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He swal owed the mouthful of cookie before answering. "Wolf Briar--I learned about it down in the jungle when I was in Special Ops." We'd recently learned that Wilbur's stint in the military had included a tour in some special operating force, one so top secret it didn't even have a name, though we knew it had been part of the marines.
"You have a lot of werewolves down in the rain forest?" I knew he'd been stationed down in South America, but he never told us just quite where.
"Yeah, actual y, we did. There are tribes of shifters down there who make your kind look like puddy tats," he said, motioning to me. "The Jaguar Warriors--deadly and swift, dangerous beyond belief. But they aren't as bad as the canid clans. The Jungle Stalkers are Mexican gray werewolves, and they're skil ed hunters but deadly to intruders. But then the coyote shifters moved in from North America, and they're far more unpredictable. They'd just as soon slit your throat as help you out. They used the Wolf Briar to take over some of the Jungle Stalkers clans."
"The coyote shifters use Wolf Briar? But don't they feel like they're betraying their cousins?" I'd only met a couple coyote shifters before--one was Siobhan the selkie's friend Marion, who owned the Supe-Urban Cafe. And she was one of the good guys. Just a few weeks ago, she'd helped Camil e and our friend Siobhan escape a crazed stalker Siobhan was running from. I'd never think of her as trying to displace someone else.
"Wait--are coyote shifters technical y Weres?" Roz asked.
"Yeah," Wilbur said. "But they often used the term shifter instead. They're a little different than a lot of other Weres. It's said they originated from Great Coyote himself."
"Hmm, a little like the werespiders we fought--they originated from Kyoka the shaman. They weren't a normal adaptation, though." I paused, then cleared my throat. "Coyotes are found in Arizona, right?"
"Just about every state, from what I know." Wilbur frowned. "So, what do you want to know? Elvira here said it was something to do with sorcery shops?
"
Menol y hissed at him, and he gave her the finger. Everybody froze. I slowly flickered my gaze toward her. She was staring him down. Not good. Oh--this could be so bad. But then she broke into laughter, startling me and everybody else, including Wilbur--I could see the sweat on his forehead--and I relaxed.
"Wilbur, do you know of any sorcerers who set up a shop in the area? Somebody who maybe could be producing Wolf Briar? It's truly a matter of life and death." Camil e leaned forward, stil looking shaken but doing what she always did: putting duty first. "Please, if you have any information, tel us."
He eyed her slowly, his gaze running up her body, but for once he wasn't ogling. "I know how bad that crap can be." His voice was gruff, but I sensed a gentleness behind it that I'd never before heard. "Somebody hit me with a load of it once, and it wiped me out for days. Of course, I didn't get no antidote either, but stil . . . you look like you got the crap beaten out of you. Okay, babe. Give me a pen and paper. I'l tel you what I know."
I slid a notepad and pen across the table to him, and he jotted down a name and address.
Wilbur shoved the notepad back to me. "This dude, he came into town a few months ago. I heard he was opening up a shop and so decided to see what he had to offer. I was looking for a few rare spel components. But a few seconds through the door, and I nearly passed out."
"What happened?" I met his eyes, thinking that maybe, beneath that rough exterior, Wilbur was okay.
"The energy was so thick in that joint I could barely breathe. Be cautious. Dude's name is Van, and his partner's name is Jaycee. As far as I can tel , they're both sorcerers. I don't know what tradition they fol ow, but I can tel you this: They're dangerous and chaotic. I got out of there as soon as I could, and I've never been back. I assume the shop is stil there."
Crap. If Wilbur was afraid to go back, then they must be pretty damned nasty. Wilbur didn't spook easily, and with his skil in necromancy, it would take a buttload of bad energy to scare him. I glanced at the notepad.
"Madame Pompey's Magical Emporium . Wow, that sounds so . . . so . . . B-grade movie-ish." Images of '60s science fiction gypsy fortune-tel er werewolf movies skittered through my head.
"Trust me, we're not talking B-grade anything. These folks are for real, and if there's Wolf Briar being produced around the area, then my bets are on them. There's bad, and then there's bad. And those two . . . they walk on the dark side of the fence." Wilbur let out a sharp breath and leaned back in his chair, folding his arms. He shook his head. "I wonder . . ."
"What are you thinking?" Camil e winced as she shifted position. "May I please have some more tea?"
Tril ian scrambled to pour her another cup.
Wilbur ran his fingers through his beard. "Just . . . Once, down in the jungles, when I was on a mission, I ran across an old shaman from the Jaguar Warriors tribe. He'd wandered away during a vision quest and was a good ten miles from his vil age. I asked him why he was hiding, and he told me he'd accidental y crossed the borders into Koyanni territory--coyote shifters who made Wolf Briar. That old man could have easily kil ed almost every one of us with the flick of an eye-lash, but he was scared shitless of the Koyanni."
"And?"
"Just this: I wonder if Van and Jaycee have anything to do with coyote shifters. I don't know enough about them to know if they're al like the ones I met when I was in the service, but . . ."
"But it's a good thought to check up on," I finished for him.
Camil e cleared her throat. "We know not al of them are like that. Marion isn't. But . . . we can ask her about others in the area, if there's any connection between the shop and the shifters."
"We'l have to be delicate about it," Menol y said. "And being so, it's not a chore for me--I'm too blunt. Camil e, tomorrow you and Delilah can take a trip over to the cafe and check it out. You think you'd be up for that?"
"Sure. I'l be fine. Real y." She yawned, and I could tel she was about ready to faint from exhaustion and shock. "I should be good to go then. But for now, I just want to sleep. If anything happens tonight while you guys are checking out the two Weres, let me know. I'l come help if you need--"
"You wil not leave this house tonight." Iris motioned to Smoky, who tossed Camil e's afghan over his shoulder. "Smoky, get her back up to bed."
As the dragon gathered Camil e up in his arms and headed toward the stairs, Tril ian fol owed with a tea tray. Morio turned to me before heading after them. "You need us, the three of us wil come help, but if you want your sister to be okay by tomorrow, she needs a ful night's sleep. The Wolf Briar real y disrupted her system. More than you think."
