Jesper didn’t flinch. “Yes, they declared war, but we are not involved.”
Immediately, hands shot up.
A vampire reporter in the front row stood, not waiting to be called on. “What about the attack on the Apex Elite Academy student? The kidnapping and the deaths at the human facility—that’s what broke the peace treaty, isn’t it? Humans claim the treaty was violated when one of our agents slaughtered her abductors.”
Heat crawled up the back of my neck.
They deserved it.
Drecken leaned into the mic, eyes narrowing. “No. It isn’t.”
The words cracked across the room with magic.
“The peace treaty is not broken,” he went on, each syllable clipped with irritation. “Let’s get that out of the way first, shall we?”
The reporter opened her mouth.
He ignored her.
“The humans have conveniently skipped the part where they violated the peace treaty first. Repeatedly. Kidnapping an academy student from our grounds is a violation. Kidnapping multiple supernaturals from our territories in Kalista is a violation. Experimenting on them?” His fingers flexed on the podium. “Isa violation.”
Magic crackled off his shoulders, sending a faint blue streak through the air. The lights above them dimmed and then brightened again.
“And the humans we are currently having issues with,” Jesper added, “are not the Human Council. They are not part of the treaty. They are a separate faction dubbed the Human Resistance Network. A terrorist network. This shouldn’t be new information for you.”
A murmur rippled through the room.
Another reporter, a witch with ink-black braids and a gold quill behind her ear, stood. “But the humans say the kidnapping and the lab massacre were acts of supernatural aggression and that we provoked their faction. That this is a supernatural war by proxy.”
Jesper’s jaw tightened. “Let me be very clear. The humans’ civil war is a human problem. The Supernatural Council is not engaged in it. We are not arming one side. We are not sending squads into their cities. We are, at this time, staying out of it.”
“So you’re telling our people not to worry?” someone else demanded. “That humans with stolen powers slaughtering villages in the Bizarre and attacking the demon capital isn’t our concern?”
“I did not say that,” Jesper said, taking a deep breath. I could feel the frustration down the matebond. “Humansarea threat to us currently, even with the treaty standing, because there is a faction that is targeting us. That faction is the Human Resistance Network. We respond where they cross into our jurisdiction. We protect our people. We do not start wars based on human propaganda.”
The first reporter raised her hand again, more cautiously this time. “Speaking of stolen powers, the humans claim they took basilisk DNA. That an agent-in-training named Rune Bloodwyne is responsible for the venom being used on us. It washervenom used to wipe out an entire village in the Bizarre and multiple demons in the capital. Is that true? And if so, does that mean they still have access to her power?”
The reporters stared intently at the stage, at my mates. No one looked toward the shadows where I sat.
Drecken’s magic exploded in tiny fireworks around him. He exhaled through his nose, blue eyes blazing, and leaned closer to the mic again. “They took her DNA and grafted it into human bodies. Those humans slaughtered supernaturals in the Bizarre and struck the demon capital. That part is unfortunately true.”
My throat tightened.
“But,” Drecken continued, “what I said from the start stands. Human bodies cannot sustain that level of power. Not safely, and not for long.” He looked directly into one of the central cameras. “All humans who were dosed with the stolen basilisk’s DNA are dead. Not because we hunted all of them, though, we certainly would have, but because the power they stole is eating them from the inside out. Their veins, their organs, their cells, all are being devoured by something they were never meant to carry.”
The room fell still.
Jesper cleared his throat. “To answer the second half of your question, no. They do not have continued access to the DNA and can no longer use it as a weapon against us. They cannot replicate it. The samples they stole have burned out beyond use.”
“And the basilisk in question,” the witch reporter pressed, “Rune Bloodwyne. Is she safe? Are there further risks to the public of her being targeted by the humans?”
“She is under the direct protection of the Supernatural Council,” Jesper replied. “She is alive. She is not in human hands, and they will not be getting another sample.”
Some of the tension in my chest loosened hearing him say that.
An imp popped up in the second row. “Are you sure this doesn’t mean the peace treaty is broken? We’re hearing rumors.”
Drecken’s fingers tapped the podium, magic pulsing in rhythm with his heart. “The treaty,” he said through gritted teeth, “isnotbroken.”
