She had to. For Henry. For Wellspring. Maybe life in Blighted Basin wasn’t grand and proper, or even straightforward, but the little corner of it she’d found herself in operated with fairness and consideration. She would not let Mr. Shearing bring Wellspring—or the Farmlands, for that matter—to ruin because of her.
Annmar closed her eyes on that image of the rolling croplands. Then drawing a breath, she placed her hand on her collarbone and conjured the image of Mr. Shearing.
* * *
Blighted Basin
The blast. Sylvan falling. Blood.
The horrific images flashed through Daeryn’s mind—until a streak of red fur cleared them. Terrent shifted forms and ran toward the man with the gun, shouting, “Don’t yous dare!”
Daeryn blinked. Sylvan wasn’t—
Jac shook, her changing form dislodging Daeryn from her back. He landed on four paws and dodged as the wolves rose on either side of him. Thickets of cover lay feet away, easy places to lose his small polecat form in the shadows. Shaking, Daeryn turned from the woods and pushed himself to shift. It took forever. Rivley stepped forward before he straightened.
“Sam,” Terrent said after too long a pause. “You know me. Let us through.”
“Yous, sure. Go,” said Sam. “You’re just going home. But the rest of youse—”
“Come off it,” Terrent snarled. “Let us by.”
Daeryn’s head stuttered at what his eyes and ears were telling him: This man with the gun was a Basin resident, a Forestridge dweller like Terrent. Damned if they didn’t have a wildly different way of guarding than his enclave down south.
“Please,” said a female who looked and sounded like Jac, except Jac never pleaded.
“Appreciate the manners,” said Sam, “but youse are still out of bounds. Go back.”
“Back?” The word burst from several of them, and Jac strode forward. “Now see here.”
Rivley darted. He grabbed Jac’s arm and yanked her behind him.
That wrenched Daeryn from his stupor. Though Rivley tried to stop her, Jac still advanced. So did Daeryn, saying, “Let’s just take a minute—”
Bang.
Daeryn flinched at the gunshot from the woods. Where to run—
Another man, and another, darted from between thick conifer trees. Three…four men. The wolves shifted in an instant, ruffs standing on end and lips peeled back, and five men stopped.
None of the Wellspring group moved.
Hell. The guns would win. And it would be his fault. Again.
chapter THIRTY
The seconds dragged out with Daeryn holding his breath, gaze darting from one ragged mountain man in worn trousers and shapeless felt hat to the next. Five long gray barrels swung from him to Jac, to Mar, to Jac again. Eyes darted in confusion, more than anger.
One wrong move, and it would be over.
Daeryn pushed past the wolves, snarling, “Change to human!” He stood, feet firm and hands loose at his sides. Rivley joined him, but before the females could shift, footsteps thudded and everyone turned toward an older man trotting into the clearing.
“Goddammit, Sam,” he swore. “I told yous not to give Jimmy bullets. Can’t I send youse boys out for one minute alone without youse getting into trouble?”
One younger man stepped to another and shoved his gun down. The fellow spat. “But what are them?” he asked, chin raised to the wolves.
Daeryn let Terrent talk to the Forestridge Borderlands guards, half of whom had never seen a lowlands wolf, a species extinct in the rest of Britain. The Wellspring group scrambled to dress, he and Rivley in their trousers and braces, Jac and Mar in their long shirts.
Jac met Daeryn’s gaze. “Sorry. Instinct wasn’t the right choice.”
“Well…living in the lowlands, you haven’t dealt with Borderlands issues. At least their instincts—and Protector training—were decent. We’re taught to never strike first. But I wouldn’t have guessed the Northerners use guns. No matter that they are Basin-reared like us, we couldn’t trust them not to shoot what appears to be an animal—and an unrecognizable animal to them.”
She shook her head and pressed her knuckles to his shoulder. “How you doing?”
“Better.” He took a breath. “I’ll be fine.” He had to be, or he’d never reach Annmar.
“We’ll find out how much they like their own.” She nodded to Terrent.
Across the clearing, one of the younger men the fox boy had been speaking with broke away to talk to the older man, Mr. Carter. After listening expressionlessly, he ambled over to Daeryn and the others.
“We can’t let you through,” Mr. Carter said. “One group and it becomes the leak that never stops. This side of Blighted Basin has one access.” The old man pointed at Daeryn. “Terrent says you’ve been part of the Black Mountains Borderlands Protective Chain. So yous know how important our work is." He punctuated this with a nod. “Now the lot of youse get back down the trail and take yourselves over to Breakthrough Gap the proper way and speak with Mr. Yates as youse ought.”
The Borderlands Protectors escorted them along the ridgeline, and watched while they descended. Eventually, Daeryn said, “This is far enough. They can’t see us.”
“I’m sorry,” Terrent blurted. “I never knew us mountain folk had such a strict policy that they wouldn’t let people other than kin pass through. Old Man Carter takes his job seriously, but honest, I only see him out there half the times I go through.”
“But they’ll let you go,” Jac said. “Miz Gere will be disappointed if we can’t check those caverns for the pests. And the rest of us…” She gestured to Daeryn.
“What’s the proper way to the Gap?” he asked Terrent.
The boy pointed and answered questions about the terrain. The rack railbed led to the Gap above, a distance of five miles.
They had no Proofs. Better to beg for one passage, especially since Rivley wouldn’t want to travel the Gateway tunnel. “I’ll go by myself,” Daeryn said. “Terrent should run the cavern inspection, and then meet up with the rest of you to return for the hunt tonight.”
Rivley’s jaw hardened. “I’m going with you.”
“Not necessary.”
Rivley pivoted and tromped off in the direction Terrent had shown them. Daeryn stared after him. Forget hawk, Rivley had the soul of an eagle.
Jac nudged Daeryn. “Order his ass back. He has your mark. He knows there’ll be hell to pay when you set it with a second and he’s bound to you.”
Right, Jac would assume Daeryn planned to follow through on the mark, same as she’d expected him to do to her a week and a half back.
Or was this a dare to see if he would?
It didn’t matter anymore. He shot her a glare and took off, keeping to a fast walk, although Rivley stormed along better than a hundred feet ahead. Daeryn needed the space to wrest his ’cambire under control. Human… I will stay human.
This marking had been a mistake. They weren’t in Rockbridge. Rivley didn’t need to act as, or even be, his beta. And if Daeryn continued to force him, they’d delay fulfilling their gildan obligation. Daeryn didn’t need a pack, just a friend. A friend he could have lost if the jittery bloke with the gun had taken a dislike to Rivley darting around. The hum and tension eased from Daeryn’s muscles. He had to drop this idiotic notion of always being in charge, even if it meant fighting instinct. He couldn’t—wouldn’t—take on a pack alpha role, not if it jeopardized Rivley’s life.
Just the gildan. Working together. Talking.
Daeryn heaved a breath, close enough and loud enough that Rivley’s head jerked up, but he marched on.
“Riv? Stop already, would you?”
“Only if you’re not talking me out of going with you.”
“I’m not,” he said, and when Rivley hesitated, he rushed on with, “Sorry I got you into this. New plan: We won’t have a pack. We’ll return to the Elders and demand—”
“Forget that.” Rivley spun around, his face twisted i
n a scowl. “This reeks on so many levels. Not the least of which is everyone is watching us,” he hissed. “Why couldn’t we have done this just the two of us?”
“Because this side’s Gateway is a dark tunnel-like gorge.” Daeryn blew out his breath. “After that visit with Old Terry, I was trying to save you some…angst.”
Rivley’s fisted hands tightened. “And you figured that after marking me, you’d decide what’s best for me? Over the last three years, I’ve managed fine with my own decisions, thanks. Why didn’t you give me the choice?”
The accusation stung. “Why didn’t you knock some sense into me?”
Riv’s face contorted and reddened. “You didn’t give me a chance,” he snapped. “Just like you never asked if Pepper should go with us.”
Pepper? Rivley had never mentioned his former female before. Daeryn cleared his throat. “What do you mean?”
Rivley sank onto a fallen log and dropped his head into his hands. A pause followed, long enough that Daeryn thought he wouldn’t get an answer.
“We wouldn’t have fought,” came his quiet words. “We’d have made up. Just like MC and I do. Did. Pepper and I had already fought and made up several times. You just hadn’t noticed. You announced to the pack she wasn’t going, and like today, I couldn’t counter your decision. Arguing before the pack would have been worse than going out one short.”
Damn. Daeryn tapped a palm to his forehead. “But it wasn’t. What happened was worse.”
“We know that now.” Rivley lifted his head. “And now, it makes no difference. I never should have brought it up. Except”—he rubbed the mark on his left shoulder—“the memory of our last time as pack is a bit sharp.”
Daeryn sat, too, elbows propped on his knees, head hanging. Back in Rockbridge that was the way he’d handled the pack, as the everything’s-on-me alpha: He judged what was right and ordered people to carry out the decision. His family expected him to take charge. His community expected it. Yet it had cost him his mate, and possibly ruined Rivley’s chances of finding one.
Daeryn squeezed his eyes shut. Something was off here, and not just his human form reacting with ’cambire instinct. He jumped up and paced the leafy ground. The last week, he, and Jac, had done so well communicating. Maybe being in charge didn’t mean being the only one with ideas, being the boss. Like Rivley said, You never asked.
Daeryn stopped. What a total ass he was. Since becoming his beta, his best friend had bent his life to accommodate Daeryn’s. That wasn’t right. Neither of them was being honest with the other, or themselves—this morning he’d asked Old Terry to be honest with Annmar.
He spun around to Rivley. “Honestly wasn’t just a word tacked on to our lesson. Honestly work together to restore yourselves and your pack. We aren’t being honest.”
Rivley stood, his body rigid but hands open. “I’ve never lied to you.”
“Not directly. But by omission? Have there been things you wanted to say to me, but didn’t?”
“You never ask.”
Daeryn cringed. “I never ask. My fault in this is I don’t work together. I always assumed I should bear all the responsibility in our pack, the way we trained as alphas to do. Apparently, that didn’t work. But you should also speak up.”
Rivley shrugged a shoulder.
“Damn it all,” Daeryn said, “if you’re still refusing to offer any help, then having a pack isn’t the solution.”
“You just won’t accept the pack issue, will you?” Rivley’s face reddened in anger. “Fine, you want honest? I’m tired of you arguing this point. Same as you’re saying honesty is named, then if pack is identified in the lesson, we have to do it. If we want any hope of completing the lesson, you have to drop the row about pack.” He waved toward the others. “It’s Basin tradition to have these alliances with others to support and ease our livelihoods. Out of all the ways we associate with others—kin, team, enclave, Collective—pack is the strongest connection any Basin dwellers form because of the blood bond. Doesn’t it make sense to use a blood bond to resolve another blood bond?”
It did. Daeryn raked a hand through his hair. He couldn’t imagine not being in some group, so why was he hesitating to be pack? He wanted to say yes, yet when he looked at Rivley, his gaze slid to the purpling tooth indentations.
“What you’re asking me to do—resume my alpha ways—counters everything I’ve learned this last week working with Jac. There has to be more opportunity for others to have a say, to show their talents, to share their strengths within a group, not always bend to what one leader determines. Hell, if Terrent hadn’t jumped in on that ridge, or Jac, or you, or Mar, where would any of us be now? Dead? I forgot those lessons when I marked you, but I’ll be forever grateful no one else did.”
Rivley crossed his arms. “You do realize you’ve just made a case for not leaving me behind.”
He had. “You won’t let me, no more than you’ve let me order you around. Good you didn’t, or we might have lost our progress on the first lesson. From now on, you and I co-lead, but I’m also allowing any friends or team or group I’m a part of to have a say in what we all do. I think… No, I know I misunderstood what the Rockbridge Elders taught us about leadership. It’s not bossing people, but coordinating with them. Finding the best way that works for your group to get the job done.”
“I see what you’re getting at, but we could also do that as packmates.” Rivley turned to wave Jac, Maraquin and Terrent over.
Daeryn studied their friends. “We’ve got a good group at Wellspring. Telling Miz Gere that Jac and I had to co-lead improved things, same as when I asked you to be my beta. If I try again with Annmar, maybe I’ll find the right way for it to work.”
“We also have to try pack again. Move beyond that one failure, remember our other successes and try to restore what we had, or improve it with your new ideas.”
Daeryn wiped a hand across his mouth. “Right. I’ve relived that failure too many times—oh.” He slapped his forehead. “Learn and let live.”
The light dawned in Rivley’s eyes. “Brilliant. The gildan lesson mimics the Creator’s Path teachings. Both of us missed it.”
“And I would have continued to miss it if I hadn’t explained that teaching to Annmar. Damned if we didn’t need to examine each part of the lesson. Restoring means moving beyond the failure.” He grinned. “Given my record lately, I’m sure to fail again. There’s still that problem of how to establish a pack if both of us claim alpha status. I’m game to approach the Elders, if you’re still in.”
Giving a return grin, Rivley extended his hand. “Just try to stop me.”
Daeryn clasped his hand, and the moment they touched, burning seared over Daeryn’s navel. He fell back. Rivley did, too, both of them bending and clutching their middles.
Wobbling on knees gone to jelly, Daeryn struggled to fill his lungs and straightened, his watering eyes blurring the figures darting to them. Terrent pulled him upright, and Mar did the same for Rivley.
“What the heck are you two playing at?” Jac snapped.
He swallowed and pulled his trousers waistband below his gildan spiral. A fresh red burn lay under the silver metal where his skin had been pierced. Now, only one piercing held the glinting bloodstone at the core of the gildan talisman.
“Just,” he gasped through the pain, “a little honesty between friends.”
Chapter THIRTY-ONE
Derby
Annmar wound her shaking hands into her skirt when the train slowed among Derby’s familiar streets.
Mary Clare leaned her nose to the window. “We’re going right through. Do we need to tell them we want off?”
“No.” She took a steadying breath. “We haven’t reached the station yet.”
Mary Clare gasped. “This city is enormous. How will I ever find you again?”
Annmar patted her hand. “The carriage driver knows where he’s going. If we tip him well, he’ll be willing to call again in the morning.”
&n
bsp; The train pulled into the station. After the conductor assisted them down the steps, Mary Clare clung to her. “It’s so loud,” she whispered.
“We’ll be out of it soon.” Annmar led the way to a line of carriages for hire. “Shearing Enterprises on Full Street,” she told the driver. “Will you wait? My business will take but a few minutes before I continue my errands.”
“Certainly, ma’am.”
Ma’am, not miss. It’d been the same on every train, the conductors assuming Mary Clare was her maid. She leaned back in the carriage while Mary Clare continued to crane her neck and hiss comments about the city sights, fascinated by even the dull factory smokestacks.
Yet her friend’s bewilderment calmed Annmar. Miss Lacey must be right, something in her had changed. Two weeks ago, she could barely even consider saying no to Mr. Shearing, and now she was determined to best him using one of his own elusive offers.
The carriage stopped. Before Annmar could rise, Mary Clare fussed with Annmar’s neckline, twitching the lace lower. “Perfect,” she murmured. “If he hesitates to give you the money, you dip forward with your chin lifted.” Then she refastened the jacket and grinned. “Good luck.”
The driver handed Annmar down. At Shearing Enterprises’ door, she raised her hand to knock, then paused. Thrusting out her seemingly larger bosom, she turned the knob and walked in.
The secretary lifted his gaze, then rose. “How may I help you, ma’am?”
“Please inform Mr. Shearing that Miss Masterson is waiting to see him.”
“Miss Mas—oh.” He looked over the satin finery and nodded. “Yes’m. Right away.”
The man disappeared into the closed office. Not thirty seconds passed before he reappeared and held open the door.
Annmar gave him her jacket, took a breath and swept into the office.
Mr. Shearing hadn’t bothered to rise, or even look up from his papers. She’d turned him down twice. Would he really give her a third chance? At the click of the closing door, he said, “So you’ve changed your mind.”
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