up into different patrols. The team is off in groups, but he assigns me a solo patrol out to Merl's cabin and down through town by the school. I can't help but wonder why he's sending me off alone.

My mind jumps to the obvious conclusion that he's questioning my position in the team, in the clan. I've had it happen before in other clans. It's part of the territory that comes with being an outsider searching for a home.

"Why isn't Rufus coming with me?" I ask, hating that it almost sounds like an admission of vulnerability that I think lurks in that question.

"Because if Rufus sets foot within a hundred yards of Merl's cabin, he and Merl will be drunk, and he will accomplish nothing for the next two days while he sleeps off the hangover," Cyrus laughs, elbowing Rufus.

"Hey, I resent that," Rufus grumbles, "I'm pretty sure I can get plenty drunk without Merl's help. Thank you very much."

I know I'm being ridiculous, at least on some level. It's a perfectly reasonable decision. He's not wrong. Rufus and Merl have been on a tear lately, drinking their way through the bar's top-shelf whiskey most nights. Still, I can't shake the feeling he"s doubting me.

Why wouldn't he? I didn't particularly make this mission turn out any differently. I can't help feeling the other shoe is going to drop soon. It always does. This whole move, this new dynamic trying to fit in, blending around humans.

It puts me on edge. I feel like I'm caught in between something finally feeling right, like home, and struggling to figure out how to fit in a place where I don't really belong.

"You seem to think that sending me on a patrol is going to prevent me from drinking with Merl? Bold assumption on your part," Rufus chuckles, his voice far deeper than its usual tone in his dragon form.

"Pretty sure that's why he has me babysitting you," Evander comments with a sigh, "Since Kaius is more likely to instigate your drinking than stop it."

"You're not wrong," I admit as I realize the validity of that statement, "But if nothing else, it's just because he and Merl can harmonize so much better when they're both blasted."

I try to crack the joke, make them laugh, or at least smile. Maybe it'll be enough to break the tension that I think is there. It's easier to hide behind the mask of sarcasm and wit than actually let anyone see the real me. That's a mistake I won't make again after my last clan.

I need to stop letting it get to me. I need to get this shit out of my head and just focus on the task at hand. The mission. The fact that I am not sure if this clan will turn me out, just like all the rest, can't change who I am and how I approach my work. If, after three years here, this is where it finally turns, then I can't let it be because I slipped up.

It won't.

I'm going to stop being such a whiny little bitch about my situation in the clan. I will force the worry that they'll kick me out to the back of my mind and plan for it just in case. If I see it coming, it won't be so bad. I'm going to suck it up and realize that this nonsense about my loneliness and lack of feeling of belonging is entirely nonsense. I'm fine. This is fine.