Written in Red

CHAPTER 13

On Sunsday morning, the new set of bowls and the dog bed for the office were delivered as promised, and Sam was delighted to have his own comfortable spot where he could watch Meg as she sorted mail and packages. Boone brought over a small container of chopped meat, claiming it was now a regular order. Meg didn’t ask what kind of meat it was or who had placed the order. She just warmed up the meat and stirred it into the kibble.

That morning, there was no sign of Jake Crowgard. There was also no sign of any of the pencils or pens he’d been playing with—including the three that were supposed to be hers. Between deliveries, she called toy stores, found what she was looking for, and got a promise from the store that she would have the merchandise by that afternoon.

Sometimes Sam hid from the deliverymen; sometimes he watched them from the sorting-room doorway—and Meg watched the way a couple of them studied the red harness just a little too long for her liking.

And too often throughout the day, when she thought about the vision of the men in black and Sam howling in terror, she found herself rubbing her arms to relieve the prickling under her skin while she struggled with the craving to make another cut.

By Windsday, Meg and Sam had a workable morning routine, and for the first time since beginning her puppy-sitting stint seven days ago, they got to the office without rushing.

As she opened the front door, Meg stuck her head out and smiled at the Crows who had taken up their usual position on the wall. “Tell Jake I have a package for him.”

After setting up for business, she unclipped the leash and removed Sam’s harness. She made that decision after waking up twice, scared by dreams she couldn’t remember. She would keep the harness and leash handy, but she didn’t want him wearing it when it wasn’t necessary.

Besides, Merri Lee told her that Ferus had been reassigned to work with Blair at the Utilities Complex. And yesterday Henry suddenly came into the office several times to check on a delivery or look through a catalog he claimed he didn’t have. It hadn’t escaped her notice that the Grizzly showed up every time Elliot Wolfgard left the consulate. Realizing Blair and Henry had done those things because some of the Wolves were upset about the harness was another reason for Sam not to wear it.

“We don’t need the safety line when we’re inside the office,” she told him when he tried to leap up and grab the harness off the counter. “All you have to remember is not to run out when we fill the mail baskets for the ponies.”

He talked back, but she gave him cookies and another piece of the stag stick, which he took back to his bed to gnaw on, ending the discussion.

Jake Crowgard wasn’t as easy to distract.

Meg didn’t know how he was getting in, but he was on the counter, studying the empty pen holder when she came back to the front room. Setting her peppermint tea on the sorting table, where it would be out of reach of any gifts he might want to drop into it, she pulled out a box from under the counter, opened it, and showed him the wooden wheels, colored sticks, and various connectors.

“Give back all my pencils and pens—and promise to leave them alone from now on—and you can have this,” she said.

Negotiations would have been simpler if Jake had shifted to his human form so that he could actually talk to her. She was sure that was the reason he didn’t shift. He tried to pretend he didn’t understand what she was saying, so she smiled at him, closed the box, took it into the sorting room, and shut the Private door.

She ignored Jake’s cawing while she sorted the mail. She ignored Sam’s howling when she unlocked the sorting-room’s outside door, then went into the back room to fetch her coat and the bowl of carrot chunks that was the ponies’ treat that day.

Sam stood in front of the outside door, mouthing his end of the leash and wagging his tail. Clearly, having a door open to the outside required the safety line. Wondering if she had emphasized the buddy system a little too much, Meg slipped the leash’s loop over her wrist and picked up the first two bundles of mail just as a chorus of neighs announced the arrival of the ponies. Pleased with himself, Sam stayed beside her as she walked back and forth between the table and the ponies, loading their baskets with mail, catalogs from nearby stores, and flat packages.

Once the ponies were on their way and Sam had ducked out just long enough to yellow up some snow, Meg locked the doors. Then she checked the front room. Jake wasn’t in sight, but there were three pencils on the counter.

She took the pencils and put two colored sticks and a wheel in their place.

When she closed for lunch, she snuck the toy box out of the office and locked it in her BOW. Then she dropped Sam off at Henry’s yard for an hour of playtime while she went to A Little Bite for a leisurely meal.

Returning to the office, she found three more pencils and four pens on the counter—and a black feather in the sorting room. Apparently, Jake had tried to get around trading by searching for the box. She felt oddly proud that she’d been sneakier than a Crow.

She never saw him during the afternoon delivery hours, but every time she checked the front room, a few more pens or pencils would be on the counter. When the pen holder and the pencil boxes were full, Meg set all the remaining toy pieces on the counter and locked up for the day. She had deliveries to make, and she needed to get Sam settled at home before heading out.

As she and Sam went out the back door, Starr Crowgard ran up to them.

“Jake wants to know if you found the last pencils,” Starr said.

“Yes, I did.” Meg paused, her key in the lock.

“He wondered if he could have the rest of the sticks.”

He wondered? Meg thought as she opened the door. “Sure.”

They went to the front room. Meg put the remaining pieces back in the box and gave it all to Starr, who shifted from foot to foot.

It was a mistake to think the Others were exactly like the birds or animals they mimicked, but after living in those forms for so many generations, they had absorbed some of the behaviors of those animals. Putting together what she knew about crows with the way Starr was looking at her, Meg tried not to sigh. “How many boxes would you like for the Corvine social room?”

Starr held up five fingers.

“I’ll order them tomorrow.”

Smiling, Starr followed her out, then hurried toward the Market Square, where her sisters—and, no doubt, Jake—were waiting at Sparkles and Junk to finish building whatever they were building.

Once she and Sam were settled in the BOW, Meg let out a gusty sigh. It wasn’t easy dealing with the Others, but at least she had shown the Crows that she wasn’t a pushover.

The Crows might have learned she wasn’t a pushover, but that particular lesson had been lost on the puppy. When she parked at the Green Complex, Sam wouldn’t get out of the BOW.

“Sam,” Meg said sternly. “I have deliveries to make before we can play. You have to wait for me at home.”

He talked back, and she didn’t need to speak Wolf to know he wanted to come with her and wasn’t agreeing with anything she said about him staying home by himself.

Until a few days ago, he’d been home by himself all the time. Apparently, he didn’t like it anymore.

Meg stared at the defiant pup and considered the problem. She could pick him up, but he was fast enough to bounce all over the inside of the BOW, and there was the possibility of him smashing a package that held something breakable. She could try to grab the harness, but he might forget they were friends and bite her. Or she could grab the leash and haul him out of the vehicle. But she had spent a lifetime of being controlled and held by one kind of a leash or another, and she didn’t want Sam thinking that he should let someone control him without fighting that person all the way.

A human someone, anyway, since Simon Wolfgard controlled pretty much everything and everyone in the Courtyard. Which didn’t help her now, as he was still out of town.

Leaning into the BOW, she shook her finger at Sam, bopping him on the nose a couple of times.

“All right,” she said. “You can come with me. But, Sam, you have to mind me, or we’ll both get in trouble. Do you understand?”

He licked her finger and wagged his tail. Once she was sure feet, tail, and leash were safely inside, she closed the door and went around to her side.

After starting the BOW, she considered her delivery route. She wasn’t going near the Wolfgard Complex while Sam was with her. That would be asking for trouble. She had a box for Jester. The Pony Barn was safe enough. The Utilities Complex? Trickier if Blair and Ferus were there, but she had sent a note along with the mail telling Blair she would deliver his boxes when she made her afternoon rounds, and she didn’t think it was a good idea to break a promise to the Courtyard’s enforcer.

“I’m going to get bitten one way or the other,” she muttered as she headed for the Pony Barn. When she pulled up in front, she counted four Owls perched on a decorative piece of wooden fence. Three Hawks claimed a similar bit of fence on the other side of the barn. And the trees around the barn held a dozen Crows. Apparently, she was still entertaining enough for the Others to watch her activities.

Jester walked over to the BOW, glanced in the passenger’s window, and grinned. Coming around to Meg’s side, he waited until she rolled down her window and blocked Sam’s attempt to climb in her lap and poke his head out.

“Got a helper today?” Jester asked.

“I’ve got something,” she replied. Then, “Sam! Stop it! You promised to behave.”

“If you had a better sense of smell, you’d want to sniff around too,” Jester said. He looked at her face and let out his yipping laugh. “I’ll get my own box out of the back.”

“Thank you.” She grabbed Sam before he climbed in the back with the packages, but she couldn’t stop him from howling to let the whole Courtyard know he was there. And the whole Courtyard would know, because the Crows cawed, the Hawks screamed, the Owls hooted, and the ponies neighed. And the damn Coyote raised his voice along with the rest of them, despite being in human form.

“Drive carefully,” Jester said. “Got some snow coming.” He closed the BOW’s back door and headed for the barn.

As she drove off, several ponies, including Thunder, Lightning, and old Hurricane, left the barn and trotted along behind her, turning off on one of the unmarked tracks while she continued to the Utilities Complex.

Blair was there, waiting for his delivery. So was Ferus. When she pulled up, both of them were focused on her passenger.

“You have to stay inside,” Meg said quietly. “Big Wolves don’t like the safety line.” She got out of the BOW and had the back door open before the two Wolves approached.

There were flickers of red in Ferus’s eyes. He snarled at her. Blair immediately turned and snarled at him until Ferus lowered his eyes and took a step back. And Sam, poking his head between the seats to watch the Wolves, vocalized opinions to everyone.

Blair studied the pup. Then he studied Meg. Finally, he said, “You have any packages for the Wolfgard Complex?”

“Yes.”

“You leave those here. I’ll take them with me when I go home.”

Relieved, she hauled out boxes and packages, which Blair handed to Ferus to take into the Utilities building.

“Simon will be home tonight,” Blair said as he took the last box.

“Oh. That’s good.” It was good. It also meant she needed to have Sam tucked at home before Simon arrived.

Having sufficiently expressed his opinion, Sam was curled up in the passenger’s seat, napping, when she got back into the BOW and headed for the Chambers.

Her hands shook a little as the BOW chugged up the road and snow swiftly covered the pavement. She wanted to finish her deliveries and get home before the snowfall surpassed her driving skills—and it wouldn’t take much snow on the roads to do that.

Sam didn’t stir when she stopped at the first set of delivery boxes for the Chambers, but he woke up when she rummaged through the BOW to find the snow brush and clean off the windows before she could drive to the next group of mausoleums the Sanguinati called home.

By the time she pulled up in front of Erebus’s home, Sam was almost bouncing with excitement, pawing at the passenger’s window and then at the door handle.

“Come out this way,” Meg said, holding her own door open.

He leaped out of the BOW and dodged across the road to explore as far as the leash allowed.

“Over here, Sam.” Meg breathed a sigh of relief when he immediately obeyed. Crouching, she put a hand on his head. “We must never run across a road without looking in both directions. There could be other vehicles on the road, and the drivers might not see us in time to stop. That would be very bad, especially if anyone got hurt. So you don’t run across the road like that. All right?”

He licked her chin, which she took as agreement.

When they went to the back of the BOW and she began gathering the packages, she noticed the way the pup stared at the wrought-iron fence, and thought of what Jester had told her about the Chambers.

Getting Sam’s attention again, she said, “This is also a very important rule that we all have to follow. No one is allowed to go inside the fence unless Mr. Erebus gives his permission. Even Simon doesn’t enter the Chambers without permission. So we stay on this side of the fence and don’t even poke our noses between the bars.”

Sam sighed.

“I know,” she said as she opened a couple of the delivery boxes and began filling them. “There are a lot of rules to remember when you go beyond the Green Complex—and even more rules when traveling outside the Courtyard. If you had let me take you home, you could have been in a warm house, watching a movie, instead of being out here in the snow.”

“Do you like movies, little Wolf?”

Meg jumped and let out a squeak. Sam responded by making puppy growls and snarls—which would have sounded more impressive if he hadn’t leaped behind her and then poked his head between her knees to voice those opinions.

She looked at the old man standing at the gate, smiling gently at her. “Mr. Erebus.”

“I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“I know. I just didn’t see you.” She glanced at his mausoleum. The door was open, but there were no footprints marring the fresh snow on the walk. She had gotten so used to seeing smoke drifting over the snow, she hadn’t even noticed it this time.

Erebus didn’t comment. He just stood there, smiling gently.

“Sam does like movies,” Meg said to fill the silence. She closed the full delivery boxes, then went back to the BOW for another group of packages. “But I don’t think he watches the same kind of movies that you do.”

“I like many kinds of movies,” Erebus replied, looking at Sam. “Have you seen the movies called cartoons? I especially enjoy the ones where the animals or people do the most foolish things and still survive.”

Sam stayed close to her while she filled the boxes, but when she went back to the BOW for the final packages—the ones addressed to Erebus—Sam eased up to the gate to study the vampire patriarch.

Erebus opened the gate, crouched down, and extended one hand beyond the Chambers boundary. Sam sniffed the hand, licked a finger, and wagged his tail.

Erebus laughed softly as he petted the pup. “You’re a delightful boy. I’m glad you’re looking after our Meg.”

“Looks like you have another movie,” Meg said. When Erebus rose, she expected him to tell her to put it in the delivery box. Even when she had gone up the walk and delivered his packages at the door and he was watching, she had set them on the stoop per his instructions. But he had petted Sam, and she had a feeling that meant something. So she held out the package.

He hesitated. Erebus actually hesitated before he took the package from her hand.

“Namid is full of many things, some wondrous and some terrible,” he said softly. “And some of her creations are both. Thank you for bringing my movies, Meg. I do like my old movies.”

She opened the passenger’s door, made sure the towel was on the seat, and let Sam jump in. Once he was settled, she got in, waved at Erebus, and drove off.

Why had he always hesitated to take a package from her until now? Was there some taboo about Sanguinati touching cassandra sangue? Did he even know what she was? And why had he looked at her when he said some of the world’s creations were both terrible and wondrous? Yes, prophecies could be either and sometimes both, but she didn’t think Erebus had been talking about prophecies.

Which made her wonder what he knew about her kind that she didn’t.

The snow was falling faster. Meg stopped the BOW and took out the copy of the Courtyard map that she tucked into her purse each time she went out to make deliveries. She wasn’t ignoring the danger of taking a map out of the Liaison’s Office, but she was careful to keep it out of sight. And while it did show where each gard lived within the Courtyard, the map didn’t show any roads except the paved ones that were suitable for vehicles. It wasn’t anywhere near as detailed as the map of Lakeside that she had found in the Courtyard’s library.

The Controller would have paid a lot of money for even this much information about the interior of a Courtyard.

After studying the map for a minute, she tucked it back in her purse, put the BOW in gear, and turned onto an interior road. She’d make the other deliveries tomorrow if the roads in the Courtyard were passable. Right now, she wanted to get back to the Green Complex while she could.

By the time the BOW slid across Ripple Bridge, Meg was gripping the steering wheel and hardly daring to breathe. Even with the wipers going and the heater switched to blow on the front window, it was getting harder and harder to see.

The white horse standing at the edge of the road blended in with the swirling snow, and she wouldn’t have seen him on his own, but the black horse and his rider stood in the road, waiting for her.

She stopped the BOW and put it in park, afraid that if she shut it off, she would never clear the snow off the windows enough to drive home. Rolling down her window, she peered at the riders who came up alongside the vehicle. Not girls. Closer to adult women, but still looking a bit too young to be considered mature.

Their faces—eerie, seductive, and compelling—looked even less human than their child faces, but the green scarf confirmed the identity of the black horse’s rider.

“Winter?”

Winter laughed, and the snow swirled around them. “Yes, it’s me. Thunder and Lightning wanted to stretch their legs, so Air and I are out riding.” Her smile was chilling.

Meg stared at the horses—beautiful, otherworldly creatures with flowing manes and tails, who, except for their color, didn’t look anything like the chubby ponies who delivered the mail.

Then Thunder lightly stamped a foot, and sound rolled softly through the Courtyard.

“Be patient,” Winter scolded mildly. “This is our Meg.”

Thunder tossed his head as if agreeing. Then the horse poked his nose in the window at the same moment Sam clambered into Meg’s lap. The two breathed in each other’s scent and seemed satisfied.

“More snow is coming,” Winter said once Thunder pulled his head back. “You should go home.”

“I have the library books you requested.” Nudging Sam back into the passenger’s seat, she started to twist around to find the carry bag.

“Leave it with Jester,” Winter said. “We’ll fetch it on the way back.” She studied the BOW, then exchanged a look with Air. “And we can give you a little help getting home.”

“You don’t have to do that.” Meg wasn’t sure what they were offering, but she didn’t want to face Thunder and Lightning anytime soon if they ended up hitched to the front of the BOW to pull her back to the Green Complex.

“No, we don’t. But it will be amusing,” Winter replied.

“Do you think the storm will hold off long enough for Simon to get home?” Meg asked. It was more thinking out loud than an actual question.

Another look between Winter and Air. “The Wolfgard will be able to get home tonight. Follow us.”

Turning, they cantered down the road.

Rolling up her window, Meg put the BOW in gear and followed.

Snow blew off the road in front of her, leaving the pavement clear so the BOW could keep up with the horses, and filling back in moments after Meg drove past. It was like driving through a snow-shaped tunnel that was lit up by flickers of lightning and trembled with the thunder that followed. It should have been frightening, but she felt oddly safe in the cocoon of weather the Elementals were shaping around her. A few flakes drifted down and were cleared by the wipers, but she could see the road and the horses up ahead, and that’s all she really needed.

As they neared the Pony Barn, she spotted another rider heading out on a brown horse—and noticed the funnel of snow that followed Tornado.

They stopped at the Pony Barn long enough for Jester to run out and fetch the bag of library books. After that, Winter and Air escorted Meg and Sam all the way back to the Green Complex’s garage.

“Thank you,” Meg said, grabbing her own carry bag and Sam’s towel as the pup jumped out of the BOW.

With a nod of their heads, Winter and Air turned the horses and rode off.

Meg paused long enough to check that she’d shut off the lights. She couldn’t remember what the power gauge read, but she shook her head and closed the garage door. There should be enough power for her to get to the office, and she could charge the BOW in the garage there. Besides, the snow was coming down harder now, and it was lung-biting cold outside.

Sam didn’t have any trouble running in snow, but after Meg skidded a couple of times and almost landed on her butt, he slowed down to accommodate human legs. Pausing at the bottom of her stairs to catch her breath, she noticed the black sedan idling at the side of the road.

“What does he want?” she muttered uneasily as she looked around. No lights on in Henry’s apartment. Most likely he was still working in his studio. She paused a moment longer, then climbed the stairs to her apartment.

“Come on, Sam. You can stay up here with me until Simon gets home.” She’d spent so much time in Simon’s apartment these past few days, she hadn’t had a chance to settle into her own place.

“Meg!”

Meg opened her door, tossed the towel on the floor near the boot mat, and told Sam to stay on the towel. Then she greeted Tess as the other woman bounded up the stairs.

“Here,” Tess said, holding out a bakery tin. “Chocolate chip cookies, still warm from the oven. I booted everyone out and closed A Little Bite early, but after I got home, I felt restless and decided to bake.”

Meg took the tin. “Thanks, Tess. Do you want to come in?”

“No. I’ve got a casserole in the oven now. You’re shivering. You should get inside.”

Tess wasn’t shivering—yet—but she wasn’t dressed for being outside for long.

Meg stepped inside.

Tess’s hair began to streak with green. She shook her head, but the hair continued to change to green and started to curl. “It’s this storm,” she explained. “Everyone will be edgy if the Wolfgard gets stranded tonight.”

“Winter said the storm will hold off and Simon will be able to get home,” Meg said.

Tess gave her an odd look. “Did she? Well, she would know.”

Bounding down the stairs, Tess ran back to her own apartment. Meg closed her door and set down the tin with the rest of her things as she took off her boots and hung up her coat.

Sam immediately began sniffing at the bakery tin. When he couldn’t nose it open, he sat and grabbed it between his front paws, trying to hook his claws under the lid to pull it open.

“No,” Meg said, taking it from him. Going into the kitchen with him bouncing beside her, she set the tin in the middle of her table, opened it, and recalled everything she could about cookies and animals.

The chocolate chip cookies smelled delicious, and she wanted to bite into one. But she looked at Sam, balanced on his hind legs with his front paws resting on the table’s edge, and closed the tin.

“I’m sorry, Sam, but I don’t know if Wolves can eat these cookies. I remember that chocolate is bad for dogs—” She held up a hand to stop him when he began vocalizing. “Yes, I know you’re not a dog, and maybe since you can change shape you’d be fine eating chocolate even when you’re furry, but I can’t take the chance of you getting sick, especially tonight, when it would be hard to get help. So no people cookies. And I won’t have any either.” At least, not until you go home.

Sam howled.

Someone pounded on her front door.

Meg hesitated, rememories of bad things happening when someone answered a door flashing through her mind. Then, reminding herself that she was safe in the Green Complex, she hurried to the door. It was probably Vlad checking to make sure she and Sam had gotten home all right. Or maybe Henry had come home in the past few minutes and wanted to let her know he was close by.

But when she opened the door, Elliot Wolfgard stepped inside far enough to prevent her from closing the door. The hatred in his eyes froze her—more so when Sam bounded in from the kitchen, trailing the leash because she hadn’t had time to remove the harness.

“Sam,” he said, still looking at Meg. “Come with me.”

Sam whined and looked at her.

“Sam,” Elliot snarled.

“It’s all right,” Meg told the pup. “Simon will be home soon.”

Elliot scooped up Sam. “Once I get him settled, I’ll be back. I have some things to say to you.”

As soon as Elliot went down the stairs, Meg closed the door and hurried to the phone.

“Tess?” she said as soon as the other woman answered the phone.

“Meg? Is something wrong?”

“Elliot Wolfgard was just here. He took Sam back to Simon’s place. Was it all right to let Sam go with him?”

A pause. “In human terms, Elliot is Sam’s grandfather, so there’s no reason why the pup can’t go with him.”

Then why didn’t Simon ask Elliot to watch Sam? “All right. Thanks. Have to go. Someone is at the door.”

“Call me when your visitor leaves.”

She hung up without promising to call and hurried back to the door.

Elliot stepped inside, leaving her to shiver because, once again, he wasn’t far enough inside for her to close the door.

“The enforcer may be willing to protect you, but the rest of the Wolves will never forgive what you’ve done,” he snarled. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re barely useful meat, and I am going to do everything I can to have you running before the pack as prey for what you did to Sam.”

“I haven’t done anything to Sam!”

He slapped her face.

“Enjoy your evening, meat. You won’t live to see many more of them.”

He went down the stairs, leaving her shaking. A few moments later, she heard Simon’s front door slam.

She was going to die in the Courtyard. She’d known that since the first time she’d set eyes on Simon Wolfgard.

She swallowed convulsively, but her mouth kept filling with saliva. She barely made it to the toilet before she threw up.

Vlad flowed over the snow toward the Green Complex, ready to spend a quiet evening at home. Blair was on his way to pick up Simon and the two guards who had gone with him, Nathan Wolfgard and Marie Hawkgard. If the weather forecast was right about Lakeside getting another foot of snow this evening, the drive home would be slow going.

After hearing that report, he had sent Heather home, closed Howling Good Reads, and locked up the social center. Tess had already closed A Little Bite, and Run & Thump, along with the rest of the Courtyard businesses, had closed an hour after that. But a bar across the street from the Courtyard was still doing a brisk business. He had fed sufficiently on two delightful girls who claimed they had missed their bus and were in the bar drinking while they waited for the next one. He was suspicious about their reason for being in the bar, but he had no doubt they’d been drinking, because he was a little drunk from the alcohol in their blood.

If the weather had been milder, he would have let the girls find their own way to the bus stop, since it was within sight of the bar. By itself, the amount of blood he’d taken from each of them wouldn’t do more than make them tired. But the police officer, Lieutenant Montgomery, paid attention to the Courtyard now, and Vlad didn’t think Simon would appreciate questions about two girls falling into a drunken sleep and dying in a snowdrift so close to where the Sanguinati lived—especially when there was no reason for the girls to die. So he flagged down a cab and paid the driver to take the girls back to their residence at the nearby tech college.

He wasn’t sure he liked thinking of humans as something other than useful prey or concerning himself with their welfare once he was done with them, but with humans stirred up about whatever had happened in the western part of Thaisia, being considerate of the prey here was just healthy self-interest.

As he flowed into the Green Complex and headed for his apartment, he became aware of sounds coming from Simon’s apartment. Sam was howling, an unhappy sound. Probably meant that Meg wanted some time to herself or wasn’t interested in taking any kind of walk with the temperature dropping and the snow falling so heavily.

Passing his own door, Vlad shifted into human form and walked over to the stairs leading to Meg’s apartment. Since the cold and snow didn’t bother him, he would offer to take the pup for a walk. That would at least give them all a bit of quiet.

Her front door stood open.

Shifting back to smoke, he flowed up the stairs and into her apartment. No sign of intruders. No sign of struggle. He flowed into the kitchen and found nothing. Nothing in her bedroom.

Shifting back to human form, he hesitated outside the bathroom door.

“Meg?” he called softly. “Meg? Are you in there?”

“I— Yes, I’m here.”

Ignoring how many ways he might upset a human female by entering a bathroom uninvited, he pushed open the door, then rushed over to her. The room smelled of vomit, which he found repulsive, but not of blood. No injuries then, just illness.

“You’re sick?” Should he call Heather to find out what medicine humans used for stomach sickness? Or maybe Elizabeth Bennefeld. Wouldn’t she need to know about the human body for her massage work?

“No,” Meg replied. “I’m . . .” Tears spilled down her face. She shook her head.

“Sam?”

“Home.”

He knew that much. “You done here?”

She nodded. She flushed the toilet once more and closed the lid. When he helped her up, he saw the other side of her face.

“What’s that?”

She shook her head. When he continued to block her way out of the bathroom, she whispered, “Please. Don’t make this harder.”

Make what harder? Vlad thought.

“I’d really like to be alone now,” Meg said.

Not knowing what else to do, he left her apartment, closing the front door behind him. He hesitated at the top of the stairs, then went down and knocked on Simon’s door.

He heard a crash, followed by Elliot’s angry shout. He knocked again, harder. Elliot finally opened the door enough to look out, his body blocking the space.

Vlad smelled blood. “Problem?”

“A family matter,” Elliot replied darkly.

He leaned closer to Elliot. “If Meg ends up with another unexplained bruise or is frightened into sickness again, that, too, will be a family matter. But the family involved won’t be the Wolfgard’s.”

Threat delivered, Vlad went to his own apartment. He would inform Grandfather Erebus tomorrow. That would give Simon time to settle things in his own way.

Flanked by Nathan and Marie, Simon stepped off the train, walked through the station, and out the door that opened onto the parking lot. There had been bands of snow all along the way, but once the train reached Lake Etu, the snow had turned into serious weather. By the time they reached the train station at Lakeside, Simon figured the snow was going to make all but the main roads impassable.

He breathed out a sigh of relief when he saw Blair brushing off the van’s windows—and he felt his muscles tense when he spotted the police car idling in the parking lot.

After handing his carryall to Nathan, who climbed into the back with Marie, Simon took the passenger’s seat in the front of the van. Blair got in on the driver’s side a moment later, turned on the wipers, and put the van in gear.

Simon tipped his head toward the police car. “Is there some trouble I should know about?”

Blair shook his head. “I think that lieutenant who comes sniffing around wanted to know when you returned.”

The tire tracks from the cars that had arrived to pick up passengers were already filling in with fresh snow. Blair pulled out of the parking space and slowly drove toward the lot’s exit.

“You think we’ll get home tonight?” Nathan asked, leaning forward.

For a moment, Blair didn’t answer. Looking at the other Wolf’s face, Simon had the strong impression the Courtyard’s enforcer wasn’t easy about something. Maybe more than one something.

“Tess called while I was waiting for the train to get in,” Blair said. “Apparently, the Liaison expressed the same concern about you being able to get home. The girl at the lake assured her that you would get home tonight.” He paused, then added, “Vlad called too, but not about the weather.”

A plow had come by recently, filling the entrance to the parking lot with a wall of snow. Blair revved the van’s engine and rammed through the snow. The van lost traction for a moment, its tires spinning. Then it muscled through the rest of the white barricade and reached the road.

“Of course,” Blair said dryly, “the girl at the lake didn’t say getting home would be easy.”

No, it wasn’t easy, but most of the streets they needed were plowed to some extent, and the ones that weren’t plowed had snow drifted in unnatural patterns that gave them one passable, if serpentine, lane.

Simon stayed quiet until they reached the Courtyard, letting Blair focus on driving. When they pulled in at the Utilities entrance, the gates were open enough for the van to squeeze through.

“That’s not good security, leaving the gates open,” Nathan growled.

“We’re not going to get them closed until we shift some of that snow,” Blair replied. He wasn’t pleased about that.

“I don’t think a potential intruder will get far,” Simon said. It looked like someone had cleared the part of the Courtyard’s main road that headed for the Green Complex. In the other direction, the road was completely hidden under fresh snow.

He twisted in his seat to look at Nathan and Marie. “Doesn’t look like you’ll get back to your own homes tonight.”

“Julia’s apartment is in the Green Complex. I can stay with her tonight,” Marie said.

“Nathan?”

Before answering, Nathan glanced at Blair. “I guess I’ll bed down in one of the apartments above the Liaison’s Office?”

Blair nodded. “And I’ll come back to the Utilities Complex and bed down there to keep an eye on things. The Crows will take care of the Corvine gate.”

Simon demanded.

Blair replied.

A chill went through Simon as Blair slowly drove toward the Green Complex.

Blair’s lips twitched.

He hesitated.

A dark note in Blair’s voice.

What did that mean? He was tired and frustrated and as worried as the rest of the terra indigene leaders over the unexplained aggression that had ended with so many dead in that western village. They had no answers, didn’t even know where to begin looking for the enemy hiding somewhere in the human villages and cities scattered throughout Thaisia.

He knew the solution most of the Others would take if humans became too much of a threat. He’d make the same choice. But he wanted extermination to be the last choice, not the first.

He hadn’t wanted to come home to trouble. He had hoped Meg and Sam . . .

But Blair said Sam was fine. So why wasn’t Meg fine?

When the van pulled up at the entrance to the Green Complex, Blair reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a set of keys tied to a leather loop that would slip over a human head—or a Wolf’s.

“Take the BOW as far as you can,” he said, handing the keys to Nathan after pointing to the vehicle parked in the visitor’s space. “You might make it all the way. Call Henry when you get to the apartment.”

“Should I be on the lookout for anything in particular?” Nathan asked as he opened the van’s side door.

“Same thing we always look for,” Blair replied. “Intruders.”

“I’ll do a sweep from the Liaison’s Office to the Corvine gate in the morning,” Marie said, hefting her carryall. She followed Nathan out of the van.

Simon watched them trudge through several inches of snow. He wanted to shift, wanted to lash out at his enforcer, wanted to purge the uneasiness growing inside him. “We’re alone. Now tell me.”

“Sam is fine.” Blair looked straight ahead. The only other sound was the rhythmic swish of the wipers. “I’m not easy about how she did it, but I’m sure she meant no harm, and I do like the results.” He turned his head to look at Simon. “She got him out of the cage, and not just a few steps outside the apartment door to pee and poop. They’ve walked around the complex. He’s gone to the office with her. He was with her this afternoon when she made some deliveries before the weather started to turn. Maybe he was ready to wake up, and she did things that were just strange enough to slip past his fear.”

Simon looked away, confused by what he was feeling. Jealousy? Hurt? He’d spent two years trying to find a way to help Sam come back to them, and Meg had found the answer in a few days? He felt like a pair of jaws had closed over his throat, making it hard to breathe.

“How?” he finally asked.

“Something none of us would have considered,” Blair said. “A harness and leash.”

Shock. Fear. Fury. How dare any human try to restrain a Wolf?

“You let her do this?”

“First I knew of it, they were walking around the complex, and I wasn’t going to take on Henry and Vlad in order to discipline her. And after seeing how the pup was playing, I thought it best not to interfere.” Blair paused. “He’s playing again, Simon. He’s eating meat again. He’s acting like a young Wolf again. For the most part. He still hasn’t talked to any of us, but I think that will come if he’s not scared back into that cage.”

“Why would he be?” The pup was playing again? He wouldn’t allow anything to interfere with that.

Blair went back to staring out the window. “Like I said, I’m not easy with how Meg got Sam out of the cage, but Henry and Vlad have been keeping an eye on them and have voiced no objections. Elliot, however, is a problem.”

“Did he hurt Meg?” Simon asked, his voice stripped of emotion. Elliot didn’t know about Meg. If he bit her, cut her . . .

“She’s puking scared. I had the feeling there was something else, but Vlad wasn’t interested in telling me. He did want me to remind you that while the Sanguinati don’t usually hunt other terra indigene, we are not exempt from being prey.”

Simon couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “The Sanguinati are going after Elliot?”

A long pause. Then Blair said quietly, “I guess that depends on whether you can talk Meg into staying.”

“Well, she’s not going anywhere tonight.” Of course, someone who was puking scared might not consider the danger of trying to run when the roads were bad and the air too cold. Especially when that person had already run away once in exactly that kind of weather.

He unbuckled the seat belt. “Anything else that can’t wait until morning?”

Another pause. “Nothing that can’t wait. But if any monkeys dressed all in black try to enter the complex tonight, just kill them.” A longer pause. “It’s something Meg saw. Henry can tell you about it.”

Simon shivered, and it wasn’t because of the cold. Meg had cut herself while he was gone? How many times? What other scraps of information were going to be tossed at him?

“We’re all going to meet tomorrow morning,” he growled. “You, me, Tess, Henry, Vlad, Jester, and anyone else you think needs to be there.”

“I’ll call you in the morning to find out if we’re meeting at the Business Association or the social room here at the complex,” Blair said.

He nodded. Except for Blair, the rest of them lived in the Green Complex. They could meet early and then see about getting the stores and roads open.

Grabbing his carryall, Simon got out of the van and broke a trail to his apartment’s front door. He reached for the door, then stepped back and looked around. Lights shining from the windows of every apartment except Meg’s.

It wasn’t that late, so it shouldn’t have been strange to see all the residences lit up. But it seemed like there were too many lights, too much brightness, making that dark space too noticeable, almost ominous.

Why was Meg sitting in the dark?

His uneasiness became an itch under his human skin, making him anxious to shift to a more natural shape. As Wolf, he had the fangs and strength to deal with itchy problems.

He heard Sam howl—and Elliot’s growl of reply. Opening his front door, he stepped into a tension that had him fighting not to shift and force both Wolves into submission.

Tossing the carryall toward the stairs, he stepped into the living room’s archway, treading snow on the wood floor. Elliot whipped around to face him, teeth bared, the canines too long to pass as human. Sam gave Simon one accusing look, then sat in a corner of his cage, his back to both adults.

Simon said.

No answer. Not even a grumble.

Looking oddly uneasy, Elliot turned his head and snapped at the pup, “Stop this foolishness, and come out of that damn cage! You don’t need to be in there!”

Simon growled. Blood and anger. He could smell both.

“At least take off those snowy boots,” Elliot said snippily. “You’re tracking the wet all over the—”

Simon grabbed Elliot and pushed him against the hallway wall. “I’m not some human you can intimidate. And I’m not a pup anymore. You don’t tell me what to do. No one tells me what to do.”

He lengthened his fangs and waited.

Elliot stared at him for a moment. Then he closed his eyes and raised his head, exposing his throat to his leader.

Simon stepped back, not feeling sufficiently human or Wolf to decide how he should respond. Releasing Elliot, he walked into the kitchen, unlaced his boots, and put them on the mat by the back door.

Elliot fetched a couple of old towels and wiped up the floors. When he returned to the kitchen, Simon studied his sire.

“You stirred things up here,” he finally said. “Why?”

“I’m not the one who—”

“You’ve angered the Sanguinati, and that’s not going to help any of us right now.”

“You don’t know what’s been going on here,” Elliot snapped. “What that monkey-fuck female has done.”

“She’s not a monkey fuck, and she is not prey,” Simon said, his voice a low, threatening rumble. “She is Meg.”

“You don’t know what she’s done!”

“She gets mail and deliveries to the complexes on a regular basis. She has a routine with the deliverymen, so we get the merchandise we bought. And she got Sam out of that damn cage!”

“She put him on a leash, Simon. On a leash!”

“It’s not a leash,” a young, scratchy voice shouted. Or tried to shout. “It’s a safety line. Adventure buddies use a safety line so they can help each other.”

Elliot stared, frozen. Simon turned, barely breathing.

Small naked boy, wobbling on stick-thin legs. His hair was a gold mixed with Wolf gray that was rarer than a pure black or white Wolf. Gray eyes full of angry tears, and yet there was a dominance in that weak body that didn’t match Simon’s but was higher than Elliot’s standing within the Lakeside pack. Or would be when Sam was an adult.

“Sam,” Simon whispered.

Sam ignored him and glared at Elliot. “You made Meg cry, so I’m not sorry I bit you!”

Now Simon closed the distance between them and went down on one knee in front of the boy. “Sam.” Fingers hesitantly touched those skinny, weak-muscled arms. A nose twitched at the odor of an unwashed body. “Hey. Sam.”

Big eyes fixed on him now. He was the leader. He was supposed to make things better, make things right.

Just bite me, he thought. He understood pup. He wasn’t sure what to do with boy.

Simon glanced over his shoulder at his sire, who looked pale and shaken.

Elliot said.

“This safety line for adventure buddies is a new thing you learned from Meg?” Simon asked.

Sam nodded.

“It’s not something other Wolves have heard of. So Elliot thought the safety line was something else, something that might hurt you.”

“Meg wouldn’t hurt me,” Sam protested. “She’s my friend.”

“I know that, Sam. I know.” Another hesitant touch of fingers on the boy’s shoulders. Compared to the human form of the other Wolf pups his age, Sam was small and too thin. But that would change if the boy didn’t disappear again inside the Wolf.

“Is Meg going away?” Sam asked.

Simon shook his head. “No. She’s not going away.”

Elliot cleared his throat. “I will offer an apology tomorrow.”

Sam swayed. His leg muscles trembled with the effort of keeping him upright. But the look he gave Simon, while shy, clearly had a focus.

“Simon?”

“Sam?”

“Can I have a cookie?”

He wasn’t sure there was anything to eat besides Sam’s kibble. He was sure of what he wouldn’t find. “I’m sorry, Sam. We don’t have any cookies.”

“Meg does.” Sam licked his lips. “They smelled really good, but she didn’t know if Wolves could have chocolate, so we didn’t eat any. But I could have one now.”

Oh, chew a tail and spit out the fur. Sure, the boy could have one if the man was willing to knock on Meg’s door and beg for it.

Right now, he would do a lot more than beg in order to get the cookie Sam wanted.

“I’ll go ask her.” He wrinkled his nose and smiled. “Maybe you should take a bath before you have a treat.”

“I can help Sam,” Elliot said quietly.

Simon rose and stepped back. “Then I’ll get the cookie.” And while he was there, he’d find out if Meg was planning to run away.

Thinking about her dark apartment and wondering whether any of the terra indigene would be welcome tonight, he took the spare set of keys for her apartment before going upstairs to the back hall door.

A quick knock. “Meg?” Another knock, louder. “Meg? It’s Simon. Open the door.” When he didn’t get a response, he used the key, breathing a sigh of relief that she hadn’t used the slide lock as well.

She was sitting at the kitchen table in the dark, her arms wrapped around herself.

“I don’t want company,” she said, not looking at him.

“Too bad.” He reached for the ceiling light’s pull string, then considered the brightness and flipped on the light over the sink. Going back to the table, he looked at her face and couldn’t stop the snarl when he saw the bruise. That explained why Vlad was threatening to go after Elliot.

He leaned down, capturing her chin between thumb and forefinger in order to turn her head and get a better look. He leaned closer, breathing in the scent of her. The smell of sickness lingered on her clothes. Not sure what to do, he gave her cheek a gentle lick.

“Snow,” he said, easing back. “Snow will help.”

“What?”

Her eyes looked bruised. Not physically, which somehow made it worse. “Stay there.” He found a kitchen towel, then went down the back stairs to the outside door. Leaning out enough to reach the snow, he packed a ball of it in the towel and brought it to her. “Put this on your face.”

When she obeyed, he picked up the other kitchen chair and set it down so he could face her.

“I didn’t mean to cause trouble,” she whispered. Tears filled her eyes and rolled down her face. “I wasn’t trying to hurt Sam.”

“I know.” Taking her free hand, he petted the soft skin, that delicate, strange skin that was the gateway to prophecy. “Elliot didn’t understand, and he’s sorry he hurt you. I’m sorry he hurt you.”

“He said . . .” She shuddered.

Simon shook his head. “It doesn’t matter what he said. You’re safe here, Meg. You’re safe with us. I’ll make sure of that.”

She lifted the towel away from her face. “The snow is melting.”

He took the towel and dumped it in the sink. Then he turned to look at her. What was he supposed to do with her? What was proper to do with her? He knew how to deal with human females when they were customers in the store. He knew what to do when they wanted the heat of sex and he was in the mood to provide it. And he knew what to do with prey. But he didn’t know what to do with Meg.

“Do you want food?” he asked, studying her back.

She shook her head.

“Tea?”

Another head shake.

He’d come here to get something for Sam, but that didn’t feel right anymore. And yet how could he disappoint the boy?

Returning to the table, he sat in the chair. The bakery tin was right there in front of him, taunting him. Until she had shown up half frozen and changed some of the rules, it had been so much easier dealing with humans.

“Meg?” he asked softly. “Could I take a cookie for Sam?”

She blinked. Brushed away tears. Then she looked at the bakery tin and frowned. “Those are chocolate chip cookies. Can Wolves eat chocolate?”

It hadn’t occurred to him to wonder. “He shifted, Meg. He’s a boy.” He couldn’t meet her eyes, and he heard his own whine of confusion. “He hasn’t shifted to human since his mother was killed. He hasn’t talked to us in any way since the night Daphne died. He’s been afraid to be outside, and he hurt himself a couple of times. That’s why I had to get the cage. But you changed that. He couldn’t have a cookie as a Wolf, so he shifted to a boy. I couldn’t reach him, but you did—with a leash that isn’t a leash and a cookie.”

“You took care of him and you loved him and you kept him safe,” she said. “Even if it didn’t show, he was learning from you.” She sniffed, then got up and rummaged in the cupboard until she found a small container. After placing a few cookies in the container, she gave him the bakery tin. “Do you have any milk to go with the cookies?”

“I don’t know.”

She opened her fridge and gave him an unopened quart.

The quick glance in her fridge didn’t reassure him that she had enough to eat—especially if they were snowed in tomorrow.

Awkward, this sniffing around a female’s personal life. Awkward, this no longer being sure how far he could push her when he hadn’t hesitated to push before he’d left on that trip. Awkward, because somehow she was starting to matter to him the way his own people mattered.

He backed away. “Thank you.”

“Don’t let him eat all the cookies,” she said. “Even as a boy, it would make him sick.”

Nodding, he let himself out and fled back to his own apartment.

Sam was sitting at the kitchen table, explaining about safety lines to Elliot, who was listening as if every word was desperately important. The words dried up as soon as Simon put the bakery tin on the table.

“One,” Simon said firmly. He poured a glass of milk for each of them and opened the tin.

Sam took small bites, savoring the taste while he eyed the bakery tin until Simon put the lid back on, confirming that one meant one.

“The Wolf cookies are good, but these are better,” Sam said.

“Wolf cookies?” Elliot asked.

Sam nodded. “Meg got them special for me.”

Elliot asked Simon.

He shrugged. Something else he needed to find out.

Sam yawned.

“Long day for all of us,” Simon said.

Sam struggled to sit up. “I’m not tired. Meg would let me watch a movie.”

Elliot asked.

Simon replied. “All right. Go pick out a movie.”

Wobbling. Using the walls for support. But still holding on to a shape that had been a recent discovery before fear had frozen Sam into Wolf form.

Simon drained his glass, then finished off Sam’s glass of milk. “Roads to the Wolfgard Complex aren’t passable. You should stay here.”

“All right.” Elliot hesitated. “I’d rather not stay in this form.”

He wanted to shed the human skin too. “We’ll wait until Sam is asleep.”

It didn’t take long. Tucked on the couch, wrapped in a blanket to protect that small, shivering body, Sam was asleep five minutes into the movie. Simon checked the doors, turned off lights, and made sure everything was secure. By the time he returned to the living room, Elliot had already shifted.

Leaving the movie on, Simon stripped off his clothes. Then he shifted and settled beside Elliot on the living room floor. If the floor wasn’t as warm or comfortable as the beds upstairs, the boy sleeping on the couch provided a different, and deeper, contentment.