Chapter 1
Beryl Moonscale
An Undisclosed Island in the Tropics
I stretched out on the seashell patterned blue beach towel and rested my head on Sermon’s thigh.
His muscles tensed for a second and then relaxed as he looked away from his Aben Radcliffe novel.
His long fingers played absent-mindedly through my hair.
I let my eyes drift closed and enjoyed the small moment of intimacy as he scritched my scalp.
Growing up, jet setting around the globe didn’t provide me with many opportunities to form friendships close enough for touch.
Sure, a lot of furry shifters ran around touching each other all over, and don’t even get me started on kissing lions, or how rodents will instinctively touch another rodent shifter.
Most dragon shifters are different. Touch is reserved for special people.
I’ve never understood how furry shifters put up with it.
Since my penultimate year of high school, Sermon has been my best friend.
“You finally woke up,” he yawned.
I woke up when Sermon and his mate snuck out of the Scale B&B rental but had laid around scrolling on my phone for a while.
Then had coffee and breakfast before working up the motivation to walk down the path and onto the sandy private beach.
I had a nagging suspicion in my gut that things were about to change forever.
The night before, I’d read Clarence and Medwin Moonscale’s memoir.
I hadn’t expected to think much of it because we’d always been a bit removed from our family.
It was mostly me, Mum, and those she called family for whatever reason.
We didn’t even use our real last name but took the flight name as all members of the flight were entitled to do.
Only, now my brain was full in the worst way.
Mum wanted me to wait until after they ensured Ferrick Moonscale was gone for good, but it felt dishonorable to miss Pras Lavender’s leaving ceremony.
The dude was only a few generations back from me and had given up so much to ensure we were here.
Before reading the memoir, I thought Mum had lost her mind wanting to be on any sort of council that Clarence Moonscale put together.
Now, I understood why she was going to do it.
“Answer him. Stop being a space cadet,” my dragon chimed into my thoughts while Sermon still scritched at my scalp.
“Eh, gotta sleep while I can. Mum wants me to fly out to the GGB soon. That place never sleeps,” I shrugged, looking up at him.
Sermon had dark hair that had always sort of stuck up no matter how much he brushed it or how much product he used.
He had dark brown eyes and a skin tone that hinted of his draconic ancestors that originated somewhere in the Mediterranean.
“Excited for the wedding? To meet your new mummy?” he arched a brow.
Sermon was good at picking up on when someone was in a mood, but he’d never been the best at puzzling out what had put them in the bad mood in the first place.
My mood wasn’t so much a bad one as it was one that left me at odds with the world I knew.
Just like Clarence Moonscale, Roster’s blood ran through my veins.
Had I been a good enough person to counter some of what he had done in his lifetime? Was it my job?
“I dare you to call her that when you meet her,” I laughed, smiling for Sermon, because I wasn’t in the mood to explain all the storm clouds rolling through my dragon’s inner sanctum.
“She’ll probably eat you. From what I’ve seen of Bree, her underwater form is giant.
Like she’s giving krakens a run for their money. ”
“Who are we talking about?” Gaia asked, walking up, dragging her green painted toes through the sand.
She’d just come from the water and only had her green bikini bottom on.
Like most people on the island, she’s embraced the clothing optional culture.
Not that I cared one way or another. I grew up surrounded by women – much older than me.
While I did enjoy a boob here and there sometimes as a pansexual, most boobs were just boobs existing in the world as hers were this morning.
Gaia grew up in a pretty conservative draconic community where omegas were expected to cover up.
She left them and went no contact with her family decades before she true-mate responded to Sermon.
Still, as a general rule, we’ll both knock anyone who makes her feel less than comfortable down a few notches.
She can take care of herself like any dragoness can, but what’s the use of being a giant alpha dragon if you don’t throw your weight around in helpful directions?
“Bree, Beryl’s new mummy,” Sermon told her as if she hasn’t already heard about Bree.
That was the thing about couples. If you told one, you told both.
That was particularly awkward when they met because I knew them both before they were an item.
Sermon, I knew from school but years and years ago I’d hooked up with Gaia on a different beach.
It’d been a full moon bonfire party and we’d both hit the joint that was passed continuously around enough times that everything felt good.
We never saw each other again until she showed up on Sermon’s arm.
He knew because neither Gaia nor I was the sort to keep secrets, but that night meant nothing more than a couple of stoned twenty somethings getting their rocks off.
“Quit calling her that! It’s weird,” Gaia said, reaching over to tweak her mate’s nipple.
“Ouch! Sorry! I won’t call any other woman mummy, Mummy!” he mock cried and she playfully slapped his pec, a smile pulling at the corners of her glossy lips.
“Don’t call me mummy!” she laughed but twisted his nipple hard enough to make his face scrunch as he laughed. His hand moved to her thigh and she leaned against him. It was all rough housing with them.
I’d lost track of how long they’d been together now.
Long enough to raise two batches of hatchlings and be grandparents.
At first, it felt as if I was a perpetual third wheel.
It wasn’t like I didn’t have other friends, because I did, but those friends always wanted to do things, and I’d already done enough things to last me a lifetime.
After a while, I figured out I was the only one worried about the arrangement and neither one of them wanted me gone full-time.
It probably helped that I came and went because like my mother my wings never wanted to stay in one place too long and that I was always willing to help out with the kids whether it was money, time, or emotional bandwidth.
“Nah,” Gaia said, picking up my thoughts over the flight link. “You keep him busy,” she nodded at Sermon. “Plus, no one fucks with me. Not just because they know I’ll kick their asses, but because they think we’re fucking you and your mom will kick their asses.”
“I mean, she would kick the ass of anyone who fucked with you,” I shrugged, glancing up at her. “But only because it’s her favorite hobby after the plane.”
“Is she coming to get you?” Gaia asked, because that was my mum’s MO. She had a private plane and loved to use it. If planes still used fossil fuels, she’d probably start climate change all over again.
“No, she doesn’t want to leave Bree’s side and I don’t blame her.
Not with everything going on. I remember the first time this one put an egg in you---” I said, trying to guide the conversation away from the real reason she wasn’t flying to pick me up.
I hadn’t actually been invited yet. Still, I had wings and a bank account. I could get around on my own just fine.
“He didn’t put an egg in me. He doesn’t make his own eggs! I had an egg and he fertilized it!” Gaia said, reaching over to slap my arm.
I glanced at Sermon, but he was already reading his book again, arms over his nipples in case he got caught in the crossfire.
“At least put a top on before you attack me. I can’t hit you back for fear of those things getting in the way,” I nod at her.
“They’re breasts. It’s not like you haven’t seen a million pairs before,” she rolled her eyes.
“I haven’t counted them,” I shrugged. “I just don’t want to accidentally knock one off and get Sermon going.”
“I can’t believe you two ever hooked up,” Sermon laughed.
“We were stoned!” we groaned in unison.
I adored Gaia. She was loud-mouthed in a way that reminded me of my mother and the dragonesses I grew up around. She was fiercely protective of those she cared about but also didn’t let any of them get by with bullshit.
“Are we going with Beryl?” she asked Sermon while pulling her long light brown hair up into a high ponytail.
“Do you want to for the wedding? I think they’re in the planning stages? Maybe?” Sermon shrugged.
“Sort of. I think we should be there for a wedding, and I wouldn’t mind catching a drag show. Besides, I’m almost out of sunscreen again and they don’t sell my brand here,” she said, looking around. “Have you stolen my top again?”
“What? It’s him that has a problem with the liberation of your girls, not me,” he laughed. “For all I care they can live in the sunshine year round.”
“I don’t have a problem with it unless she’s trying to beat me up!” I laughed and Gaia glanced at me in the way that said I needed to occupy myself for some time because she was about to monopolize her true-mate’s attention in a way that I didn’t want to bear witness to.
“Here,” he reached for her and tugged her onto his lap as I sat up. “I’ll cover them up for you.”
“I’ll leave you to plundering your mate, but are you coming to the GGB?” I asked, rising to my feet.
They shared a quick look that let me know they were speaking over their mating link.
“Think your mum will have a problem with us staying?” Sermon asked.
“Never has before.”
“Well, double-check because babies change everything,” Sermon said. “We’ll come, but I’d rather stay with her than at a hotel. They’re so loud there!”
I nodded and left them to their own devices. Back inside the Scale B&B beach house, I scrolled on my phone catching up with all the GGB stuff I’d missed. They had a few murders recently and I didn’t want to drag Gaia into that. She was Sermon’s omega and that made her family.
I was just reading through a post about the threats Jade’s playroom, Flight School, was still receiving when my phone rang.
I had meant to text mum and tell her that my friends would probably come in for the wedding too if that was okay, but had waited too long.
To be fair, we talked on the phone most days.
So her calling wasn’t that out of the ordinary.
“Hey,” I yawned and went into the kitchen to put on another pot of coffee.
“Mornin’,” she said, turning on her camera. She was sitting on the porch next to Bree who rested her head against Mum’s shoulder.
“How’s my sibling?” I asked.
“Still not budging,” Bree laughed, patting her big belly.
Any day now that egg was coming out of her. Carrying an egg didn’t always produce the big pregnant belly that shifters who had live births got, but sometimes it did.
“Listen, Ber, I really don’t want you to come in for the ceremony, but I can’t tell you what to do.
So, if you’re coming let me know, alright?
Especially, if you’re bringing Sermon and Gaia.
Look, I love them, but I don’t want that woman in the line of fire, okay?
I know, I know. She can take care of herself, but she’s lived a sheltered life, even with her adventures. ”
“Were you eavesdropping on us?” I blinked at the phone.
“No, I just know you. I’m surprised I’ve been able to keep you away this long,” she sighed.
“That’s because you had enough to do with ---” I stopped myself from talking about how one of the ghosts nearly sliced through Bree’s belly not long after they discovered she was with egg.
“Your matingmoon and stuff,” I decided on instead.
“I don’t want to rehash everything because I don’t know when Sermon and Gaia will be back up from the beach, but I think I gotta be there.
I think --- For the sake of honor, I’ve got to be there.
Without Pras none of us would be here at all.
I can feel it in my fire and scales that I need to be there. ”
“Look, I can’t stop you, but if something goes wrong, don’t try to play hero. Get Gaia and Sermon out of there. Grab a couple other people on your way out too,” she laughed, but the sound didn’t reach her eyes. “I don’t think it’s dishonorable to stay safe, just so you know.”
“I could say the same to you,” I said.
“Touche.”