by Robin Roseau
And I had just learned something vital. I just wasn't sure what.
"All right," Daniel said. "Greg, I believe you had more testimony."
Greg stood up. It took him ninety minutes to bring everyone up to his part in arranging the challenge. He used recordings of our conversations extensively coupled with his own notes. He did a good job of painting me as a cold, efficient murderer.
But I wasn't on trial for murder.
Greg said, "Wendy will describe events at the challenge, and then I will finish." He sat down and Wendy stood up.
"Excuse me," Lara said. All eyes turned to her. "Before Wendy testifies, I would like to list additional charges."
Wendy sat down and Daniel told Lara to list them.
"I am adding five charges of trespassing on pack territory." She paused. "I am unable to determine the exact count that is appropriate. These cover Michaela's returns into Wisconsin once entering Iowa."
Daniel raised an eyebrow then turned to me. "Do you understand the charges?"
"Yes," I said. "What are the penalties?"
"Trespassing is normally charged when evicting someone from pack territory," Daniel explained. "Normally eviction is the only penalty. For a repeat or egregious offender, the offender may be given a beating before the eviction. From time to time, there are monetary damages. In my history, I have killed two especially egregious offenders but only after repeated offenses." He turned to Lara. "I do not believe you will be seeking extreme penalties in this case."
"No," she said. "I am treating this as a first offense. I want the charges on record."
"Very well," Daniel said. "Wendy, if you would proceed."
Wendy stood again and presented the events of the challenge calmly and without embellishment until the end. All she said at the end was, "Good riddance."
I stared at her. She was looking at me when she said it.
Then she sat down. Greg stood up and continued, explaining how I had come to be here. He offered a short summary of the wolves I had killed in Iowa City. He also spoke without embellishment until the end. "I didn't believe what she did was possible, not for one small fox with virtually no outside support. I advised Lara to deny Michaela's repeated requests for permission to handle this issue. I thought she'd get herself killed, or worse, involve the human authorities. She did neither, although some of that involved luck that one shouldn't count on."
He looked around the room, then faced Lara. "I grossly underestimated your mate. You have my apologies."
"Everyone underestimates her," Lara said. "Repeatedly, in spite of continued evidence that her abilities are unbounded. I don't blame you any more than I do myself."
Greg nodded and sat down.
"Alpha," Daniel said after a moment. "Do you have further testimony to offer?"
"I would summarize," she said. "I will be brief."
"We will listen to your summary and then break for lunch."
"Boulder Alpha," I said immediately. "I will have questions, and I would prefer to ask them prior to the break. It may be you will have immediate answers, and then I will have opportunity to consider your answers. It may be you will wish to consider your answers, and you will have time to do so."
"All right," he said. "Alpha, if you would summarize please."
Lara stood up. She gave a brief summary of events. She didn't say anything anyone didn't already know, and she only took a few minutes. She sat back down, and Daniel thanked her.
"Alpha," he said, turning to me. "You have questions?"
I studied him for a minute. "I believe that title is inaccurate," I said.
"So you have stated. I believe you are mistaken. You have questions?"
"Yes," I said. "We have received several days of testimony from those gathered here. And we have a list of charges filed against me. But not once has anyone related these charges to the testimony offered. I do not know how I can defend myself against charges when I do not understand which charges apply to which of my actions."
Daniel looked to Lara. "She is correct. These charges are yours, Alpha. Can you answer this question now, or do you require time to prepare."
"I can answer," she said. Lara stood up, pulling a piece of paper from her stack of papers. "Let us start with the minor charges. Endangerment of a Valued Pack Asset. That asset is you, Alpha." She waited for my reaction, but I refused to give her one. "There are four counts, one for each time you engaged in violence without proper protection."
The irony of the charge didn't escape anyone.
"Three charges of abandonment. That would be your mate and your two children."
Again she waited for me to respond. I sat still, waiting for Lara to continue.
"Now we come to the larger charges. You already understand one charge each of Insubordination and Dereliction of Duty."
I nodded.
"The different levels of Insubordination all refer to the same events; it is up to the court to decide if you are guilty of Insubordination and how extreme." She paused, watching me, but I offered no response. "One charge is for violating my order that there would be no retribution. One charge is for violating orders to allow your protective detail to protect you. The other six are for your repeated refusal to return home when ordered."
"I am sorry," I said. "Which orders were those?"
"Two direct orders from me and four more from Elisabeth," Lara explained.
"All right," I said. "Please continue."
"Finally, Dereliction of Duty. There is one charge of simple Dereliction of Duty related to your teaching duties. You are not charged with the higher levels for that offense."
"It is good to know you don't intend to kill me because I failed to show up for work."
"Quite," she replied with the ghost of a smile. "The remaining four charges are for the four times you engaged in violence in Iowa."
"Will you explain why defending the pack constitutes Dereliction of Duty?"
"You were not defending the pack!" she said hotly. "You were engaging in vengeance!"
"Regardless of my motives," I replied calmly, "would you explain why that constitutes Dereliction of Duty?"
"You have multiple duties that do not constitute going off half-cocked, Michaela," Lara said firmly. "You have repeatedly been given orders by me to see to your personal safety. Placing yourself in danger is contrary to those orders. You have a duty to protect the pack. You have a duty to protect your young. Harrying off to Iowa to enact vengeance is not in keeping with those duties."
"You have stated three distinct duties you believe I have failed to perform," I said. "And four instances of when I failed to perform them. Should that not be a total of twelve counts?"
She stared at me and then said quietly, "This was a compromise."
"Thank you, Alpha, for your explanations," I said. "I have no further questions at this time."
Lara sat back down and Daniel excused us until after lunch.
Banishment
As soon as we convened after lunch, I stood up and addressed Daniel. "I have questions."
"I thought you might."
"The Madison alpha has brought these charges to me. I wish some additional clarification of the charges. With the exception of the charges of trespassing and perhaps endangerment of a pack asset, as I understand these charges, they may only be applied to a member of the pack. Is that accurate?"
"It is," he said.
"Well then, I move that the majority of the remaining charges be immediately dismissed, as I was not a member of the pack when the events in question occurred."
I leaned on the table, looking directly into Daniel's eyes. He returned my gaze then spoke calmly. "Well, if that were true, you would have legitimate cause for dismissal of most of these charges. When did you notify your alpha that you were removing yourself from the pack?"
"I didn't," I said. "She banished me."
Lara didn't say a word.
"I am afraid I am confused," Daniel stated. "Did you receive some sort of official notice you had
been banished?"
"Yes," I said. "Elisabeth told me."
"I did no such thing," Elisabeth stated firmly.
"You certainly did!" I said hotly.
Daniel raised his hand. "Alpha," he said clearly. "Did you receive written notice?"
"No, of course not."
"Did your alpha tell you that you had been banished?"
"No."
"So your evidence is that your head enforcer informed you that you were banished, a claim she denies?"
"She did tell me I was banished," I said. "And yes, that is my evidence. Does anyone doubt my word?"
"I did not tell her she was banished," Elisabeth repeated.
"You did!" I repeated.
Daniel held his hand up again. "Alpha, perhaps there has been a misunderstanding. We should calmly-" and he stressed that word, "arrive at the cause of the misunderstanding."
"She told me I was banished," I said in a quieter voice.
"Enforcer," Daniel said. "Do you know why your alpha believes she was banished?"
"Yes," Elisabeth said. She faced me. "Alpha, I did not tell you that you were banished. What did I tell you?"
I ran her question through my head several times. "You told me if I did not return to Madison by noon the next day, I would be banished. I did not return." I paused. "You lied. Elisabeth, you lied to me!" I glared at Lara. "We agreed there wouldn't be any lies like that!"
"I didn't lie, Alpha," Elisabeth said calmly. "At the time I stated the words, that was Lara's plan, one I pressed on her."
"I changed my mind," Lara said. "Also at Elisabeth's urging. And Serena's."
I looked between the three of them. "I could have come home," I said quietly. I considered everything, and it all rushed at me. I began to hyperventilate. "I could have come home. Oh god, I'm never going to see my babies again, and I could have gone home."
I slumped back into my chair and buried my face in my hands.
I could have gone home. I had been welcome back home the entire time.
No one said a word. No one attempted to comfort me; I wouldn't have accepted their attempts, anyway. I sat quietly, stunned and silent.
When finally I looked up, wiping tears from my eyes, the first person I saw, the one seated closest to me, was Scarlett. She hadn't tried to hide the tears sliding down her cheeks. Next to her was Angel. She was clasping Scarlett's hand, and they were both white knuckled.
If that had been my hand, it would have been crushed.
There was a box of tissues on the table in front of me. It hadn't been there before. I pulled several, then climbed to my feet and turned away, addressing to my needs. There was a trash can near the doorway, and I walked over to dispose of the soiled tissues. When I turned around, I saw that Scarlett was pushed away from the table, and her legs were crossed.
She was wearing a skirt, which wasn't unusual for Scarlett, but she was seated in an un-ladylike fashion, which wasn't necessarily unusual for a twenty-year-old, and wasn't particularly unusual for Scarlett. Except when Scarlett took the time to appear in feminine clothing, she also was more likely to act ladylike.
During my first ransom night, one of my punishments had been a tattoo on my buttocks. The tattoo said simply, "Lara's" in a fine script. Over the past year and a half, I had threatened to heal it away a few times, but I had never done so.
During my second ransom night, one of my punishments was to be a subtle tattoo of a set of wolf tracks on my ankle. I was offered an alternate punishment, one fairly severe, but if I accepted it, then each of them would accept a tattoo instead.
I had instead negotiated with Elisabeth for far more. I got her away from the cameras and then told her I wanted a set of tracks all the way up my leg to my hip, and I wanted a mix of wolf and fox tracks to represent Lara and me walking through a shared path of life. I then told her in exchange for my accepting such a long tattoo, I wanted fox tracks mixed in with the wolf tracks on each of their ankles.
Several of the women had balked at the fox tracks. I accused them of dishonoring their alpha -- me -- but finally told them they were free to adorn their bodies as they chose. They began my severe punishment, my payment for them each accepting a tattoo, but when they did, Scarlett whispered to me she would be accepting a tattoo as long as mine, and that while she would not have as many fox tracks as I would have, she would incorporate fox tracks. She also told me Angel was doing the same thing.
Scarlett was sitting in the chair, her legs cocked at an odd angle, and her skirt pulled up above her knee. Her fingers were brushing against her leg in a fashion that could be considered subconscious, but her fingers were repeatedly circling one of the fox tracks high on her leg. She tapped the marks. She circled the marks.
And I was sure she was doing it deliberately, as nonchalant as it appeared.
Seated next to her, Angel was wearing a skirt as well. Angel never wore skirts. I didn't think she even owned any. But she was wearing a skirt, and it was also pulled up over her knee, exposing her tattooed leg. She wasn't brushing the tattoo the way Angel was, but the combined wolf and fox tracks were readily visible to me.
They wouldn't have been visible to me when I was seated, nor were they visible to most of the wolves in the room. But they were visible to me.
Serena was sitting between Angel and Elisabeth. Serena hadn't been tattooed with the rest of us, but she was wearing a skirt, and she had pulled it up. On her leg, readily visible, was a tattoo similar to mine. It was subtle, only on her ankle, but it was clearly a set of wolf and fox tracks. I had never seen that tattoo on her before; it was new. Serena was making no particular effort to bring attention to it, but she was seated in a fashion her ankle was exposed to the light and visible to me, even with Angel and Scarlett partially blocking my view.
Seated past Serena was Elisabeth. She was in a skirt. I had seen Elisabeth in a dress only once, and it was under extreme duress. Elisabeth's tattoo was on her far leg from me, but she had turned her chair to face me, one ankle resting on the other knee, and she had one hand resting casually on her ankle, the fingertips just touching a set of fox tracks.
At the end of the table on this side, next to Elisabeth, sat Lara, my mate. She was also wearing a skirt. From time to time, Lara dressed in a feminine style, but it was rare. She was more likely to dress in a suit with slacks, and I didn't realize she even owned a business suit with a skirt, but she was wearing one today.
Lara had accepted her own tattoo the night of my ransom, the same length as mine, but on opposite legs from mine. Mine was on my right leg; hers was on her left. When we stood side-by-side, the pair of tracks was together. The way she was seated, I couldn't see her tattoo, and she wasn't doing anything to bring attention to it.
I stood there, staring down the line of my pack mates. And then Lara stood up, stretched, then turned around and lifted her left leg to the seat of her chair. She bent down to adjust her shoe, her skirt riding up her leg a little further, and when she straightened, she very clearly ran her fingers up the outside of her leg, following the path of the tattoo. It was a clear, deliberate move, and it was done in a fashion I could clearly see it.
She glanced over in my direction and saw where I was looking, staring at her leg. I caught the ghost of a smile, and then she sat back down.
I moved back to my chair, drank some of my water, and addressed Daniel. "My apologies."
"Quite understandable," he said. "Alpha."
I nodded in understanding.
"I understand I have not been banished as I was led to believe," I stated. I stared at Elisabeth. "I was led to that belief deliberately. There was amble opportunity to disabuse me of the notion I had been banished." I glared at Angel. "I would like to know the original reasons why I was to be banished, and I would like to know why I was not."
"Those are not pertinent," Daniel said immediately.
"Are we going to start that again?" I asked. "It didn't go well last time."
Daniel turned to Lara. "Answer her questio
ns or talk her out of asking."
Lara stood up before speaking. She paced around for a moment then turned to face me. "Please retract your questions."
"Answer the first and I will consider retracting the second."
"Retract the second, agree not to bring it up again, and I will answer the first," she offered. "As Daniel has stated, my motivations are not pertinent to these proceedings, and I will indulge you only so far."
I looked around the room, hoping for clues, and I found one. Scarlett was seated sufficiently close to the end of the table, and she was pushed away from the table slightly. Her skirt had ridden up even further, and she was frantically scratching her leg, as if she had an itch, but she was scratching directly over the highest of her fox tracks.
I stared at it for just a moment before I realized I wasn't being subtle, and they were, so I schooled my features and turned to Lara. "Agreed."
"You were rogue," she said. "But you were pack. If Brody Mortens had called me to complain about your actions, he could have demanded I resolve the issue. I would have been obligated to hunt you down, utilizing all the pack resources available to me. Furthermore, he would have had cause to bring charges against you and would be at these proceedings to bear witness against you. This is a very minor point, but he could also have demanded significant reparations for your actions; this was not a significant reason. By declaring you banished, if he were to call, I could tell him it wasn't my problem and to solve it himself."
We stared at each other for a while. "I believe there is more to it than that," I told her.
She looked away for a moment. "Yes, you are correct."
"I have already retracted my second question," I said. "A good faith answer would have been complete."
"You already know the second reason, Michaela," she said. "If you were banished, you would be protected from proceedings of this nature."
She didn't sit down. I stared at her while I tried to consider everything she had said.
"You didn't exert every effort to apprehend me," I said finally. "But you didn't banish me."
"Brody Mortens never called me," Lara said. "And so I was under no obligation to him to pursue you."