“Things change,” Dane said.
“Not so much. I speak. You ignore most of it.”
“Only the parts that don’t matter.” Dane looked out past the place where the snow stopped. From
here, a layer of snow blanketed the garden that had been, when Dane had been on the ground, green and
new. There was no knowing anything for certain in Ezqel’s house, nor about Ezqel.
“I think you keeping your hands off the boy matters.” Even from thousands of miles away, Cyrus
could sound snippy.
“It mattered more to him that I touch him,” Dane pointed out. “And to me.”
“And you see no danger in that?” The wind snapped at Dane’s cheek with an icy finger. “In either of
those things?”
“It wouldn’t stop me if I did.” Dane shook his head. “I never cared much for the rules, Cyrus, and
you’ll have to live with me having my own opinion again. It’s not going to kill you.”
There was a long pause that made Dane’s chest hollow with dread as he wondered what truth he’d hit
upon. Then again, maybe Cyrus was sulking, or talking to someone else. He was just starting to feel ill and cold when Cyrus sighed.
“You are well, then?” Cyrus sounded subdued, or maybe resigned.
“I think so. Better, at the least.” He’d been a little better before Ezqel healed him, he knew that much.
He’d already felt more whole. Lindsay had as much magic in his little frowns and rare smiles as most
enchantments, all but the strongest of them.
“It is good to know.”
“You weren’t listening to find out if I did it or not?” Dane asked dryly.
“I heard it happen to you,” Cyrus said softly. “But I wasn’t listening.” The wind touched his cheek,
gently this time.
“I think it’s over,” Dane allowed. He hadn’t been fully his other self yet, but he’d been human
enough, even if not totally of his own accord that last time.
“And the boy?”
“He’s not a boy.” Dane couldn’t help his growl. Lindsay was young and new and tender, but not a
boy. “He’s grown.”
The wind sighed in Dane’s ear, but Dane wasn’t budging on the matter. “Figure of speech,” Cyrus
said, at last. “If he’s not a boy, what am I?”
“A withered old stick with no sense of humor?” Dane offered, and got his hair pulled for it. He
startled himself when he had to stifle laughter. The human in him was more easily amused than the beast.
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“What are you, then?” Cyrus snapped.
“A moth-eaten old fur coat.” Dane let his head fall back against the stone. “A tattered thing with a
little use left in it. To keep him warm enough until he can find something warmer and newer that suits
him.”
“You’re so sure of that?”
“No matter what you think of me, I’m not that much of a fool.” Dane didn’t expect Cyrus to think
better of him than that, but he wished it from time to time. Cyrus had little enough reason to change his thinking, and Dane knew it. The way he’d nearly gotten Lindsay killed in Cholula was reason enough and
that was only one of many foolish things Dane had done. Lindsay would grow up and move on, if Dane
didn’t get him killed first.
“You’ve let him into your bed,” Cyrus said, and Dane could hear him rolling his eyes. “And you want
me to think you’re not a fool?” The wind laughed in Dane’s ear.
“Not so much of a fool that I think he’ll keep me,” Dane rumbled. “Don’t worry, Cyrus. You’ll have
me all to yourself again before you know it.”
“I won’t have you at all if you don’t come back in one piece,” Cyrus said, changing the subject as the
wind changed quarters.
“That’s why I went through all this,” Dane said irritably. Now that he’d thought about Lindsay
outgrowing him, he was in an ill-temper, and doubly so because he was upset about it at all. “So I wouldn’t die so easily. Or did you forget that part?”
That guardians were outgrown was life, Dane reminded himself, forcing down his irritation. It wasn’t
as though Lindsay would suffer anything terrible and be gone. He would grow and change until he had
outgrown Dane and their relationship was altered forever. If Dane had any say about it, it would be one day at a time, so slowly that Lindsay would hardly notice until it occurred to him to be at most a little
melancholy over it and no more than that. It was what Dane wanted more than anything, when the human
in him could be counseled by the unselfish, steadfast beast.
“I haven’t forgotten,” Cyrus said, breaking into Dane’s argument with himself. “But I have taken
steps to see you back here safely nonetheless. Vivian has drawn Moore’s attention away from us.”
“Is the girl there?” Dane’s mind snapped into the present as his hackles rose and his teeth pricked his
lip. There, now he was more himself.
“Vivian has seen nothing of her. Moore has made no move and had no communication that suggests
the girl has been in contact with her. We think the girl must be after the dog, who has not been seen either, or in disgrace.”
Dane tamped down his irrational surge of disappointment at that. “We’ll be safe to come in by
LaGuardia?” Getting Lindsay home in one piece was far more important than killing Jonas.
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“Moore uncovered your actions in Cholula, but our contacts on the West Coast—at Vivian’s urging—
convinced her people that the two of you had gone up that way, especially since the trail ran cold in Ezqel’s forest. Right now, they are tracking Brenna’s people instead.”
Brenna. Dane remembered her, and not fondly. The temperamental electromancer made his skin itch,
and not just from her ozone and static aura. She was a trollish bitch, and thought as ill of him as he did of her. But he could forgive her a great deal if she kept Moore busy.
“So, they think we haven’t made it back here?” Dane hadn’t thought to worry about that on the hunt,
that some message about his presence would get through to Moore. He’d been too busy killing, too busy in
the present. It was his own fault for stopping partway to being fully himself. He’d forgotten how little his animal-self could understand when he was between his true forms.
“No one believes you’d do any business with Ezqel you did not have to do,” Cyrus pointed out. His
laughter tickled the hairs in Dane’s ears, making Dane shake his head. “The word is that you and Jonas are
equally unwelcome there, once Ezqel paid his debt by telling you where to find the guul.”
Moore was chasing Brenna up the West Coast, the girl was still off somewhere after the dog, and the
world was still certain that Dane was fool enough to refuse the aid that would heal him. It suited Dane just fine. He would get Lindsay back to New York, back to the safety of Vivian and Cyrus, and then deal with
Jonas.
Kristan. Dane chuckled softly. There was bait that no dog could refuse. Sweet meat. She’d forgive him for taking Lindsay as a lover instead of her, he was sure, especially if he could offer her a way to
please everyone.
“You’re amused by the efforts of others to save your moth-eaten hide?” Cyrus was most certainly not
amused.
“Just thinking ahead,” Dane said, feeling contented. “I can do that, you know.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Cyrus said. “Come home and show me.” The wind tugged at Dane,
drawing him in as though Cyrus planned to pick him up and bring him home on the back of the North
Wind.
Dane was ready to go right then, too. Suddenly, he was swept through with a need to return so intense