“Maybe, maybe not,” said Charles. “It’s too early to rule anything out. It doesn’t look like it from where we are standing, but that could change.”

“A Gray Lord might put all the cameras in place and zap them himself, just to watch us run around like half-wits,” muttered Tag. “Some of those guys are really off-kilter.”

Charles took pride in the self-control that allowed him not to respond to the maybe-unintentional irony in that statement. His self-control was aided by the short time it had to stay strong because, from somewhere out of sight, Asil called, “I’ve got another one up here for you techies. Está roto. What is it you said about the last one, Tag? Pretty borked. This one is pretty borked, too.”

“Coming,” Tag called back.

The three of them headed toward Asil. Ducking through some underbrush, they came upon a fresh break in the ground some three feet across, fifteen feet long, and maybe twelve feet down. Probably the crack was due to Jonesy’s earthquakes. Roots were stretched from one side to the other, the damage from the sudden wrenching obvious. One tree leaned precariously, its root ball rising out of the otherwise stable side of the tree.

Next storm or heavy snow, and it would fall, Charles judged. Several hundred years of life now dying a slow death. It was not the oldest fatality this day, nor the only tree to fall. But Charles was tired of death, and the trees were entirely innocent.

Brother Wolf wasn’t tired of death, just tired of the deaths of those who had belonged to them, who were theirs to protect. He would be happy to kill all of the ones responsible for this attack on their territory. Very happy.

Anna slipped her hand under Charles’s tee, just at the small of his back, and let her fingers rest against the skin there. Brother Wolf relaxed. Anna made Brother Wolf happier than killing their enemies would have.

“Not sure it wouldn’t have been smarter to have put Jonesy down when he went funny,” Tag said thoughtfully, looking at the damage. “Lugh’s children are too damn powerful by half to let run around without the sense God gave a goose. But he was Hester’s mate, and she wouldn’t have survived his death any more than he survived hers.” On the last word, he jumped across the broken ground.

Charles waited for Anna to make the jump. She had no trouble with it, and he didn’t expect her to, but some things were ingrained. And he liked to watch her move. She was economical, so much so that it was easy to underestimate just how strong she was. He liked that about her, the way she could pass for human. It made her safer.

As he jumped, part of him was locked onto how well Anna’s jeans showed off her muscular curves, part of him noted that she still had that witchcrafted gun tucked in the waistband of her jeans, but the biggest part of his attention was still stuck on Tag’s rambling dialogue. “Lugh’s children,” he’d said.

There was only one Lugh Tag could have been talking about when referring to a fae. Charles had met a son of Lugh once. In Boston. He’d rather that none of the ancient fae god’s progeny had ever been located within a thousand miles of his home.

He regretted Jonesy’s death, but the chasm, small as it was, gave evidence of how much more Hester’s death could have cost his pack. He thought of what he would do if someone killed his Anna—and part of him, Charles and Brother Wolf both, thought the less of Jonesy for not defying Hester’s wishes and laying waste to the world for her sake.

“Finally, children. I had despaired of you reaching me in this century.” Asil’s voice came from somewhere in the mass of evergreen branches directly over their heads. “Your slowness has not been without benefit, however. It allowed me leisure to locate three more devices of some sort in a direct line from this one in this tree. Our enemies were very industrious.”

• • •

OVER THE COURSE of the next few hours, if they didn’t find all of the electronics the invaders had left, they probably found everything within a mile of Hester’s house. Charles was, at least, absolutely certain that the pack left nothing any human-based investigators would be able to find.

“You seem to be awfully worried about human authorities,” commented Asil, dusting off the dirt and debris that an afternoon of tree-climbing had left on him. “Do you think this might be the US government who dropped in to visit?”

Sage, who was seldom to be found too far from Asil if he was present, looked at Charles, echoing Asil’s question without speaking a word.

“I don’t,” Charles said. “At least not directly. As far as I can tell, the government is as happy with werewolves as they have ever been. But a government is made of individuals, and there are plenty of those who are afraid of us, of the fae, and all the other things they know are out there in the night.”

“Can’t blame them,” said Sage softly. “They call us monsters for a reason—and werewolves are just the tip of the iceberg. I could tell you some stories …”

Sage had her own nightmares suffered at werewolf hands. That his da had found out about her and rescued her as soon as he heard didn’t mean that she loved being a werewolf any more than most of those who’d been changed against their wishes.

Anna—who, as far as Charles could see, seemed to have embraced her wolf without bitterness—gave Sage a sharp look. “Hating all werewolves or fae makes as much sense as hating all humans,” she said mildly.

Asil smiled at her, a smile both patronizing and affectionate. “Ah,” he told her. “But you are a child of your generation. Raised by people who grew up in the 1960s and taught that people are not to ‘be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.’ That profiling by race, religion—or species—is anathema, no matter how useful.”

If Asil had realized his expression was also wistful, doubtless the old Moor would have found a different smile for Anna.

“Werewolves are a bit more frightening than a black man in an all-white restaurant,” said Sage.

Anna pursed her lip. Her father was a high-profile liberal lawyer who’d started his practice defending protestors, which gave her a certain perspective on the subject.

“Not to someone raised in ignorance,” she said. “The unknown is a lot more scary than something you understand, no matter how bad that is.”

“It isn’t the ignorant,” said Asil softly, “who fear our kind. And their fear is not baseless. What do you think would happen if Bran chose to take over the government?”

Sage started to speak, then her face went blank except for the narrowing of her eyes.

Asil nodded toward her. “Yes, you see it, don’t you? We hear all the time that the fae couldn’t do it—they are too few for all of their power. Human weapons have advanced unimaginably far since my birth. Eventually, in any match of strength to strength, they would win an outright battle with any of us on the supernaturally endowed spectrum. The vampires … I think the vampires believe that they are in control. That spider in Europe could no more resist allowing the government to run without unwitting slaves in key positions than he could resist … poking his fingers into the Nazi pie in the middle of the last century. But if Bran wanted it?”

Anna, her eyes bright, was still mouthing “supernaturally endowed spectrum” at Charles, when Sage murmured, “Bran is more subtle than the vampires. Even Bonarata. Bran is … like everyone’s favorite big brother. He’s charming. He looks so harmless until he doesn’t. And you know that he really does care.”

“My da,” said Charles dryly, “Dictator at Large.”

“Well, yes,” said Anna, recovering from her amusement. “Of course, he could make a fine stab at it. But since he really doesn’t care about anyone who doesn’t turn furry in the full moon, I’d rather he leave the government to the humans.”

“And so would Da,” agreed Charles.

“But if he wanted to …” said Sage, her voice soft.

“No,” said Charles firmly. “It wouldn’t be as easy as Asil makes it sound.”

“I’d help,” said Asil.

But the seriousness had gone out of the moment. Anna made a pithy sound.