Silence. Then O’Sullivan said, “Kick a pebble, start a landslide.”
Burke nodded and addressed the explanation to Chen and Alvarez. “For the terra indigene, the attacks by the Humans First and Last movement were somewhat understandable—two opposing packs fighting for territory, winner take all, and everything that lives within that territory has to adjust to the rules laid down by the victors. But the disruptions and conflicts within a human pack that could be created by someone like Cyrus Montgomery weren’t something that had been seen by the Others in the wild country—especially the Elders. Maybe there was concern that that kind of behavior could be absorbed by shifters who had too much contact with us. Sort of a psychological kind of rabies. Or maybe the Elders needed to study the effect one disruptive personality could have on a small community of humans before they allowed us to resettle places under their control. I doubt we’ll ever know for sure.”
“Captain Burke and I talked with Henry Beargard earlier this morning,” O’Sullivan said. “We had the impression that the Elders took some responsibility for what happened because they didn’t heed Simon Wolfgard’s warnings about Cyrus being a danger to the Courtyard’s residents. We also had the impression that seeing the police and Wolves working together to find Ms. Corbyn had shown the terra indigene who had little interaction with us that humans could fit in with other creatures.” He paused. “Governor Hannigan received a message last night. He doesn’t know how it was delivered or who, specifically, it was from, but the gist of the message was that police, firemen, and medical personnel can do their jobs after dark without fear of attack by the terra indigene, and that those who clearly belong to those professions won’t be harmed if they enter the wild country to search for a missing human.”
“That’s a big concession,” Alvarez said.
“With some luck and more work on our part to continue to build trust, some phone lines between regions may be restored as well,” Burke said.
“The mayor’s office will do what it can to help build that trust,” Chen said.
Alvarez shifted in his chair. “What about the blood prophets? Is the governor going to replace the doctors who were killed by people trying to find those girls?”
O’Sullivan shook his head. “The task force has been disbanded. There are less obvious ways for caretakers to share information about the girls, and letting those girls remain hidden is safer for all of us.”
Chen looked at Alvarez, then at Burke. “What is being done about Sandee Montgomery and young Clarence Montgomery? Were their crimes against the Courtyard premeditated?”
Burke shook his head. “Cyrus had given Clarence twenty dollars to cause trouble and draw attention away from the Liaison’s Office at the time he had planned to abduct Meg Corbyn. The boy did it as much for the pleasure of causing trouble as for the money, but he didn’t know what his father intended—or that Cyrus had no intention of coming back for him.”
“The boy can’t be charged as an adult,” Alvarez said. “And given the nature of his crimes and the fact that they took place on property belonging to the Courtyard, human law is rather flexible. There is a ‘tough love’ school tucked away in the Addirondak Mountains. It’s connected to a village that discourages visitors and is, in fact, so deep in the wild country, there aren’t many people outside of law enforcement who even know it exists.”
Burke wondered if the village was an Intuit community. Something to ask Steve Ferryman the next time they talked.
“I’m going to recommend that Clarence be sent there,” Alvarez continued.
“It’s a good solution,” Burke said. “He’ll receive care and a chance at an education, and maybe he’ll turn away from the path his father had encouraged. One thing is certain: he won’t survive if he stays in Lakeside.”
“What about Sandee Montgomery?” Chen asked. “She was arrested for drugs, but she was on property that we’ve already established is not bound by our laws.”
“Prison is a rough place, but it’s about the only place right now where she would have enough time to make some choices,” Burke replied. “She was told the skin cream would repel the Sanguinati, which it does since it was laced with heavy-duty household cleaners. But Sandee was the actual target, not the Sanguinati. She’d gotten in a dispute with a couple of other prostitutes who were freelancing in the downtown area. The women’s male friends came up with the idea of the cream as a way to disfigure Sandee enough that she would no longer be competition.”
“And the men who made this skin cream?” Chen asked after a moment.
Burke wondered if Chen and Alvarez appreciated the danger of even asking the question.
“Before we could bring them in for questioning, the three men died under suspicious circumstances,” Alvarez said. “Two of them contracted the strange plague that has struck our city a few times and is still a mystery to the doctors. The third man drank the mixture of household cleaners, possibly thinking it was a more merciful death.”
It probably was, Burke thought. But when Chen and Alvarez looked at him, as if inviting him to confirm what they suspected, he said nothing—for all their sakes.
CHAPTER 31
They gathered in the wild country between Tala and Etu, and their footsteps filled the land with a terrible silence.
While the rest of the Elders listened, the two who had returned from Lakeside told the story of the sly predator that wasn’t a danger to the world or to Namid’s teeth and claws but was still dangerous because of the harm it could cause within a human pack—a harm that touched the smaller shifters. They told their kin about the sweet blood howling not-Wolf and the Wolf who wanted to be her mate. They spoke of job-fair migrations and the proper way to ask for tasty Wolf cookie treats. And they spoke of their mistakes in ignoring the animosity the smaller shifters felt toward the Cyrus human and how the not-Wolf had been lost and could have died because they had not heeded the Wolf’s warnings about that particular kind of human.
The two who had been in Lakeside told their story. And when the Elders made the journeys back to their own territories, they took the story—and its lessons—with them.
CHAPTER 32
Moonsday, Messis 27
Vlad filled the checkout counter with the book requests from terra indigene settlements. A few of the requests mentioned a specific book or author—human, Intuit, or Other. Most were requests for a kind of story that sounded similar to the hunt for Cyrus Montgomery and the rescue of Meg Corbyn: police and terra indigene working together; resourceful but wounded girl; plenty of blood and gore as the hunters tore through the bad human’s accomplices to find the girl before she received a fatal wound.
The requests themselves held a hefty dose of fiction—although he suspected variations of the story would be written in the next few months—but he still needed to find something among the published books that might come close to the story requested. And he’d ask the police to recommend a nonfiction book about police cars that would satisfy the request from the Crowgard living around the Feather Lakes.
Tess walked through the archway and stopped at the counter. He hadn’t seen her since Meg’s abduction. Her hair was brown and wavy with a few narrow streaks of green, a sign she was almost relaxed.
“There are strange humans in my coffee shop,” Tess said. “Nadine said you would explain.”