The Dragon's Companion

Disclaimer:

I do not own BBC Sherlock.

Notes:

Basically there are people who are creatures. They can look human but can make certain animal features of theirs appear/disappear at will to blend in with ordinary humans. There's prejudice between humans and creatures so they generally hide what they are.

I dedicate this chapter to my followers: Franklin21, 28505, RiverDragonWarrior, RyuNeko, TheCrystalEevee, brandyfaire, iTorchic, kiras70 and otala

Also, a special thank you for kiras70 for the enthusiastic review :) I hope to see more in the future.

Chapter 5

Charles Augustus Magnussen. The man who could blackmail anyone and get away with it. Meliora's gut had twisted at the thought of the man and she knew she had to keep the dragon safe. Not from physical harm. No, that wasn't Magnussen's style. This man that Sherlock told her about had the dead eyes of a shark. She didn't disagree with that statement and briefly wondered if the man was a literal shark. Not that it would be any help if he was. One of her ears twitched as she heard someone come up the stairs.

The door opened to reveal Janine, Mary's maid of honor. She walked over to the wolf, one hand playfully tweaking one of her ears before dropping a kiss to the woman's lips. "Sherl not home?" She asked as she went to the kitchen and placed her bags on the table beside one of Sherlock's experiments.

"No," Meliora slightly grumbled, obviously displeased.

Janine almost giggled. After getting to know the two occupants of 221B it'd been plain to see that while Sherl and Meli wore hard exteriors for the world the pair were actually quite soft at heart. And oh so adorable.

The black-haired wolf glared.

This time she did laugh and only laughed more at the pout on her girlfriend's lips. "Oh don't worry so much. You said yourself that he was perfectly capable of taking care of himself."

She shifted, face flushing slightly.

Janine stared at her, a wide smile appearing as she suddenly understood. "You miss those cuddle puddle things."

Her face darkened just before she glanced away. She did miss the cuddle puddles. Before Sherlock and Janine it wasn't something she'd done before although it was fairly common among wolves in general, group cuddling. Her green eyes landed on the groceries that her girlfriend had brought and she glanced back with a smile, "Missed my cooking, have you?"

"It's amazing you two ever got along before me," the other woman teased, "considering you both absolutely refuse to go out to buy groceries."

Meliora shrugged dismissively, "Mrs Hudson brings us food." She casually watched Janine put the groceries away.

She shot her a smile back over her shoulder. "Well no offense to Mrs Hudson but I think your cooking is the best I've ever tasted."

Her lips formed a sly smirk, "Flattery will get you nowhere."

Janine shut the cupboards and strut over to Meli's chair. "Oh really?"

She swallowed as her girlfriend straddled her lap and felt fingers going through her hair. Her eyes closed and she gave a low moan as nails scratched the base of her wolf ears, causing her to lower her forehead to Janine's shoulder. "Jaaaan," she whined.

"How about we go to bed early?" Jan whispered.

"Stay out of my bedroom."

Meliora knew that was Sherlock's way of informing her John was most likely going to go in if they didn't come out. She smirked. Ah, what a perfect opportunity for some revenge against John. She smiled at her girlfriend who wore nothing but a buttoned up shirt and her underwear, "Why don't you join Sherlock in the shower?"

Janine wrapped her arms around the wolf's waist from behind, setting her chin on her girlfriend's shoulder. "Are you sure you don't wanna join us?"

"You do recall what happened the last time we tried to all share a shower, don't you?" She questioned.

"Mm, that was rather disastrous, wasn't it?" The woman chuckled, pressing a kiss to her neck before pulling away. "Okay then." She put her hand on the doorknob but glanced back for a moment, "Breakfast?"

Meliora snorted, "I think Sherlock's gonna need it."

Janine opened the door, startled to see someone standing there. "Oh, John, hi," she greeted, pulling her shirt down a little. "How are you?"

Smirk in place, the green-eyed woman slid into view behind her girlfriend and was grateful to be wearing a slightly longer shirt, "Yes John, how are you?"

"Janine?"

"Sorry," she apologized, feeling a bit embarrassed, "not dressed."

Meliora slipped around her girlfriend, walking past John and toward the kitchen.

"Okay, I'm just going to," she gestured toward the bathroom, "if you don't mind."

"Sherlock's in there."

Janine smiled, "Oh, I know."

Meli heard the bathroom door open and close and held in the urge to giggle. It threatened to bubble up again as John went back to sit down on the couch as she started the coffee maker and went about making breakfast.

"Good morning Meliora," Sherlock greeted, giving his pack mate a brief one arm hug around the waist while placing a kiss on her cheek.

She held up a cup of tea that he relieved her of as he walked out of the kitchen to sit in his chair.

"So, just a guess but you've probably got some questions." He took a sip of the tea before setting it on top of some books stacked near him.

"Yeaah, one or two," John replied.

"Naturally."

Jan's heels echoed as she walked back into the bedroom.

"You have a girlfriend?"

Meli's mouth quirked.

"Two actually." Sherlock glanced over at John. He wasn't one to be deterred from the more important topic. "Now, Magnussen. Magnussen is like a shark. Have you ever been to the shark tank at the London Aquarium John? Stood up close to the glass? Those floating flat faces, those dead eyes. That's what he is."

Meliora was starting to wonder if getting Sherlock to watch shark week with her had been a bad idea. He was becoming a bit shark obsessed.

"I've dealt with murders, psychopaths, terrorists, serial killers... None of them can turn my stomach like Charles. Augustus. Magnussen."

There's silence so she glances over. Her lips twitch at the sight of John's face. That smile. Whether she cares or not to know it is quite plain to her what that smile means and it fills her with triumph. Because it isn't a happy smile. It is disbelief, shock, puzzlement and the sinking feeling that John realizes he's not exactly happy although he doesn't understand why he isn't.

"You have."

The wolf almost snorts as she hears the dragon's confused 'Sorry, what?' and finishes wrapping up Janine's to-go breakfast.

"Yes you have girlfriends," John says.

"What?" Sherlock's brain catch's up quickly as he continues, "Yes. Yes. I'm going out with Janine and Meliora. I thought that was fairly obvious."

"Yes. Well. Yes." John clears his throat and stutters out, "But I mean you-you-you are in a relationship?" With two women, his mind shouts.

His brows raise for a moment before he sighs. Out of the corner of his eye he can see Meliora standing in the kitchen with an expression signaling how she's trying not to laugh. "Yes I am." His voice cracks slightly at the end and he notices the amusement drain slightly from the wolf.

"You, Janine and Meliora?"

"Hm," he nods once. "Yes. Me, Janine and Meliora."

"Care to elaborate?"

At this, Meli shoots John a glare. Like it's really any of his business. Plus, she's slightly worried about Sherlock's answer.

"Well we're in a good place," he tells John, "and it's um...very affirming." He gives the former blogger a short smile.

"You got that from a book."

One of her ears twitched and she missed the dragon's response as she heard Janine start walking toward them.

"Okay you two bad boys," the human woman starts as she goes toward Sherlock who now has a smile plastered on his face as he holds out his arm to signal her to sit on the arm of his chair. "Behave yourselves," she says as she sits with Sherlock's eyes still on her. "You Sherl," her voice lowers in volume, "are gonna have to tell us where you were yesterday."

"Working," he replies.

"Workin.' Of course. Just try not stay away too long." Then she whispered, "It takes twice the work to keep two women happy after all." She winked at him to let him know she wasn't scolding him, just reminding him.

His smile became less wide but more genuine. "I'll remember."

Janine turned her attention toward John. "I haven't told Mary about this. I kinda wanted to surprise her."

"Yeah, you probably will."

Meliora silently disagrees with John. Perhaps the woman-not-named-Mary won't be surprised at all.

"But we should have you two over for dinner real soon."

Sherlock agrees and Meli once again silently disagrees.

"My place though-"

"Janine, you're going to be late," the wolf reminds her. God, she inwardly groans. A dinner with John and Mary. Just what she didn't want.

Janine stood up. "Oh, yes." She goes over to her girlfriend and gives her a brief kiss before taking the offered breakfast sandwich. "I shall see you later then." Then she goes over to the door which Sherlock is holding open. "It was brilliant to see you," she says to John before turning to Sherl.

"Have a lovely day. Call me later."

"I might do that," she says flirtatiously, kissing him. "Solve me a crime Sherlock Holmes."

Meliora rolls her eyes though she can't help but smile. She really did like Janine.

Sherlock watched Meliora out of the corner of his gaze as the wolf's attention was focused on the number of rings in front of them. He had brought her along in order to make up for the time missed but as he observed her he was starting to think she was taking picking out an engagement ring a little too seriously for a fake relationship even though he knew she was particularly picky when it came to buying anything. His eyes narrowed slightly. Was it possible Meliora had developed feelings for Janine? Real feelings? More than the transferred attachment he had been expecting due to Janine's presence during his absence? It was why he had included her in this after all. He knew Meliora needed someone but this case meant he had to develop close relations with Janine and so his compromise had been for them all to be in a relationship. For Meliora to get close to someone so fast meant something was different because it had taken months for the wolf to count him as a pack mate and that was after several life and death situations in which they had rescued one another.

It was obvious what he was thinking about. Even an idiot would start to be suspicious after five different stores. But she cared. Even though she wouldn't even be the one proposing she cared about the engagement ring. And it had occurred to her the reason why was because she wanted to be engaged to Janine. With that thought had come the realization of exactly why that was. She'd had known something was different when they'd met but she hadn't thought it was this. How could she not have seen it sooner? Maybe then she wouldn't be ruining any chance she had at being with her mate. Now there was nothing she could do. This wasn't something she could change no matter how much she wanted.

"Meliora?" The consulting detective whispered.

Her eyes widened slightly in surprise. She hadn't really been paying much attention to the rings but somehow her vision had landed on it anyway. "This one," she exhaled in awe, pointing to the ring. "It's perfect."