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“I have decided to have a candid chat with my father about everything that has happened.” Misha looked on expectantly, so Bertram added, “He could very well decide what I have done is inexcusable and banish me, or put out orders for my execution.”
The addendum had the desired effect. Misha nodded. “I suppose that is reason enough.”
He unzipped a pouch hanging from his belt and took out a large and rather clunky device. It had an antenna like a walkie-talkie but was shaped like a cordless phone. “Here,” Misha said, handing him the device. “This is a satellite phone—it will work no matter where in the world you are as long as you have access to clear sky. No cellular towers necessary. I have modified this particular device to be untraceable and installed certain protections to keep hackers out even while in use. No one should be able to discover anything about your location, but there is one thing you need to keep in mind.” Misha’s voice darkened. “Betray me or any of my friends, and I will make you wish you had turned yourself in to the council when you still had the chance.”
Misha was small and pretty—a perfect example of a Pedigree omega—but Bertram did not doubt his claim. “Understood.”
“You will want to make the call outside,” Misha went on to say as though he hadn’t just threatened Bertram’s life. “And try not to talk too long. Active use drains the battery quickly, and I would like to have a charge on our way home in case of emergencies.”
“I will endeavor to wrap the conversation up as quickly as I can.”
“Good.” Misha crossed his arms. “I expect nothing less.”
On the surface, it appeared the conversation was over, but there was a look on Misha’s face that gave Bertram pause. The way the corners of Misha’s lips were pinched suggested there was something else he wanted to say.
“I am not a man who forgives quickly,” he said eventually, after Bertram made no move to leave. “Apologies tend to be hollow. Saying sorry is so often an empty gesture, a cheap way weak men absolve themselves of guilt. We are inherently selfish creatures. Lazy and comfortable by nature. All of us want forgiveness, but few of us are willing to put in the work it takes to actually change. But you…” He narrowed his eyes and thinned his lips bitterly, shifting his weight from one hip to the other. “You are not like other drakons, are you? You are not selfish in the same way. Words are not enough for you, much in the same way they are not enough for me. You take action. You accept culpability. You and your mate both.” He considered Bertram for a long moment until the bitterness in his expression no longer seemed as bitter. “I am not saying that we are friends,” he said at last, “but I admire that about you. So, good luck, I guess, drakon. If you are doing what you say you are, you will need it.”
Bertram chuckled and, with a quick word of thanks, left to make a call that—for better or for worse—would change the course of his life.
* * *
When Bertram stepped outside, sunset had lit the sky on fire. Reds, oranges, and even pinks burned with an inner glow so beautiful, if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he would have assumed it to be fake. Overhead, in lieu of smoke, there was a dark canvas of night spattered with twinkling stars. It would be cool and clear after the sun set—a cold front was already blustering in from the east, carrying the promise of frost—but Bertram did not let the temperature deter him. He crossed the grounds between the manor and the crag and sat with his legs dangling over the edge. Before him, the sea was stained pink, and it sparkled in the dying light of day as its waves swelled and broke, ever moving, always changing.
On the surface, it was the same sea it always was, yet from second to second, it was never twice the same.
Bertram watched it with unfocused eyes while he collected his thoughts. He’d come to Scotland to remove himself from a society he did not feel like he belonged to, and yet here he was, phone in hand, ready to renege on his commitment to living as an outsider… and for what? Because Peregrine believed all could be made well with an emotional appeal and an apology? Confessing his crimes to his father would not erase the fact that, as a whole, draconic society was deeply and fundamentally flawed. Begging for forgiveness would not change the minds of the council when it came to interspecies rights or matters of equality. Even if he were to be pardoned, the issues that had driven him to treason would persist. The Pedigree was being disbanded, yes, and its omegas set free, but the hearts of those who had established it had not changed.
And would not change.
Eventually, Bertram would sniff out another one of their injustices, and he would be right back where he started, his voice unheard, as dragons with far more power than him clung stubbornly to tradition and turned their noses up at what was right, and fair, and good.
Heart heavy, he dropped his gaze from the horizon and considered the phone in his hand. If it had been his own, he would have chucked it into the sea, but it belonged to Misha, and he would not destroy it to prove a point to himself. Instead, he planted a hand on the ground, intending to hoist himself onto his feet, when he heard the sound of footsteps across mossy stone. A blanket-wrapped Sorin came to sit next to him, wordlessly producing a spare flannel fleece blanket from inside his blanket cocoon.
He handed it to Bertram.
“It’s cold,” Sorin said as Bertram took it, “and it’s only going to get colder as night sets in. I thought you might like another layer… and maybe some company.”
“Thank you.” Bertram smiled down at the blanket, then looked Sorin in the eyes. “But I was about to get up as you came over. What do you say we go back inside and see to our guests? It isn’t terribly hospitable of us to leave them on their own.”
Sorin looked divided. “Did you speak to your father already?”
“Peregrine told you?”
“And Misha.” His lips twitched, hinting at a grin. “Although he was less concerned about reconciliation than he was about what else you might be getting up to with his top-of-the-line cell phone. I’m not sure what kinds of evil things he thinks you’ll be able to accomplish with a secure line and nothing else—prank calls, maybe?—but I’m pretty sure that after I left, he went to find a back window he could spy on us from. If we had glass panes, I one hundred percent guarantee his nose would be smushed up against one of them. He’s not someone who forgives easily… but I think, like most modern men and women brought up in the Pedigree, his worldview is a little warped. If there’s anyone he shouldn’t trust, it’s me, but he’s more or less dismissed me as a non-threat and decided to pin all the blame for what has happened to him on you.”
Sorin’s blanket rippled at the top. It was extremely unnatural, and Bertram was alarmed until a tiny scaled head with a rounded snout poked out to investigate the night. It was Harrison’s snake. She flicked her tongue in the air, decided it was far too cold, and wriggled her way back into the warm space between the blanket and Sorin’s chest.
“I don’t mind if Misha is suspicious of me,” Bertram admitted. He set the phone down beside him and leaned back, supporting his weight on both hands as he looked out across the sea and watched the color leach from the sky. “Some suspicion is healthy. I wouldn’t expect someone who has suffered due to us, even indirectly, to be wholly receptive of us straight from the start. And if it means there is less of a burden on you, I mind it even less. He does not bother me.”
“You not being bothered doesn’t make what he’s doing right.”
“Perhaps not. But it is a small transgression. And none of us can say we haven’t been guilty of being a little unfair when our emotions are involved.”
Bertram rolled his head to the side to look at Sorin, and found him bundled up to his nose in the blankets, his head only peeking out enough so he could watch the sunset. His dark hair, shorter now than it had been in their wild youth, was being ruffled by the wind, and while he didn’t look as relaxed as he had earlier, he did not look unhappy.
Feeling eyes on him, he turned his head and rested his cheek on his shoulder, gazing up at Bertram. The color of his eyes had gone murky from twilight, but the darkness did not obscure the love in them. Even though they had been discovered and their happily ever after threatened, Sorin had not let the stress get to him. He was cool and collected, ready to take on whatever came their way. Confident that together, they could handle anything.
Bertram scooched his hand closer to him, and a beat later, Sorin’s hand ventured out from beneath the blankets and bumped gently against his. He looped his pinkie over Bertram’s, and Bertram, smiling, curled his own pinkie so their fingers were entwined.
