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Dragons Are People, Too
by Sarah Nicolas

Copyright © 2015 by Sarah Nicolas. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Chapter One

Well, crap. Mission Intelligence got it wrong. Again.

I mean, seriously? Heat sensors? When your operatives have a core body temperature of 142 degrees, that should be the first thing you check for. Deep breaths, Kitty. I daydream about ripping Simon a new one as I scale up the three stories of crumbling stone.

So now I cling to the east wall of the Lebanese embassy in D.C. with a diplomatic document pouch hanging from my belt.

I’m overly conscious of the two security cameras aimed at my back, despite the full-body black catsuit with matching ski mask that Draconic Intelligence Command (or, as I like to call it, DIC) requires me to wear. Sirens blare, telling me security already knows we’re here, but I still can’t let them see my face. And, more importantly,

I can’t let them see me change.

Beside me, Wallace scrabbles, then loses his balance and falls twenty feet to the ground, hitting the wall at least twice in the process. Rookie. His breath comes fast, but he’s uninjured. He could probably fall from three times that height without a scratch.

“Kitty.” Even his whisper has a British accent. He lies sprawled on the immaculate walled lawn of the Embassy and slowly makes his way to his feet. “I can’t make it without changing.”

“No!” I yell, then catch myself and lower my voice to something more like a hiss. “Absolutely not. Do you have any idea how many cameras are on you right now? You can make it.”

His hooded head flicks toward the cameras mounted around the lawn and back to me. I can’t see his face through the black cloth, but something in his body language betrays his panic. I may be only sixteen, but this is Wallace’s first mission, and I have been training since I was four. Though he’s thirteen years older than me, I am the senior field agent; I have to get him through this. Thank the Gods it’s not his dragon half that’s panicking, just the human half. It’s bad, but it’s at least manageable. And, you know, not catastrophic.

I soften my voice and mimic the tone my mother uses when she convinces me to do something I don’t want to do. “I’m almost to the top. I’ll lower a rope when I get there, okay?”

His head snaps up and down in something resembling agreement. I almost feel sorry for him. We’d all told him his first mission would be a piece of cake. It should’ve been, anyway, if it wasn’t for those freaking heat sensors.

It doesn’t help that English dragons aren’t exactly the ideal operatives for a stealth mission. They are too big, less agile than Chinese or African dragons, and they don’t like any situation they can’t bully their way out of. But if you need fire power or brute strength, they’re definitely the dragons for you. During normal operations, this mission should’ve been given to an African dragon, but Command always wants every operative to train in every kind of mission.

Even if, like Wallace, they’ll probably never see the same situation again.

I’m about five feet below the roof ledge when I hear the dogs barking. The first sleek shape rounds the corner from the north wall at a full sprint, his claws scrabbling in the lawn as he slides around the turn. A second set of snapping, snarling jaws follows close behind and I know their human counterparts can’t be too far away—probably with something a little more dangerous than a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth.

In the next instant, I realize Wallace’s chest is heaving too quickly, his eyes rolling frantically in their sockets. A panicking rookie means my night is about to get so much worse. The fact that it’s not his dragon half raging out of control is now about as comforting as a single ice cube when you’re on fire.

“No!” I scream, not caring about being heard now. “Wallace! Don’t! That’s an order.”

He’s going to break the Number One rule of an operative for the Draconic Intelligence Command: Don’t let anyone know what you are. At any one time, there are maybe six or seven humans who know about our kind for assorted reasons. But there has never been any actual evidence.

But that all changes the moment his green and purple patterned wings snap out of his back, his body following closely behind, his clothes dematerializing.

Crap. Crap. Crap.

Before the dogs even make it halfway across the lawn, he becomes a twenty-foot monstrosity of muscle and scales. Because they’re the showy ones, English dragons are the ones always depicted in movies: a four-legged dinosaur-like body, a bearded head with jewel-bright eyes, a long tail ending in an arrow-shaped tip, and massive leathery wings.
His ebony talons dig deep gouges into the soft soil of the Embassy’s lawn.

The dogs stop and paw at the ground, shaking their heads in confusion. Their prey has suddenly become a predator. A powerful wind swirls around the lawn with the first beat of Wallace’s wings and it almost knocks me off my perch on the Embassy’s wall. The dogs whimper and sprint for the useless cover of the nearest bush. Wallace aims a spurt of fire at each of the security cameras, leaving behind charred metal poles and the toxic smell of burned plastic.

Like that will do any good now.

Before I decide what to do next, his tail wraps around my waist—with the sharp defensive scales pointed away from my body—and we rise above the Embassy. I swoop up and over his back and he lets go, depositing me roughly on his neck in front of his wings. He climbs high into the clouds and heads toward Draconic Intelligence Command. My mind races, trying to figure out if I can get into the Embassy and destroy the security tapes before an army descends on me. I abandon that plan as soon as I remember Simon explaining how Embassy security footage is uploaded to an off-site server in real time. If the Lebanese release those tapes—I can’t even imagine what will happen.

As soon as we are inside a thick cloud, I jump off his back and shift into my dragon shape in mid-air, wanting to distance myself at least symbolically from his actions before we reach DIC. Chinese dragons don’t have wings, but we manipulate the earth’s magnetic fields in order to fly. My dragon body is much longer and thinner than
Wallace’s, with a shape more like a thirty-foot green serpent with four feet and yellow spines all the way down my back. I also have this crazy red, green, and purple comb on top of my head that looks like some punk kid stuck his finger in a light socket. As soon as I shift, psychic waves of fear and regret pouring from Wallace pound against my consciousness and nearly knock me out of the sky. He’s got enough of his own to deal with, so I guard my panic from him as best I can. If I’m being honest, I fly a little slower than top speed toward DIC and Wallace follows my lead, neither of us wanting to explain what just took place to my Draco Team Delta leader—who also happens to be my mom. I’ve messed up a lot before. Like, a lot. But I have never been this deep in crap.

As the humans would say, this is a game changer. If those tapes get out, this will go down in the history books as the most significant event in dragonkind history. And there, in black Helvetica on semi-gloss paper, will be the name of the person in charge when everything went to hell.

…

“Katherine Lung.”

I wince as my full first name bounces around the stark gray walls and I press my palms against the cool fiberglass table in front of me. My mother hasn’t used my first name since I was twelve and I decided to sneak into a mission briefing. I had just developed the ability to turn myself invisible and thought myself invincible also. The game ended when I touched Draco Team Beta Commander’s arm and he disappeared from everyone else’s view. I hadn’t realized my power would turn any dragon I touched invisible too—and then he could see me. As a dragon, I was too big to escape from the conference room, so I’d had to shift to human form, which meant dropping the cloaking shields.

Today is so much worse.

Mom shakes her head and her eyes give me the I’m-so-disappointed-in-you glare all Chinese mothers master as soon as they give birth. I would prefer any amount of shouting or even physical punishment over this stare. Make me run sprints until I throw up or spar until my hands bleed—as long as I don’t have to see how disappointed my mom is in me.

All the team commanders and the director had listened to the story Wallace and I told, then immediately darted out of the room to begin the attempts at damage control.

Now, my mom and I sit alone in the mission briefing room. The dim lighting in here almost lets the red streak in her hair blend in to the gentle sweep of her sable French twist, and it definitely softens the wrinkles just starting to pop up around her eyes.

I can’t take the silence and the staring; I have to say something. That’s probably her plan.

“Technically,” I hedge, “I didn’t do anything wrong.”

It would probably sound more convincing if I believed it.

“You were the senior agent,” she says, cool and calm. “You are responsible for the actions of your team.” She’s legendary for her repose in the worst of situations, even when in dragon form. Most people mistake it for serenity, but I know her secret truth: control is the only way she feels powerful. When she can’t control everything around her, the only thing left is her emotions.

And all that emotional control my mother has? She must have taken mine too, because I’m utterly lacking.

“We shouldn’t have even been on the side of the building. The heat sensors—”

She cuts me off by standing up straight and crossing her arms over her chest. For a five-foot-nothing middle-aged Asian woman, my mom can be intimidating as hell. The power and majesty of the dragons seems to roll off her in waves stronger than any other dragon I’ve ever met. Her eyes say what she doesn’t have to: No Excuses.

“Do you have any idea what this could mean?” she asks. I open my mouth to respond, but she obviously doesn’t want an answer. “Depending on what the Lebanese government decides to do with the security footage, this could be the end of life as we know it.”

Before tonight, I’ve always accepted the old party line that a dragon had never been caught on film. But just now, in this room, it doesn’t seem possible. Between security cameras, tourists with digital cameras around their necks, and the ever-present cell phone camera, I can’t figure out how we’ve gone so long without something like this happening. Impossible.

Obviously.

I realize my mom’s glaring at me again, waiting for some kind of response. The air in my chest feels combustible, pressing against my ribs until I’m afraid I might burst. Finally, I let it all out with one violent exhalation. My palms slap the table, startling both of us.

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Mom. He panicked.” I feel my voice waver and I clench my fists, willing my body to at least pretend I’m not scared out of my mind. “There was nothing I could’ve done. He wasn’t ready; he shouldn’t have been there.”

As soon as the words form on my tongue, before they even cross my lips, I know I shouldn’t say this. Sending Wallace on his first mission was my mom’s decision. And I question it? Gods, having your mom as your commanding officer really sucks sometimes.

They say Chinese dragons don’t have anything to do with fire, but I would bet every one of the very few things I own that I see flames flicker in my mom’s eyes just now.

“He was more than ready; he’s been training for a full year.” She swallows, dousing the flames in her eyes with great effort. “Perhaps it was his commanding officer who wasn’t ready.”

Anger bursts in my chest and drives me to stand up, towering a whole four inches over my mom. “Know what? I think you’re right. I’m freaking sixteen years old. This whole DIC thing—”

“D-I-C,” my mom interrupts, correcting my pronunciation. “How many times do I have to tell you to drop the childish nickname for our employer?”

I roll my eyes. “My point is: I should be going to high school dances and studying for my biology test, not running missions to steal diplomatic papers for the U.S. government.”

Truth be told, I love working for DIC. And I actually do go to high school, but only because I happen to be the same age as the president’s son. I can take out any assailant as well as three grown men with guns and I don’t stand out at a high school like the other Secret Service agents. Or, at least, I don’t stand out in the same way. Our family has been serving presidents since Woodrow Wilson, so a background check isn’t even necessary. The U.S. government is my background.

But I’m not entirely ready to be treated like a full-blown adult, either. I’m just wise enough to realize I’m still a teenager, caught halfway between kid and adult. Sometimes, I need my mom to be just my mom. And being semi-responsible for both an international incident and the exposure of an entire species that thrives on secrecy? This could be one of those times.

“Well, you might soon get your wish,” Mom says. “That is, as long as the public doesn’t find out what you are.”

I try to stop what happens next, I truly do. But my chest tightens, and my eyes sting, begging for a release.

Dragons don’t cry like humans do. Our bodies are too hot to let liquid water hang around for very long, but even though we don’t have actual tears to shed, the rest of the crying is the same. The aching in the chest, the irregular breathing, the red puffy eyes—all unfortunate side effects of our human inclination. I’ve always wondered if dragons had to put up with this a hundred thousand years ago, before we developed our human forms. Might be worth it, trading my opposable thumbs for never having to cry again. But then I imagine always being able to feel everyone’s emotions and I’m back in the humanoid camp again.

I don’t think my mom realizes what is happening to me at first, but when I cover my face with my hands and a loud, embarrassing sob escapes my throat, she rushes to my side of the table and wraps her thin, iron arms around my shaking shoulders. My mom may be one tough-as-dragon-teeth commander, but she’s also a good mother. She usually knows when to bark out orders and when to hand out hugs.

“I’m sorry, Kitty,” she says, after letting me cry myself out. “You’re one of my most reliable operatives.
Sometimes I forget you’re just a kid.”

Normally, I would object to the last part, but right now, when I just quite possibly ruined everything? I need to be “just a kid.”