“Have him bring all the consorts to the dining room.” I bared my teeth in something close to a smile. “I’ll shower before we meet.”
Sonja opened her mouth, her eyes narrowed, breath coming short for a moment. Before she could respond, Cade stood.
“That’s all for now. We’ll reconvene tomorrow morning with any new information based on what Sonja and Lynn find.” Cade looked at Leon. “Please have Jesaiah go over the grounds for any evidence of tampering. He can take anyone from the staff he trusts.”
At the dismissal, the other members rose, nodding awkwardly before teleporting out. Cade slumped heavily back in his seat, rubbing his temples.
“Leon always takes charge of these things,” he said. “I remember after my parents were killed, the estate was locked down for days.”
“He seemed to let you take over now,” I said. I rested my back against the chair, shifting uncomfortably at how hard the wood was, the carvings a kind of torture where they dug into the tight muscles.
“I suppose this must be what it’s like the first time you see your parents as people and not as gods.” Cade pressed his palm flat to the table, and I saw a curl of tattoo spiral on his wrist. I reached out, touching my finger to it, watching it dart away under the cuff of his shirt.
“You saw Leon as a god?” I asked, tracing over his wrist. He turned his hand, and I drew a long line over his palm, watching his finger twitch, his breath catch.
“No. Obviously not. But all of them, all the counselors, even Sonja, they all seemed older and wiser than me. I could never match them. I could never lead them. How could I? When I was a child and they were them?” He seemed to struggle over it, his hand opening and closing.
“You did fine.” I looked at the chairs that were now empty. “Thereareholes in the wards. Jesaiah shoved me through one.”
“I know,” Cade said.
“Why is Lynn so insistent that there aren’t?” I asked.
“Her family is tied as closely to the house as mine is. She inherited the wards. They’re tied to her bloodline, but more importantly, they’re tied to her life. Just like the laws of hospitality would have killed me if the dryads had been murdered on House Bartlett territory, she would die if the wards didn’t do their fullest to protect House Bartlett.” Cade stared at Lynn’s empty chair. “Holes in the wards would feel like holes in her own soul. She wouldn’t be able to bear it.”
“Unless Lynn convinced the magic that the holes were protecting House Bartlett,” I said. When Cade turned to me, I held up both hands at his wide eyes. I looked away before I could get lost in the blue ocean of them. “If she’s one of the people trying to kill you, then for some reason, she must have convinced the magic that your death is better for House Bartlett.”
We stared at each other, and Cade’s jaw trembled before he clenched tightly. He stood, sending the chair flying backward, crashing onto the floor behind him. Turning away from me, he clenched both fists but flexed them open when I put a hand on his shoulder.
“Let’s meet together after you deal with the werewolves,” he said.
I followed him out of the room, not surprised when we ended up back in his bedroom. He went to the closet while I took a shower, rinsing off the blood and debris from the forest. A chunk of rock washed out of my hair, and I stared at it in the drain before kicking it to the side and turning off the water.
Cade was gone when I emerged, but he had left behind a fresh set of clothes. When I touched my finger to them, I saw a hint of a dark line moving, magic he had left behind embedded in the threads.
Clean, well-dressed, my chin itching from the shave I needed, I strode out of the room, inhaling deeply and trying to imbue every movement with the strength of an alpha. Alphas didn’t fight for control, my mother had said. Alphas owned control from the moment they stepped into a room.
When I entered the dining room, the wolves went silent. None of them were sitting in the chairs. The kitchen had provided trays of food and small plates, and everyone was spread to corners and along the walls.
I saw Jay huddled together with Coral and Theo. Nia was on her own, picking at a plate of cheese and crackers. Her eyes looked me over before she turned back to her plate, dismissing me. I would have felt insulted, except she kept glancing at me out of the corner of her eye, the way I might look at another alpha who came into my territory, unsure if I was going to give a black eye or get one.
Tyson had his group of followers near the head of the table, and when he saw me, he raised his chin. It wasn’t a greeting; it was a challenge, and I ignored it in favor of gesturing at Jay.
He immediately came over. “What do you need?”
“I need someone to take notes,” I said low, even though every wolf in the room could hear me. “I know most of the names, but I’m still missing some.”
“If you don’t know the names, you can’t possibly know capabilities. I’ll just do the assignments. You can sign your name at the bottom if you want to get credit like a teacher’s pet,” Tyson sneered.
“If I put my name on a homework assignment you turn in, Tyson, I would fail the class.” I gritted my teeth in a show of mock humor. Then, I stepped toward him.
He tensed, ready for a fight, but before I reached him, I pulled out the chair to the right of the head of the table. Everyone stared.
I sat. “Coral, you and Tyson will be team one. Go along as much of the ward line as you can. Look for any holes or signs that something has broken through the wards. Does the house have trackers for the wolves?”
It was a common practice in packs that had children. It was a lot easier to follow a GPS tracker than try and trace a puppy by scent alone. You would be back and forth three dozen times before you caught them.
“We have clips for the collars,” Jay said immediately.
