The three shifters were in shock, but their reaction if that faded would be violent. Unless I kept them calm, I knew Winters would add more bodies to the count for today.
“Load him into the car,” I told them, my voice catching in mid-sentence. “Then follow my van.”
Barry nodded wordlessly, the shifters obeying me in silence.
I stepped away from them and started my van, checking to be sure that the black Hummer followed me out of the parking lot. I didn’t drive far, just enough to be completely out of view from the Ink Quill and any route the Enforcers would likely take to leave, and then pulled over.
“Why are we stopping?” Barry demanded, stepping out of the Hummer into the cold as I pulled my cellphone out.
“I hate politics,” I said aloud. “I don’t like it, I don’t understand it—and it just fucking killed a man I liked. We need help, and there’s only one other person at Tarvers’s level left.”
Gesturing the wolf shifter abruptly to silence, I called Oberis.
I got Laurie.
“What do you want?” the hag demanded.
“I need to speak to Lord Oberis,” I told her.
“He’s busy; you can speak to me,” she informed me.
“No,” I told her harshly. “I must speak to Lord Oberis.”
“You don’t get to decide that,” she said coldly. “Tell me what this is about and maybe I will let you talk to him.”
I hate politics.
“Alpha Tenerim is dead,” I said flatly. “I need to speak to Lord Oberis.”
“Oh,” she answered. “I’m sorry, Lord Oberis is simply not available,” she continued, her voice somewhat more polite now. “I will pass on your message as soon as I am able.”
She hung up on me, and I stared at my phone for a minute. Not available for the news of a major player’s death? That was a pretty spectacular level of “not available.”
I looked at the three wolf shifters from the Clan Tenerim, all of them looking like very lost, very dangerous puppies. Oberis was the leader of my Court; who the hell else was I supposed to talk to when everything went to hell?
I hate politics. Then, I realized that Eric, if nothing else, could probably get ahold of Oberis! I dug his number out of my phone and called him.
“Eric, we have a situation,” I said quickly when the gnome answered his cellphone. “Tarvers Tenerim is dead. Gerard Winters killed him. I can’t get ahold of Lord Oberis. What do I do?” I asked plaintively. I was lost, completely out of my depth, and left hoping that the Keeper would have some idea how to help me.
“Fuck,” Eric said simply when I finished. He was silent for a moment. “Fuck,” he repeated. “Call Talus—I don’t care what Oberis is involved in; Talus will know and be able to interrupt. Here’s his number.”
I quickly scribbled the fae noble’s number down.
“Thank you, Eric,” I told the Keeper. “I had no idea who else to turn to.”
“Call Talus,” he repeated. “Powers keep you safe.”
I did. After a couple of rings, Talus answered.
“Who is this?” he demanded.
“It’s Kilkenny,” I told him. “Eric gave me your number; we have an emergency.”
“Okay,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“The Tenerim Alpha is dead; I need to speak to your uncle,” I explained.
“Shit.” Silence on the other end of the line. “He’s in a teleconference with five other Lords.” A moment of more silence. “Stay on the line,” Talus instructed.
I heard Laurie’s voice in the background. “You can’t go in there!”
“Who are you to tell me what to do?” Talus said, his voice suddenly flat, cold, and angry—a tone of utter command I hoped no noble ever had cause to use on me. I heard a door open.
“Uncle, Kilkenny is on the line,” the noble told Oberis. “It’s an emergency.”
“Gentlemen, excuse me a moment,” I heard Oberis say, and then soft footsteps before the fae lord spoke into the phone.
“I just put off five of the most powerful fae on this continent for you,” he said simply. There was no menace in his voice. It would have been redundant. “What is it?”
“Tarvers Tenerim is dead, murdered by Enforcer Gerard Winters,” I told him in a rush, relieved to have finally reached him. “Laurie told me you were unavailable, so I called Talus—I’m sitting here with a dead Alpha and three shifters about to go critical.”
“I see.” His voice was flat. “Laurie, we will discuss this,” he said, away from the phone but I heard the words clearly. “Talus, make my apologies to the Lords. Now, Jason, where are you?”
I told him, and he hung up without responding. Moments later, before I could even start panicking at being hung up on again, air twisted, and Lord Oberis stepped out of Between to face the vehicle full of shifters. With a wordless gesture, he called me to his side. With a sigh, I obeyed, walking slightly behind him as he approached Tarvers’s vehicle.
Barry and the other two shifters stood outside it, ignoring the cold as they faced the fae lord sullenly, angrily. Oberis returned their gazes levelly.
“Show him to me,” he asked them, his voice gentle. Barry nodded and led the fae lord to the back of the vehicle, opening it up to reveal Tarvers’s body.
“Winters had a bane sword,” the wolf shifter said quietly, his voice choked. “But he was so fast, so strong—I would never have thought a human would last a second against an Alpha.”
“Winters is no longer human,” the leader of Calgary’s fae told the shifter quietly. “He is much changed by the Wizard’s runes, more a construct of magic now than a man.”
“Twisted and evil,” I muttered. I’m sure everyone there heard me, but no one commented. I’m not sure anyone disagreed.
“What happened?” Oberis asked.
“We followed a lead on the lifesblood we found on a vampire,” Barry explained slowly. “It led to this print shop, so we started questioning the guy running the joint. He freaked when we asked about it, and tried to have a security guard evict us.
“After that, we started asking questions forcefully and Jason showed up and was being helpful,” the wolf shifter continued, “until the Enforcers showed up.
“Winters told us we had no jurisdiction, that the man was under the Enforcers’ protection, and that they would ‘investigate our allegations.’ He and Tarvers argued, then fought. He killed Tarvers.”
“It wasn’t even a fair fight,” I said quietly. “I never thought I’d see Tarvers that outmatched.”
“Thank you,” Oberis told us all. “This is not acceptable, but I am not sure what to do about it yet.” He sighed. “Take Tarvers home; I’m sure Clan Tenerim has affairs they must deal with. You did the right thing by waiting for me—I and I alone can take this to the Wizard until a successor as Speaker for the Clans is selected.”
The shifters drifted into the car and drove off, looking like they were in a daze, and Oberis looked at me.
“You have a knack for trouble,” he told me.
“I came here trying to avoid this shit,” I complained, aware that this was not the time to whine but unable to help myself.
“And the Queen has bound you to try and find it,” the fae lord reminded me. “There are too many pieces in play; I am not sure I understand what is happening. I need time to assess.”
“What will happen next?” I asked.
“We will mourn Dave and Elena,” he said quietly. “By Monday, I should know. Until then...we honor our dead.
“We all have our jobs to do,” Oberis continued. “Deciding what to do about this is mine, not yours.”
“Jobs,” I said slowly. “Shit. I’m going to be so late back to dispatch.”
I was. I spun a tale to Trysta about a restaurant I’d stopped for lunch where the service had been atrocious and they’d kept me waiting for my bill, and she’d laughed sympathetically and helped me load up my afternoon load.
I finally returned the truck t
o the parking lot over an hour late, with the office already deserted. With a sigh, I offloaded the next day’s delivery parcels myself before locking everything up and starting the walk home in the cold.
Moments after leaving the office, my cell phone started to ring.
“Hello,” I answered wearily.
“It’s Mary,” she said quietly, her voice choked. “I just found out about Tarvers. You were there?!”
“I was,” I said, feeling the ache of weariness, a good chunk of grief, and a huge amount of guilt settling into my bones. “I saw it all.”
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Terrified,” I admitted. “I have the feeling that things are starting to fall apart around us.”
She was silent on the phone for a long time.
“Me too,” she finally said. “Tarvers was a father to all of us. I’m scared.”
“Can I see you?” I asked after a long moment, realizing what both of us wanted and neither of us wanted to seem weak by asking.
“I don’t think I should leave the Den,” she told me. “But you can come here. I’ll make sure you get in. Things are...hectic here right now.”
“I’ll grab a cab; I should be there in twenty minutes or so,” I promised. “Take care of yourself.”
“You too,” she told me.
I hung up and called the cab company.
The Tenerim Den was a townhouse complex of what had originally been twelve separate homes. At some point, they had all been bought out by the Clan, and the renovations had begun.
Now it was a warren of interconnected bedrooms, kitchens, media rooms, storage areas and armories that served as the home to over half of Clan Tenerim’s forty-odd members and as a de facto home base for the shifters in Calgary.
Unlike the Lodge, which was neutral territory, the Den was definitely Clan Tenerim’s turf. Other inhumans came there on the Clan’s terms, and it looked like tonight, a lot of them had.
The Den’s parking spots were full and the street outside was lined with cars. A dozen or so burly-looking men and women, mostly wolf shifters with a couple of bears and one individual, who after looking at them for a good ten seconds I realized was a tiger shapeshifter, lounged around a propane area heater in the yard between the Den and the street.
I recognized none of them, and only one or two were Tenerim, from their features. All of them moved with the ready tension of soldiers and guards, and as I approached the complex, several of them drifted over to me, attempting and failing to appear casual.
“This house is closed, changeling,” one of them, a tall dark-haired man who I’d identified as one of the bear shifters—mostly by his height—told me. His tone was polite but firm. “We mourn one of our own.”
“I know,” I said gently. “I’m here to visit a child of Clan Tenerim, Mary.”
“I’m sorry, this house is closed,” he repeated.
I glanced up to the house, about to pull out my phone and call Mary, when the front door opened and Barry Tenerim hurried out.
“Not to Clan-Friends, Kal,” Barry told the hulking bear. “Nor to those who stood by us when our Alpha was killed. This is the changeling who was there.”
At the blond wolf shifter’s words, the change in the demeanor of the guards out front of the Den changed instantly. They went from politely threatening to casually respectful, stepping back to give me space and offering nods of greeting.
The young shifter offered me his hand, and then took mine in both of his when I took it.
“If you hadn’t been there, we would have attacked the bastard,” he told me. “And there would be three more sons of Tenerim being mourned tonight. You did the right thing, and you saved my life.
“Thank you,” he finished simply, then stood aside and gestured me towards the door, where Mary stood, waiting for me.
I barely made it to the door before I had every inch of my wildcat shifter girlfriend wrapped around me. For a moment, I froze under the impact, and then I wrapped my arms around her and held her gently while she sobbed into my shoulder.
Eventually, she let go and led me into a crowded living room. A growl from Barry that I barely heard vacated one of the loveseats, and we took a seat, clinging to each other for comfort.
Mary was crying. Nothing dramatic, nothing attention-seeking, just soft, quiet tears.
“He was more than our leader,” she told me through her tears. “He was our patriarch, our Alpha. He was a father to us all in so many ways. It’s hard to accept that he’s gone.”
I held her in silence. There was nothing I could say. I had known Tarvers a matter of weeks, not the years and decades of his Clan. He had been a good ally, a source of help and wisdom and, yes, a good friend.
“He was Clan Tenerim,” Barry said quietly. “It’s hard to describe, but this Den feels empty without him.”
Mary continued to weep, and I continued to hold her. The room was very quiet, and as I looked around, I saw we weren’t the only couple clutching each other for support, and no one else was talking.
After several long minutes, a man stood and crossed to me. Native by his features and coloring, his black hair was woven into long braids that fell to his waist that were tinged with gray. His skin was worn with time and sun, yet his eyes were bright, touched with an edge of felinity and carrying the full power of an Alpha’s gaze.
The cougar shifter was old, and given how shifters aged, it was easily possible this man had been born before Columbus set sail. He had seen a world of change, and the pain written in his eyes and face told of its prices.
“I am Enli,” he told me. “Folks around here call me Grandfather, as I am the oldest living shifter in this city.” His eyes bore into me. “I was the oldest shifter when MacDonald came here. I am Alpha of what remains of the Enli Clan—and yes, it is named for me.”
I bowed my head in respect. “What do you need of me, Grandfather?” I asked quietly. I doubted that the oldest Alpha in Calgary had come to see me just to introduce himself. While he didn’t speak for the Clans, I doubted any shifter had ever made a major decision in this city without talking to him.
“I am sorry to interrupt,” he continued, laying a gentle old hand on Mary’s shoulder. “All of us grieve for Tarvers, but you were there when he died. I have heard Barry and the other boys’ story. Now I must hear yours. I must understand everything that happened.”
“Why?” I asked frankly. I didn’t really want to talk about the Tenerim Alpha’s murder yet.
“Because if I do not understand, I may talk my grandchildren into a war that should not be fought,” the old shifter told me quietly. “With no Speaker, it is to me they will look for judgment on the actions of the Wizard’s dogs.”
I nodded, and sighed. “All right, I will tell you what I can,” I told him, my drawl quiet in the near-silence of the Den.
The story wasn’t easy to tell. Mary sat next to me, holding my hand throughout. I was stunned at how angry I found myself growing as I told the old cougar what I had seen, what I had heard, everything that had led to a servant of the Wizard killing the leader of the shifters.
Grandfather listened well, the fruit of centuries of practice, I suppose. He said little, a grunt here and there when needed to encourage me to speak, a pointed question to bring up details I hadn’t thought of. He managed to wheedle more details out of me than I had thought I knew.
In the end, the story ran out, and I found myself weeping—half from grief and half from rage. The old Alpha laid one of his hands on my shoulder and the other on Mary’s.
“This is a harsh time,” he told us. “It is through the strength of individuals and their bonds to each other that we will survive. Draw on each other’s strengths and those of those around you. Only as a Clan, only as a people, only as friends and lovers and family will we survive.”
I bowed my head over his hand, holding tight to Mary. Enli squeezed both of our shoulders and then stood, as there was a commotion outside. Men shouted; I heard Kal’s voice
among them as an argument clearly proceeded.
It ended with the door to the house being flung open, and two men in the black suits of Enforcers stepped in. They hadn’t drawn weapons, and I was amazed they’d made it through the guards outside without being torn to shreds.
A sudden rippling shift of motion and a dramatic increase in tension led me to realize that I was probably the only person in the room who wasn’t armed, and one wrong word could start the war Enli had said he wanted to avoid. A war that would represent a huge failure of my attempt to protect the Wizard!
“This house is closed to outsiders,” said a man I didn’t recognize, though he shared Tarvers’s bulk and features. “We mourn my father. Your kind are especially not welcome,” he snarled at them.
“We are here to deliver the verdict of the Magus,” the lead Enforcer, a dark-haired man of much the same mold as every other Enforcer I’d seen. He had no visible tattoos, but I was sure they were there.
“Speak your piece,” Tarvers’s son growled.
“A group of members of this Clan attacked an Enforcer-protected human business without provocation,” the Enforcer said flatly, apparently oblivious to the slowly growing rumble of growls around the room.
“Inhuman gifts were used in full sight of humans, two of whom were badly injured, and a business and production facility in service to the Magus has been forced to temporarily close its doors.
“For this, the decision of the Enforcers has been to apply production sanctions—”
“Be silent,” Enli snapped, and the Enforcer stopped in mid-sentence at the sheer power of command in the old man’s voice. So did the low growling.
Grandfather stood, straightening to his full height and somehow overshadowing the many taller and bulkier men in the room.
“I have a piece for you to deliver to the Magus,” he said flatly, and a dropped pin would have echoed in the silence that followed. He held the Enforcer’s gaze, and it was clear the man could no more have looked aside than he could have sunk through the floor.
“The murder of Alpha Tarvers Tenerim, Speaker for the Clans and Signatory to the Covenants,” Enli said slowly, the words falling one by one like hammerblows, “while he was pursuing an investigation of the presence of a vampire cabal—as authorized by the Covenants—by one of Magus MacDonald’s dogs is an unquestionable act of war.
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