Frostbound

Chapter 14

Wednesday, December 29, 2:30 p.m.

Spookytown

There might be Latin-spewing evil burning down the city, but Lore still was Alpha of the pack. Since questioning vampires in daylight was pointless and it was too soon for Errata to have found any answers, he would spend the afternoon finding out who had put Helver up to breaking into the campaign office.

Lore stood on a street corner downtown, or where he thought the corner should be. Snow hid the curbsides and muted the shapes of fire hydrants and garbage cans. It was still coming down, too, the heavy clouds making a twilight out of midafternoon. The buses had wallowed down the main roads without getting stuck, but he didn’t hold out hope for tomorrow. The city didn’t have much snow-removal equipment, and this storm was freakish.

Fortunately, he’d been born with an optional fur coat. Letting his human shape drop, Lore fell to a dark mist. The cold shocked him for a moment, seeping through the infinitesimal spaces between demon and nothingness. He swirled, buffeted by the rising wind. It took all his considerable strength to pull the particles of himself and re-form into a hound—ears, paws, tail, nose—his deep-chested body the last to form out of the churning mist. Lore shook himself, scattering the falling snow from his back. With a bound, he dove into the drifts, heading toward the cluster of city blocks the hellhounds called home.

He saw the pups first, bouncing in and out of the snowdrifts, rolling and wiggling in the soft white mounds, and tossing clumps of snow with their noses. Lore slowed to a trot as they raced in circles around him, seeming to barely notice the cold. Where do children get all that energy? He mock-nipped at a stubby tail as it flashed past.

He was tempted to give chase, giving in to the game, but a nudge of his psychic senses made him look down Heron Street. The urge to play vanished in a lurch of foreboding. There was a cluster of hounds in human form, hands in their pockets, standing in the intersection a block away.

There were two groups of hounds in Spookytown: his own Lurcher pack, and these others, the Redbones. When Lore and his allies had rescued his pack from the Castle, they had freed the Redbones, too. There were many casualties, and survivors from the two packs had amalgamated under the Lurchers.

Sort of. The Redbones’ idea of getting along seemed limited to sharing a zip code.

Lore barked the pups out of the way and shifted back to human form. He turned down Heron Street to see what fresh hell the Redbones were plotting. He was willing to bet they were at the bottom of Helver’s sudden interest in crime.

Blowing on his hands, he walked toward the group. They fell silent as they spotted him, leaving nothing but the eerie quiet of the traffic-free streets and the soft crunch of his boots through the new-fallen snow. He counted five hounds, including the Redbones’ leader—the she-hound from his nightmare.

As he drew near, the female put a hand to her chest and bowed. At her signal, the four males followed suit. Lore had no illusions about the greeting. Mavritte was an Alpha in her own right, bowing to Lore only because so few of the Redbones survived. As leader of a diminished pack, her position was awkward. She could only truly join her group with another by mating with the Alpha or by losing to him in a fight—and losing was usually fatal. Her best option was to do what she was doing—maintain a truce with the Lurchers and treat Lore as her king. If their positions had been reversed, she’d expect Lore to do the bowing.

Not bloody likely. She was a bitch in every sense of the word. Beautiful, but in a spine-chilling way. Like all the hounds, she was tall, strong-boned, and leanly muscled. Her black hair was thick and cut to a shaggy cloud that framed her face and showed off huge, dark eyes. Despite the cold, she was dressed in more weapons than clothes, and a generous part of the clothing was rings, chains, and zippers.

He’d heard a Castle warlord had used Mavritte as a body slave, tending to his physical requirements. She’d eventually slit his throat. After that, she’d ousted her pack leader and taken his place. Now she was looking at Lore with dark, serious eyes. He had a fleeting urge to duck.

“Greetings, Madhyor,” she said, giving him his formal title.

She never did that unless she wanted something.

“Greetings, Mavritte.” He returned the bow, showing respect.

Lore took a quick survey of the others. All Mavritte’s favorites, and probably bedmates. All heavily armed. Each one shifting to block an exit from the intersection. He unbuttoned his coat, just in case he needed the freedom to move.

“I am glad we meet. There are matters concerning the Redbone pack that require your attention.”

Lore felt like saying that the Redbones took threequarters of his time already, but thought better of it. “Is this a discussion that can be accomplished indoors?”

She tilted her head, the gesture showing off the striking bone structure of her face. “It is better that we talk where no others can listen.”

Lore looked pointedly at her friends.

“They are no one,” she said with a wave of one hand. She wore gloves with the fingers cut out, all the better for gripping a weapon. “My business is with you.”

“How fortunate for me.”

Mavritte gave him a caustic look.

If she was going to thrust a meeting on him, Lore would take advantage of the situation. “I am happy to listen to any member of my pack, but right now I have a whelp to discipline for breaking pack law. Perhaps you know something of that?”

“Helver?”

“Yes.”

She shrugged. “I heard about that. We all need money. Can you blame him for using a hound’s natural gifts to get ahead? Besides, the bloodsuckers have wealth to spare. To listen to them, you’d think they were all emperors in their youth.”

“Theft is lazy. There are means to earn our keep.”

Building and fixing came as second nature to the hounds. Hauling lumber up a scaffold was easy. Engines surrendered their secrets with barely a struggle. The Lurcher pack had opened a business recycling everything from furniture to auto parts. As long as humans were wasteful, there was good money to be made by clever hounds.

“Picking garbage?” Mavritte shifted her weight to one hip. “What sort of a future is that?”

“We came from hell. Now we live in a place that lets us earn and pay our way. We have hope that we can send our young to good schools, so they will live even better lives.”

She laughed, a throaty sound of sheer amusement. “You’re an idealist. I didn’t think that was possible after the way we grew up.”

“I think it’s essential. What I say is also truth. We are living a life better than anything we dreamed of.”

They were silent a moment, the snow drifting down. It caught in Mavritte’s dark hair, ephemeral stars.

She shook it off. “The humans won’t let us get ahead unless we force them. We are like the insects that hide in their cupboards, stealing scraps of food. One day they will grow weary of us and call the exterminator.”

Lore felt a niggle of doubt. “Not all of them are like that. Many welcome us. Remember when we first came to Fairview? Some sent food and blankets.”

Her voice softened. “There are always a compassionate few. I would rather have the respectful many.”

“I don’t see how raising a pack of thieves will gain respect.”

“I grant you that, but it’s time we consolidate. Seek power.”

“What are you hoping for?”

She straightened, as if they’d finally reached the part of the conversation that mattered. “Wealth. A louder voice on the Supernatural Council. Fear, if necessary. You know how the Castle warlords worked. You learned their lessons as well as I did.”

“Enough to know I never want to live in such a place again,” Lore shot back. “Why re-create the very thing we fled from?”

She raised her hands in an exasperated gesture. “Because if we can’t defend ourselves, the pack will fail.”

“We are the peacekeepers that patrol Fairview. We are the ones who break bones and smash heads. How are we not defended?”

Mavritte thrust a finger into his chest. “You need to pick a mate. Pick me. Bind our packs once and for all.”

Lore’s mouth dropped open for a heartbeat. Prophets save me!

She folded her arms. “Do I not please you?”

That’s what she said in the dream.

“You are beautiful and fierce. Strong. Powerful. Smart.” Hellhounds could not lie, and she was all of those things.

“But?”

He hesitated. But I don’t trust you enough to give you half my power.

She grabbed his face. His first instinct was to throw her to the ground, but then she pressed her lips to his. They were surprisingly soft, full, and hot. Her tongue danced at the entrance of his mouth, teasing, coaxing. He let her inside as her body pressed against his. They shifted slightly, adjusting for the bulge of weapons, the exact placement of hip and shoulder. They were a good fit. She was nearly six feet of warm, female hellhound, everything his genetic code had bred him to want. Someone who would give him litter after litter, and guard them with her last breath.

Lore crushed her to him, savoring the musky, honeyed taste of bitch. He’d always noticed Mavritte. Now he slaked his male curiosity, letting his hands wander down the taut muscles of her back. He had slept with plenty of the pack’s women. Some would even say he’d been downright democratic in his interviews for a mate. Mavritte was certainly the most exciting, in a vaguely suicidal way.

Someday, the mating urge—that drive to take a female in a permanent bond—would drive him mad. Mavritte was right. It was past time to pick somebody, but it wasn’t just a choice made by lust. There was more than pure biology involved. A hellhound chose with his soul.

He released her. They panted slightly, gusts of breath forming clouds in the air. He could see the disappointment in her eyes. She would feel the failure as much as he did.

“You’re not the right one.”

Scent. Taste. Something was off. He’d found Talia more appealing, and she wasn’t even the right species. And yet Talia felt right. Was there something wrong with him?

“I don’t care if we’re not the match for each other’s souls,” Mavritte returned, her voice soft. “There are too few of us left to search endlessly for one eternal mate. The ones we were supposed to bond with could be dead, killed in the Castle. We have to choose and move on.”

Lore didn’t reply. There was a chance she was right, but they were still a bad pairing. They didn’t think the same way.

“I’d never regret having you in my bed.” She looked him up and down, but her bravado wobbled. However she chose to spin it, her Alpha had rejected her.

“I am honored that you considered me worthy of interest,” he said, and meant it.

Nevertheless, anger flared in her eyes, flickering out of sight so fast he wasn’t sure he’d seen it. “Go, then,” she said. “Go look after the misbehaving whelp.”

Lore made a move to leave, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm. “Wait. How are you going to punish him?”

“I must think of a way for him to make amends to the vampires. Then I will give him to a trainer for a few months.” A trainer acted as a strict but fair taskmaster, usually appointed to younger hounds who had transgressed. The sentence usually meant a span of hard labor on difficult, unpleasant jobs.

“Let Grash be his trainer.” She nodded to one of her men. “He is good at working with wood. He could teach Helver much. Let the Redbones prove to the Lurchers that we are also invested in the pack’s welfare. If we can’t bond one way”—she gave a lopsided smile—“we’ll have to come up with other ways of integrating the packs.”

It made political sense, but Lore didn’t like it. He didn’t trust Mavritte, especially in a conciliatory mood. Still, this was a low-risk way of extending goodwill. He would keep an eye on the situation, and set others to do the same. “Very well.”

Mavritte nodded and folded her arms. “Good.”

Lore studied her a moment. The snowflakes had made a crown in her hair. “Be well.”

“Be well.”

Lore turned. Grash stepped aside to let him pass, bowing as he did so. Lore nodded an acknowledgment, resisting an urge to growl. There was something about the Redbones that set his teeth on edge.

He was still stewing when he reached Helver’s home. It was one in a string of ancient row houses, two stories high with identical green doors and peaked roofs. The hellhounds had repaired what they could, but the walls were crooked and the foundations cracked. The homes of refugees, Lore thought. One day, when there was enough time and money, he would tear them down and build afresh.

The grandmother of the family opened the door.

“Greetings, Osan Mina,” he said, giving her his best smile.

Grandmother Mina had been littermate to his own osan, and was the closest he had now to family. She was dressed in a long skirt and apron, a white blouse, and a flowered kerchief that tied over her hair. She wasn’t a tiny woman, but years of hard work had rounded her spine. He bowed low, as befit one who was so much younger.

“Madhyor,” she replied in the hound’s tongue. “Sit by the fire and let me serve you tea.”

The fire in question was a steam radiator, but Lore didn’t argue. He pulled up a wooden chair to the tiny kitchen table. The family had painted the walls in a bright yellow, with trim in brilliant blues and reds. Geometric designs ran along the edges of the ceiling. It was the same pattern the women sewed on the hems of their skirts, symbolizing the endless return of souls to the pack, life after life.

Grandmother Mina gave him tea in a mug emblazoned with the CSUP logo. Like so many in Spookytown, Grandmother Mina spent the day listening to the station. Then she put a plate of meat and bread on the table. The smell of it reminded Lore that he hadn’t eaten anything solid yet that day, and refusing refreshments was an insult.

“Bevan wants to know what to do about the taxes for the warehouse,” Mina said. “He told me to ask you when you next came around.”

“He has my phone number. He can call me anytime.” He turned the mug around, liking the fact it was warm against his chilled hands.

“He knows if you stop by his house, that will make his mother happy. A family feels blessed when the Alpha steps through their doorway.” Mina patted his hand. “Osan Riva will have no one else fix her sink. She says you are the only one who can make the drains run right.”

“Water flows downward no matter who fixes the drain.”

“And Livrok wants advice on the batball team.”

“Baseball.” He put a slab of chicken onto a thick slice of bread and bit into it.

“That makes no sense. They don’t hit it with the base.”

“I didn’t make up the name, Grandmother,” he said, taking another bite.

“Why not? It would have made sense if you had done it. And don’t forget my sister wants to know what to do now that her grandson is old enough to work a full day. He needs an occupation.”

Which was the main reason Lore lived a little distance away. With the pack turning to him for everything—especially since coming to the human world—a sanctuary was essential. And perhaps it is also a rebellion, along with the vampire in it?

“Is Helver at home?” he asked. “I want to continue our discussion from last night.”

“I know you do. I sent him to spend the afternoon with Erich and Breckan.” Those were younger cousins.

Lore set his mug down on the table, irritated at her interference, but keeping his expression respectful. “Why, Osan Mina? He stole money from the vampires. Money I have to take back to them with an apology. He has brought dishonor on the pack.”

“I want to talk to you alone. You can punish my grandson later.” She pursed her lips as she sat down across from him. Although her hair had gone white, she was still lean and clear-eyed. Unlike other half demons, hellhounds were mortal. They loved, labored, and bore children. Grandmother Mina bore the testimony of all that and more in the lines of her face.

They were also the only species who had reproduced, aged, and died inside the Castle. Its strange magic had not affected them the same way as any other species. They were the worker bees of the nonhuman world, always in demand, never allowed the luxuries of the others.

He meant to change their status in this land, where hard work and imagination could take the common man to the heights of power. Opportunity was all they had ever needed, and already he had made great strides. Lore had scored a victory when he won a seat at the table with the other leaders of the supernatural community, and now sat there as their equal—but he still felt like a young boy beneath Grandmother Mina’s dark gaze.

His cell phone rang. It was Baines again. He switched the phone off.

“What is more important than Helver’s welfare?” he asked.

“He runs riot with the Redbone pack. They are not like us. They question your strength as Alpha.”

“They’re wrong.”

“Is that all you have to say?”

“What should I say? That I will bite Mavritte on the nose?”

“You have to show the Redbones your strength.”

“If they challenge me, it will be to the death. Mavritte isn’t the type to stop at first blood.”

“A fight isn’t what we need.”

“Then what?”

“You know the pack waits for the Alpha to choose a mate.”

Lore shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Perhaps that is a tradition that must fall by the wayside. Just because I haven’t . . .”

Mina’s eyes snapped. “It’s not tradition. It’s fact. We’re neither human nor animal. Magic sometimes dictates how we live.”

Lore stared stubbornly into his tea. The legend had it that until there was an Alpha pair, the females would not bear young. It was true that very few pups had arrived since his father’s death and none since his mother had passed away. But how much was fact and how much simply tradition? How much would he let an ancient legend rule his life in a world filled with refrigerators and wireless Internet?

“Kirsta is willing. So is Zofia, Sasha’s daughter. What is wrong with them?”

“Nothing.”

“Then get on with it!” She twisted her fingers through the bright strings of beads around her neck.

“There is no hound I want to take to my bed. At least not permanently.”

“No bonding means no young. No young means no future.”

Lore was silent.

Mina released the beads, and they fell with a clatter. “If you don’t do your duty, the pack will find an Alpha who will.”

“I’m still young.”

“Your father was younger. Why won’t you choose? Have the humans tempted you? Are we no longer good enough?”

Lore pushed his tea away. “Forgive me, Osan, but you know me better. I walked back into the Castle time and again to rescue the last of our people, one by one. I am loyal to the pack.”

“What about Mavritte?”

Lore stood. “I have already told her no.”

“The Elders favor her. It would unite the packs.”

“But I am Alpha.” And I am ambushed. It was too much a coincidence that he was having this conversation twice in one day.

Mina rose and took Lore’s hands. “Promise me you will think on this, Madhyor.”

“I will ask for a prophecy.” It was a ritual answer, but a true one. He was going to need divine intervention to find his way through this mess.

“The Elders seek prophecy on your mate, too. So far, all is darkness. The Eldest threw the bones of divination, but they turned up blank.”

Thank all the gods. At least that bought him some time. Lore bowed over her hands. “I honor your concern.”

“Don’t honor, act. Choose someone before the Elders choose for you.”

Like hell they will!

Lore changed the subject. “Tell Helver that Grash will be his trainer.”

Grandmother Mina gave him a surprised look. “Grash?”

He crossed the tiny kitchen toward the door. “It will make Mavritte happy.”

“Are you certain this is wise?”

Lore put his hand on the doorknob, then dropped it. He turned to face her, needing to make his point. “Either we trust the Redbones enough to mate with them, or we don’t. Merging the packs has to go beyond a mere pair bond. We need other bridges between us.”

She pressed her lips into a dubious scowl. “I don’t like Grash.”

“I don’t like any of them, but I sleep better knowing I am their Alpha. If they step out of line, I have the authority to take action.”

“Spoken like an Alpha.”

“Maybe, but our packs are small. We are still better off together. I will keep trying to make peace.”

“You are your father’s son.”

“Be well, Osan.”

“Be well.”

Lore left the house, feeling oddly alone when the door closed behind him. Would the Elders really force a mate on me? Choose a different Alpha? What would he do? Take a female he didn’t want or walk away from the pack, losing everything he’d ever known?

The once-familiar street looked strange, smothered, and frozen.

Trapped.

Welcome to my future.