“Yes. You see now why we’d hidden the cub.”
He understood perfectly.
“Matilda keeps the information she overhears confidential, unless something alarms her.”
Ah. That’s how Diana found out about Arabella’s internship. Matilda must’ve discovered it and shared it with her aunt.
Diana studied him for another moment and turned the tablet toward him. On it, Kitty took shaky steps on stubby legs. She stumbled over to her frightening mother and batted at the otherworldly beast with her small paw. Celeste lowered her head. The cub tried to pounce, fell, and let out a frustrated noise, a tiny baby growl.
“You said something was stolen from you. They took the cub,” he guessed.
“They did.”
For a moment something vicious and cold shone through Diana’s eyes. It seemed so incompatible with her usual demeanor, he wondered if he’d imagined it.
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Have you received a ransom demand?”
“No.”
“You need MII’s help to find and recover Kitty,” he said.
“Yes.”
“You’ve gone to great lengths to keep Kitty’s existence secret. Someone discovered it against all odds, infiltrated your security,and stole the cub. If this was a money grab, by now the kidnapper would’ve reached out. This tells me two things: the entity behind the theft wanted the cub for a specific purpose and the culprit is likely another House.”
She nodded. “Yes.”
They both knew what was left unsaid: a conflict like that meant House warfare. When Houses clashed, they paid the price not just in money, but in lives, and that cost could be staggering. Diana’s face told him she understood all of that.
“Do you have any suspects?”
“No.”
“If you had to guess?”
“Any animal mage would kill to possess a tigrionex,” she said. “People know we have Zeus. We’ve had multiple offers from many Houses who want to purchase him. We rejected all of them. One of the Houses attempted to break the bond between Zeus and Cornelius.”
“What happened?”
“They are no longer a House.”
To become a House, a family had to produce three Primes in two generations. To remain a House, it had to have at least one living Prime. The Harrissons had killed at least one rival animal Prime. Possibly more.
“Kitty is still nursing,” Diana said. “She requires her mother’s milk to survive. There is no substitute. No formula. Without Celeste’s milk, she will fall sick very quickly. We cannot wait.”
“A recovery like that will be costly in every sense of that word. Although our Houses are in a friendship pact, even with that discount, the fee would be significant. Do you wish to see an estimate?”
“No. Whatever it takes. We will pay it.”
“Are you sure?” The Harrisons were a House, but their talents didn’t have many lucrative applications. He would put their total net worth under forty million.
“Absolutely. This isn’t property, Prime Montgomery. This is a life.”
Diana brushed her fingers over the recording. Her eyes shone with green, a sign of her magic activating.
