Hunting Ground

Charles made himself let A

“You’re the first ones back,” he told A

She gave him an odd look. “Brother Wolf told me you needed me here.”

He had no idea what to say to that. Should he admit that he had no idea what Brother Wolf had been up to? Would that worry her? Before he had to make a decision, Dana broke free of the group around Arthur and approached Charles.

“There is some concern for Arthur’s sanity,” she murmured softly as soon as she was close.

And there were no other wolves here who would stand a chance of controlling Arthur if he lost it, she meant. They needed him to be on watch.

“I’m coming,” Charles said.

“I’ll come over, too,” A

He didn’t want her anywhere near the other wolves. There were too many of them. If they all attacked her, there was no way for him to protect her.

But an Omega wolf could be useful.

“Thank you,” he told A

Arthur was sitting on the ground, cradling his mate in his arms and whispering to her while the others held a wary vigil. His face was streaked with tears and his nose ran. “Su

He looked up, and his eyes focused on Charles. “She is gone.”

“Yes,” Charles said.

“Vampires did this,” he whispered. Then he roared, his voice echoing in the tall room. “They hurt her!”

“I know. I will find them.”

“Kill them.” Arthur’s face was ravaged, almost unrecognizable in his grief and rage. In his pain.

“I will.”

Arthur tightened his hold on his wife, tucking her head against his shoulder. “She hated growing old,” he said, rocking her. “Now she won’t have to. My poor Su

Angus said to Charles, though he made no effort to quiet his voice, “He’ll survive. If the madness was going to take him, it would have already done so. That being so, it might be a good thing to remove our fallen and wounded from the hunting grounds altogether.” He looked at Arthur a moment. “Arthur, would you let us take you home? The others will be here soon, fresh from the hunt.” A dead body smelling of fear and pain was not, probably, going to send any of these wolves into a frenzy. But there was no use in taking the chance.

“Yes.” Arthur stood up, his wife cradled in his arms. Charles thought that Angus might be a little too quick to pronounce Arthur well. He swayed a little and looked shocky-still, it would be better to get him away from the hunt.

But he couldn’t go alone. He hadn’t brought any of his pack-a statement of strength and, maybe, trust. But that left him alone in a foreign county with his dead wife.

Angus met Charles’s eyes briefly, maybe he saw the panic in them-Charles wasn’t up to comforting Arthur tonight. Offering comfort wasn’t something he was very good at on his best day.

The Emerald City Alpha looked over his shoulder at one of his wolves. “Send someone to find Alan Choo. Bring me Tom.” He glanced at Charles, not long enough to be a challenge, just enough to indicate he was talking to him when he said, “Alan’s cousins own a funeral parlor. His family takes care of our dead, they know what we are, and they can help Arthur now. And if Tom and his witch can fight off a pack of vampires-they should be able to keep Arthur on track.”

“You wanted me, Angus? I was just outside.” Tom’s usually easy glide was a little stiff-the only thing that showed he wasn’t fully recovered from his fight. His calm gaze took in the distraught werewolf and Su

“Yes. Gather a couple of more pack members, your witch, and Alan-he’ll be here in a moment-and see if you can settle Arthur in for the night at his house.”

Charles pulled out his wallet and extracted one of Arthur’s cards-he had two, one from his father and one from Arthur. “This is where he’s living in Seattle. Someone should take his wife’s car back to his house as well. It’s the blue Jaguar parked just inside the gate-I don’t know what he drove here.”

“I do.” Tom took the card. “I’ll see to it.” And within a few minutes he’d extracted Arthur, the body, and a handful of Angus’s wolves as skillfully as a surgeon.

And the first victor of the hunt came into the room just as the door closed behind Tom. Charles looked around for his A

Better that she talk with them than with him at this moment. He wanted to take her away, fly her home, where the vampires and whoever was behind them would never be able to come. Lock her in his house and bar the door.

Yes, it was better that he not talk to her just yet.

THE wolf who came in was carrying their bag. A

“Yes, Valentin, dear,” said Isaac. “I see that you got it. Congratulations.” Under the biting sarcasm, A

The smell of rotten pork was a little overwhelming.

The wolf gri

“So the talks are doomed,” A

Isaac shrugged. “Anything is possible-except defying Chastel outright. I expect everyone will go home without accepting anything the Marrok has offered.” He smiled at her, though there was darkness under the expression. “Then they’ll call him and make quiet deals. Nothing as good as what we could accomplish openly-but maybe, just maybe, enough for our survival.”

“Why doesn’t anyone go after Chastel?”

“Because he’s as good as he claims. The fields of Europe are graves for a good many of our dead who have tried to kill the Beast. Maybe the Marrok could take him on-but in Chastel’s own territory, I would not bet on the Marrok. Here?” He shrugged. “But the Marrok is not here, and I do not think that Charles is his match.”

“He made Chastel back down,” she said, “twice.”

“When Chastel hunts, you don’t get a chance to face him down.” Isaac’s face was grim. “That’s not how he takes his prey unless they are children or human women.” He looked at her. “In the first hundred years he lived, he killed three hundred humans that we know of, probably more. Many, many he took in broad daylight in front of their friends and families. They shot him, hit him, and nothing happened.

“Late in the eighteenth century, Chastel concentrated his killing in Gévaudan, France. It was so bad there that the peasants-those who worked the land-would no longer go out into their fields. Frightened, the nobles organized hunting parties, hired wolf-hunters, and killed every wolf in the region-and many werewolves, too. The king of France was bestirring himself, then history tells us a man named Jean Chastel, whose wife had just been killed by the beast, took a silver musket ball made from a melted heirloom cross. He had it blessed three times by the village priest and went out with a small party to hunt the animal down. A great Beast appeared before them, and Chastel shot it once and killed it-and so died the Beast of Gévaudan.”

“What really happened to stop him?”

“The Marrok happened,” said Ric.

“He wasn’t the Marrok yet,” Isaac corrected. “The story I think is most likely is that Bran Cornick hunted the Beast down and told him unless he put an end to things, he would see that Chastel ended up in the hands of the witches.” He smiled a little. “The witches were more powerful in those days-and would have liked nothing better than a werewolf to torture for blood, meat, and fur for their spells. Chastel was a hundred years old-and Bran was… Bran. It was a very good threat, then. Now Chastel is stronger than he was then, smarter, too-and he hates Bran like any dominant hates the one who humiliates him.”