by Eileen Wilks
It wasn’t completely black. The windows in the great room weren’t draped, so some light spilled in from that end of the hall. But the moon was only a couple of days past new, so that wisp of illumination was too thin for human eyes. Lily trailed her fingers along the wall to guide her.
“Here,” Rule said, giving her a target.
She brushed past him and entered Isen’s study—where it was truly, deeply dark, being a completely interior room. When the light was on, it was a cozy and inviting room with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, a desk in one corner, a small bassinet in another, and four cushy chairs grouped in the middle. The walls and ceiling were reinforced with steel. The trapdoor that opened on the emergency escape tunnel was hidden beneath a fine old Persian carpet.
Lily stopped just inside and waited for Rule to shut the door and turn on the lights.
“I’m leaving the door open until Cynna gets here with the baby,” he told her. “I’ll have to switch to the landline then, but until…yes.” The last was apparently addressed to Pete. “I see. Lily, call Benedict. His mobile number is star four. Brief him. Pete can’t raise the patrol that was on Big Sister at the time of the explosion.”
Rule was in full Rho-mode, which meant tossing out orders, not requests, but Lily wasn’t going to quibble over phrasing. Benedict had to be told, and she wasn’t useful otherwise at the moment. She moved farther into the room, feeling for the desk. She’d need the landline; there was too much metal in the walls for her mobile phone.
She found the desk and the phone, propped her rump on one and lifted the receiver of the other, causing the number pad to light up. She tapped the star key, then the four, and waited.
Benedict was Rule’s oldest brother, the head of security for the clan, and absent. That was highly unusual, but so was being gifted with a second Chosen by the Lady, which was the reason he wasn’t at Clanhome. He’d traveled across the country to spend the holidays with Arjenie’s family. Then, right after the holiday, they’d had to go to D.C. Benedict’s Chosen was Arjenie Fox, a researcher for the Bureau with a secret heritage: she was part elf. She hadn’t seen her father in years, but he’d told her a lot about the sidhe, so when the trade delegation showed up in Washington, Ruben had summoned her.
Benedict was also the only Nokolai other than Rule who could carry the mantle if Isen were killed, since Toby was too young. That made him a major potential target for their enemies. If Isen and Rule were killed, Benedict would be the clan’s only chance to survive.
She could just barely make out Rule’s bulk against the rectangle of paler darkness that was the doorway. She couldn’t hear him much better than she could see him. He was talking to Pete, but keeping his voice so low she’d need lupi hearing to make out the words.
“Yes,” a deep voice said in her ear.
“This is Lily. We’ve got a situation. Between five and ten minutes ago there was an explosion halfway up Big Sister—the east face—resulting in a fire Pete described as not very large. We’re on full alert. The patrol nearest the incident can’t be raised by phone. Two other patrols are headed there to investigate, and Rule is sending a squad with Cullen to deal with the fire. Rule and I are in Isen’s study. Cynna and the baby will be here any minute. Toby’s at Danny’s—Eric Snowden’s son—with his guards tripled. Isen’s whereabouts are unknown, but he’s alive.”
“His guards?”
“He went for a run without them.”
A moment’s silence. “Mick’s birthday.”
“Yes.”
“Hold a moment.” He didn’t wait for her to agree—typical Benedict—but he wasn’t gone long. She heard him telling someone about the explosion, then she heard Arjenie’s voice, though she couldn’t make out the words. Then he spoke to her again. “I’ve informed the guards. We’re vulnerable if we attempt to leave the hotel, so we’ll stay here for now. Arjenie’s going to increase the power to her ward, and I’ll attempt to contact Mika and see if he’s willing to stand watch.”
“Okay. Rule, Benedict and Arjenie are staying put. He’s going to see if Mika will keep an eye on things. Anything else I should pass on?” He didn’t answer. Maybe he’d shaken his head, forgetting that she couldn’t see him. But if he’d had something to add, he would have, so she said, “I’ll call when I can and there’s more information.” She disconnected.
Then there was nothing to do but wait in the darkness. And think.
It wasn’t that hard to sneak onto Nokolai Clanhome. It was too big. Over six thousand acres meant miles of perimeter to patrol, and even with the recent influx there weren’t enough guards to survey the entire border at every moment. A single person could cross easily if he or she was fit enough for the terrain and savvy or lucky enough to miss the patrols. The trick was remaining unseen, unheard, and unsmelled once you got here. Lupi patrolled in pairs—one two-footed and armed, one four-footed, with onboard armament and a really good nose.
If you wanted to penetrate very far into Clanhome—say, all the way to the small village at its heart—you’d want a diversion. Especially if you were leading a small group bent on mayhem. The problem was, the diversion their intruder had chosen didn’t make sense.
Big Sister was a relatively easy target for an outsider. The peak itself was on Nokolai land, but part of its rumpled skirts lay in the state lands that abutted the clan’s acreage, and the terrain was rougher on the Nokolai side. Hard to patrol. A bomb set off there would certainly pull the nearest patrols that way, potentially opening a route…but to what? Lily pictured the area in her mind, but she couldn’t come up with a target that was both close enough to Big Sister for the absence of nearby patrols to matter, and far enough away that the intruders wouldn’t be spotted by the patrols converging on the fire.
Fire. Maybe that was the key point. Maybe the intruder was counting on the fire to get big enough to require most or all of Nokolai’s fighters, leaving the village relatively undefended. If whoever it was didn’t know about Cullen’s knack with fire, that would make sense.…except that this was winter. An unusually wet winter. There was more to burn on the east face of Big Sister than the west—more trees, brush, and general growth—but none of it was dry enough to catch readily.
Maybe Big Sister hadn’t been the first choice. What was it Rule had said? Isen might have “precipitated an incident.” Or someone else could have, like the missing patrol. Someone who spotted the intruders or was spotted, which somehow resulted in setting off the bomb in a less than ideal spot.
And she was diving off into pure speculation now, when what she needed was facts.
Faint but not distant, she heard yipping. That meant someone had approached the house who was supposed to be here.
“Cynna’s here,” Rule said abruptly—and in his normal voice, which meant he was talking to her, not Pete. “With Ryder. Toby’s team reports all quiet there. Still no word from the missing patrol, but the others should reach the area any minute now. If…yes?”
Lily heard the front door open and a woman’s voice murmuring softly: “Shh, now, we’re going to see Uncle Rule and Aunt Lily, and yes, I know you want to finish eating and you will in just a minute, promise…”
“Hell,” Rule said. “Warn Cullen. Cynna’s here, so I’m switching to the landline now.”
Lily shoved to her feet. “What?”
“Rick,” Rule said—apparently to the dark shape that suddenly bulked in the doorway, blocking what bit of light there was. “Any problems on the way here?”
“Nothing,” said a young lupi Lily knew slightly.
“Good. Take your post. Cynna, once you’re in here, we’ll turn on a light.”
“Good, because while Ryder doesn’t mind the dark, I bump into things. Lily?”
“Back here,” she answered as dim forms moved against the paler shape of the doorway. Cynna was a good friend and fellow FBI agent, currently on extended maternity leave. She was also the new Nokolai Rhej, as vital to the clan in her way as its Rho. “You’ve been told what
happened?”
“An explosion and a fire up on Big Sister.” Her voice moved as she came into the room. “Cullen’s off to—” She stopped, blinking as the overhead light came on. “Wow, that’s bright. Cullen’s going to go put the fire out.”
Cynna looked a bit like a blond Xena who’d gotten carried away with body art. Lacy patterns decorated pretty much every exposed inch of her skin, and most of the unexposed regions, too. Anyone who knew much about tattooing would realize the designs hadn’t been applied with a needle, however. It took magic to imprint lines that spiderweb-fine.
At the moment she wore jeans and a button-down shirt and carried a blanket-wrapped bundle that was beginning to bleat like a distressed sheep. “Firebug Asshole interrupted Ryder’s dinner,” she added, plopping down in one of the chairs and unbuttoning her blouse with one hand. “That’s about all I know.”
“We don’t know much more,” Lily told her. “Isen’s off on a run. He went alone, which is why Rule’s in charge. Rule, you learned something just as Cynna got here.”
His face was about as closed as the door he’d just shut. “One of the nearest patrols got close to the fire, but had to retreat. Our intruder has burned some grass, a couple of trees, and one hellishly large amount of wolfbane.”
SEVEN
WOLFBANE, aka monkshood, blue rocket, devil’s helmet, aconite. There were over two hundred species in the genus, many of which had been used medicinally for hundreds of years. Landscapers still planted it ornamentally. It was a deadly poison.
The roots of several species contained a highly toxic alkaloid that the Japanese once used for hunting bears and the Chinese in war. In Ayurvedic medicine, aconite was said to increase the fire dosha, and traditional Chinese medicine considered it a remedy for “coldness” or lassitude. In Western medicine, it had been used for everything from a local anesthetic—contact with the sap caused first tingling, then numbness—to a treatment for various heart problems. Certainly it acted on the heart. It stimulated the cardio-inhibitory nerve in the medulla oblongata, reducing both heart rate and blood pressure, but there was a wee tendency for the heart to slow too much. In most mammals, though, respiration stopped before the heart did.
Werewolves were not most mammals, but wolfbane affected them, too. It made them sick. Deeply, miserably sick. Hence the name.
“What symptoms?” Lily asked urgently.
“Aaron is still puking his guts out,” Rule said. “Will wasn’t as badly affected and was able to drag Aaron away from the smoke and call Pete. No paralysis.”
That was a relief. There was a woman—currently in prison and stripped of her Gift—who’d devised a way to combine wolfbane with other ingredients to create a smoke that paralyzed lupi. Best if that innovation did not spread.
Lily looked at Cynna. “How close does Cullen have to be to tell the fire to quit burning?”
“It depends on how big the fire is, but the closer the better. He won’t be able to get very close, will he? Unless…how steady is the wind?”
Rule answered that one. “Too fitful up on the slope to predict. Unless it steadies so that Cullen and the others can approach from upwind, we’ll have to wait for the wolfbane to be consumed before we can deal with the fire.”
Lily gave him a look. “You’ve got plenty of clan who aren’t lupi.” Clan who were female, in other words. The daughters of lupi were human but were considered clan, and there were more than the usual number of adult females at Clanhome now.
Rule got a funny expression on his face, as if he’d taken a swig of what he thought was water and found out was vodka. “You’re right. I didn’t think of it, but…still, it would take them awhile to get up there, and the wolfbane should have burned up by then.”
“Unless Firebug Asshole scattered wolfbane all over the place, so that wherever the fire spreads, there’s wolfbane around to burn.”
It took Rule five seconds to nod. Every instinct was arguing against it, she knew. Lupi didn’t precisely coddle their women. At least Nokolai didn’t. Southern California sprouted wildfires in the summer the way Iowa grew corn, and Lily knew that some of the female clan had been on fire lines before. But the instinct to protect went deep. Sending women out now, exposing them to possible attack from whoever had invaded Clanhome…no, that hadn’t occurred to Rule, and it took him a moment to accept the necessity.
Still, he called Pete and told him that Mellie would be in touch shortly about an escort for the female firefighting crew she would put together. Then he called Mellie. Mellie Blackstone was fifty-something, tough as nails, and owned a small construction company. She was also on Nokolai’s council of elders.
All of the lupi clans had councils except Etorri, which was too small to need one. Lily hadn’t understood the function of these councils at first, save for the obvious: they advised the Rho. In a few clans they also managed the clan’s financial affairs; in others they had ceremonial duties; in a couple they were responsible for overseeing the clan’s youth. They also took on the day-to-day duties of the Rho if he were incapacitated or unavailable. Wythe’s elders had kept the clan going until their mantle found its new holder in Ruben; Leidolf’s elders were responsible for a great deal now that Rule held that clan’s mantle, given how little time he was able to spend there.
But the most vital duty of a Councilor was never stated outright, which was why it had taken Lily awhile to figure it out. They had to be able to argue with their Rho. Not simply advise, but disagree loudly, firmly, even fiercely.
Most lupi are deeply reluctant to argue with their Rho. Many simply can’t. The ability to do so if necessary was the most essential qualification for becoming an elder. Lily had eventually realized that this, rather than egalitarianism, was why all of the councils except Leidolf had at least one female member, and some had several. The mantle didn’t include or affect female clan. Lupi did not—ever—harm women. So a tough-minded woman could look her Rho in the eye and tell him he was being an idiot when even strong-minded male Councilors might find it hard to offer more than tepid disagreement.
“I guess Mellie has firefighting experience,” Lily said when Rule ended the call.
“She used to be a fire-jumper, and she’d kick my ass if she knew I had to be prodded to think of her for this,” he said wryly. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t—hold on.” He touched his phone again, accepting a call.
It must have been good news. The tension in his shoulders eased. All he said was, “Good,” before disconnecting, but when he looked at Lily his eyes were smiling. “Isen’s on his way. He’s fine, unhurt. Hammond found him at Snake Draw, all the way at the east end. Down there he couldn’t see the glow from the fire, so he didn’t know. They’re headed back at a run.”
Lily felt her own shoulders relaxing, too. The east end of the draw was maybe four horizontal miles away, but the first part of the return trip was anything but horizontal. Still, lupi were fast. Isen would be here soon.
“Excellent!” Cynna said, and, “Say, could one of you get me a diaper? She’s about finished, which means she’ll go to sleep, then in ten minutes she’ll stink the place up. Regular as a clock,” Cynna said proudly. “Thanks,” she added to Lily, who’d retrieved a diaper and some wipes from the stash in the bassinet, and went on, “I was wondering if there was any way Firebug Asshole could have known that Isen wasn’t here at Clan Central. That he’d gone off alone.”
“I don’t see how,” Rule said, “unless we postulate a Nokolai traitor.”
“And that’s unlikely, I know,” Cynna said, “but if the goal wasn’t to pull attention away from an attack on Isen—or on me or you or Lily—what was it? Why hasn’t something happened?”
“It’s only been fifteen minutes or so,” Lily began, then stopped. Cynna was right. If the firebug knew what he was doing, he’d have acted by now. The more time passed, the better their chances of finding him. Or her. Or them.
“Maybe it has,” Rule said slowly, “and we just don’t know it yet.”
Lily drummed her fingers on her thigh. “When you want to figure out a perp’s goal, you start with what actually happened.”
Rule’s gaze sharpened. “We went on full alert.”
“Which meant lights out here, you and me tucked up in this room, and a squad sent to fetch Cynna and Ryder.”
“A squad that reported no problems along the way.”
“Rule.” Cynna sat bolt upright, dislodging Ryder and leaving her breast entirely bare. “You also sent Cullen to deal with the fire.”
Rule’s face went tight. He reached for the phone—but even as he did, it rang. “Yes.” A pause. “I agree. Send the closest two squads there, stat. He doesn’t go in until they’re in place. I’ll call him to make sure he understands that.” He ended the call and looked at Lily. “Someone or something triggered the wards around Cullen’s workshop.”
HINDSIGHT works a treat. Lily clambered up the steep path as quickly as she could and added up all the ways the perp had outsmarted them.
The key was the workshop’s location. Cullen didn’t always make things go boom, burn up, or stink to high heaven while investigating whatever magical conundrum had his attention, but the chances of one of those three things happening in any given month were good. There was a large sinkhole where his previous workshop had been. Still, some of the things he could make, some of the ideas he was working on, could be vital to the clan, so Isen built him a new one. That one was on Little Sister…the mini-mountain Lily was currently climbing. And the closest peak to Big Sister.
The saddle connecting the two was riven with crevices and such a tumbled confusion of rock that even a mountain goat would prefer to go the long way around. The intruder could be confident that no one sent to investigate the fire on one peak would stumble across him on the other, and there was no one on Little Sister to notice him. There were a few homes near the base of Little Sister, but none farther up, where the workshop was sited.