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“Okay,” I said. “Fine. Like what? I want things to get better for all the kintoo.”
Orion shot me a frantic glance. I felt the emotion in that too. “No,” I added, “I’m probably not going to like your answer. But I still want to hear it. I swear on my blood as dragon shifter that I’m not going to punish you just for sharing your thoughts. Allright?”
The forcefulness of my oath seemed to convince him to speak. “I’m still deciding what I agree with,” he said. “I had to meet you first, I had to see— They’ve been saying things like maybe we shouldn’t be ruled by a shifter who doesn’t have any ties to any of our kind. That—” His eyes twitched toward Nate. “That maybe our alphas should be focused completely on us and not on trying to make all the other groupshappy.”
“Doesn’t have anyties?” Nate said, his voice rising. “The woman you’re looking at is the daughter of the alpha who ruled our kin before me. Hell, Orion, we don’t evenhavea kind other than not being one of the other main kinds of shifters. And you were ready to see bloodspilled—”
“No!” Orion protested with a squeak. “I told you, I didn’t know—I neverwanted—”
“Now look,” Nate said, grabbing him by the front of his shirt. Energy rippled over him as if he were about to shift. I jumped up too. This wasn’t how I’d wanted this talk togo.
I pushed Nate back with a hand on his shoulder. His anger rolled over me, but his expression softened when he met myeyes.
“It’s okay,” I told him. “I asked for those answers. I can handle it. Maybe you should wait outside for a few minutes? I think it might be better if I talked to Orion alone.” Without an alpha’s temper in the room withus.
Nate let go of Orion’s shirt. The muskrat shifter cringed in his chair. Nate’s hands closed into fists at his sides and opened again. “We can’t trust him. I don’t want to leave you alone with thattraitor.”
“He hasn’t betrayed anyone yet,” I pointed out. “And I can turn into a dragon, remember? I think I can handle onemuskrat.”
“I’d bet she can too,” Alice put in. She strode over and motioned to Orion. “Stand up. I just need to make sure you haven’t got any weapons onyou.”
He stood stiffly as she patted him down. She stepped back, setting her hands on her hips. “All clear. Come on, Mr. Grizzly. What’s he going to do—batter her with books? We can wait right outside the door.” She arched an eyebrow at me. “Scream if you needus.”
Nate grumbled wordlessly, but followed her out. As the door shut with a thud behind them, Orion sank into his chair. I sat back down too. He peered at me with eyes that suddenly looked flat andhopeless.
“Are you going to fry me now?” he asked. “Like you did the rogue youcaught?”
Ah. I guessed I knew what he was most scared ofnow.
I leaned forward. “I wasn’t planning on it, but I will if I have to. It doesn’t hurt—at least not much. Not enough to kill you.” He didn’t look all that comforted by those facts. Moving on... “I only used it because your rogue friend wouldn’t talk to us at all. What matters the most to me is protecting all the kin. I don’t want one more person dying on mywatch.”
Orion rubbed his mouth. “He isn’t my friend,” he said. “I’d never associate with anyone who’d do what theydid.”
“But you’re still not sure you want to turn your back on the rogues completely,” I said, reading his body language. “You still think they might have a point. Aboutme.”
He sucked in a ragged breath. “We haven’t had a dragon shifter since I was five years old. I only just met you half an hour ago. I don’tknow.”
But he wanted to. I felt it underneath the uncertainty and the fear. Hewantedme to convince him that he could believe in me. As much as he’d probably hoped the rogues would offer guidance he could believe in when he’d entertained theirideas.
I didn’t know how to give him that. The best I could think of was to behonest.
“Can I tell you a secret, Orion?” Isaid.
His expression turned puzzled. “Allright.”
I dragged in a breath. My chest clenched before I forced it to release the words. “I’ve been worried about all the same things you have. Whether I can really help. Whether me being here is changing things for good or bad. And I’m still figuring that out. I didn’t even know I was a dragon shifter a month ago. I didn’t even know there was any such thing asshifters.”
Orion stared at me as if he couldn’t imagine not knowing. I guessed he probably couldn’t. “But you’re supposed to be leading all ofus.”
“Yeah,” I said. “That’s the sticking point, isn’t it? But I can tell you this. I’m doing everything I can to learn and accept my role as quickly as possible. I know Iwantto be the dragon shifter you all need. I’ll do whatever I can, whatever it takes, to see all of you happy and safe. And from everything I’ve seen, the rogues want the exact opposite of that. They’ll be happy to tell you otherwise so they can use you, but look at how they treated your colleague. He helped them, and they killed him to protect themselves. Maybe you can’t trust me yet, but you have to see you can’t trustthem.”
He lowered his head. When he spoke, his voice was quiet. “So what do you want fromme?”
Good question. I considered it. “I want to know anything you’ve found out about the rogues and their plans, so I can make sure what happened here yesterday doesn’t happenagain.”
He nodded. “I can’t tell you very much. They wouldn’t tell me very much unless I proved I was allying with them. They approached us when we patrolled outside the estate walls, the times when we ended up on our own for a moment. I think they must have had people watching the area just for that—but maybe not anymore. The one I talked to was a foxshifter.”
“How were you supposed to reach out to them if you decided to join theircause?”
