Jynx whistled. “Fun.”
Andre grinned, nodded, and passed the book to Owen. The werebison flipped through it.
“I don’t see my rhino.”
His rhino.
“Look under Elasmotherium,” Kate told him.
“Look under things that kicked my ass,” Troy muttered.
Owen ignored him and flipped the pages. “It says that they were native to Eurasia. Also, mine was a lot larger.”
“We only have a fossil record and it’s not exactly complete,” Troy said. “We can’t say that there wasn’t a rhino of this size in North America. We can only say that we haven’t found any bones that would indicate the presence of such species.”
“So the shapeshifters are one species of human,” Hakeem said. “The hunters are another?”
“Possibly,” Troy said.
“And they fell asleep during the Ice Age and just now woke up? Why now? Why not when the Shift happened?”
“We don’t know,” Troy told him. “Maybe we will find out when we get to their home base.”
I’d been thinking about that home base. I had no idea what it would look like. We didn’t know how many fighters we would find there. We didn’t know who was in charge and how powerful that person would be. I didn’t like not knowing things.
“The two Smilodons came for us first,” Keelan said. “The rest followed their lead.”
“Hierarchy,” I said. Most shapeshifters were born and died in one.
He nodded.
“If there is hierarchy, there is an alpha,” Andre said.
“Kill the alpha and you take the pack,” Da-Eun cracked her knuckles.
“Or break it,” Troy said.
“Either way works,” Keelan growled. He was giving the wolf more leash today.
They’d settled too comfortably into our pack vs their pack. There was more to this problem than simply biting everyone’s heads off. It was time to point them in the right direction.
“Both the shapeshifters and the hunters are wearing collars,” I said. “The priest-mages are not.”
Everyone fell silent.
“We don’t know what the collars mean,” Kate said. “We do know that they can’t be taken off until the wearer dies.”
Da-Eun’s lip wrinkled in a precursor of a snarl. The humor vanished from Andre’s face. Jynx bared her teeth.
“Is that why you didn’t kill the hunters, Consort?” Keelan asked.
He knew perfectly well it was. He was throwing her a softball question to keep the rest of the pack in the loop.
“Yes,” Kate said. “If Conlan is right, these people have been plucked out of their time and thrust into ours. They may not even understand what’s going on.”
“When a unit from the Pack loses an alpha, what happens?” I asked.
“Betas step up and become alphas,” Da-Eun said.
“When Kate killed the two priest-mages, nobody stepped up,” I said. “Given a choice to fight or flee, they fled. It didn’t even occur to them that one of them should take charge.”
“So what does that mean?” Jynx asked.
“Do everything you must to defend yourself and our Pack,” I said. “If they give you no choice, respond with force. But if you see an opportunity to show mercy to someone with a collar, take it. Don’t hesitate.”
I let it sink in. Our kind had been used as little more than guard dogs before. Every Pack shapeshifter knew about it. We wouldn’t allow ourselves to be used again.
“When the third mage-priest came to deliver their ‘proposal’ to split Penderton in half, I tried to communicate.”
Kate took another sip of her tea. She looked ready to fall over. Taking the territory away from the power in the forest must’ve been harder than she let on.
“The priest-mage didn’t speak until the very end. When it became clear that I wasn’t intimidated and my ward protected me from their rocks, someone, some great power, conjured up that dark smoke and attacked the priest-mage with it. That’s when they spoke.”
“What did they say?” Hakeem asked.
“I couldn’t understand the words, but I recognized the tone. They were begging for their life. The priest-mages are valuable. In a fight, they are powerful opponents, skilled in magic and probably trained over a long period of time. And yet, the person in charge killed that priest-mage like they were nothing, on an off chance that I might get infected with the spores. Those are the actions of someone who habitually murders their own people. Someone who’d tortured that rhino. Someone without empathy or compassion.”
“That’s our target,” I said.
The pack fell silent.
“Hypothetically,” Keelan asked. “How powerful could that person be?”
“You’ve seen what I can do,” Kate told him.
Another silence.
“We don’t know what we will find in the woods,” I said. “I won’t lie to you. It will be an ugly fight. Eat and rest. Make the best of it because we will be fighting for our lives tomorrow.”
Kate laid down on her blanket, on her back, and closed her eyes. Good. She probably needed a nap. I laid next to her. Naps were always nice.
“Company,” Keelan called.
Damn it. I sat back up.
Penderton’s town council, with Mayor Gene and Ned in the lead, came out of the city gates and was making a beeline for us. Gene looked upset. Ned looked like he was spoiling for a fight. The rest of the council seemed alternatively anxious, freaked out, and alarmed. Well, at least nobody was carrying any torches or pitchforks.
I was too tired for this crap. Oy. I stood up. Kate started to get up. I laid a hand on her arm. I had this. She nodded and laid back down, half raised on her elbows.
The shapeshifters rose and moved. The pack reoriented itself. I was now in the front, with Keelan directly behind me, and the rest of our people arranged in a ragged crescent on both sides of him.
The town council arrived. For a few moments nobody said anything.
“Hello, everyone,” Ned said.
“Howdy,” I said.
Kate raised an eyebrow. She must’ve recognized my tone.
“I’m told that what you did, on the roof, was a claiming,” Mayor Gene finally said to Kate. “Have I got that right?”
“You understand correctly,” I answered. “My wife is tired. Address all your questions to me.”
Kate laid back down and closed her eyes. Rest. I’ve got this.
“What does the claiming mean, exactly?” he asked.
“It means she saturated an area in and around Penderton with her magic.”
“Why?” Ruth asked.
“Because it helps her protect it.”
Simple explanations were best. No need to disclose that she could drain all of them of their magic, murdering everything within Penderton in a matter of minutes.
An uncomfortable silence fell.
“You invited us here to deal with the threat in the forest,” I said. “We’re dealing with it.”
“Two people died today,” another man said.
“Regrettable, but two is much fewer than you would’ve lost if we weren’t here,” I said. It sounded harsh, but it was the truth and they needed to hear it.
Another tense silence.
“You said ‘claim,’” a man in fatigue overalls asked. “So, what, she owns the town?”
“No. I’m only protecting it,” Kate said, still lying back with her eyes closed.
“And we’re supposed to just trust you?” an older woman asked.
“Yes,” I told her.
“Why?” the woman pressed.
“What choice do you have? Really?” I asked her.