Chapter Thirty-Six #2
“I think...” Cyrus ran his hand through his hair. “I think even if Arnou withdraws their support, most people aren’t going to want to risk Sebastian’s ire by taking down his brother’s new clan. We’ll have financial problems—a lot of them—but I don’t expect attacks, at least not yet—”
“Not yet?”
“—but that’s for now, for however long Sebastian manages to hold onto power. Which, given how quickly he’s pissing people off, won’t be long. They’re going along with him currently because of the war, but once it’s over...”
I blinked. “You think he is, too?”
“I think he’ll still be head of Arnou, but the top spot?” Again, I was skewered by those eyes, which were a lot shrewder than the pretty-boy looks would suggest. “Yeah, I think he’s out. And with him will go a lot of the new-fangled ideas—like clans for vargulfs—that pretty much everyone hates.
“That’s why most of the other new vargulf clans aren’t getting the influx of outcasts they’d expected.
And neither were we before your battle call jump-started recruitment.
People are wary—understandably so. Half think this is just the Council’s way of identifying them so they can be more efficiently hunted down and disposed of. And the rest...
“Well, they think it’s a genuine attempt to do something, but that Sebastian doesn’t have the power to see it through. And that as soon as he’s gone, they will be, too. Unless...”
“Unless what?” I asked, not liking where this was going.
Cyrus abruptly got up to check on something in the oven, which looked like a couple of trays of mac and cheese to go with whatever he was planning to grill.
He seemed satisfied, but then paused to stir some green beans in a big pot on the stove.
Since neither had looked like they needed help, I assumed he was trying to gather his thoughts.
Which I guessed he did, because he sat back down again and just came out with it.
“If there’s one thing the Clan Council—hell, all Weres—respect, it’s power. And what we did the other night... Damn, Lia. Just damn.”
“You can’t honestly expect—”
But Cyrus did. He sat forward, his arms on the table, his face intent. “For us to fight? Yes, I do. It’s the only way—”
“Bullshit it is!”
“How is this any different from what Sebastian had to do to get his current job? From what I had to do a month ago to help him keep it? That’s what we do, what Weres have always done—we fight for what we want.”
“And I thought that’s what Sebastian was trying to change,” I said heatedly. “To give us other ways, more civilized ones—”
“Yes, and he’s pissing everyone off in the process. The Clan Council doesn’t like change. They like the old ways; their power is built on the old ways. How many of them do you think would win an election? How many rule through fear rather than respect?”
“But he’s making progress—”
“Yes, because he fights for it!” Cyrus said fiercely. “He fights every day. And these boys—they understand that he’s fighting for them, but they also know they have to do their part!”
“Their part? You mean fight Relics, and the dark mage handlers that go with them?” I couldn’t believe he was saying this, couldn’t believe we were having this conversation.
I’d genuinely thought he would be horrified at what had happened to us, at what we’d been through the other night, but instead, he’d seen an opportunity.
But for what?
“We did it, Lia,” he reminded me. “We won—”
“Yes, and almost died in the process!”
Cyrus looked like he wanted to say something, but bit it back. It was a subtle motion, but I knew him too well. “What?” I demanded.
Brown eyes met mine, and they were steady. “You know what. You knew it then. It was a choice: Noah’s life or yours, and you made it. You fought, even knowing the cost. When you could have pulled back, regrouped with the rest of us, and killed the motherfucker who was menacing him another way—”
“But not in time.”
It came out as a whisper, because I was seeing it all again: the blood splattered room, the evil look in the Relic’s eyes as he ground Noah’s leg into the floor, the sounds I shouldn’t have been able to hear over everything else, but that had come loud and resonant to my ears—the pop of shattered bone, the harshly indrawn breath, the whimper of a cub who knows he’s dead and can’t do anything about it—
I snarled, and the hand on my cup went black and furry and clenched, shattering the porcelain. Cyrus caught it in his still-human one, gripping it hard. He’d always had better control, and that had been especially true that night.
“He lives with that, every day,” he whispered. “That you had a choice, and you chose him. He doesn’t know what to do with it. Doesn’t know how to process it. Wants to run to get away from emotions he doesn’t know how to handle, but he can’t, and not just because of his leg. But because of you.
“He’s yours now; will be until his dying day. You fought for him when nobody else would, and that creates a bond, an obligation—”
“I don’t want him feeling like that! I didn’t do it for that!”
“I know, but he feels differently. Any Were would. And that includes the Clan Council.”
“Ah.” I sat back. “A point emerges.”
Cyrus grabbed a roll of paper towels to sop up the spilled coffee and began cleaning up my mess.
“If these boys want redemption, they’re going to have to fight for it,” he said. “There’s no other way, and this is the best chance any of them is ever going to get. They make the council feel an obligation now, and no matter who ends up as bardric later, they won’t be going anywhere.
“They saw that when I won my fight against Whirlwind, saw the outcast son made whole again. They want the same, and if they don’t get it, they’re right back where they started in a few years.
And before you say ‘but they’re just children,’ ask yourself how long a vargulf lasts on the streets—any vargulf—including ones far older and stronger than these? ”
I swallowed my words because that time was often measured in months instead of years. And not just because of clan violence, although that frequently played a part. But because a wolf without a clan was...
Nothing. Just nothing at all. Plenty went mad, and the rest... well, the clans didn’t have to kill them.
They often took care of that on their own.
“The boys—the young men—we’ve brought in understand it, too,” Cyrus said simply.
“And they want this chance. And not just for themselves. They’re fighting for all the other kids like them, who nobody wants and who have no hope.
But if one clan of former outcasts is approved of, is validated, is shown to be valuable, then maybe they all are.
At the very least, they won’t be immediately disbanded, and the longer they last, the more normal it all becomes.
“And before you ask, I didn’t talk to them about this; they came to me. Because the other night showed them that they do have worth, that they can fight, and by God, they want to!”
And by Were law, they had that right, I thought miserably, staring into his face.
I hadn’t realized how afraid Cyrus had been that this whole thing wouldn’t work.
That his crazy experiment would fail, with the boys scattered to the winds, save maybe a few we could support.
He hadn’t said so when I’d dragged back hundreds more from Tartarus; he hadn’t said so when the clans dumped their old and infirm on us, to make them our burden instead of theirs.
But he’d thought it. Until the other night, when he’d realized that maybe there was a way, one that even the council could understand. And I hated that he was probably right.
“Helping the Corps might be the best way to get the biggest return for the least risk,” Cyrus added, watching my face.
“Not a permanent force like Sebastian wants, or that Hargroves floated, but a temporary solution to a pressing problem that affects us all. We find this Reaper, get back that potion, and it might be enough to earn our place.”
“If you survive.” I hated that it came out broken.
“That’s what we do, what we are,” Cyrus said, taking both my hands in his. “What our people have always been. Survivors.”
I looked at him, wanting to believe, but I was scared out of my mind. I could lose him. I could lose all of them and not even be there to see it. Or to fight alongside them and die with them, if need be, with my family, my pack, my everything.
I could be left alone, with nothing but their memories to remind me of what I’d had. It was the hardest thing anyone could ask of a Lupa. And Cyrus knew it.
His hand cupped my cheek, his touch soft, his eyes sad and gentle and kind.
And yet, he asked.
“Get me a lead, Lia, no matter how tenuous, and we’ll do the rest. You have my word.”