by Anne Bishop
He ran toward the boys. So did Blair, in Wolf form, and Nathan, who was wearing swim trunks—probably the first piece of clothing he could grab when he shifted to human. Vlad veered off to intercept Skippy before the juvenile Wolf joined the fight.
They were Wolves, and they were fast. But not fast enough.
The human boy hit Sam and broke skin. Sam grabbed the boy’s wrist and sank his teeth into the boy’s hand—a punishing bite, even if delivered with human teeth.
Mostly human teeth, Simon amended, seeing Wolf fangs when Sam leaped away and snarled.
The boy screamed, flailed—and hit Meg on the mouth.
“Meg!” Sam howled as fur suddenly covered his face and limbs and his head began to change to accommodate a Wolf’s jaws and teeth. He leaped on the boy, and Simon, feeling the same fury as he caught the scent of Meg’s blood, knew what would happen if Sam managed to get his teeth into the boy’s throat.
He grabbed Sam and hauled him away from the boy. “Enough, Sam. Enough!”
Sam snapped and clawed at Simon, trying to get away and reach his enemy.
Simon wrapped a hand around Sam’s throat, a loose collar to prevent the pup from biting him. He snarled, “Stop. Now.”
Then Blair was in Sam’s face, snarling his own warning. The leader and the dominant enforcer had both given the order to stop. If the pup disobeyed now, he would be punished.
Sam sagged in Simon’s arms, panting.
Simon released his hold on Sam’s throat but kept his other arm around the pup. Nathan held on to the human boy, who was wailing as if he’d received more than a bite bruise and a bit of a tear in his skin.
Now that the combatants were secured, Simon looked for Meg, who was sitting on the pavement a few feet away. Blood dribbled from her split lip, staining her summer top. Her lips moved. He couldn’t hear her, but he knew what was happening because Starr wrote on the pavement while Jenni held Meg’s hand and stared at her face.
Emily Faire ran out of the medical office. Her eyes went from Sam, who was still in a between form, to Meg, to the boy. Then she looked at Simon, and he understood: who should she help first?
Seeing Jane Wolfgard running toward them, Simon tipped his head to indicate the boy. “Deal with him.”
The girl broke away from the Hawk and tried to run. Blair leaped in pursuit, then stopped when the girl was suddenly buried under several feet of fluffy snow.
Simon stared at the white pony who was standing near the snow. Avalanche stared back and snorted.
Could have been worse, he thought. The girls at the lake could have sent Quicksand to find out what was going on. But he found it reassuring that the Elementals were keeping their promise to watch the Market Square while the Elders observed that Cyrus and the other humans.
Theral finally appeared in the office doorway. She, too, hesitated a moment before going over to help Emily Faire deal with the boy.
No need to call the humans, Simon thought as he watched that Cyrus run toward them, shouting. Montgomery and Kowalski were a step behind him, and Debany was doing his best to hold back the human females who were standing at the other end of the Market Square.
He didn’t need the warning. He felt the odd silence that suddenly filled the Market Square. And he saw the columns of smoke filling one of the archways—and would bet one of those columns was Erebus Sanguinati.
She nodded and half carried Meg into the building with Jenni providing additional support.
Nathan released the human boy, who was making enough noise to attract the attention of every predator in the Courtyard, grabbed Sam, and took the pup into the office.
Blair, having uncovered the girl and provided a way out of the snow pile, stepped back, alert and wary but not sure which attack he might need to meet—human, Sanguinati, Elemental . . . or Elder.
Montgomery and Kowalski grabbed that Cyrus’s arms as Simon turned to face the human.
“Look what that fucking freak did to my boy!” that Cyrus screamed at Montgomery. “You gotta shoot that fucker!”
“Jimmy,” Montgomery said. “Stop. You’re in the Courtyard.”
“Who gives a fuck where I am? Did you see that thing? You gotta shoot it for what it did to my boy!”
“He received a bite,” Simon growled. “He deserved it.”
“The boy stole from the general store,” the Hawk said. “He should forfeit a hand.”
That silenced that Cyrus, but only for a moment. “What the fuck you talking about?”
“He stole from the store,” the Hawk repeated. “If you steal from us, you lose a hand.”
“Nailed him good,” Emily Faire said loudly as she examined the teeth marks in the boy’s hand. “Lost a little skin, and he’s going to have a beaut of a bruise, but I don’t see anything to worry about.”
“Need to get my boy to the hospital,” that Cyrus said.
Simon stared in disbelief. Hospital? It was a bite. From a puppy using mostly human teeth. You just licked it clean and let it heal.
Emily snorted. “I used to get harder bites from my little brother.”
He wanted to object. Even in human form, a Wolf’s jaw had more power than an ordinary human’s, so Emily’s brother couldn’t bite harder than Sam. Then he realized that, as an Intuit, Emily was trying to defuse the anger in the Market Square. She might not be able to tell where all the anger was coming from, but she probably had a feeling that human emotions weren’t that important right now compared to the rest of the beings who were involved in, or observing, this ruckus.
She looked at that Cyrus. “I can take him inside the office, wash his hand with soap and water, and put some healing ointment on the scraped skin, or you can go to the emergency room, wait your turn, and then pay lots of money to have a doctor do the same thing.”
“You should pay for the hospital,” that Cyrus said, glaring at Simon.
“Shut up,” Simon snarled, “or we’ll take the pup’s hand as punishment for stealing and be done with it.”
“Simon,” Montgomery said, sounding courteous but weary.
But Montgomery didn’t hear the odd silence, didn’t realize the Elders were in the Market Square right now watching all of them—didn’t know this was exactly the kind of clash that would get humans killed in other parts of Thaisia where the Elders were the only ones deciding who lived and who died.
Simon focused on that Cyrus. “Your pups are banned from the Courtyard. We will permit them to go into A Little Bite or Meat-n-Greens for food, but only with an adult. If we find them anywhere else or on their own, we’ll take more than a hand.”
That Cyrus stared at him. “You can’t.”
“Yes, they can,” Montgomery said. “Come on, Jimmy. I have first-aid supplies at my place. We’ll take care of Clarence’s hand.”
That Cyrus didn’t move, and the boy looked like he wanted to start another fight when Kowalski tried to lead him away.
“Jimmy,” Montgomery warned. “Let’s go.”
Simon studied the hatred in that Cyrus’s eyes. Hatred, yes, but fear too. And no concern at all about the wailing female pup who had been buried under snow—and who had run to the female pack at the other end of the square instead of seeking comfort from her sire.
When the police and that Cyrus we
re gone, Simon turned to Emily Faire. “Your brother can’t bite as hard as a Wolf.”
She shrugged. “I’m going to take care of my other patients now.”
Meg. He had taken a step toward the medical office when Vlad called him. He hesitated, but Jane knew about not licking Meg’s blood and she knew how to care for Sam. And Theral and Jenni were inside to help as well. So Emily Faire didn’t need anyone else crowding the office.
He walked over to where Vlad and Henry stood next to Starr Crowgard. Henry pointed to the words chalked on the pavement.
White car. Man. Pain face. Bullet. Numbers and letters that Simon realized must be a license plate.
Those images were the answer, but what had been the question?
“The police pack is dealing with that Cyrus and his pup,” Henry said.
“Shall I call Captain Burke?” Vlad asked.
Simon nodded. “And we’ll show this to Agent O’Sullivan as well.”
• • •
Burke swore under his breath when he saw Agent O’Sullivan waiting for him outside the consulate. “I heard about the fight. A tempest in a teapot.”
“If Cyrus Montgomery gets his hands on a weapon, it will become a lot more than that,” O’Sullivan said, reaching for the door.
Burke shot out a hand, stopping the other man. “What do you know that I didn’t hear?” Had Monty downplayed the severity of the collision between Sam Wolfgard and Clarence Montgomery? Or was Monty, caught between loyalties, unwilling to consider the worst about his brother?
“I think Cyrus is a bully who uses charm or belligerence to get what he wants, depending on the situation. I had the impression that he thinks shoplifting is an insignificant act when his children do it, and he becomes resentful when they’re caught and held accountable. Seeing Sam Wolfgard in a form that wasn’t completely human freaked him out, and he’ll use ‘he’s not human’ as a justification for any harm he does to the youngster—or anyone else in the Courtyard.” O’Sullivan hesitated. “I didn’t see anything, but there was something in the Market Square that seriously spooked Simon Wolfgard and the rest of the shifters.”
Elders. Gods above and below. “Anything else?”
“I don’t know if he understood the significance of her bleeding, but Cyrus did see Meg.”
Not a cut with a razor, but that didn’t make any difference for a blood prophet. If they were all lucky, Cyrus wouldn’t have noticed the evenly spaced scars. But he didn’t think they were going to be that lucky.
O’Sullivan opened the door. “None of which is what Simon wants to talk to us about.”
When they walked into the consulate’s meeting room, Simon didn’t give him a chance to say anything about the altercation or inquire about Meg and Sam. He held out a piece of paper.
Burke looked at the words and sucked in a breath.
Simon touched the paper. “Meg said she saw Sam get hit and thought about needing a doctor. When she was hit and her lip split, she saw this.”
“Dominic Lorenzo drives a white car,” Burke said. “I don’t remember the license plate, but that information is easy enough to find.”
“The doctor was supposed to spend some time in our medical office every week, but he hasn’t been here in a while,” Simon said. “That’s why we hired Emily Faire to be the human bodywalker in the Courtyard.”
“Isn’t Dr. Lorenzo part of the task force that was checking on the blood prophets?” O’Sullivan asked.
“He is,” Burke replied. And the last time I saw him, he’d expressed concern that members of the Humans First and Last movement might waylay him on a stretch of empty road and interrogate him for the hidden locations of the blood prophets. The Others put an end to the HFL movement, but greed could motivate men as much as a political agenda, and those girls could make some men very powerful and very rich.
An uncomfortable beat of silence before O’Sullivan said, “I’ll call the governor’s office and make some inquiries, see if they’ve heard from Dr. Lorenzo recently.”
“And I’ll do what I can to locate him.” Burke folded the paper and put it in his pocket. Since prophecy was about the future, maybe they could find Lorenzo in time to stop the pain and the bullet. Maybe Steve Ferryman could help with that, since most of the girls who had been freed from the compounds were hiding in Intuit communities. “Are your nephew and Ms. Corbyn all right?” he asked Simon.
“They will be.” Simon pulled another piece of paper out of the back pocket of his jeans and handed it to Burke.
“Ravendell on Senneca Lake? What’s this?” Senneca was one of the Finger Lakes, but he wasn’t familiar with Ravendell.
“That’s where the Sierra and her pups are now,” Simon replied. “Ravendell is a human village within settled terra indigene land.”
Not land leased and under human control, which meant there were no boundaries, no delineation between what was human and what was Other.
“Not on the rail line from Lakeside to Hubb NE,” O’Sullivan commented. “Is it on a bus route?”
“Not on a route between human cities,” Simon replied. “There is a bus that travels around the lake. It is considered local, the way the buses in Lakeside are local. Lieutenant Montgomery thought it safer for the Sierra if he and Miss Twyla didn’t know where to find her, but I thought you should know this much.”
“I will be officially relocating to Lakeside, but for now I still have a residence in Hubbney and try to get back there a couple of times each month,” O’Sullivan said. “I could find an excuse to visit the Senneca Lake area if anyone wanted to send something to Ms. Montgomery.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” Burke said. With nothing left to communicate, O’Sullivan left, but Burke held back. “If Clarence was shoplifting, why didn’t the shopkeeper stop him?”
“The Hawk would have let him get outside, so he couldn’t claim he meant to pay.” Simon shrugged. “Like all the terra indigene, the Hawkgard are larger than ordinary hawks. Not large enough to lift a human child that size, but the talons would have done a lot of damage. That’s what would have happened, except Sam, and Meg, intervened.”
“Clarence was wearing a couple of rings—a kid’s version of brass knuckles. He could have caused some serious hurt on another child.”
“Sam had one cut that bled.” Simon smiled dryly. “A few months ago, I would have licked the cut clean and that would have been that. Today, Sam’s cut cheek and Meg’s split lip justify coming to the Market Square after dinner for ice cream, followed by a Wolf Team movie marathon.”
“I’m surprised Sam and Meg didn’t campaign to have ice cream for dinner as well as dessert,” Burke said.
“They did. But Katherine Debany put on her mother hat and said ice cream wasn’t enough for dinner and recommended scrambled eggs because they would be soft to eat. Everyone in the female pack is bringing an egg to A Little Bite for me to take home.”
Sounded like Simon was still trying to figure out the pack status of Officer Debany’s mother. Fortunately the Wolf didn’t ask for a description of a mother hat. “Could be worse.”
Simon nodded. “We could be eating yogurt.”
Burke chuckled, but his amusement faded quickly. “How much longer is the tethered goat going to stay in Lakeside?”
“I don’t know. If it were up to me, that Cyrus would have been gone the day he arrived.”
“So they’re still interested in Cyrus Montgomery?”
Simon looked thoughtful. “That Cyrus is not the kind of human who normally would go near the wild country.”
WE LERNED FROM YU. The Elders had posted those signs, luring television and newspaper reporters to towns like Bennett to see for themselves what the primal forms of terra indigene in the Midwest and Northwest regions had learned about what it meant to be human. Whole towns were slaughtered in retaliation for the slaughter of the Wolfgard in t
hose areas.
That had been terrible enough and gave him sleepless nights—something he would never admit to his men or his superiors—but with the Humans First and Last movement shattered, it wasn’t likely that anyone would be able to rally humans to another all-out attack on the Others. At least, not for another generation or two. No, the next threat to humans could be more subtle and more terrible if it was a reflection of Cyrus Montgomery’s more unsavory traits.
“He’s not the kind of human anyone would want the Elders to imitate,” Burke said.
“Well,” Simon replied after a moment. “He’s just the tethered goat. I don’t think the Elders are that interested in him anymore.”
• • •
Jimmy sat at the bar in the Stag and Hare, nursing a drink. Sandee was boohooing about Clarence’s hand and how dangerous it was to be around the Courtyard. And the kids were boohooing about every damn thing. A man couldn’t get any peace.
Had to make some connections. Had to find something he could turn into cash. He’d sold the extra package of lasagna easily enough, and the men he’d approached were interested in anything else he might have to sell. But with restrictions on how much of everything humans could buy at the Courtyard, and the freaks getting riled up about Clarence palming a couple of stupid things that weren’t anything, he didn’t think he’d be able to get enough food to sell—unless he sold half of what he could squeeze out of the Courtyard and told Sandee to pay for her food some other way.
Too bad the freaks didn’t seem interested in humping. Sandee might be worth her keep if they were.
The blond-haired man he’d seen before sat on the stool next to his and gave him a smile that lacked sincerity and held a hint of mean. “Buy you a drink?”
Jimmy was inclined to like the man for the smile alone. The offer of a drink just added weight. “Appreciate it.”
“You have some kind of hook into the Courtyard,” the man said.
Feeling cautious, Jimmy sipped his drink. “I know people who have a hook.”