He headed for the door, pausing with his hand on it.
“You were right to invite Volnoye,” he said without looking back. “You were wrong to do it alone. Learn from that. You don’t have to carry all of this by yourself. Not unless you insist on it.”
Then he was gone, cold air knifing in and out as the door swung shut.
Chase let out a low whistle. “On a scale of one tothe snake has a point, how much do you want to punch something?”
Arthur stared at the empty space where Alex had sat. At the door, Dani still hadn’t walked through.
“Make me a coffee,” he said. “Strong.”
“That’s the spirit,” Chase said, “nothing like caffeine and imminent collapse of the pack to start the day.”
Arthur wrapped his hands round the mug when it came, letting the heat bite his palms, and thought of witches and wolves and the narrow, shifting strip between fear and choice.
And of Dani, somewhere in town with her sisters, deciding which side of that strip he belonged on.
Chapter 17 - Dani
Dani had never been more aware of how small Aurelia’s hand was.
It was warm in hers as they crossed the alpha house yard, the air sharp enough to sting her lungs. The compound beyond the edges of the trees hummed with nervous energy; she could feel it across the entire bay.
Meeting day.
“You don’t have to go right away,” Aurelia said, glancing up at her. “You could stay until after lunch. Or forever. Forever’s good.”
“Tempting,” Dani said, “but then who’s going to stop the wolves and witches from killing each other over whose turn it is to speak?”
Aurelia made a face. “Lavinia .”
“Lavinia will try,” Dani muttered. “Lavinia mightstartsomething if she gets any crap.”
That got her a tiny smile. Good. Dani clung to it.
They reached the long lodge at the edge of the compound that doubled as Nordan’s kid-pen when things got tense. Two older females waited by the door, Freya and Sue, both in human skin, both solid as mountains. A small herd of children spilled around them, noisy and riled up.
Freya dipped her head to Dani. “We’ll keep them inside the fence,” she said, “any trouble, we howl.”
Aurelia squeezed her hand once, hard. “I’ll be fine,” she said, “they already showed me where they keep the snacks.”
“Of course they did.” Dani crouched so they were eye to eye. “Stay with the others. If anything feels wrong—”
“I find a grown-up, I don’t try to be a hero,” Aurelia recited. Then, softer, “You’ll be careful?”
Dani lied beautifully, “Always.”
Aurelia hesitated, then leaned in and hugged her so fiercely it knocked a bit of air out of Dani’s lungs. She breathed in the warm, familiar scent of her girl, sugar, and shampoo, and the faint crackle of magic.
“Go,” Aurelia muttered into her shoulder, “before you miss the opening arguments.”
Dani snorted, throat tight, “Bossy.”
“Wonder where I got it from,” Aurelia said, and then she was gone, swept into the chaos of pups, already showing a smaller boy how to cheat at cards with a flicker of spark under her fingers.
Dani watched until the door shut.
Only then did she turn away and head down towards town.
