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"What's going on?" Both Camille and I took our seats. Whatever it was sounded big and bad, and my hackles were starting to rise. "Start at the beginning."
"I put in a phone call to the clan Tyler claims to be from. According to them, Tyler died four months ago." Zach leaned forward, his eyes bloodshot. "His body was stolen shortly before the burial ceremony, and they never found it. It's true that he'd been planning on coming to join our clan, and it's true that they'd provided him with references, but they never bothered to look for the papers when he died."
"And nobody ever called you to let you know he was dead?" Maybe the OIA was bureaucratic, but right now I could see the positive side to red tape.
"We didn't know that he was coming in the first place. Usually, a reference letter is good enough to admit a person to the clan. We're rather informal about that. So when Tyler showed up with papers, we assumed that everything was in order. We didn't bother to call them to check, since he already had his references in hand."
"Doesn't that leave room for imposters?" Camille asked, shaking her head. "Why didn't you guys think of the possibility of fraud before now?"
"Apparently it's never been a problem. Until now." Zach frowned. "I think our admittance policy's going to change."
"Holy crap," Iris said. "Does this mean Tyler's a zombie?"
"Walk-in. It's got to be," I countered. "But Kyoka didn't just bump his soul aside, he killed Tyler for his body. Did they say how he died?"
"No autopsy—Weres don't approve of autopsies. It's against our religious beliefs. I guess he'd been sick with bronchitis, and when they found him dead, they assumed he'd stopped breathing in his sleep."
"Ten to one, Kyoka forcibly drove his soul out," I said. "I'll bet you anything he cast Tyler's essence into oblivion, leaving his body an empty shell. The heart would stop beating, but the body would look like he'd just gone to sleep. With Tyler sick, and the Weres' reluctant to autopsy, it must have been the perfect setup."
"Actually," Camille interjected, "Tyler could technically be considered a zombie, but with Kyoka's soul inside the body, Menolly wouldn't be able to pin him as one of the undead."
"Undead don't have souls?" Zach asked.
"Some do," I said. "Vampires, for example. When destroyed, they're free to move on like most of the dead. Zombies don't, though, or ghouls. They're not transformed so much as used as puppets. Tyler's soul went to join his ancestors. He's no longer connected to his body.
"That makes sense," I said, darting a look at Zachary, who was squirming in his seat. "Zach, don't tell me that Tyler knows you're onto him?"
He hung his head. "Yeah. He walked in on me when I was on the phone and darted out before I could stop him. By the time I finished my conversation, Tyler had disappeared. I couldn't find him anywhere, so I called an emergency meeting of the Council, but Venus didn't show up. When we went to look for him, his house had been trashed. There'd been a godawful struggle. We searched the compound and grounds all night but haven't been able to find any sign of either Venus or Tyler."
"Great Mother, you think they have Venus the Moon Child?" This was just getting worse and worse.
He nodded. "There was no sign of a body, and Tyler knows just how powerful Venus is."
"And if anybody in your tribe knows about the spirit seals, it would be Venus," I said, shivering as a goose walked over my grave.
The Hunters Moon Clan and the demons would do everything they could to make him talk. The spiderlings were bad enough on their own, but when aligned with Shadow Wing's minions, the variety and methods of torture available to them were mind-boggling. Unless we could rescue him—and rescue him soon—Venus was a goner, in a very painful way.
"Yeah, I thought of that." Zach leaned back in his chair and took a deep breath as Iris brought him a cup of tea. "Thanks, Iris," he said. "I told the Council everything—not about Shadow Wing trying to take over the Earth, but everything I could to make them believe me that the Hunters Moon Clan is in league with the Demonkin. They said to come to you."
"What's the Puma Pride doing now?"
"The elders are evacuating all the women and children. And we've petitioned the Olympic Wolf Pack for help. They're sending over twenty young pack members tomorrow to help us patrol the borders of our compound." Zach's shoulders sagged. "We don't know what else to do. The Council will be forever in your debt if you can help us out."
We'd need Menolly. And Chase. And everybody we could think of. It was one thing to go up against Bad Ass Luke alone, but with an entire nest of werespiders in addition to Kyoka and the demons, we wouldn't stand a chance without more help.
Camille must have been thinking the same thing, because she said, "Who can we call in? There's Morio. Damn it, I wish Trillian was here—he's good in a fight. Smoky, of course. Anybody else you can think of?"
"Don't forget Chase," I said. "Do you think Grandmother Coyote would help us?"
She shook her head. "I doubt it. She tends to stay out of things unless it suits her fancy. I'm sure she knows what's going on. Maybe Menolly will know somebody from the Wayfarer we can trust."
Zachary cleared his throat. "I can pledge the help of one of our best pride members. She's our most fearless guard." His left eye twitched. "Her name's Rhoda."
"Rhoda?" I asked. "She's a werepuma, too?"
He nodded. "My ex-fiancée, actually. We were engaged until last year."
That stopped me cold. I had been so busy focusing on the current situation that I hadn't even bothered to wonder if he had a girlfriend. Not for more than a few minutes, at least. I felt myself start down that treacherous path of wondering what she looked like but stopped before I got past the garden gate. We were mired in a rapidly escalating crisis, and right now I needed to keep focused on the problem at hand.
