Chapter Thirty-One
I pulled my feet up onto the couch cushion, discovered it hurt my belly, and put them back down again. And sighed. “I feel like shit.”
Noah looked at me. “You admit it?”
I gestured vaguely. “Would it do any good to lie? You said I looked like crap.”
“I did not!” I gave him the look that deserved. “Okay, I might have thought it, but I didn’t say—”
“Thanks.”
“You’re lucky you look like anything,” he said, low and furious. “You’re lucky to be here.”
“Things happen in combat—”
“Tell it to someone else! What happened wasn’t because we were in combat. It was because you had to make a split-second decision and you chose wrong!”
“Saving you wasn’t the wrong decision, Noah.”
“Like hell!”
I blinked at him slowly, because my body wanted more sleep, but my mind didn’t, and they were fighting it out. “I’d do it again.”
“What?”
“If I had a hundred years to think about it.”
He stared at me. “Then you’re stupid or crazy!”
“Nope.”
That single word seemed to enrage him. “Do you understand that you could have died? For nothing?”
“Nothing?”
He looked disgusted. “Don’t try it. We both know what I am.”
“Yeah, you’re a member of Fireborn, just like me—”
“I’m not like you! You’re Arnou! And before that, you were Lobizon! You walk into Sebastian’s rooms whenever you feel like it—”
“I mostly try to avoid it. I keep getting into trouble.”
“—and talk to him like—”
“Like he’s my brother-in-law?”
“Exactly! You’re the goddamned sister-in-law of the bardric, and I’m—”
“A member of Fireborn,” I repeated, because it didn’t get through the first time. “We’re the same—”
“We are not the same!”
“Yes, we are. That’s what being in a clan means.
Whatever you were before doesn’t matter.
What matters is what we are now, and there’s no difference between us except for where we rank in the clan.
For example, I am Lupa, and you’re a rebellious cub who’s feeling pissy because you got your ass handed to you. ”
He actually blinked at that, and paused whatever he’d been about to blurt out for a second, so I hit the gas while I could.
“That doesn’t mean you’re worthless; it means you need training, which you’ll get.
Cyrus will help, and you can join some of the lessons I’m giving my students.
Not everything will carry over, of course, but a lot will.
And since we’re at war, you could very well end up fighting again. I want you prepared.”
“I know how to fight,” he said, but it was calmer for some reason. Probably because Noah was one of the smarter guys, and when you engaged his intellect, he forgot to freak out.
“No, you know how to use Relic strength to wreck things, which is sometimes enough. But not when fighting other Relics as strong or stronger than you are.”
“And what if…” he stopped and swallowed, but then came out with it. “What happens when I’m not a Relic anymore?”
“Not a Relic?”
“I can’t Change into that form now—I’ve tried. Neither can Lee or Jason. I think the potion we took might be wearing off. You managed to pull it out of us that night at HQ, but what happens if that doesn’t work next time? What happens when—”
“When you’re the same as the rest of Fireborn?”
“The rest of club old ass, you mean?” he said bitterly, and I vaguely remembered Lee saying something like that in my “dream.”
“Lee’s worried that all the new arrivals are going to water down the clan, isn’t he?” I said, trying to remember. “Make us be seen as weak, or a laughingstock.”
Noah blinked. “How did you know that?”
I brushed it aside because I didn’t fully understand it myself. “It’s obvious. And it’s not going to be like that. Those with skills will get a chance to use them. Those without…” I shrugged. “We’ll find a place where they fit.”
“And if they don’t fit anywhere?”
I started to answer, but then slowed down and took my time because the look in his eyes said that this was important.
“Well, not everyone is a young, fit fighter,” I said, “with a good intellect and plenty of years to use those gifts on behalf of the clan. But that doesn’t make them useless.
With so many people, though, we’re going to need to get organized.
We probably should find some lieutenants to help with all the new arrivals. ”
“Lieutenants?”
“Yeah, Cyrus and I are discussing it.” Or we would be when I could corner him long enough. “I mean, we’re not a small clan anymore. We can’t be this slipshod forever.”
“We’re—” he stopped as though that hadn’t occurred to him. “We’re not, are we?”
“No. I mean, we’re not one of the big boys, but we’re not tiny, and many of those new arrivals have knowledge and skills to pass on, some with years of experience.”
“Welders.”
“What?”
“Sienna—she was asking for welders. For some of the crazy shit they’re building out at Wolf’s Head. She had some volunteers from the old guys.”
“I bet. Plenty of Weres like to work with their hands. Who knows what else they might be able to contribute? If only we had someone to take on the duty of talking to them and figuring out what we’re working with…”
Noah was trying to look superior, and like he knew what I was doing, but eagerness was overwriting it. But he got it under control. “I thought Dave was doing that?” he said diffidently.
“Dave was helping us get names and basic background info, enough to satisfy Sienna. But he wasn’t doing anything in depth, and he’s got his own job to get back to.
He can’t work with us forever, and anyway, he’s not clan.
The new guys are never going to open up to him like they would one of our own.
“Or two,” I added, because I’d just noticed Lee listening from outside the window.
“Two?” Noah looked at me and then followed my gaze to where a dreadlocked head was sitting at the cheery little table with the red umbrella, trying to look like he wasn’t eavesdropping. “Lee! Get your ass in here!”
Lee came in, but he didn’t look ashamed to have been caught. He also didn’t look happy. “You want me to believe you wanna make me a lieutenant?” he challenged. And it was a challenge. His chin was up, and his eyes were narrowed.
“I want to try you out, see what you’ve got.” I sat back and regarded him until he grew uncomfortable. It didn’t take long.
“Why?”
“Yeah,” Noah said. “Out of everybody, why us?”
“Why not you?” I asked.
“I thought… I dunno. You might assign that job to Sophie or something. She bosses everybody around anyway.”
“The job of a lieutenant isn’t to boss people around. It’s to handle a specific job that Cyrus and I don’t have time for. And wolves are more likely to get the answers we need.”
“Not good enough!” That was Lee. The tone would have put my back up, except for the expression in the eyes. He badly wanted to know why I’d bother. He wanted to know what value I saw in him when he didn’t see any in himself.
I thought about it, because I knew why I’d picked Noah, but Lee…
Frankly, he wouldn’t have been a top choice.
He was smart and brave, but hotheaded, and that temper often overruled his good sense.
He was also as prickly as they came, quick to take offense and to square up with people, including those in his own clan.
And he was wounded in ways that even Weres found tough to heal, more than he let on, I suspected.
But someone else didn’t care.
Someone else was pushing me, hard enough to physically make me stumble if I’d been on my feet, which would have been disturbing except that it felt so normal.
As if I was arguing with the other half of my brain, which maybe I was for all I knew.
I didn’t get how this three-people-in-a-body thing worked, because my wolf was a lot less active.
My Relic, on the other hand…
“Some things can be taught,” I finally said. “Even most things. The right people can learn on the job, but they have to be the right people. And one way you know that is how they act when things are hardest.
“Noah, you got hurt the other night because you did something stupid. But you know what you didn’t do? You didn’t run.
“You saw that monster of a creature and threw yourself at it to help your clan. Yeah, it was dumb; it was epically, unbelievably, almost staggeringly—”
“You’ve made your point,” he muttered.
“—stupid, like one-for-the-record-books—”
“Okay!”
“But it was brave, too. It was self-sacrificing. It was… interesting. The kind of thing we look for in Corps recruits when we’re choosing squad leaders. Of course, being brave, or a good person who loves their clan, doesn’t mean you have leadership chops, but…”
“It’s interesting,” he repeated.
I nodded. “It’s the kind of thing that makes you stand out and makes us want to see what else you may have to offer. And the way we usually do that in the Corps is with a trial run. I don’t see any reason not to copy that practice here.”
“And me?” Lee asked, his jaw tight.
I glanced at him, information flowing now from someone who thought I needed to know it. And suddenly, keeping my temper became more of a problem. A lot more.
A silky black arm grabbed Lee’s t-shirt and jerked him down to me. “Chay went to look for a Reaper, who was specifically targeting Weres, and he went alone?”
“I thought you didn’t know about that!” he said, which was not smart.
“The fuck?” I glared at him, but he was made of sterner stuff, and I only got defiant eyes back. Or maybe he’d had far worse from his old clan, I thought, and the idea sobered me slightly. So I turned on Noah.
“I wasn’t there,” the blond protested.
“Because Jason had to ‘practically sit on’ you, right?”
He didn’t deny it. “But, uh, the guys went after Chay and caught up with him partway there. And, um…” he petered off.
“And dragged him right back here so they didn’t all end up in jars?”
He licked his lips. “Well, you know...”
“I assume that’s a no!”
“Well, yeah. I mean, that’s a no, but it turned out all right. Well, not all right, but—”
“How? How was that in any way all right?”
Noah sighed and gave up. “They didn’t end up in jars?”
“Noah!”