Challenges

by Natalie Grey

  What was it?

  He had been terrified since they had brought Andrei back with his grandfather. Andrei they had kicked around until his screams echoed through the house. The grandfather they had only slapped around a bit—but the bruises were vivid enough.

  Whatever Andrei had done, the grandfather surely hadn’t done anything.

  Mathieu swallowed hard. He didn’t like helping Ioan in little schemes like this. He knew that Ioan was going to play with these people and then kill them painfully just for fun. Ioan was like that, and Mathieu hated it. If he hadn’t had debt he needed to pay off, he’d never have gotten tangled up in this mess.

  Truth to tell, he admired the people who were attacking them. Every time Ioan mentioned a customs agent or a police officer who didn’t want to take bribes, Mathieu secretly hoped they’d shut Ioan’s operation down.

  He had been disappointed when none of them had.

  And he didn’t want to help Ioan now. On the other hand…

  His eyes went to where Andrei was lying, breath wheezing. To his surprise, Andrei was watching him and he whispered something.

  “What?” Mathieu crossed the room. “I couldn’t hear you.”

  “I said…” Andrei winced. “Don’t do it. Don’t help him. You were right, we never should have gotten involved.” He pressed a hand over his ribs.

  “I have to help him,” Mathieu said despairingly. “He knows where my family is and he spared your grandfather once, but he won’t again.”

  He jumped when Andrei’s bloody hand clamped down over his. The man’s eyes were bright, almost manic.

  “Not if these attackers kill him,” Andrei whispered. “We could let it happen.”

  “They’d only kill us too.”

  “Maybe, but won’t Ioan too someday? You know he will.” Andrei closed his eyes and grimaced. “And there are the…others. In the basement. They should know about them.”

  Mathieu wavered.

  “Don’t help him,” Andrei repeated. “Let’s make sure the others go free. Whatever happens, isn’t being free of Ioan worth it?”

  CHAPTER TEN

  “Listen.” Ioan spread his hands. “I know that you two, at least—” he looked at Ecaterina and Alexi, “are locals. You understand the way things must be. You know that the laws and the police only aid the rich. You know that in order to survive, common people like you and me must break those laws.”

  He looked around. Constantinou really was taking a very long time.

  From a few paces away, Nathan looked at Ecaterina. He said in rapid-fire English, “I thought you said you wanted to kill him immediately, not take any chances.”

  She gave him a delighted smile. “I did, but you see, I think he’s waiting for someone and I don’t think they’re showing up. And now that we’re here, I want to watch him figure that out.”

  Ioan was definitely worried now. He took the time to adjust his face into a pleasant smile.

  “You know that whatever the laws are, they can be bent for the very rich, and it is the very rich who enjoy these furs. Now, it is clear to me that you came here to halt my operation, and for that you would find yourself in jail for a very long time. As I said, the laws can be bent and the rich will not be pleased to be deprived of their goods. But if you leave me this pelt, I will forget you were ever here. I will let you go back to your village, and nothing more will ever be said. In fact…”

  His voice trailed away and he stared at them.

  “Why are you smiling?” he asked finally.

  Ecaterina took a moment to enjoy his discomfort. It was risky, she knew—the backup could arrive at any moment—but in the meantime Ioan showed the annoyance of a man accustomed to obedience warring with the self-preservation instincts of a man who knew his minions weren’t obeying him anymore.

  She spoke in Romanian now, strolling forward. “I think you know why I’m smiling. As you say, I came here to halt your operation. You thought you held all the cards, but you don’t, do you? I don’t know who you’re waiting for, Ioan, but they’re not coming.”

  Ioan’s face twisted.

  “Shoot her,” he instructed curtly.

  The guards frankly never had a chance. From where they stood they had the very brief impression that two wolves came out of nowhere.

  Very brief, because within seconds they were dead.

  They were quick. Both had gotten their hands to their holsters, ready to draw their guns, but they didn’t get the chance to fire.

  Ecaterina raised her head from one guard’s throat and looked Ioan in the eyes. In this form she could smell the fear rolling off him.

  “It was true.” He crossed himself. “It was true! My God, he was telling the truth. You’re a… You’re a monster.”

  “Iiiii ammmm noooo mooonnnnster.” The wolf’s voice seemed to have the echo of howls and cold nights even as it reverberated inside Ioan’s bones. It seemed to him to be something entirely beyond the Earth he knew.

  He didn’t realize how right he was about that.

  “Youuuuuu hurrrrrt people. Iiiiii willll ssstoppp youuuuu.”

  Nathan prowled behind Ioan, teeth bared. He had been ready to shift since they had entered the forest, but instinct and rage had made him quicker than he would otherwise have been when Ioan ordered Ecaterina’s death.

  The guards had signed their own death warrants when they hadn’t even wavered. They had been willing to kill a woman simply because their boss requested it.

  They had known, as Nathan had, that Ioan’s offers of mercy were lies, but unlike Nathan they had no moral distaste for what Ioan asked them to do.

  They were the sort to say a job was a job and morals were for others.

  He wondered where Andrei was.

  Ioan, however, had now realized just how alone he was.

  “Spare me.” He thudded to his knees in the leaves. His expensive suit was out of place in the forest. It was his armor when he was dealing with other smugglers and his rich clients, but here and now it was only a hindrance.

  “Spaaaaaaare youuuuuuu?” Ecaterina gave a laugh that made Ioan scream. “Whyyyyy?”

  “Because I was doing what I needed to do to survive! I brought money to your little town, I helped your people! They could never have done this on their own, could they? Have you no mercy in your heart for them?”

  “Forrrrr themmmm, yesssss.” The Pricolici paused. “Sommmmmme mercyyyyyy,” it amended, “noooooot unliiimiteeeeed.”

  Nathan huffed a laugh and Alexi grinned where he leaned up against a tree.

  “I’m a businessman, nothing more! You would hold me to standards that mean nothing? You would make a world out of a fantasy!” Ioan’s voice was desperate.

  “Hmmmmmm.” The giant wolf came to stare into his eyes. “Iiiii thiiiiiink … Iiiii willlll giiiive youuuuu to Ashuuuuuur and Belllllllatrix.”

  Ioan had no idea what that meant, but he knew enough to see the end result plainly.

  “Grigore!” His voice was raw. “GRIGORE! HELP!”

  Alexi’s head whipped around. The man who had been following them was crashing back up the hill. He didn’t even pause when Ioan screamed, but Alexi didn’t find that funny at all.

  Grigore was bumbling right toward Yelena and Christina.

  ***

  Mihai was testy about being locked in one of the storage rooms.

  “In all my years—” he started.

  Andrei cut him off. “Please, Grandfather. Let me make things right without having you suffer for my mistakes.”

  Mihai’s old face softened. “Ah, you were always a good child.”

  Andrei smiled ruefully, and winced when his lip cracked. “You said I was always a selfish, cowardly child.”

  “That too.” Mihai lifted his shoulders. “I feared you would be just as selfish and cowardly as you grew older instead of following your better nature.”

  “I was,” Andrei admitted.

  “Well, the day’s not over yet.” Mihai stepped back into the sto
reroom and gestured to the door. “Do what you need to do, then.”

  “Thank you, Grandfather.” Andrei closed the door and began limping along the hall. “Give me the phone,” he told Mathieu.

  “Why?” Mathieu asked nervously.

  “Just give it to me.”

  Mathieu hesitated, then handed it over. In truth, he was a little bit scared of this new Andrei. The friend he remembered from childhood was, exactly as Mihai had said, a good boy, and one who was selfish and cowardly.

  In grade school, Andrei was always the one to give you his snack if you said you were hungry. He waded into a spring river once, overflowing its banks, to save a cat that had gotten stranded. When their friend’s parents had grounded him over a schoolyard incident, Andrei was the one to go over and argue that the grounding wasn’t fair, that the friend had been standing up for a younger child.

  But he was also the one who might lure you into ditching school and then leave you to get caught if he had a way out. He was the one who would snatch candy from the store sometimes, and even if he shared it with you, you were just as likely to get caught as well.

  Always, Andrei had been…more than other people. He laughed more, he shouted more. He seemed to contain more energy in his body.

  When he had talked Mathieu into joining Ioan’s group he’d done so with the same silver tongue he’d used to persuade people all his life, and Mathieu had agreed with the familiar despairing thought that this was just as likely to go well as poorly.

  Andrei had changed today.

  It was as if the beating had freed a man Mathieu had never seen before. Andrei was calm and determined. He did not deny the risks anymore.

  The only thing that remained was his insistence that Mathieu should do something risky and defy Ioan.

  As Mathieu watched, Andrei talked to Constantinou.

  “Ioan just called. They’re heading back from the forest, so they won’t need you.” He listened to the words. “You’ll still get paid. Of course you will.”

  He lied as easily as he had when they were children, Mathieu thought with a grimace.

  He hadn’t changed that much.

  “No, they were scared by the mention of the customs agents.” Andrei faked a laugh, and though he winced in pain he kept his voice level. “And the police are on their way to their house. They’ll regret meddling.” He listened to the voice on the other end. “People here are tightly knit. It is too risky to kill them if he doesn’t have to. He already made two examples today. That’s enough.”

  Another pause while Constantinou argued.

  “No, no, you can go back to the city. The money should show up in your accounts in a few minutes. Just remember this, eh? Remember you got good pay for doing nothing, and maybe when you have to choose jobs you choose us?” He smiled. “Good, good.”

  He hung up and smiled at Mathieu. “There. Now they’ll leave Ioan to rot, and no one’s the wiser.”

  Mathieu groaned and dropped his forehead into his hands. “But if Ioan survives…”

  “Mathieu.” Andrei put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “You and I both know Ioan deserves to die. If he comes here, I know what I will do. You should think about what you will do?”

  “Why?” Mathieu asked nervously.

  Please, please let Andrei not be turning into another Ioan.

  “Because a lifetime is very long, and you will think of yourself with pride for all those years if you do the right thing, but you will carry shame in your heart if you do the wrong thing,” Andrei said seriously. “I already have more shame than I want to carry. I want no more.” He nodded his head to the basement stairs. “I am going to free the others. Will you come with me?”

  Will you come with me? It was a risky plan and a silver-tongued speech, but it was different than it had been before. Andrei was taking all the risk for himself, and merely offering for Mathieu to follow him.

  And if Andrei could change, Mathieu thought, so could he.

  “I will come with you,” he said, and was rewarded by Andrei’s smile.

  ***

  Ioan demanded complete loyalty, and it made sense to give it when he had all the power and wealth in his hands.

  But when he was clearly going to die, it was every man for himself.

  That was Grigore’s opinion, anyway. He’d been raised in these forests, so he knew that wolves did not hunt humans unless they were starving or sick—or unless there was something very wrong with them.

  He also knew what he’d seen: wolves larger than any should be which had appeared from nowhere. A white one rising from the trap apparently unharmed and a black wolf just as big who had participated in tearing Ioan to shreds.

  He’d thought they were dogs, those two wolves. He must have been wrong, though.

  Dogs didn’t get that big, did they?

  And he knew the humans who controlled those wolves were coming back this way. He couldn’t outrun wolves, so he had one choice: find a hunter’s stand and hide there.

  It was a risk, but it was the best option.

  He saw the faint outline of one ahead, the littlest distortion in the way the branches lay, and he kept running. He’d always hated hunting. He wasn’t quiet, it was always either too hot or too cold, it was boring, and he wasn’t a good shot.

  But his father had dragged him out here enough that he at least recognized a hunting stand when he saw one.

  He heard someone running behind him and yelling, and he dived for cover.

  He made it. That was his last thought before the shot went off and Yelena pushed his dead body back out of the hunting stand onto the ground.

  She looked behind her to make sure that Christina was still looking away with her hands over her ears, and nodded to Alexi as he plunged into the clearing.

  “You told me to look after Christina,” she said defiantly. “I wasn’t going to give him even the chance to think of her as a hostage.”

  Alexi sagged with relief. He’d had the same thought: Grigore realizing that the child was the same one he’d seen before, would know that he could bargain for his freedom. In situations like that adrenaline got the better of people sometimes, and hostages got killed.

  He pressed a hand over his pounding heart and nodded.

  “You did well,” he said. “Thank you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.”

  Next to him, two Pricolici transformed back into humans. They kept running even through their transformations, and Ecaterina and Nathan enfolded Christina in their arms.

  Ecaterina turned after a moment to embrace Yelena as well.

  “I told you that you were an important part of the plan,” she said.

  Yelena smiled. “I won’t doubt that ever again.”

  A shout caught their attention, and they turned to see Andrei.

  Alexi drew in his breath sharply. The man had more bruised skin than unbruised, and he walked with a cautious limp as if both his legs and his ribs were injured.

  “There are more who need your help,” he said. “You can kill me afterward if you want, but at least let me show you to them.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Ecaterina was the first to follow Andrei down the steps into the mansion’s basement.

  Nathan, watching her as he followed her, was proud of her. She walked with purpose, her eyes alert. She knew this might be a trap and she was determined that no one else would take the risk of it.

  She had made a good plan. They had killed those in the woods quickly, and she had left Yelena—known to be a good shot, known not to hold back in a fight—to guard Christina.

  His heart was still pounding at the thought of Grigore trying to use his daughter as a hostage, but Nathan knew that was only adrenaline.

  No one had ever had a chance to hurt any of them.

  When he saw what was in the basement, though, he stopped dead. They all did.

  The walls were lined with cages, and in those cages were dozens of wolves. Many were too weak to stand now, their fur matted and du
ll, but others paced and whined when they caught the scent of the Wechselbalg.

  In the center of the room stood a man none of them had ever seen. Mathieu, Nathan guessed.

  Ecaterina looked over at Andrei. “Talk, and don’t even think of glossing over your part in this.”

  “I knew he kept them,” Andrei said. His voice quavered, but his chin was high. “It was his pet project. No one else was allowed down here, and often one of the guards stood at the door. I didn’t know how many there were, but I knew they were here.”

  “Why?” Ecaterina’s voice was full of frustration and raw horror.

  “Trapping for pelts is random,” Andrei explained. “If you were able to breed wolves, though, you would always have some to use. It was…insurance for him.”

  He had tried to explain it dispassionately and realized his mistake a moment later.

  “Insurance?” Ecaterina asked dangerously.

  “You asked me to explain. I am doing so.” He shook his head. “I didn’t think it was right.”

  “But you didn’t think it was wrong enough to stop it,” she said. Her voice was still deathly soft.

  “No.” He swallowed, but he met her eyes. “It wasn’t enough to push me over the edge, no matter how wrong I knew it was. Even when you confronted me in the forest my plan was to go back, take my grandfather, and run away. I wasn’t planning to save these wolves.”

  “What changed your mind then?” She crossed her arms and stared at him.

  Behind her, Nathan fought the urge to growl low in his throat. He was glad Ecaterina did not just accept this man’s good intentions now.

  “To be honest with you, it was the danger to myself.” Andrei looked down at last. “Even the good things I have done today are because I knew the only hope for saving my own skin was to let Ioan die in the forest. I was the one who made sure his backup never arrived.”

  Ecaterina didn’t say anything, but one eyebrow lifted in amusement. “I wondered. Go on.”

  “What more do you want me to say about my own culpability?” Andrei clasped his hands together behind his back to stop them from trembling. “You know everything I have done. I ignored others’ pain in hopes that Ioan would not hurt me. I turned a blind eye to what he was doing to these animals. I went into the forest this morning with the intention of shooting you if you would not comply.