I stepped between him and the far wall, cutting his line of sight. “So—a walk?” I had already cost the girl her dog. I didn’t want to get her grounded for life too if he figured out she was still hanging around me.
Ryuu grunted, not fooled but not sure what I was hiding. Yet. He held open the door and gestured for me to join him in the hallway. Unlike my earlier foray, we passed three guards in casual dress who made no attempt at hiding their curiosity. As though proud of the way they admired me, Ryuu’s shoulders straightened a fraction, and he offered me his hand.
I wrinkled my nose at his open palm. “Is that a requirement?”
“You’re fast and you fight mean.” He made it sound like a compliment. “I don’t want to risk you escaping a second time.”
Before the murmuring guards, I took his hand, and a cheer rose behind us. A blush heated my cheeks, which struck me as ridiculous under the circumstances.
Once outside of their hearing range, I asked, “What are they so excited about?”
He rolled a shoulder. “They know what my intentions are.”
I studied him. “Am I allowed to know those too?”
“I told you.” His thumb caressed the top of my hand, and I shivered under his touch. “I plan to formally mate you.”
Not an ounce of doubt laced the statement. Boy was he optimistic. “Don’t I get a say?”
His lips parted, but he shook his head. “We should hurry if we want to dine with the others.”
A shock zinged down my spine, but I tried not to clue him in to the fact his announcement had surprised me. I expected to be kept isolated. I anticipated more of the lock-and-key treatment. I must be on early parole if he was ready to trot me around town on his arm. “Trying to show me off?”
“Something like that.” He tugged on our linked hands, forcing me to match his longer strides. He must be serious about food. Another time it would be a quality I admired in a man, but not in this one. “After your misadventure today, the skulk is talking. Seeing you for themselves will quiet them down.”
I could tell what they had to say wasn’t complimentary. If it was anything like my parents, it would be along the lines of proper females don’t… followed by a list of my favorite activities. “Do they know you stole me?”
Muscle leapt in his jaw. “They are aware you’re not here of your own free will, yes.”
“And they’re cool with that.” Most skulks would be. Ryuu’s prowess in securing a female of my lineage spoke highly of him. “So if I run screaming through town, yelling for help, it wouldn’t do me much good.”
“No.” The wind blew black strands of hair across his cheek. “They are loyal to me, and we have waited a long time for this.”
As ominous as that sounded, I was spared from asking him what that meant when Gen stomped up to us.
“What is she doing here?” The girl walked up to me and kicked me in the shin. “Life ruiner!”
“Hey,” I yelped. “That hurt.”
“Katsuo,” Ryuu called, grabbing Gen by the upper arm. With his hand still in mine, he was caught between the two of us. “Katsuo.”
My old friend strolled out of a nearby tent with a towel over one shoulder and a generous bowl of rice in his arms. A handsome man with a few white grains stuck in his hair poked his head outside to watch the show. Katsuo pointed a warning finger at him, but the man just smiled and dusted his hair. Confident a sneak attack was not forthcoming, Katsuo turned his attention to me. “What’s she done this time?”
I pinched the leg of my pants and lifted it high enough to examine the tender spot. “She kicked me in the shin.”
“Tattler.” Gen strained against Ryuu. “You can’t keep any secrets, can you?”
“I don’t know,” I forced between clenched teeth. “Do you have any other secrets I shouldn’t share?”
Her eyes narrowed, and some of the fight drained out of her. “You’re not a nice person.”
“You don’t get to judge me.” I scoffed. “Find me in a few years after you’re hauled into enemy territory by a male with an alpha complex, and then you can lecture me about being polite to your captors.”
“Send her back where she came from,” Gen demanded. “You told me stories about Mai. This isn’t Mai. She doesn’t act right.”
Katsuo stopped stirring. He shifted the bowl to one hand, took Gen’s wrist with the other and hauled her into the tent with him. Ryuu headed in the opposite direction, towing me in his wake.
“If Katsuo was telling her stories, I could see it.” Something wasn’t adding up here. “But I don’t even know you. How is it you have stories to tell about me at all? Unless you’re just repeating what Katsuo told you.”
My grim-faced tour guide didn’t respond to the accusation, and he didn’t lead me down into the field dotted with blankets where the atmosphere reminded me of families ready for a picnic. I counted an equal number of males and females. Their ages ranged from walker-assisted to nursing. None dressed in uniform, unless you counted the simple, handmade fabric garments they wore. They weren’t much of an army, and that unsettled me even more. A battalion of armored kitsunes with swords at the ready would have put me more at ease.
“I thought we were eating with the people?” I mocked as he hauled me up a sloping hill to the base of an oak tree.
“We will dine with them, but not with them.” A hard edge made his next words sharp. “You’re a Hayashi. You understand a reynard must be of his people and yet apart from them.”
I did understand, but I didn’t have to like it. If he had his way, I would be as much responsible for all these people as he was. I balked at the idea. It felt like a cage of another kind being lowered over me.
A quilt was spread over the grass under the tree, and mason jars lit with small tea lights hung in the branches. It wasn’t dark yet, but night was fast approaching. By the time dinner was served, the hilltop would be well lit, and all the kitsunes in the valley below us would have a clear view of their reynard and his future bride.
I had to hand it to him. Ryuu was slick. He had staged the moment to perfection.
Careful to keep hold of my hand, he settled himself against the tree trunk and helped me sit beside him. The view, I had to admit, wasn’t half bad. As long as you discounted all the hopeful stares spearing through me. All the expectation smothering me.
“Why are they all staring at me?” I patted my hair. “Have I sprouted a second head since the last time I saw myself in a mirror?”
The tiny crease in Ryuu’s lips might have passed for a smile on another man. On him, it was likely indigestion. “You don’t need a mirror.” His grip tightened a fraction. “You’re beautiful, Mai. You always have been.”
The flush of satisfaction at his words left me unsettled. Stockholm syndrome required time to develop, right? I had only been his prisoner for forty-eight hours. Anger. That was what I needed to cut through the confusion.
“Don’t act like you know me,” I snapped. “The only person I know here is Katsuo, and he’s avoiding me like the plague.” I scowled in the direction of the tent where he had vanished. “He was my best friend.” His fresh betrayal stung almost as much as his disappearance once had.
“Would you like him to visit you?” Ryuu’s hand formed a fist on the other side of his body.
“Jealous?” I couldn’t help myself. “Scared I’ll prefer your brother to you?”
Instead of the blast of fury I expected, he faced me full on, a fraction of a smirk lifting his lips. “You made your choice a long time ago, and it wasn’t him.”
“It wasn’t you either.” His smugness rankled, and I spat, “I haven’t chosen a mate, and I’m not stupid enough to get caught by one.”
One of his eyebrows rose.
“This doesn’t count.” I hoisted our joined hands. “You cheated.”
“I bent a few rules to get you here. I’ll own up to that.” Ryuu leaned closer. His breath hit my lips, and I almost tasted his magic. “Now that I have you back, I would bre
ak all of them to keep you.”
I took the warning for what it was worth and turned away from him to gaze out at the darkening sky.
The meal arrived in a puff of steam and in the hands of Katsuo, who appeared to be the resident chef. One of them anyway. It must have taken many sets of hands to feed so many people at once. The guy with rice in his hair made rounds lower in the valley. Katsuo offered me a wooden bowl I could tell was hand-turned by the slight imperfections in the thickness of its lip. The spoon was heavy silverware, and mine didn’t match the one he passed Ryuu. Dinner was gyūdon, stewed beef and onions served over rice.
I inhaled the rich scent and let it awaken my hunger. The food Katsuo had served me thus far had been shoveled in as a source of energy to fuel Escape Attempt #2. Surrounded by the skulk, I surrendered to the simple pleasure of enjoying a hot meal, secure in the unpleasant knowledge I couldn’t break free of these ranks without capture even if I tried.
“There’s more where that came from if you’re still hungry afterward.” Katsuo watched me with intensity as I took the first bite. “Give me a half hour to feed everyone else, and we’ll start divvying the leftovers.”
That he mentioned it at all told me he remembered how much I loved to eat. He must have been wondering if I was being fed enough when he ought to know I hadn’t been fed regularly at all since arriving.
“I’ll let you know.” I shuttered my expression to rob him of any satisfaction he might have experienced at how much I enjoyed the robust taste.
After he headed down the hill and I was alone with Ryuu again, I asked the question pinging through my head. “You said these are your people. If you’re reynard, then this skulk is Tanabe, and there are no Tanabe skulks on the charter in Texas.”
I knew because my dad had fingers in a whole lot of pies, including most skulks in the state of Texas.
“That’s because our skulk isn’t formally recognized.” The admission sounded ripped from him.
I paused with the spoon halfway to my mouth. “Are you insane?” I dropped the utensil and gazed out at the blankets dotted with kitsune families. There must have been at least a hundred. “Do you have any idea how dangerous it is for these people to be united under a rogue leader?”
“Ask your father about it sometime.” He tucked into his meal. “He gets the final decision on appointments, after all.”
“Release me, and I’ll be more than happy to question him.” If for no other reason than to rid myself of the tightness coiling in my gut.
Without recognition, these people had no home. They had no leader any other reynard would recognize. They had no allies, no supply allotment and no rights under kitsune law. They were rogues, and they could be chased off this land, their property seized and their children taken and absorbed into another skulk to spare them the stigma should this encampment be discovered and another skulk decide to do something about the squatters.
Ryuu scooped a perfect rice-to-beef ratio. “You’ll see him soon enough.”
A spark of hope lit my chest followed by the realization if I was seeing Dad soon, then it was only because I was either already bound to Ryuu or about to be. And yet… If Ryuu was a rogue, nothing short of me choosing him as a mate would bring honor to our union, and that wasn’t going to happen.
“You’re risking their lives by bringing me here.” The food no longer held any appeal. “You’re practically begging my father to retaliate, and they’re the ones who will pay the price for following you.”
“We can’t keep living like this, and the people know it.” He balanced his bowl on his thigh. “Every year more kits are born into this skulk, and more elders die without treatment that would have saved them, because of the stigma. They have no future until we are recognized and afforded the same rights and privileges due to us.”
“I don’t understand.” At some point our hands had come unclasped, and I almost reached for his again. “Our fathers were close. Your family was part of the Hayashi skulk.” I thought back on all the tears I had shed the day Katsuo vanished from his house without a word. “Your family chose to split from mine. Why? For this? For a chance to strike out on your own?”
His bark of bitter laughter rankled. “Is that what he told you? That we chose this?”
Framed that way it did seem unlikely anyone would trade the comforts of the Hayashi den for a drifter’s life by choice. Accepting that meant acknowledging the discrepancy, allowing doubt to root in my conscience and embracing the idea that maybe there was more to their claims than what my father had told me.
“I came home from school and Katsuo was gone.” I’d missed him in homeroom, and I ran straight to their house after the bell rang. “His room was empty.” The whole house had been vacant. “I cried for weeks.”
A shadow crawled over his expression. “You remember that, but do you have any memories of me?” The force of his stare made me swallow hard. “Even if you were just my little brother’s best friend, wouldn’t you remember he had an older brother? We’re only four years apart. I still lived at home then. I was still in school. That means we attended the same school, spent time in the same house, ate meals at the same table, and you had no idea who I was when I arrived at that Expo. You don’t find that strange?”
I massaged my forehead and the tension headache stirring there. “I must not have been paying attention.”
Because the perfect specimen of reynardhood that was Ryuu Tanabe was so easily ignored. Yeah. Right.
“Come now.” He scraped his spoon with his thumbnail. “You’re smarter than that.”
Tempted as I was to shoot down his woe-is-meing, he had a point. I remembered Katsuo. He and I had been in all the same classes together up until middle school. We had been inseparable, dressing up as superheroes and villains, generally wreaking havoc on unsuspecting classmates. We even cosplayed together for a couple of years in junior divisions until he left without saying goodbye. As close as we had been, Ryuu was right. I would have at least registered the fact Katsuo had an older brother. Knowing me and my poor taste in men, I probably would have stalked Ryuu until parental intervention was required.
So why didn’t I remember any of that?
“Ry.” The frantic shout rang across the lawn.
He was on his feet, tensed and waiting, when Katsuo crested the hill. “What’s wrong?”
“Gen’s gone.” He pulled a hand through his hair. “I left her in the kitchen with Shinji. By the time the skulk had been fed and I went to fix myself a bowl, she had vanished.”
Ryuu stepped forward. “What about Shinji?”
“He fell for one of Gen’s tricks.” Katsuo sighed. “She left her MP3 player in a bush behind the mess tent. She must have recorded the kits playing earlier. When Shinji went to corral them, Gen left.” He waited for Ryuu to absorb that before adding, “She took Chiffon with her.”
“That godsdamn dog.”
“I told you not to let her keep it.”
“It kept following me home from the job.”
I stood and positioned myself between them. “Guys, cast blame later. I’ll even help you point fingers. Right now, we have to find Gen.” Both men homed in on me. “It’s my fault she ran in the first place. I’m the one who asked her to sneak me out so I could see the dog. If I hadn’t done that—and shifted while she had him off leash without telling her—none of this would have happened.”
Katsuo glanced at Ryuu, who shook his head. “I want to believe your offer to help is genuine, but I can’t risk losing you in the dark.” He gripped my arm and passed me over to Katsuo. “Put her back in her room and then come find me. Gen couldn’t have gone far, and that dog reeks. They won’t be hard to locate.”
The older brother blended into the night while the younger one stared after him, lips mashed into a hard line.
“I could help.” I was playing devil’s advocate, but what else was new? “It’s not like I have anything better to do than beat the bushes anyway.”
A slight hes
itation made me think he was considering the offer, but he dismissed it just as quickly. “Ry would strangle me if I lost you.”
“Will you at least ask the others for help?” No use in being stubborn about it.
“If we can’t find her in the next half hour, yes. Until then…” He shook his head. “There’s been enough turmoil over the past few days. We’re trying to keep the town as drama-free as possible.”
“I am sorry she ran.” I was sorry a lot lately.
“This isn’t your fault.”
“It kind of is. She visited me after Chiffon was sentenced.” I should have told the guards and dealt with her wrath, but no. I had opted to watch my own six instead of hers. I had more than a dozen nieces and nephews. I would lose my mind if one of them vanished on my watch. “I should have mentioned it earlier.”
“No. This is my doing. I played up the mystery of your identity until I knew she would seek you out.” He exhaled. “I thought if you two talked, if you saw the town and the people, you might understand what’s at stake.”
I misstepped as it hit me. “You knew she broke me out of the room?”
“Her tricks are good, but they’re not jailbreak good.” A flash of white teeth in the dark. “The guards followed you at a safe distance.”
“What did you think I would see? People in need of rescuing?” I plucked at my shirt. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not wearing a cape, and I left my tights at home. Saving skulks who splinter—sticking my nose in my dad’s business—isn’t my job.”
“We’re running out of time.” He led me into the darkened barn, and the gloom beat at me. “You’re the only one who can save them, Mai. So yes, I wanted you to see their living conditions, look into their eyes and feel…something. I wanted you to want to help them.”
I snorted. “By accepting Ryuu as my mate?”
“If you formalize your union with Ryuu, then your father will have no choice but to recognize the Tanabe skulk.” He forced patience into his tone. “Males are forbidden to leave their homes and establish new skulks without a mate. Every reynard needs a vixen. That’s how it works. It keeps the rivalries down and allows for fair allotment of resources. It ensures no one in the community goes without.”
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