Page 2 of Charming the Dragon
He sat down, leaned back, and crossed his arms over his chest.
Oh, dear.That wasn’t the best posture to start with.
Regardless, Hayley sipped her tea and finally said, “Hello, Bram. Nice to see you again.”
“I want to say the same, but I don’t know exactly what you want yet. You said you had a proposal, lass. Tell me about it.”
She frowned. “As I mentioned in my email, it will benefit us both.” He raised his dark eyebrows, and she resisted sighing. Had he guessed what she wanted already?
Yes, dragons were sometimes even hunted and killed for their blood because of its healing properties. But hadn’t her past work proved she thought more of them than magical blood sources?
Remember, he doesn’t know you well, Hayley. Convince him. You’re good at that.
After clearing her throat, she replied, “Let me explain a little before I get to my proposal.” Bram nodded, and she continued, “When I worked on first Dawn’s and then later Sarah’s case, I noticed there wasn’t an electronic database of any past dragon-related cases, let alone the human ones that might apply to dragons as well.”
He snorted. “Until recently, the DDA or British government didn’t believe in giving us fair trials.”
“I know, Bram. But I do believe things are changing, and we need to prepare for it.”
He stared at her for a few beats, and her heart raced. The dragonman looked dubious and far from someone about to agree to her deal.
Well, she wasn’t going to give up so easily.
After readjusting her glasses, she cleared her throat and said, “Just look at how much things have changed since Melanie Hall-MacLeod released her book about dragon-shifters. Not to mention Jane Hartley’s interviews and later online video series. Without those two things, winning Sarah and Dawn’s cases would’ve been impossible, in my opinion. The more humans get to know your kind, the less abstract you become and more human, for lack of a better term, you become. I fully believe there will come a day when the law treats both humans and dragon-shifters equally, and the time to prepare for it is sooner rather than later. You need to start collecting and centralizing all the information you have now. Sometimes it’s the abstract, forgotten laws that can save you in the present, when you least expect it. My proposal is related to that. But if you’re dead set against it, then please just say so.”
Because if he said no, she’d have to think quickly about what else she could offer. Knowing the dragon-shifters like she did, she refused to buy dragon’s blood from the black market. And Stonefire was the clan she knew the best. Yes, she’d briefly worked with Lochguard, but if Bram said no, she didn’t think the Scottish dragon leader, Finn, would then say yes.
Hayley did her best to sit still and waited to see how Bram would respond. There were times she needed to push and argue, and times when she needed to wait. Right now, it was the latter.
Eventually, Bram sighed, uncrossed his arms, and replied, “I want to believe you’re right, Hayley, about the crawl toward equality. I really do. However, I’m not sure if or when the British humans will let us regularly use past precedent to win court cases. Whatever the Department of Dragon Affairs says, so goes.”
This would be the tricky part, for sure. Until the most recent DDA Director, Rosalind Abbott, had taken office, the dragon-shifters had suffered at the whim of the man in charge with no say. And yes, before Rosalind, they had all been men.
“I still think it’s important to know what you’re up against. Any good barrister knows that information and preparation are key to any court case, be it prosecution or defense.”
“And here I thought it was whoever could lie the best,” he drawled.
Used to similar barbs, she barreled past it. “Persuasion is important, yes. But I rely on facts and the truth to win. And it hasn’t hurt me since I’m one of the best.”
Bram studied her a second before replying, “Aye, I know your history. Many say that if you’d stop tinkering with dragon-shifters, you could become one of the most in-demand solicitors in the country. So I have to ask—why don’t you do that, lass?”
The fact Bram had done some research on her made Hayley respect him all the more. “Well, it’s somewhat personal, really. When I was a little kid, I met my first dragon-shifter girl during a family day trip to Brighton. We had fun playing together on the beach until someone noticed her flashing dragon eyes. She was immediately taken away by the authorities.”
The laws had been much stricter back then, laws she hadn’t known about. To Hayley, she’d merely made a new friend named Martha.
It’d been so long since she’d recalled that day. One minute she’d been laughing and trying to fly a kite, and the next, the police had taken Martha away crying.
That was the last time Hayley had ever seen the dragon girl.
Hayley’s throat tightened, and she did her best not to let her emotions get the best of her. “I later learned she was confined to her clan’s land for the rest of her life, simply because she played with a human child.” She paused, took a deep breath, and whispered, “She was from Skyhunter, and eventually their former bastard leader killed her, like with so many others.”
The current Skyhunter co-leaders were lovely, but before them, a cruel dragonman had used his clan members as pawns—imprisoning, torturing, and killing as he saw fit.
Bram said softly, “I’m so sorry, Hayley.”
She tried to smile, but failed. “Simply talking and playing with me confined the little dragon girl to a type of prison for the rest of her life. It was so unfair. And as I got older, I looked more and more into the laws and rules surrounding dragon-shifters until I decided I wanted to help others like her—dragon-shifters who need a human ally, one who might be able to use the law to their advantage. So that’s why I help both humans and dragon-shifters. It’s personal to me.”
He studied her for a few seconds before replying, “Thank you for sharing and helping me to understand. Creating a dragon-shifter law database might have some value.” She opened her mouth to further argue her case, but he beat her to it. “So let’s say we go for it. What is it you want in return for your help?”
