Silver Borne (Mercy Thompson #5)(37)

"His grandmother? She was older, but not that old. Phin is . . ." It had been difficult to pin his age, I remembered. But he had been an adult - at least in his thirties, possibly as old as a well-preserved fifty. "Anyway, this woman was maybe early sixties, no older than that."

Tad cleared his throat. "If she's fae, Mercy, it doesn't matter how old she looks."

"Phin doesn't have much fae in his background," I said. I was certain of that. "This woman was big-time old-school Gray Lord kind of fae."

Tad laughed. "The woman he calls his grandmother is probably more like his great, great, great . . . Add a lot more 'great's to the end of it. He told me that one time, when he was a kid, she drove off a bunch of fae who were unhappy that he was so human . . . or maybe that he, a human, had a touch of fae blood at all. After that, she'd drop in now and then until she started to keep up with him just by cell phone."

"So she's a good guy? You think I should talk to her? Tell her about the book and ask her where Phin is?"

"I don't know if this piece has any good guys or villains, Mercy," he said. "And I certainly don't know if the fae you saw was Phin's grandmother or a Gray Lord. And if it was . . . there's no surety that she's safe to deal with. Fae are not human, Mercy. Some of them could eat their own children without anger or regret. Power motivates them more than love - if they can love. Some of them are so alone . . . You have no idea. I'll call Dad, then get back to you."

He hung up.

"Well," I asked Sam, "excitement enough for one day? Do you want to go home?"

He looked up at me, and I saw that he was tired, too. More tired than a day mostly running around in a car could account for. Sad, I thought suddenly.

"Don't worry," I told him, bending down until my forehead was on the back of his neck. "Don't worry, we'll find some answers for you, too."

He sighed and wiggled until his muzzle was on my lap. I drove home that way.
* * *

I MADE MEAT LOAF - SAMUEL'S RECIPE, WHICH INCLUDED plenty of jalapenos and several other peppers. Day-old and out of the refrigerator, it could burn the skin off the roof of your mouth if you weren't careful.

My phone rang, and I looked at the number. I set the timer on the oven, and it was still ringing.

"Bran," I answered.

"You're playing with fire," he said. He sounded tired.

"How did you know I'm making Samuel's meat loaf?"

"Mercedes."

"You're supposed to give us some time," I told him. My stomach roiled. I needed more time to prove Sam's ability to keep the peace.

"I love my son," Bran said, "but I love you, too."

I heard everything that he didn't say. He'd chosen his son over me before - that was how he saw it. That was how I might have seen it at the time, too.

"He's not going to hurt me," I said, looking into Sam's white eyes. He stiffened, and I remembered to drop my gaze - though he hadn't been making me do that after last night. Usually, once the wolf knows you've acknowledged he's the boss, those kinds of things only crop up when the more dominant wolf is upset.

"You don't know that."

"I do, actually," I replied. "I had a gunman break into the garage and point a gun at him, and he didn't attack because I asked him not to - and because someone, a child, might have gotten hurt in the cross fire."

There was a very long pause.

"I need you to be very clear on what is wrong," he said.

But I interrupted him. "No, you don't. If I tell you that Samuel's wolf is in charge, you will have to kill him."

He didn't say anything.

"Maybe if he weren't your son, you could afford to be more lenient. Or if you hadn't used your position as Marrok to force wolves who would rather have stayed hidden out into the open. But that lost you a lot of moral support that you haven't recovered yet. If you loosen those rules even a little . . . well, you probably won't lose your position - but there might be a lot of dead bodies on the ground. Maybe more than can be explained away to the humans." I'd been doing a lot of thinking about this.

I let that hang in the air for a little while. We needed that week to justify Sam's reprieve to the other wolves.

"Stay by the phone," he said, and hung up.

Sam looked at me and sighed, then flattened out on the floor on his side like a big fur rug.

When the phone rang next, it was Charles, Samuel's brother and Bran's enforcer. "Mercy?"

"Right here," I answered.

"Tell me about Samuel."

"Is it safe?"

"I won't know until you tell me, will I?"

Was he trying to be funny? With Charles, I could never tell. Of all the Marrok's wolves, his younger son was the most intimidating - at least to me.

"I meant for Samuel," I said.

"I'm under orders," he said, with a cool smile in his voice, "to keep the contents of our conversation to myself."

"All right." I cleared my throat and took Charles through my discovery that Samuel had tried to commit suicide all the way through Kelly Heart trying to apprehend Adam.

"He played with the children?" Charles asked.