“She is mine.”
The simple words were enough for Cross. And for Pere, who smiled from his place at their father’s right.
“The violence by the humans against Others continues to escalate. We have tried diplomacy. Molly Ryan has delivered an articulate message about our limits being reached.” Simon shrugged.
Lark was shot twice when they’d sent the Magister from the human realm. But Simon had killed the shooter. It had been enough to hold back on a declaration of war by Lycia. But this was different.
“When you were here with Lark before, we called a council of war. You have all the beasts of Lycia at your beck and call.” Pere spoke this time. Cross was the elder, but it was Pere who really ran things. “Simon, you are my voice on that side of the Veil. Faine, we wish to meet your Helena when you are able to bring her.”
“What is she to you? Will you take her in marriage?” His father asked this with hooded eyes.
“She is . . . she is everything. My key.”
He nodded. “As you know, I had love before I bonded with Tila. I cared for Simon’s mother with everything I am. But the difference now? What I have with my Ne’est and anyone who came before is immense. I am glad that you cleave to this witch. I know how much our little bird cares for and respects her sister. We will welcome her to our Pack when she is ready to come here to perform the binding.”
“I’m working on it.”
“Your mother says you’ve never failed to convince a female to give you what you wanted. I doubt you will this time either.”
Simon snorted. “The Jaansen sisters are a world apart. But Helena is worthy.”
Faine was proud to have the words from his brother.
They thanked their father and brother and headed back, both males loath to leave their protected alone for too long in a world full of people who wished for nothing less than their annihilation.
Chapter 13
TOSH felt it was his turn to face some danger. He looked to his left at Delilah, who was his escort to this Council of Others meeting.
He hadn’t been surprised that Helena had recommended the Others cease their PR travel. After all, how much could they be expected to endure? How many more of their people had to die just to be heard?
But he knew it was more than a simple cease of travel. The bomb at the capitol building, the second such incident in less than a month, had only underlined the tenuous nature of the situation. And then the attack and subsequent destruction of Simon and Lark’s home and the evidence of an armed male with silver ammunition on a trail on Simon’s land.
Spiraling out of control and heading to war. Which is why he needed to address the Council to try his best to alleviate the mounting tensions that he worried would explode into a war neither side would really win. And it would definitely end with far too much damage to recover from.
Encroaching on a werewolf’s land the way those who’d bombed Simon Leviathan’s house had done had broken so many rules Toshio knew it would be an uphill battle to get the Others to ease back. More than that, Simon’s woman and Helena—Faine’s woman, Tosh suspected—had been there. The mate of a shifter being endangered would push both males into hyper-protective mode.
He knew Simon and Faine were more than normal werewolves. Werewolves were large, but the Leviathan brothers were beyond large, they were massive. The werewolves treated them with respect and a bit of awe, but it was clear they were apart somehow.
“Simon and Faine aren’t werewolves, so what are they?” Tosh asked Delilah, who accompanied him on the trip.
“It’s not safe for anyone to know more than they already do. Not for any of us. And this is a public place.”
Her words were severe and she must have noted that because she relaxed and took his hand, squeezing it and then, as if she were surprised by her action, letting go quickly.
“After this, will you have a drink with me?” He blurted it before he changed his mind.
Clearly surprised—again—Delilah started, and then she smiled. “A drink drink? Like you like me as a female? Or a collegial drink?”
He got caught up in the shape of her mouth as she smiled. “Huh?”
She rolled her eyes. “Are you asking because you’re interested in me romantically or is this just a drink like you’d have with anyone else who served in the senate?”
He blushed, he knew it. “I don’t feel the same way about Senator Harley that I do about you. I’ve been meaning to ask you to dinner for some time, but things have been . . . crazy. I realized if I didn’t move now I might lose my chance.”
“It’s about time, Toshio. I was beginning to wonder, you know, if I was imagining things between us.”
“Not imagining it. So yes to the drink?”
“You can buy me a drink and dinner when all this is finished.”
“I’ll even spring for chocolate cake.” He knew she had a fondness for it.
She leaned in and her scent wrapped around him, holding on tight. “I might just let you kiss me.”
He laughed, taking her hand and kissing her knuckles before turning all business again. “Two slices then. So I think with the Council, you should take the lead. Your voice is important. They’ve heard mine.”
“Just take my cues. Molly will be there, along with Helena, so there will be friendly faces. But this isn’t human communication any more. There are things shifters do . . . I’ll need to show my obeisance to my Alpha. I’m here to address them not only as an elected official, but as a wolf as well.”
He nodded. “I understand. We’re on your turf. I’ll defer to your expertise.”
She laughed. “Well, one step at a time. The Vampires were our biggest worry. But now that there’ve been two bombs in less than twenty four hours, both attacking Others, one in the den of a very powerful male? It’s going to be very bad. The wolves and cats are going to follow the lead of Simon, who’s older than everyone else and far better trained.”
She was giving him information, what she could anyway, about Simon and Faine. That trust was important to him.
“If we lose the wolves and cats as well as the Vampires, I’m not sure we can stop a declaration of war by the COO. There’s only so much we’re going to take and we’re going into scary territory.”
“I know, believe me, I know. I’m hoping you can sway them.”
“I’m not sure I should, to be totally honest with you. We’ve been turning the other cheek and we’re bleeding. Our children are being killed. We’re not safe in our homes. Talk isn’t protecting us anymore. It is not our nature to allow harm to our people to go unchallenged. Cade has been holding things together but he’s out of patience.”
Tosh knew he had a seemingly insurmountable task ahead of him. The Others he’d met and knew were good people. They deserved to be safe in their own damned country. “I understand. But if we can get them to hold back until I can convince the president to issue an executive order to declare all Others to have the same citizenship they had before, things might calm down.”
“Maybe. But again, that’s words. I don’t know if words are enough.”
She shrugged and he hoped they were enough to get them through before even more people got killed.
THEY’D been taken to an outbuilding on Cascadia land. They’d been sniffed and searched and one of Helena’s witches was there to examine them as well.
“They’re making sure we haven’t been spelled on any level.” Delilah had softened in some ways. Tosh wasn’t sure if it was him or the fact that she now had dual loyalties. But in other ways, her humanness had muted and that Otherness she had moved to the forefront.