The Arrivals

Chapter 34

When Jack and the others returned, Kitty and Edgar were sitting with a significantly improved Francis. Styrr had been standing quietly at the window, watching the street below. He looked at her, said, “They are here,” and then he resumed watching the street.

Kitty couldn’t say she was surprised. The bloedzuiger had been unfailing in his guard duties, but he was not particularly talkative. When he did speak for anything other than basic reasons, he directed his remarks only to Kitty.

Francis had slept for the majority of the time that Jack and the others were away. The medicine seemed to send his body into the opposite of a Verrot alertness, but it worked, and that was all that really mattered. Francis hadn’t recovered full sight, but he could see hazy images in both eyes, and more important, the bleeding had stopped. Healing always took far more time than being broken.

“Soanes is gone,” Jack said when he walked in.

Melody made an unhappy noise. “Nothing but bits by the time we were there. Demon-filled monk made a mess of him, and then didn’t have the decency to stand still so we could at least torture him since he killed the governor before I could interrogate him.” She huffed. “In my day, monks were monks, and monsters were on the television or in books, where they belong. Demons being inside of monks is just rude.”

While Melody was talking, both Hector and Jack looked down at Kitty and Edgar’s entwined hands. Jack nodded once at Edgar; Hector just grinned. Yesterday, she would’ve had a hard time not commenting on their reactions, but today she was too happy to bother. She rolled her eyes at Hector and turned her attention back to Melody, who was gesticulating and lamenting “the intolerably bad manner of demons and monks and corrupt governors.”

“Melly?” Hector interjected.

Melody blinked like she was trying to refocus on the world around her, and then she patted her hair, smoothing it back in case any tendrils had escaped their assigned places. “Yes?”

“We could hunt,” he suggested. “Maybe the bad-mannered monks came here.”

Melody looked as happy as a girl accepting a bouquet of freshly picked flowers. “I would like to kill something . . .” she murmured, before abruptly turning her attention to Jack. “Hector and I are patrolling.”

Jack nodded, and Hector ushered the manic woman out of the room.

Once she was gone, Styrr murmured, “She is very much like a young bloedzuiger . . . but she speaks. I am quite grateful that our newborns do not speak.”

Francis laughed, and both Jack and Edgar smiled.

“Katherine?” Styrr said. When she looked at him, he continued, “Garuda asks that I tell you that the toxin he has prepared seems to be ready for use. The pack told him that speaking to the governor did not work, so he suspects your pack will soon seek Ajani. Is this true?”

“Maybe. What is the toxin?”

“It will kill Ajani,” Styrr said mildly. “However, it cannot be administered by anyone native to the Wasteland.”

“I am not native,” Kitty said.

“True,” Styrr replied, as if he were thinking. “Perhaps, for your protection—as kin to my kin—you might like to have it if you are going to see Ajani. It’s not something we could offer to anyone not kin, but it would not be pleasing to the pack should you be injured.”

Everyone in the room was silent for a moment, and then Kitty replied very politely, “Yes, I think I would like that if it’s of no trouble.”

Styrr bowed his head.

After a moment of stunned silence, Jack said, “If we have a way to kill Ajani, I’m going after him tonight. Tell Garuda to bring the poison.”

“This is a gift we can only offer to kin.” Styrr looked at Kitty, not Jack, as he said this.

Jack was the one in charge; he had always been the one who made decisions. It wasn’t a burden Kitty had ever wanted to shoulder, but she’d also seen how near Jack had been to falling apart over Chloe. Maybe having someone else check his decisions wasn’t an entirely bad idea right now.

She glanced at her brother, but he was staring out the window, seemingly lost in thought.

Kitty turned to Styrr. “Could Garuda bring it now?”

Merely a moment had passed before Styrr said, “He will be here shortly.”