Wolf's Cage

by Laura Taylor

  Then there was that assassin who’d caused such havoc when he’d come looking for Dee, shooting one of their shifters dead and threatening to kill the rest of them, without the slightest hint of remorse. Genna wasn’t sure what he was still doing here, having been under the impression that the Council kept a tight leash on their guard dogs, but his presence was unsettling, and she resolved to keep an eye on him.

  Beside the assassin was another man. Tall, muscular, blond, holding a gun that clearly packed a hefty punch. He had a military air about him, his attention focused on Sempre, but he was still able to keep an eye on the other shifters, and Genna had no doubt that if any of them tried anything suspicious, he would be all over it in a heartbeat. His steady focus was intimidating… and yet oddly appealing at the same time. He was clearly a man in control, answering to Baron, but not held under his thumb, the way the Watch’s males were. She glanced sideways at Sven, one of their own males, who had dared to come to the doorway of the van. To the door, she noted with disdain, but not out of it entirely. He was more dog than wolf, she thought sadly. Trained, collared, so beaten down he didn’t know himself any more. And she paused to reflect that if a woman had been kept in that condition, she would be considered nothing more than a sex slave, righteous anger spewing forth from various sectors of society about the inhumanity of such oppression.

  Did it make any difference because he was a man? Because he had, ostensibly, at least, chosen this for himself?

  Genna stopped to wonder about that. She’d always been told that the males joined the Watch willingly, that they knew their place and their future role in it before making that decision.

  But Genna wasn’t so sure. She, herself, had been lured here with promises of magic and wonder, otherworldly power and the answers to unsolvable mysteries. While all that had been true, there had also been a darker, bleaker side to this new life that she had never been told about, constant bickering over food and shelter, lower ranking wolves downtrodden and cast aside. By the time she’d learned the truth of her new life, she’d already been converted and all thoughts of escape had come far too late. So perhaps these males had only been given half the story. Promised endless sex and otherworldly magic, only to realise, once they’d accepted the trade, that the other side of it was a life of slavery, of control, of servitude to unsympathetic masters.

  But the man standing there with a gun, with those watchful eyes and masculine physique… he was nothing like the men of the Watch. He was powerful. Independent. A fully functional member of the pack, rather than an optional extra.

  Genna’s first thought was to wonder what it would be like to sleep with him. That was the only purpose of the men in the Watch, and she’d been trained to see them that way, walking sex dispensers with no desires or expectations of their own.

  She couldn’t see this man that way. He might be interested in a woman, she mused, might be tempted to spend a night in one’s bed, but only on his own terms. There would be no coercing him, no manipulating him into giving more than he wanted to. The idea was refreshing, and entirely more alluring than Genna wanted to admit.

  But more than that, she found herself wanting to know more about him. When had he become a shifter? Where had he learned to use a gun? His weapon was far superior to the small pistols the Watch were supplied with, and she was curious both as to how he would have learned to use such a powerful piece, and how Il Trosa came to have them in the first place.

  Could they buy more? Could they supply them to the Watch? Though their run-ins with the Noturatii were few and far between, there was always a risk things were going to suddenly go south, and they would be hard pressed to defend themselves against submachine guns and grenades with simple pistols.

  What did he think of his alpha, she wondered. Her own relationship with Sempre was strained at best, terrifying at worst, and it was hard to believe that a man as strong and independent as this one would bow to Baron if he didn’t truly respect the man.

  It was a captivating mystery to be explored, but one she would likely never get the chance to solve. This meeting was going to be as brief as possible, and there was little chance of finding time for idle chat.

  “You betray us!” Sempre shrieked suddenly, and Genna spun around to see her facing off against Caroline, Sempre’s face red with indignation, while Caroline looked calm, though resolved.

  “I betray no one,” she replied firmly. “No more than you betrayed me when you handed me over to a Council assassin. The conditions of the Treaty dictate that a census must be taken of all of our respective members. That means you have no grounds upon which to ask for Dee to be absent. She is a confirmed member of Il Trosa. She will stand at the census, as will you and your pack, or you break the conditions of the Treaty. Are you so eager to find out what the Council would have to say about that?”

  The threat worked, though it made Sempre more angry in the process, and Genna sighed at the thought of how foul a mood she would be in once they got out of here and back to their forest.

  “I break no Treaty,” Sempre said stiffly, drawing herself up to her full height. Which was an inch or so shorter than Caroline, Genna was amused to see. “Clear the road. We shall proceed to the meeting point.”

  It was a short walk to the manor, only a hundred metres or so, but as one, the shifters around her turned and clambered back into the waiting vans. A display of solidarity, Genna wondered, as she followed without a word? Or blind obedience to someone who couldn’t see past the end of her own nose?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  An hour later, Tank stood on the wide lawn where a folding table and chairs had been set up in the centre. The census had been taken, and Tank had carefully written down the names and ranks of every member of both the Grey Watch and the Den, duplicating the list and handing the copy to Sempre. She’d stared at Dee and glowered the entire time, while Dee, to her credit, had stared back, calm and composed, not willing to be intimidated. From what Tank had heard of the story, the last time she and Sempre had met, Dee and Mark had kicked the wolf’s butt, and Sempre no doubt remembered the incident, her defeat fuelling her anger.

  After the census was complete, the alphas had turned their attention to other matters – a discussion on each pack’s encounters with the Noturatii; the members of their respective packs who had been killed over the past year – a sore point given that two of the Watch had been killed by Il Trosa; introductions of any new recruits. That had been an interesting one. Baron had introduced Dee with a minimum of ceremony, sending her swiftly back to the gathered shifters at the side of the lawn before Sempre could throw a tantrum about the presence of the Destroyer, and then a young woman from the Watch had been called forward. She was introduced as Genna, her name called out clearly, and Tank eyed her with curiosity. She was young, maybe only twenty years old, and though it was hard to tell beneath her grey cloak, he thought she looked rather gaunt. Her cheeks were hollow, her expression guarded, and it surprised him that the Watch would let one of their new recruits suffer from malnutrition.

  As she reluctantly shook Baron’s and then Caroline’s hand, she glanced up at him, their eyes meeting across the lawn, and Tank felt a jolt as that dark, hollow gaze met his. There was a great depth of emotion in those eyes, anger, guilt, and a weariness that Tank could relate to only too well. It was the same look that had stared at him from out of the mirror for weeks after he’d been freed from the Noturatii lab, an almost helpless disgust with the world that was matched only by a stubborn determination not to let its hardships beat him.

  Tank immediately knew that he had to talk to this woman. What had she been through to make her so hard at such a young age? It wasn’t uncommon for shifters to recruit those who were down on their luck, orphans, petty criminals, the homeless or unemployed. But the look in her eyes was more like that of someone who had been through a war zone. And thanks to his service in the military, Tank had seen enough of those in his life to recognise the result.

  But that conversat
ion would have to wait, he acknowledged reluctantly, if they even got the chance to meet at all. Sempre had made it clear that this meeting would last only as long as was absolutely necessary, and with the Grey Watch looking on like a pride of lions guarding their cubs, and Il Trosa facing off against them, guns still at the ready, he didn’t like his chances of getting a private moment to introduce himself to the woman.

  But perhaps he shouldn’t discount the possibility too quickly, he thought a moment later, seeing that a new development was about to take place.

  Nikolai had disappeared a few minutes ago, Tank idly wondering where he had gone, and he reappeared now, with the other three Ukrainians in tow, each carrying a tray of glasses filled with a clear liquid. Water for the hot, tired shifters, Tank thought with a smile, liking Nikolai even more. He was a straight forward, no-nonsense man, and this ridiculous stand off was no doubt annoying the hell out of him. It was about time someone broke the deadlock.

  The four men split up, working through the crowd, handing out the drinks, and while a few of the women refused – presumably out of resentment rather than lack of thirst – most took the glass willingly.

  Tank watched as one of the women took a large sip, and immediately choked, spitting half of it out. “What is this?” she asked hoarsely.

  “Best Ukrainian vodka,” Tank heard Nikolai say. “Mixed with lemonade. Because you Brits don’t know how to drink.” The complaint was said with a grin, taking the barb out of the words, and the woman looked startled, glanced at Sempre, who was still deep in discussions with Baron and Caroline, and smiled back.

  “Thank you,” she said softly. Nikolai winked at her, then moved on to the next woman, who couldn’t get her hands on a glass quick enough.

  Re-joining her pack mates, Genna sighed with relief as a tall, thickly built man offered her a tray full of drinks. She took a glass, but didn’t drink straight away, too caught up in her own curiosity about Il Trosa.

  Whenever Sempre or the senior wolves spoke about them, it was with derision, complaining about their use of technology, the risks they took in exposing the shifters to humanity, their greed and inability to put aside physical desires to pursue the more spiritual aspects of life.

  But what they had left out was the overwhelming sense of solidarity among this supposed foe. When Dee had been brought forward for her introduction, several of the men had watched over her with all the attentiveness of a mother bear guarding her cub. They were trained fighters, their weapons more advanced than the Watch’s, every member maintaining a grim focus on their opposition that would make even seasoned soldiers apprehensive. They worked as a unit, the guards moving to cover weak points without being told, the men respecting the women, and vice versa, their clothes clean, but not overly showy, and Genna had to reassess Sempre’s opinion of them as materialistic egotists. It would be nice to be able to choose her own clothes for once, she thought with longing, growing rapidly tired of the plain grey robe that she wore every time she took her human form.

  Besides which, Genna thought with a stab of resentment, it was hard to care about the spiritual side of life when you were constantly hungry and cold and damp, fighting for food and a place to sleep. And while technology could certainly be over-relied upon, an excuse for laziness, there was a certain logic to keeping a computer around with an internet connection, the ability to look something up in the vast sea of information that was floating around the world’s servers.

  Glancing at the tall, blond man again, Genna took a sip of her drink, expecting plain water, but then she swallowed quickly, shocked by the strong, sweet taste, and glanced around at the other women. From the looks of them, they all had the same thing – vodka, if Genna’s guess was right, though she hadn’t tasted the spirit in a long while – and they were all being as clandestine about it as she was. Alcohol, while not forbidden in the Watch, was generally not available. It wasn’t a priority for anyone heading into town for supplies, and a few small attempts at brewing their own in the forest had gone badly, apple cider turning to vinegar when it had become contaminated with bacteria.

  Suddenly, Genna burst out laughing, seeing the ridiculous charade for what it was. They were a bunch of grown women, each with exactly the same drink in their hands, and each pretending they were doing nothing more than sipping water as they stood around a garden tea party.

  Genna turned to Luna, standing beside her, and deliberately clinked her glass with hers. “Cheers,” she said happily, taking a longer drink. Standing a few metres away, the man who had given her the glass winked at her and took a glass for himself, raising it in a silent toast before taking a drink, and that simple gesture seemed to break the tension in the women all around her.

  Small laughs broke out, and then small conversations, those standing at the edges of the group daring to talk to members of Il Trosa, and Sempre looked around at the sudden noise, glaring daggers at her pack as they relaxed their carefully guarded stances and began to mingle. Oh, the horror of it, Genna thought sardonically, as she began to slowly work her way towards some of the shifters from Il Trosa. But there was little Sempre could do. She was caught in deep conversation with Baron and Caroline for the moment, and later… well, she could hardly punish the entire pack for having a friendly chat, could she?

  Tank almost laughed as he watched Nikolai work the crowd of Grey Watch women. He would be flirting at one moment, offering serious words of advice the next, and then suddenly cracking jokes, slowly convincing even the most serious of the women to open up and start having a little fun. It didn’t take long for the rest of Il Trosa to join in – with a few exceptions, of course. Silas was busy watching the discussion between Sempre and Baron. Andre was keeping to himself – no doubt a concession to the fact that he made everyone nervous as hell. And Dee was standing beside Mark, both of them avoiding the main crowd, for obvious reasons. While Baron and Caroline had both argued firmly in favour of Dee being allowed to remain during the meeting, it was clear that many of the Grey Watch were apprehensive about her presence, and there was no point pouring fuel on the fire.

  Tank exchanged polite words with one or two women, vague sentiments to the effect that he was glad they’d been able to come, and then he turned around, meaning to check on Baron and Caroline at the centre table when he suddenly found himself face to face with Genna.

  “Good morning,” she said, eyeing the gun he still carried with more curiosity than trepidation. “You’re a high ranking wolf, right?”

  It was fairly blunt, as far as introductions went, but he was willing to go with it for the moment. “2IC to the alphas,” he confirmed. “I’m Tank.”

  “Genna,” Genna said, though she had already been introduced to the gathering. “How long have you been a shifter?”

  It was more like an interrogation than a conversation, and Tank hesitated as he considered how he could turn it to more friendly terms. “Eight years. I was in the military before I was recruited.”

  “Where do you get your weapons from?”

  Say what? “That’s an awfully pointed question for a newly converted wolf,” Tank observed, an undertone of warning in his voice. What game was this woman playing? He wasn’t entirely sure it was safe to be discussing weapons supplies with one so new to the Watch, especially considering their rather rocky relationship with the group of late.

  But to his surprise, Genna looked instantly contrite. “Ah, I’m sorry,” she apologised. “I wasn’t… I didn’t mean to pry. I mean, you probably talk about that sort of thing with Sempre, or Lita. I was just…” She trailed off.

  “You were just what?”

  “You have better weapons than us. Which helps, when you go up against the Noturatii. I was just… wondering.”

  Interesting. A newbie, already concerned with the Endless War and wondering how best to arm her pack. No, Tank thought to himself, confirming his earlier opinion. This was no ordinary woman.

  “Have you used a gun before?” he asked gently, not wanting to inadverten
tly prod a raw wound. If she had been in a war zone, she might not like to talk about it-

  “No. Never. I just like to be prepared.”

  Well, that was nicely vague. Perhaps he was approaching this from the wrong angle. “How did you come to meet the Watch?” he tried again, hoping to learn more about her.

  “Working a dead end job. Sempre tracked me down, told me a bunch of… stories.” There’d been a clear hesitation before that final word, and Tank wondered what she’d been about to say instead. “The rest is history.” Then she looked up at him, a perplexed, quizzical look on her face. “You’re not like our males.”

  Tank glanced involuntarily at one of the men from the Watch, loitering at the edge of the lawn, trying hard to ignore Kwan and Aaron, who were trying to make conversation with him. “Thank God for that,” he said, not bothering to disguise his feelings on the topic.

  “You don’t like the way we treat our men.”

  “Can’t say I do, no.”

  “Good,” Genna said, surprising him once again. “Neither do I.”

  “How old are you?” he asked suddenly, aware that he was constantly off balance around this woman, and not sure how she managed to be so forthright, and so mysterious at the same time.”

  “Twenty-one. Nearly twenty-two.”

  Genna cringed internally as she saw Tank wince at her age. This conversation was a far cry from the one she had been hoping to have with him. It was a long time since she’d had a real conversation with anyone, after spending so much time in wolf form with the Watch, and she couldn’t remember a time she’d ever had the chance to talk to a man as attractive as Tank. She was making a dog’s breakfast of it, overcompensating for her nervousness and no doubt coming across as confrontational. The men of the Watch had been no help either, not prone to conversation, answering direct questions, but never asking any of their own, and she was well out of practice at small talk.