“I could eat pizza,” T. Laine said, accepting the change in subject with relief. “Youneed to talk?”
“No. Except to say that my family is both horrible and wonderful. I kind of…hate them while I love them. You know?”
“Yeah. Family is always a mess. So are covens, especially when the one you were born into lets you down. Then you have chosen family and…” She stopped, her face screwing up.
Margot was stepping gingerly across the ice in human form, dressed in sweats that hung on her.
Suddenly Lainie laughed. “Chosen family. That’s us. Unit Eighteen. Even with asshole FireWind in charge.”
I gave a small snort. “Yeah. A witch, a bunch of were-creatures, a skinwalker, a guy who reads emotions, a human hacker.”
“And a plant-woman. She plays a very important part for the rest of us. She and her land are the soul of us.”
EIGHTEEN
The day had warmed. Lunch was very, very late, and tasted even better because of the stress and the hunger: more take-out pizza with a salad from my window box garden, a silent meal while we all typed up our after-action reports. I had already switched my chair for another and so the seat didn’t feel maggoty.
FireWind, still in wolf form, ate his own take-out food, an entire rib section—the part of a steer that provided the rib eye roast, rolled rib roast, and standing rib roast—on the floor of the break room, the raw meat on a newspaper to absorb the blood. He finished it fast and went to shift into human, padding down the hallway to the locker room.
There were a lot of things going on politically in the world, things I kept abreast of through online newspapers and media sources, because that was one church teaching I agreed with: know your historical politics, current politics, and legal rights; know what is at stake in every election and with every law passed or vetoed—or you lose your rights and history repeats itself.
But the politics of the microcosm were harder to keep up with: the politics in law enforcement, the petty disagreements between agencies, the changes in financing and diversion of taxpayer money, the change in leadership in different organizations, who had been caught with their hand in the cookie jar or the honeypot and who hadn’t, who was on the way up and who was on the way down, who was a dangerous hothead and who was cool under fire.
FireWind had been in law enforcement in one capacity or another, under one name or another, for a hundred years. The addition of a queen over the vampires and the total reorganization of the European and North American vampire politicalpower structure wasn’t something I understood at all. But it was clear that Aya was torn between the protocols and demands of PsyLED, the military, mundane law enforcement, the dithering of Congress about the status of paranormal creatures like us, and the power offered by his sister, the queen. That kind of internal struggle about external political struggles was affected by history, love, family, and the demands of honor. All that pulled at him.
Or at least that was how I read his silence and the emotions that flitted across his usually stoic face as he returned and ate ten pounds of deli beef in one sitting. FireWind finished his second lunch and reached for a piece of pizza. It disappeared in two bites. He went into the break room and returned, his eyes settling on Occam. “Thank you for cleaning up the bones.”
“Thank Margot,” Occam said, not looking up from his computer.
“Not a problem,” Margot said, not waiting for the thanks, her fingers flying over her keyboard.
Aya returned to his chair and wiped his hands fastidiously before saying, “The vampires have Soul. They may have more devil dogs held captive, possibly being tortured. Their lair will not be where we expect it to be. It may be much more heavily fortified than we expect, or we may find the trail simply disappears. I will have the best nose and the best defenses if we are attacked, so if we find them, I will shift back to wolf form. We have three hours until sunset. I want everyone in human form except me.”
Rick frowned, but no one argued. It had been phrased as an order, and when FireWind used that tone, he expected to be obeyed.
“Rettell. Have you informed your chain of command that PsyLED headquarters in Richmond has placed restraints on your removing any paranormal creatures? And that if you attempt to do so, you will be disarmed and placed in a cell?”
“I didn’t phrase it quite so blatantly,” the woman said with a twisted smile, eyebrows high, “but they are aware that the Dark Queen ispersonallyinvolved,while on her honeymoon, and that she is most unhappy at having to ‘deal with politics during this joyous and private occasion.’ That’s a direct quote from a certain three-star general who had plans forgwyllgi. JaneYellowrock’s personal interest has changed things.” Her brows arched up higher. “Must be nice to have family in high places,” she said, in what sounded like a direct challenge to FireWind.
“I didn’t make the call,” FireWind said calmly, “though I would have had Rick not taken it upon himself to speak to an honorable and kind woman who has the power to help others instead of use them.”
Rettell glared, knowing the barb was aimed at her personally as much as at her bosses. “I have free rein at this time and permission to act as I see fit. Within reason.”
FireWind asked, “ ‘As you see fit’? If we find a more dangerous situation than expected, can you offer resources?”
“Yes,” she said, “but that horny wereleopard sitting across from me and I need some time off soon, because me beating him up won’t work much longer.”
“I’ll authorize forty-eight hours’ PTO for him once the vampires are contained or true-dead.”
“Good enough.” The lieutenant colonel didn’t seem very happy about getting Rick alone. She didn’t seem very happy about much of anything right now. Mostly wry, irritated, and maybe a little bit tired of the politics of being a female werecat in a male-human-run world.
* * *
It was late afternoon when we returned to the site of Gad Purdy’s death. The city’s and PsyLED’s crime techs had been over it extensively, and the body had been removed to PsyLED’s headquarters in Richmond for a more thorough necropsy than UTMC could do. Not an autopsy, done on a human. But a necropsy, done on an animal. Gad had died horribly, and still mostly in devil dog shape. There was little we could learn at the scene itself. The snow was gone, the blood washed away, leaving the site clean-ish, but even with the cleanup, FireWind’s nose was on high alert. He was tired and scrawny, having shifted several times in twenty-four hours, but he’d eaten a huge raw turkey and another twenty-pound roast after he shifted back to wolf, so he wasn’t looking too terribly starved.
Before he shifted, he had told us he planned to start at the center of the previously bloody site and work out in a spiral, tapping the pavement every time he found a scent marker thatwas vamp orgwyllgi. In a system worked out by LaFleur and Rettell, FireWind used his right front paw for vamp and his left front paw for one of the boys, and he ignored the scents left by techs, cops, and others, such as our small group.
The wolf started in the center of the kill scene, and with the first sniff, his hair stood on end and he began to growl, that low, ominous vibration I had felt at the Nicholson clan home. He put his nose down and sniffed, his nostrils quivering, his entire body tense and taut, his tail down in a rigid position. Moving outward, the black wolf began to walk in a growing spiral.
