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‘They can get onto our land,’ Manners confirmed. ‘But we’ve set up perimeter cameras and motion detectors.’
I thought of Archie’s shattered door. ‘Can we arrange a master key for all the bedrooms in case of emergency?’
‘That was already sorted,’ He pulled out a keyring with a wolf head on it.
I blinked. ‘It was? So, I didn’t need to break down Archie’s door?’
‘No, but you were pretty impressive. You certainly made an impression on the pack.’ He grinned. ‘I heard a few people talking about it afterwards.’
I was such a doofus; I’d had access to a key the whole time. I groaned aloud and changed the subject. ‘Who is going to monitor this?’ I gestured to the cameras and screens.
‘In down times we don’t need to worry too much, but when we’re on high alert like now, we’ll set up a rota. I’ll ask for volunteers, run some training and get some six-hour shifts in place. We shouldn’t need to maintain that level for long.’
‘I’ve set alerts,’ Fritz piped up. ‘When the external motion detectors are triggered, it sends a notification to Greg’s phone. He can log in and monitor remotely wherever he is.’
‘Nice work,’ I complimented him.
Fritz flashed me a grin. ‘I’m good at this stuff. Now I’m going to spend the next day trying to make your security system as un-hackable as possible.’
‘I appreciate that,’ I said, like it didn’t fluster me that my system might be hacked. This realm was something else, and I needed to learn fast or I’d fall behind.
Fritz nodded, turned back to his computers and started to type rapidly.
Manners watched him for a minute and called his name a couple of times. No reaction. ‘He’s in the zone, so now we can talk freely.’ His tone was ominous and I didn’t think I was going to like what was to follow. Serious Manners was a troubled Manners.
Chapter 22
‘What’sup?’Iaskedeasily, like I wasn’t nervous of the answer.
Probably death and destruction,Esme commented.He’s always so serious when there’s death or destruction. He doesn’t know anything about how to have fun.
Sam’s lips twitched a little. ‘I like her. She’s funny – for a wolf.’
I froze. He could hear Esme? First the gargoyle, and now him? I frowned. ‘All right, what are you?’
‘I’m known in some circles as Bastion,’ Sam confessed.
I froze. There was only one Bastion I’d heard about. ‘Bastion the deadly assassin griffin?’
Amusement flickered in those deadly eyes. ‘That’s the one.’
‘We’ve met before. You were at the battle of the daemons when Manners was turned wolfy.’
‘I was.’
‘We didn’t get a chance to chat, but I know Jess was grateful that you flew in to wreak havoc.’
‘I’m always ready to wreak havoc.’ He said it levelly, with no hint of amusement. He wasn’t kidding.
‘Yeah, I get that. You’re a pretty scary dude.’
He was looking at me analytically. ‘You’ve adjusted well to the Other.’
There was something in his tone, something almost familiar. Maybe a hint of affection? Jess had told me that the deadly griffin assassin thought of her like a favourite niece, that he watched over her.Jess and I were BFFs; if he knew Jess, he knew me. I wasn’t sure if that was creepy or reassuring.
He watched understanding flicker over my face and gave an approving nod. ‘You were always a quick girl, Lucy.’
‘I’m missing something,’ Manners interjected, an edge to his voice. He didn’t like not being in the know.
