Chapter 4
Little Wolf Creek, Winthrop, WA
Niamh Harpe, a lithe six-foot blond blue-eyed panther shifter, looked like she should be gracing the cover of Vogue. Instead, she wore a pair of well-worn grey Carhartt bib overalls and a paint-stained sweatshirt with the University of Washington on the front.
She was in her workshop using a spoon gouge to carve out the undercuts that would outline the forest in the bottom corner of a cedar plank mural. She had harvested the massive plank from a windblown cedar she had come upon on one of her biweekly hunts. Her carving was a labor of love, a nice transition from her regular job as the lead investigator/enforcer for the Kin Council, which governed all species of shifter-kin from California to Alaska.
Jeffery, the little boy she had rescued from Dökkálfar slavers, watched with fascinated eyes as she switched gouges and carved out tiny trees in the forest along the edge. The seven-year-old's time as a slave had dampened his natural exuberance, but some healing from Anna, the hedge witch, had gone a long way toward repairing his psyche. He was still hyper-alert to disapproval, but this morning, he had been brave enough to say he didn't like sunny-side-up eggs.
A major win.
Niamh could tell he was dying to ask a million questions, but Jeffery was a rule follower; slaves knew all about the harsh punishment that followed rule-breaking. Niamh had asked him to keep quiet while she was working, so he just watched.
In the three weeks since his rescue, she had worked out a mutual fostering system with Anna, the Opari Hedge Witch down in Emory. Jeffery stayed with her when she was not on assignment and with Anna when she was gone. Most of the other fourteen rescued children, including Jeffery's sister, were with families in Oldtown. The remaining mundane children kidnapped from Seattle were spell-secreted and returned to their families — traumatized but far better off than they would have been as slaves for the Dökkálfar in Alfheim.
A vehicle crunching on the gravel road outside the shop interrupted her work. She looked out and recognized it as her grandfather's truck.
"Damn, what does he want?"
Niamh sighed and put her knives and gouges away on the shelves, away from curious fingers.
"Come on, Jeffery, let's go greet my grandfather."
Niamh's grandfather, Selwyn Harpe, was a panther shifter in his seventies who looked to be in his forties. A fit man with white hair trimmed short, he had clear gray eyes set deep within their sockets. A scar stretched from the top of the right cheek to the edge of his lips gave him a sardonic grin that was unsettling. According to family legend, the scar was a memento from a hunter's lucky shot during Selwyn's first adolescent shift. The bullet left a mark stretching across his right cheekbone. The shooter hadn't survived to tender an apology. These days, he showed his alpha predator nature by ruling the Kin Council, the body that governed all shifter-kin on the West Coast.
Niamh watched, stone-faced, as he got out of the truck, looked around, spread his arms and breathed deeply.
"Singer and Song bless you, granddaughter."
"And you as well, grandfather," she replied.
"This is a fine place. Your mother would be proud of how well you've kept it up. I see you've added on as well."
"What do you want, grandfather? I'm sure you didn't drive four hours from Bellingham to Winthrop to admire the home place of a woman you absolutely hated when she was alive."
"I will admit that I would have chosen a different mate for your father, but it all worked out in the end. You've turned out to be an excellent addition to the family line. Granddaughter, you need to move to Bellingham and stop this foolishness of living way out here. You need to get rid of the boy; no good can come of you saddling yourself with a mundane."
"Not going to happen, grandfather."
Niamh kept a firm grasp on her temper. To allow herself to be baited by the old man was to lose.
He shifted the conversation abruptly.
"What did you make of the Keeper's boy?"
She laughed. "Well, Lachlan is no longer the Keeper's boy. He is the Keeper. If I had to choose one word to describe him, I'd pick impressive—and I imagine the witches are no happier than you are of that fact."
The old man gave her a sour look. "I should never have let the old man talk me into letting you spend time with those women. You forget your place with your own kind. But never mind that. I tasked you with forming a judgment about him. Tell me."
"Well, I can say that he will be just as much a pain in the ass for you as he is for the witches. Lachlan Quinn goes his own way and does what he thinks is right."
"Is he damaged? Althea told me she thought him unsuitable.
Niamh smiled. "You and Althea are peas in a pod. What you two want is someone you can manipulate to your ends. That person is not Lachlan. Grandfather, you and I don't get along, but we serve the Kin. Do not think about moving against Lachlan. Do not threaten him. I'm warning you for your own good. I saw him take down two adult Sidhe warriors in the blink of an eye."
He scoffed. "You imagine things, girl. I will do what I must to protect the Kin community."
He paused and scowled at Jeffery, who was peering at him.
The small boy ducked his head and quickly moved behind Niamh.
"I've informed Mina about what I'm going to have you do next. I have agreed to pair you with one of Althea's guardians, Katherine Keenan. I think you know her well."
Niamh nodded. She knew Katie very well. As a teenager, she spent summers with her and her sisters when Anna, the Hedge Witch, tutored her. She didn't mention that half of the time had been spent with the two of them, hating each other and fighting over Lachlan Quinn.
"Anyway, I've gotten word that some beings are soul-raping and killing young half-blood females in Oldtown. Rumors suggest the Kin are involved. Our people are allowed to move freely down there, only grudgingly. If it leaks out that one of the Kin Clans has gone feral, all my hard work building bridges will go for nothing. Find out and stop it. This time, maybe you can do it with some semblance of competence, unlike last time when you allowed yourself to be captured like the greenest kit."
The old man glared again at Jeffery, who was peeking at him from the safety of her back. He despised mundanes with a passion—always had.
Niamh waited silently for him to continue. The old man was a master manipulator. She was careful to keep her resentment at his tone from boiling over. The old man knew she did not do well with authority figures. She wondered why he was taking this tone rather than his usual one of reasonable persuasiveness.
He continued, "I want you to get close to this Lachlan Quinn. Make up to him. We may need him down the trail."
"You want me to make up to him?" Niamh was enjoying this. The old man was unsettled. Sweet Mother, he's spooked at something. "What's going on?"
He glared at her. "First of all, we have a mess going on in Oldtown. Next, something or someone stirs up the various Kin Clans. The new Alpha of the Chelan Pack is a perfect example. He is pushing hard for us to move against the Emory Witches and this new Keeper to recover the lands bordering the Opari. There are plenty of reasons to be spooked. Anyway, that is not your business. Just do your job in Oldtown without arguing, granddaughter."
He glared at the little boy again, turned, got into his truck, and drove off.
"I thought grandpas were supposed to be nice. Trudy was always going on and on about her Grandpa and how he told her stories," Jeffery said. "I don't like him. He's scary."
