by Geonn Cannon
“Humans and wolves can indeed come together,” Ari said.
Dale glared at her and playfully kicked her under the blankets. “I’m being serious, puppy.”
“I know, babe,” She cuddled closer and put her head on Dale’s shoulder. “I go for humor when I don’t have the foggiest idea what else to say.” She turned her head and kissed Dale through the T-shirt she was wearing. “I wish I had some big idea to fix things, Dale. I wish I had that hero speech you were hoping for the other night. I don’t. There are always going to be hunters. There are always going to be canidae. We stopped them this time, but someone else is going to show up eventually. We just have to be there to stop them when the time comes.”
“Yeah.” She tilted her head away, exposing more of her neck. “You’re too low, by the way.”
Ari hmmed and moved her head. “Better?”
Dale sank down, pushing the book away with one hand as she pulled Ari to her with the other. “You’re getting closer...”
Ari growled and climbed on top of Dale to get a better angle.
***
The next morning, Ari was woken by a series of very soft kisses on her cheek punctuated by a whispered chant of “Wake up, puppy.” She uncurled her arm from beneath the pillow and reached out blindly to put Dale in a headlock, trying to pull her down to make a counterargument. Dale pushed back and Ari reluctantly opened one eye to see what she wanted. Dale looked excited, but there was a nervousness in her eyes. She brushed the hair back from Ari’s forehead and bent down to kiss her again.
“Good morning, puppy. Get up, we have to go somewhere.”
“It’s the middle of the night.”
“You can clearly see that it’s light out,” Dale said.
Ari grunted and burrowed her face into the pillow. “How important is it?”
“Life and death.” She stood up and swatted Ari’s ass through the blankets. “Get up, my wolf wife, we have a meeting with a lawyer.”
Ari was intrigued enough to get out of bed for that.
Thirty minutes and one shower later, Ari was no less grumpy about being pulled out of bed. An egg sandwich from Skillet helped improve her mood a little, but any gains were immediately soured when Dale pulled up in front of Donald Keech’s office.
“I thought you said we were going to a lawyer, not some ambulance chaser owned by hunters.”
“Trust me, puppy,” Dale said.
Ari followed Dale into the building. Keech was in his office and glanced up at the sound of the bell over the door. He flinched, his shoulders sagged, and he hauled himself up out of his chair to shuffle around the desk with one arm raised to fend them off.
“You get out of here. I have nothing to say to either of you.” He looked at Ari. “I assume you’re Willow, right?”
“You’re smarter than you look.” Ari slipped an arm around Dale’s elbow. “C’mon, babe, we’re not wanted here. Let’s go home.”
Dale shook her head. “No, we need to be here. Mr. Keech, you’re probably very busy dealing with all the men who were arrested in connection with Marin Cardoso’s abduction.”
“And women,” Keech said, aiming a finger at her. “See? See, it’s easy to be accidentally sexist, you assumed they were all men.”
Ari rolled her eyes and wondered if she needed to be present for whatever Dale was planning.
Keech continued. “And no. I’m not as busy as you might think, because apparently free counsel isn’t as appealing to them when the stakes are this high. A lot of them have taken their business elsewhere. And good riddance, honestly. These cases are all losers, and I don’t need the marks on my record. So let them throw their cash away on some flashy suit who can’t do a damn thing for them anyway. No skin off my nose.”
Dale said, “But you’re still in contact with them? The hunters?”
He sighed and flailed his hands in a lazy shrug. “I guess. I’m not going to give you their information so you can go off on some witch hunt.”
“We don’t want you to give us anything,” Dale said. “We want you to tell them something. Arrange a meeting.”
“What?” Ari and Keech said at the same time.
Dale didn’t take her eyes off Keech. “Columbia Center. Tonight, six o’clock.”
Ari said, “Wait, who are we meeting?”
“Whoever is in charge now,” Dale said. “Someone who can make decisions. Tell them they can bring a couple of bodyguards for security if they want, but they should know that we won’t be alone, either. So it’s going to be a nice, civil meeting. Can you do that?”
Keech looked at Ari, confused, but she only shrugged.
“I think I can arrange that. They’re going to want to know why, though.”
“They’ll find out at the meeting,” Dale said, backing toward the door. “Six o’clock. Columbia Center, the Sky View Observatory. We’ll be waiting.”
She left and Ari followed her. “Do you want to fill me in on the plan, Dale?”
Dale stopped in front of the car. “I could. I don’t quite have it all figured out yet. I mean,” she gestured at her temple. “I know what I want to say up here. But it’s not quite all put together in words. I can give you the general--”
“No,” Ari said. “I trust you. Whatever is going on, I trust you.”
“Enough to bring Mom and Milo into a room full of hunters just because I said so?”
Ari didn’t hesitate. “Yep.”
Dale smiled. “You trusting me makes me trust myself.”
“That’s how this marriage thing is supposed to work, I think.” She nodded at the car. “Come on. We have a lot of time until six o’clock and you need to figure out how to say what you need to say. Let’s go to the office. You can bounce some ideas off me.”
“Just like normal,” Dale said. “Just in reverse.”
Ari smiled and got in the car. Whatever Dale was planning, whatever unspoken idea was in her head, Ari had no doubt or hesitation about following where she led.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The Space Needle attracted all the tourists, but Columbia Center was home to the truly unbeatable view of the city. The observation deck was high enough that the neighboring buildings didn’t get in the way, granting unbroken views of the entire city from north to south. Ari walked up to one of the walls of glass and looked out over the water, hands in her pockets as she drifted north. She could see downtown, all the way to Queen Anne and beyond. The sun was just beginning to set, and Elliott Bay glistened with the same brilliance of every downtown building.
Milo came up to stand next to her. “Never thought I’d call somewhere besides London home,” she said, “but this place kind of gets under your skin.”
Ari smiled. “Are you sure my mother doesn’t have anything to do with that feeling?”
“It’s either her or the fish market,” Milo said. “Neck and neck.”
Ari laughed. “I’m still not calling you ‘mom’.”
“That’s it, go to your room.”
Ari bumped her shoulder against Milo’s and turned to face the room. Diana and Lucy were standing by the bar, which was currently unstaffed. Gwen and Dale were close to the elevators, speaking quietly. Ari had a better idea of what Dale’s plan was now, but she still wasn’t convinced it could work. But she had faith. That, along with trust, was enough to get her in the room and to support the big swing they were about to make.
Diana moved closer. “I’m still not sure why Lucy and I are here.”
“Dale will explain everything,” Ari said.
“If she expects me to represent the police in some official manner, I can’t--”
“It’s--”
They were interrupted by the arrival of the elevator. Dale ushered Gwen deeper into the room as the doors opened. Ari motioned for Diana and Lucy to get behind her and Milo. Diana’s cop instinct caused her to hesitate before she accepted she didn’t have the authority in this situation, and she did as she was instructed.
The new arrivals
were mostly men, mostly dressed in dark suits, like someone had a casting call for Secret Agent Douches. They remained by the elevator while the only woman in the group continued forward. She was also dressed in a suit, open at the collar. Her hair was either very light brown or very dark blonde, slicked back against her skull. She stopped a few feet in front of Ari and Dale, put her hands behind her back, and smiled.
“Ariadne Willow and Dale Frye. It’s an honor to meet you both.”
“You represent the hunters?” Dale asked.
The woman inclined her head. “Captain Grace Lang. Air Force. Here unofficially, of course, just like your law enforcement representatives are here as civilians. I was chosen because we understood you would respond better to a female counterpart in... whatever this may be. I’ve been given the authority to hear you out and, if need be, make decisions for the group. We’re all very excited to hear what you have to say.”
Dale stepped forward. “The last time we were this close to war between humans and canidae, it was stopped by a union between a woman and a wolf. They represented hope that the two species could live in harmony. These are very different times. Something so relatively small would never hold the same weight now. Ariadne and I are married, but we don’t honestly believe that will sway any hunters in this day and age. We needed something bigger.
“We needed a pack.”
Ari stepped forward. “My mother was raped by a hunter. I was born a hunter, but made into a wolf. I’ve spent the majority of my life as both. Transforming hurt me, it was agony, because of the genetics I was born into. I’ve been healed of that, but the fact remains that I have a foot in both worlds. Hunter and canidae.”
Dale said, “I’m a human, but reading Magnusson’s essays changed me. Even though I clawed my way back to the surface and found myself again, I know that I’m not the same person I was before those essays. I also have a foot in both worlds. Human and hunter.” She stepped back and held her hand out to indicate Gwen and Milo. “A union between two canidae.” She moved her arm to Diana and Lucy. “A union between two humans.”
Ari said, “Three wolves. Three humans. Representing both sides equally. Dale and I aren’t hunters, but we’ve been irrevocably influenced by them.”
Grace raised an eyebrow. “Not enough to appropriately speak for us.”
“Of course not,” Dale said. “For this to work, we need cooperation. Someone to step in if there’s ever a disagreement between the two sides.”
Val stepped out of the snack bar’s kitchen. “Is that supposed to be my cue? Sorry. It’s surprisingly hard to hear back there.”
Grace looked intrigued. “Valerie Byrne.”
“Daughter of Gabriel Roemer, indoctrinated into the hunter lifestyle. She was raised on a steady diet of hunter logic. And when she grew up, she decided to take that knowledge and use it to help canidae. As a child, she was forced to fight a canidae. She was forced to make an awful decision to survive that day, and she was scarred by what she did. Val took that pain and she turned it into something good. She’s saved countless canidae lives. She will always be a hunter, but she has the trust of every canidae that’s ever met her. She’s suffered at the hands of hunters and at the claws of wolves, and we have faith she’ll be a bridge between the two sides.”
Val looked at Grace. “I won’t advocate for genocide of the wolves. But at the same time, I will never agree to a mass extinction of humanity.”
“I’d call that fair,” Ari said.
“We wouldn’t be a single union,” Dale said. “We’d be a pack. Human, canidae, hunter. The Willow Pack. Dedicated to protecting the peace between the three groups. We stopped Keighley. We stopped Hayden. We stopped Roemer and Gavin. We’re already doing the work, we’re just making it a little more official.”
Grace pursed her lips and lowered her head like a robot processing information. The observation deck was silent until she raised her head again.
“You could have made your little pack without putting yourself at this risk. Why invite us? Why announce yourselves like this?”
“Because this is going to be official and agreed-upon by both sides.” She pointed at the sunset-gilded city outside. “Look out those windows. That is our city. Seattle, all of Washington, and the Pacific Northwest, will be a peaceful zone for canidae. Hunters are allowed, naturally, it’s a free country. But you will be here at the blessing of your wolf hosts and you will treat them with respect when you’re within our borders.”
Grace laughed. “My, my! That is quite a request. And what do you have to offer to make such a huge leap?”
“We won’t build an army.”
Grace’s smile faded. “Pardon?”
“We have Simon Lehner’s book. A book that was once used to raise an army of canidae to rise up against humanity. If you agree to this plan, we won’t post the contents of the book online for any wolf who wants to read it.”
Ari said, “We’ll also release it if the Magnusson essays get posted anywhere.”
“And we will be checking,” Dale added. “Religiously.”
All the humor had left Grace’s expression, and she looked darker, meaner. The sun had also sunk lower and caused the room to dim as well.
“What... exactly... are you proposing?”
“The Pacific Northwest is a safe haven for canidae. Since that’s kind of a vague term, we’ll just say pretty much from Portland north, and everything to the west. Canada included.”
“Cascadia for canidae,” Ari said.
Dale looked at her and said through her teeth, “I thought we agreed to drop that.”
“Oh come on, it’s perfect.”
Dale cleared her throat and looked at Grace again. “It’s basically pretty simple. No hunting within the borders. Canidae will be safe here. Hunters will be safe from canidae if they come into the borders. We all learn how to coexist. And if any issues come up, the Willow Pack will be there to deal with it. Because we always have been in the past, and we’re not going anywhere.”
“How do we know you actually have the Book of Simon?”
Ari and Dale spoke in unison. “Simon is the one who will lead us out of the darkness and into the light!” They both punched the air. “He is Alpha!” Another punch. “The ends will justify! Repenting is for the weak. We do as we must. We do as they do. We do what is needed to survive!”
Grace remained stoic but her face paled behind her makeup.
“In addition,” Ari added, “if any hunter is ever bitten by a canidae - either accidentally or with malice - we will help save their lives.”
Grace hadn’t expected that. “A bite is a death sentence.”
“Not if you agree to our terms,” Ari said. “If they get to us before the first transformation, we can save them. It requires an injection twice a year, but the bitten person will be alive to receive it.”
A few of the bodyguards looked shaken. Ari assumed they all knew someone who had been bitten.
“Nothing has to change,” Dale said. “Not on the surface. Any hunters who live here are welcome to stay here and go about their lives. But they cannot kill. They will not hunt. They will not recruit or attempt to indoctrinate their children into lives of hate and fear. No hunter will thrive within the Pacific Northwest. Because the simple truth is that canidae will never be completely wiped out. Canidae will never eliminate every hunter out there. All we want to do is prevent a whole lot of unnecessary pain and suffering for individuals on both sides.”
Grace turned to look at the men who had arrived with her. They had grown less robotic the longer the speech went on, and now they looked positively stunned. They were watching Grace carefully, which implied she really was the person with the final say. She looked at the group in front of her again.
“Keighley is dead. Gavin is dead. Roemer and Hayden are in prison. And here you stand in front of me, not just unharmed but thriving. Ariadne Willow and Valerie Byrne, you should have been legacy hunters. Dale Frye, you should have been a valuable convert.
Gwyneth Willow, you have been a thorn in the side of hunters for the past three decades, and we are quite convinced that you’re responsible for a black hole in our finances that we’ve never been able to locate, let alone plug. And if what you say is true about a cure for a canidae bite...”
She took a deep breath and examined each woman’s face in turn.
One of the men said, “Captain...”
She held up a hand, which immediately silenced him. “As for the rest of the world?”
Dale said, “We’re only negotiating for the P... for Cascadia.” She looked at Ari, who smiled proudly back at her. “Word will spread, I’m sure. If we prove that it can work here, it can work other places. And our pack will prove to hunters and canidae alike that we can live together in peace.”
Grace squared her shoulders and stepped forward. She held out her hand.
Dale turned and looked at Gwen. She’d been fighting longer than any of them, suffered more than any of them, and it was her actions that helped make the Willow Pack possible. She came forward slowly, looking at Ari and Dale in turn before she continued on. She stood in front of Grace Lang and met her eye. She held out her hand, gripping Grace’s forearm. Grace smiled and gripped Gwen’s arm in kind.
“Your terms are accepted,” Grace said.
“We have an accord,” Gwen confirmed.
Grace nodded. They held the gaze, their grips tight, and then released at the same time. Ari looked at Dale, who looked stunned. Ari went to her and put a hand on her shoulder to keep her upright. Dale looked at her like she wasn’t sure what had just happened, and Ari smiled at her.
“Now that’s a damn hero speech,” Ari said and pulled Dale to her for a hug.
Epilogue
She was naked again. Of course.
Ari stood and slumped against a tree, arms crossed in front of herself as she caught her breath and looked around for clues about where she’d ended up. Thick forest all around, a muddy trail, the scent of water nearby and the sound of a cruise ship... she was north, west, and... Queen Anne Greenbelt. The wolf had taken her away from the drug-infested area and the homeless encampments. She managed to orient herself with the sun and headed off the trail.
