Shifting Shadows: Stories from the World of Mercy Thompson(98)
Asil frowned. Surely it should be the wolves who attacked Kara who would pay. “Explain that,” he said. Then, because he remembered that he wasn’t Alpha anymore, “Please. I don’t pay attention to politics anymore,” he told Bran, half-apologetically. “That’s your job.”
“Yeah,” Bran said. “Well, my job sucks.” He knelt and slid his hand along Kara’s jaw. Helplessly, her tail wagged her body—her wolf delighted by his attention. “You are mine, darling. I’ll keep you safe.”
Bran’s idea of safe, which paralleled Asil’s own, sometimes meant dead. Asil quit breathing for a moment.
Asil thought back over what he and Bran had done to imperil Kara. The last interaction had been in Bran’s study. He glanced at the door where the miscreant wolves had gone, preceding them into the pole barn. Eric of the “we attack children” pack had been waiting just outside that study door when Asil and Bran had spoken of how long Kara had been a wolf. She’d been a wolf for three years and had yet to be in control of her change.
That werewolves have one year to prove themselves or they have to be killed was a hard and necessary law. It required people to kill their loved ones to preserve the rest of the wolves. They were willing to do so only because that law applied to all of them. If Bran made an exception for Kara, it would spell decades of resentment and rebellion. If he did not make an exception for Kara, then Asil and Bran would have that battle that Asil came here for.
It was oddly stupid of them to hunt Kara so loudly where there were wolves to hear. It was odd that they had done so little damage to her. What if it had not been stupidity—or rather, it had been stupidity on a much grander scale? What if someone had wanted this meeting, wanted to push the issue of Kara out into the open?
Asil’s eyes met Bran’s—letting Bran know that Asil understood the issue, and that he would not allow Kara to be harmed without a protest. If Bran upheld the law, the battle that Asil had been seeking almost sixteen years ago when he’d first come here would take place.
“Whom do they belong to?” Asil asked.
“Hatchard Cole. A wolf who wants to expand his territory to include all of Alaska. He’d gladly take care of Liam Oldham and Ibrahim Ward—all he needs is my endorsement. If I don’t give it, he might just present me with a fait accompli.”
“Ah,” said Asil. “Is he here?” And is he still alive after a blackmail attempt like that?
“No,” Bran said sourly. “He gave the orders and left his wolves to spin in the wind when it didn’t work. When I called to inform him of the trespass after you called me, he commented about privileged wolves who do not follow the rules. I’m sure he’ll get some unsuspecting wolf all hot and bothered about it—someone who had to put a brother, mother, sister to rest when they couldn’t control themselves within the allotted time.”
“He wants your position,” Asil said. “Hatchard Cole.” He took a deep breath and thought about the werewolves he knew who were powerful enough to think they could take on Bran. “Was he perhaps once Conrad Hatch? I met him about three hundred years ago, give or take a few decades. Decent man, I thought then.”
Bran nodded. “That’s him. He hasn’t left Alaska since the 1880s. I’ve let him be, and until now he has given me no reason to complain.”
“Dominant wolves who do not live under your thumb forget why they swore obedience to you,” Asil said. “They become arrogant. And most of them do not like that you have brought us out into the eye of the public. They are stuck in old habits, and change frightens them.”
Bran smiled—a flash, then gone. “They?”
“I’m beyond that,” Asil said aloofly. “Now I’m just bored. He thinks that being Marrok is like being Alpha. If he can just knock you off your pedestal, make you look weak, it will reduce your support. Weaken your magic.” He snorted. “Idiot.”
Kara gave him an anxious whine.
“It will be okay,” he told her, his voice confident. Bran would hear the lie, but she wouldn’t—and that was all he cared about. To Bran he said, “I will stand with her.”
“Then go find Charles—he’ll be in the center of the floor with the three Alaskan wolves. I will come in when everyone is here.”
Kara beside him, Asil pushed his way through a group of people talking just outside the doorway. One of them turned to snarl, saw who it was, and shut up with gratifying suddenness.
The interior of the pole barn was set up with hay bales set around three sides in a horseshoe shape for seating, leaving the center as a stage. Bran hadn’t called the whole pack, but a casual glance told Asil that all of the wolves Asil would have considered stable—excepting himself—were there. The Marrok’s pack had more than its fair share of unstable wolves. Sage was seated near the far wall, but she caught his eyes and raised her eyebrows in a “do you know what’s going on?” He gravely nodded to her, though he could not conceive that his knowing anything helped her in the slightest. The three men he’d captured were on their knees in the center of the room, with Charles standing beside them.
He could hear the whispers of speculation; apparently Bran had not told anyone what he was doing. As Asil and Kara passed through the invisible ring imposed by Charles’s impassive regard, they became the subject of attention so thick Asil could taste it. When their audience noticed the blood on Kara’s side and digested what that meant in conjunction with the strangers on their knees in disgrace, Asil felt the pack bonds flash with the eager anger of the collected pack. Kara belonged to them, too.