by Mason Sabre
Phoenix swivelled around on his chair and nodded. “It’s numbers ... it’s easy. It makes sense. Numbers always stay the same no matter what.”
Cade nodded. He could understand that. It was stable, and god knows the boy needed some kind of stability. “I guess so,” he said. He offered Phoenix a plate and then took his own and began to eat. “So …” he began. “We have to go for that meeting.”
Phoenix didn’t say anything.
“Stephen and Gemma’s father wants to meet you. Do you remember I told you about Malcolm and Emily? Their mother and father?”
“You said Malcolm is the one who makes all the decisions.”
“He is the head of the Council, yes. He wants to meet you and we need to update him on everything.” Cade paused for a moment, and Phoenix remained quiet. Cade had realised that when something serious was going on, Phoenix clammed up. But it would be a mistake to assume that he wasn’t listening, or watching. Those eyes and ears were taking everything in. “My father is going to be there,” Cade added. “And Aaron.”
Phoenix’s expression hardened, his eyes boring into Cade’s as he paused mid-chew. “What if I don’t go?”
“You have to,” Cade said. “You don’t defy the orders of Malcolm.”
“Didn’t you?”
Cade raised an eyebrow.
“When you took me in.”
“I am sure I will pay for that. But it is my problem, not yours. I did what I did, and I don’t regret it. I would take you in again tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that,” said Cade solemnly, needing Phoenix to trust him, to feel safe and know that Cade was not about to turn his back on him. “My father won’t do anything now. Neither will Aaron. He is Malcolm’s beta—his second in command. He wouldn’t risk that, no matter what. It has gone to the Council now, so you are safe. Trevor can no longer act without Malcolm’s permission—and Malcolm is a fair man. That is why he is in the position he is.”
Phoenix pushed the last couple of bits of raw meat around on his plate with his fork. “When is the meeting?”
Cade glanced at his watch. “In about forty-five minutes. We have to leave as soon as you have eaten.”
Phoenix said nothing else.
Cade paced back and forth in Malcolm’s study as they waited outside the council room. The study was a large room at the front of the house that Malcolm used for general business and his day-to-day running of the Council. He clenched and unclenched his fists, going from the window to the door and back again. It was like sitting in the dentist’s waiting room and not knowing if the treatment was going to be a simple check-up or an excruciating extraction without Novocain. Each time he turned, he exhaled heavily, all the while colourful epithets floating around in his head. It wouldn’t be polite to voice them out loud in front of Phoenix and Emily, who were both sitting on the small two-seater sofa by the window. Gemma’s mother was trying to read, but every time Cade passed her, she’d lift her head and look at him.
The room was lined with bookcase after bookcase, some filled with books, others holding records relating to the Council. Some of the books were medical journals—old ones that they had acquired from the Humans. They had detailed diagrams of the different species, as well as diagrams and photographs of the viscera and internal organs of Others. Stephen had once pointed out that no one ever questioned just how they had obtained those pictures. Malcolm had told him it didn’t matter.
There were two doors that branched off from Malcolm’s study. One of them led to the hallway and the rest of the house, and the other one was thicker, purpose-built, and it blocked the way to the room beyond. That was the Council’s quiet room. A person could be slaughtered in there, and whoever was on the other side would not hear a thing. Stephen often remarked how that was handy—he was most looking forward to acquiring that room when he took over from his father.
“Cadence MacDonald, will you sit down,” Emily said finally. She pinned him with a stare that made him feel ten years old again. All she was missing in her reprimand was his middle name. “You’re making even me nervous.”
“Sorry,” Cade muttered. The door was still closed and he glared at it. It was taking them god damn ages.
“I’m going to get Phoenix a drink. Would you like one?”
Cade shook his head. “I just want this over with.”
Emily came over to him and laid a gentle hand on his arm. “I know,” she said. “It’ll all be fine. You’ll see.” She offered him a warm smile before turning back to Phoenix. “Orange or apple.”
“I don’t mind,” he said nervously.
“I’ll be back in a minute.”
Cade sat down in the seat Emily had just vacated. “These meetings always take so long,” he said, but it was more for his own reassurance than Phoenix’s.
“It hasn’t been that long,” Phoenix replied.
Emily came back a minute later with Evie, the youngest child in the family. Curiosity, no doubt, had her following her mother into the room as her eyes immediately fixed on Phoenix. There was no hesitation or shyness to her. She came right in and sat in the single chair opposite them and continued to stare at Phoenix. Emily placed two glasses down on the coffee table between them, the contents of which looked highly questionable. It was orange, but that was no fruit in there, and it was bright enough that he worried he would start glowing.
“Drink it,” she encouraged Phoenix. “It builds you up. You need some muscle on you if you’re to make it like this lot.” She pushed the other one in front of Cade. “You drink up, too. Calm those nerves.”
Evie smirked. She couldn’t keep her eyes off Phoenix, but she looked away long enough to screw her face up at Cade.
“Curiosity killed the cat?” Cade said reprovingly. She was still young, but she was old enough to know better than to stare at people so openly and rudely.
Phoenix reached a nervous hand for his glass and then brought it to his lips. He sniffed at it first, but to his credit, he kept his face expressionless. Cade didn’t need to bring it to his nose to get a whiff of the putrid smell.
“Thank you,” Phoenix said to Emily as he took a sip under her ever watchful eye.
“You make sure you both finish those up.” She nodded toward the drinks then looked at Cade. “I have a full bottle of it for you to take home for him. It’ll keep you both strong.”
Emily wasn’t just the wife of the alpha—she was a healer, too. She worked with potions and god knows what else, and they stank to high heaven. God, even the smell of them sometimes was enough to make them want to vomit for a week. Cade and Stephen often joked that the reason they got better is because she scared any germs away with it. She grew almost everything in the back garden herself, and some in the greenhouse or the attic, where it was warmer. She knew about almost every herb and plant, and probably even weed that existed. But whatever she did—the lotions and potions that she made—that shit worked.
“Do you think they will be much longer?” Cade asked her, scowling.
She shrugged. “Who knows with them? Once they enter that room, it’s like a whole different world. I think they forget the one that is out here.”
Cade slumped in his seat at the prospect and took the smallest sips he could manage from the glass. His taste buds were never going to forgive him.
Thirty minutes had passed when the door finally swung open and Gemma emerged. Thirty minutes that seemed liked thirty hours. She smiled apologetically to Cade. “Sorry we were so long.”
Cade stood and then threw a worried glance at Phoenix, who was staring at Gemma nervously. He didn’t want to leave him alone, not for a minute. Emily must have read his mind, because she smiled and said, “He’ll be fine. I’ll sit here with him.”
Cade returned her smile, but his reluctance to leave Phoenix was no doubt evident. He knew the boy would be fine with Emily. She had a way about her that went against what was expected—she was tiger, and tigers were not known for their nurturing ways. But Emily was the exact opposite. She put god damn
Mother Teresa to shame sometimes.
“I won’t be long. I'm just in there,” he said to Phoenix, then followed Gemma into the room with one final glance at him.
Everyone was sitting around the table waiting for him as he entered with Gemma and closed the door. Malcolm sat at the head of the table, and to the right was Trevor. His face was stern and his refusal to greet Cade showed that he had definitely not got over the other day. That man could sulk like a toddler some days. Next to him was Aaron—he at least got a nod of acknowledgement from him. On the other side of Malcom was Stephen. He looked at Cade as he entered and lifted his chin in greeting. “Hey, man.”
Gemma sat down next to Stephen, but Cade opted for the seat closest to the door—and closest to Phoenix.
Malcolm interlaced his fingers, elbows resting on the table, and focused his gaze directly on Cade. “This is quite the predicament that you have put us in,” he said, eschewing any formalities. “You do realise that what you have done is against Society rules.”
Cade nodded solemnly.
“Then you must also realise that if you were someone other than the son of one of my Council officers, I would have no bother tossing you out with the strays and shutting the door behind you.”
“Yes,” he replied, keeping his eyes level with those of their leader. “Thank you for not doing that.”
“Your father has come to us today to bring over this case. He tells me that you have taken in the half-breed and that he is the one the Humans are seeking.”
“Yes.”
“And that this half-breed is responsible for the death of the Human boy.”
“Yes, but it wasn’t …”
Malcolm held his hand up to silence him. “I cannot allow members of the Society to choose which rules they will follow and which rules they will break just because it suits them.”
Cade was not about to defend the fact that—however well-intentioned his reason—he had, in truth, broken the law. “I apologise for putting the Society in this position.” Malcolm’s shrewd mind did not miss the fact that he was not, however, apologising for taking Phoenix in. Only for the trouble it was causing.
“You should have come to me first. You have put the Society, me, your father, and even yourself, in a very difficult situation. You are a man of the law. This could cost you your job.”
Cade’s jaw clenched. Even though there were things he wished he had never needed to witness in his job, he loved working for the DSA. He loved the challenge, the mystery and crime-solving, and most of all, bringing justice to the community. It would cost him greatly if he was kicked out of the agency. “I know,” he replied evenly.
“However,” Malcolm continued, “I do realise that the actions that you took were honourable, and that should not go unnoticed.” Malcolm paused. “I find myself at a crossroads with what to do.”
Cade looked him square in the eye. “I will do whatever it is that you require of me. Just please spare Phoenix.”
Trevor shifted in his chair at that request, and Cade could practically see him sneering, even though his eyes remained on Malcolm. “I try to be fair to everyone in Society, Cade. The good and the not-so-good. Now I understand that you and your father have come to some agreement with regards to the half-breed?”
Cade swore inwardly and hoped Malcolm would not go into the details of that agreement. Not with Gemma in the room. “Yes.”
Malcolm gave a slow nod. “While his words as my beta are as good as my own in my absence, this incident cannot go unpunished, however.”
Cade nodded. “I understand.”
He stopped to take a sip of his water and then fixed Cade with a steady gaze. “On the next full moon and pack run, you are forbidden from shifting,” he began. “You are also to be confined to the cage for a period of no less than twenty-four hours. Twelve hours before and twelve hours after.”
Cade heard Gemma’s sharp intake of breath at her father’s ruling. The hairs on the back of his neck rose and his stomach knotted, but he did not argue.
“I know that I ask much already,” Cade said. “But please, I ask one more thing of you. I take full responsibility for Phoenix and everything he does. It is a direct reflection on me. I will pay for him in Society. I understand that he also has to challenge and defeat his maker in order to be granted full membership.”
“Yes,” Malcolm agreed.
Cade didn’t let his gaze waver from Malcolm’s. “Phoenix is still learning. He has shifted completely and has managed to do it every day this week. He is working hard to learn and accept what he is, but he is not there yet. The next pack run will be his first full moon.”
“Go on.”
“He will be alone if I am in the cage, away from me. He isn’t as fast as everyone else, and no one will stay behind with him. He is already afraid of everyone—a new half-breed alone and afraid on the full moon is not a good combination.”
“What are you proposing?” Malcom asked.
“I will do two nights in the cage if I must,” Cade said. “The next two full moons after this one, or forty-eight straight hours. Whatever it is that you see fit. Just please, I am begging you. Let me be here for this one. For Phoenix.”
“You have no fucking idea what you are asking,” Stephen growled at him, a muscle working in his jaw. “You won’t make it two days. You’ve never been in the cage.”
“You’re right, I haven’t,” Cade said, meeting his best friend’s angry stare. “But if Phoenix runs without me, I fear that something will go wrong, and then he will end up dead. The cage won’t kill me.”
“Not physically.” Stephen glared at him, frustration rolling off him in waves. “There are other ways to die.”
“Please, father,” Gemma said, desperation in her voice. “I helped him to take Phoenix in. I stayed there. I lied to you and the pack. I should be …”
“Gemma,” Cade cut in angrily. Fuck. He couldn’t have her getting into trouble over this.
“No,” she said sternly. “If you are to be punished for this, then I should be, too. I am as much a part of it as you are.” She turned back to her father and sat up straight, shoulders back and head held high. “I helped.”
Malcolm did not need to speak for his anger to be seen. His expression gave nothing away, but fury swirled in the depths of his eyes. He regarded both Gemma and Cade, then addressed Stephen without taking his eyes off either of them. “Stephen, can you run with the wolves?”
Stephen nodded. “Yes.”
“My son can run with your pack and the half-breed at the next full moon?” he asked Trevor. “They can run at the back.”
“As long as they stay at the back,” Trevor agreed.
“Can you handle him?” Malcolm asked, looking at Stephen now. “If he rages?”
“Yes,” he said cautiously.
With a curt nod, Malcolm turned back to Cade. “I take your offer of two nights in the cage,” he said. He fixed his eyes on Gemma and there was nothing gentle in his voice when he spoke again. He spoke as their alpha, strict and unyielding. “But you will do a night each. Stephen will run with the boy.”
Cade heard Stephen mutter a curse, but like him, they could say nothing. If they did, it could mean added punishment, worse than what they had just got. He clenched his jaw and stared at Gemma, wanting to shout at her for speaking up. She continued to sit there with her head held high, accepting her punishment even though Cade was sure she must be scared out of her wits at the prospect of the cage. Hell, he was. But the thought of Gemma going through it was tearing him to pieces inside. He’d do a week if it meant she’d get a pass, but he knew that proposing that to Malcolm would only anger him more. He kept his mouth shut and faced Malcolm once more. Furious as he was with her, though, Cade was amazed at what she has just done for him. She had literally put herself in the line of fire for him, and while he cursed her stubborn head, he couldn’t deny the warmth that spread through him that she had been willing to do that for him. Not that she wouldn’t hear it from
him later on, he scowled, and he was sure she’d be getting an earful from Stephen as well. God damn headstrong woman.
Trevor sat back in his chair, looking completely unperturbed by the fact that his son would be facing twenty-four hours in the cage soon. Aaron’s expression was unreadable, showing neither glee nor disappointment. Malcolm moved on. “Where are we with locating his maker?”
Cade forced himself to focus on the question. “I have been going through the list of names. Phoenix gave me some idea of location—now I just need to narrow it down.”
“Give the list to your father,” Malcolm said tersely. “Trevor, you and Aaron can deal with finding his maker. I want Cade dealing with the boy’s training. We have three weeks to the Humans’ deadline. Phoenix has that amount of time to prove to me that he can fit in with us. Challenging his maker or not, if he doesn’t fit, he goes. I will not tolerate any attack, rage or even a hair out of place. I will hand him over to the Humans. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I am putting my neck out for this boy. Do not make me regret it.”
“No, sir.”
“Before we close this meeting, there is another condition that was agreed to with your father,” Malcolm said.
Cade froze and threw a quick glance at Gemma. Shit.
“Stephen, you need to note this down for the records.” Stephen bent over his notes, pen in hand, and Cade braced himself. He didn’t look at Gemma at all—he couldn’t. “Cadence MacDonald has also agreed to his father, Trevor MacDonald’s terms, that he take the hand of one of the Castle girls. He will choose one as his mate and fulfil that promise when Aaron has mated and has his firstborn.”
Stephen stopped writing mid-sentence and his head shot up to look at Cade. Cade could almost hear all of Stephen’s silent swearing that was aimed at him in that moment. His expression told him that Gemma wasn’t the only one who was going to get an earful from her brother later on. But Cade’s concern at the moment wasn’t Stephen—it was concentrated completely on Gemma. Her gaze had flown to Cade at Malcolm’s announcement, and the disbelief and hurt that was written all over her face destroyed him. Is this correct?” Malcolm inquired of Trevor.
