Varian’s eyes widened in alarm. “We will stand between you,” he repeated, and glanced at me.
Case followed his look and frowned.
“She’s going to need another set of armor,” the assassin observed, and I wanted to ask her whose fault that was.
You’re the one who let yourself get shot...
As if I had a choice.
Next time, run faster, Stepyan suggested.
I rolled my eyes, and Varian curled his lip in a wolf grin.
“I might not be able to hear you,” he said, “but I know your pack speaks with you.”
I shot a glance at Mack. “When you’re ready,” I muttered and he arched his eyebrows.
Varian snorted.
Ignoring me, Mack signaled Varian to move the lupar squad into position, and the wolf second yipped at his people. They slid around us, making the assassins grow tense, and doing nothing to improve how happy I was with the situation.
“Ready,” Varian reported, and Mack’s eyes grew distant.
“When you’re ready, Tens.’
Silver light shimmered around us and we dissolved from the station’s reception area. We reappeared in an office I’d hoped to never see again—with a growl echoing through my ears that I’d never wanted to hear repeated.
Mind you, I had also not wanted to materialize nose to chest with the lupar captain, either.
We moved simultaneously, him to draw his blaster and grab me by the throat, and me to drop below his grasp and roll to one side. This would have worked out a whole lot better if the lupar hadn’t been packed so tight around us.
Tens was swearing a blue streak in my head, and Mack had already cocked his fist. Varian turned to grab the captain—and what penalties that particular maneuver might hold, I didn’t want to know—and things were rapidly going south, when the cub’s voice came over the office intercom.
“Papa!”
That single word was echoed by two shrill yips from the cub’s she, and the captain hesitated. The lupar soldier whose boots I’d fetched up against, reached down and grabbed me by the collar, dragging me behind his back and out of the captain’s reach.
I stayed there, tucked between his armor and the bookcase against the wall, and I waited.
Varian dropped his hands and cleared his throat, and Mack, Case and Stepyan stood as still as stone, their muscles tense as they prepared to defend themselves.
“Papa!” the cub’s voice snapped out again, more an order than an appeal.
The wolf captain looked around as the viewscreen at the end of the office came alive. I watched as his cub moved to center himself in the screen, his she moving to stand beside him. She twined her hand through his and he looked up at his father, his small muzzle curling.
“Did you send them?” the cub demanded, and the wolf captain gave him a startled glance.
It was as if he’d never been spoken to like that before. Instead of the anger I’d expected, he smiled, looking the cub over carefully.
“They hurt you?” he asked, and the cub cocked his head.
“This crew saved me,” he told the captain, “and the Rennet’s World wolves were too busy with their other captives to reach us.”
His voice darkened. “It was only a matter of time.”
“Other captives?” the captain asked.
“The insect and spider people,” the boy explained. “I do not know what they are called.”
“Vespis and Weavers.” The words were out before I could stop them, and the wolf captain turned.
Well, fuck. I didn’t bother trying to run. The door was on the opposite side of the room and the corridors full of lupar assholes. I had nowhere to go and no way to get there. At least I remembered to keep my head low as he moved the squad member aside.
“You,” he growled, and I hunched, dropping my hand to where my blaster should be.
It wasn’t, of course. The damned thing had been holstered on my armor and the damned asshole assassins had removed it with the rest.
The nearest asshole assassin shot me a dark look. Stepyan...and he wasn’t impressed. I thought about apologizing and then decided I didn’t need to.
“I’m the one who had you teleported unarmed.” That voice was Mack’s and it had the same mild tone he used when he was trying to tell me something but didn’t want to say it out loud.
Man, I wished he’d just spit it out.
“I figured you were less likely to get yourself killed if I brought you down unarmed and unarmored.”
Oh, he had, had he? I went to lift my head and look the wolf captain full in the face, only to discover Rohan perched inside my head controlling the movement centers for the muscles I needed. He snickered when he saw I’d noticed.
“Captain’s orders,” he told he, sounding far too pleased with himself.
The wolf, in the meantime, crouched down in front of me and curled his forefinger under my chin. Rohan eased up enough the wolf could move my head, but I couldn’t wrest back control.
“Pig-sucking bastard,” I muttered, and then gasped. I managed to close my eyes, but couldn’t curl up on myself as fury flashed through the wolf captain’s eyes.
Stepyan chuckled, drawing his attention.
“The crewman keeping her still forgot to close her mouth,” the assassin explained. “She was swearing at him, not you.”
The captain studied him for a long moment, and Stepyan returned his gaze, but somehow respectfully enough to not have his throat torn out. I wondered how the assassin managed it.
“Practice,” he told me, and didn’t tell me when he’d had the time or reason to put that kind of time in. ‘Not your business.”
I wanted to argue that it very much was my business, but the warmth of the wolf’s breath on my cheek had me freezing all over, again.
“You saved my son?” he asked and Rohan released me to I could nod.
“And his she?” Again, a nod seemed
