"Have you given a thought to whom the boy's parent might be? Will she object to his treatment? He is High Born; else he would not mist or shapeshift."
"We will make sure they do not object," Diamond clenched his fists. "The Royal House is all but gone, destroyed by the predations of our Darker cousins and a few, well-placed assassinations, here and there. At the Queen's command, of course."
"Of course," Sapphire agreed. Diamond was firstborn of the brothers, and often acted as assassin for the Queen. Sapphire was next, followed by Ruby and Emerald. Their parents were dead—killed by Baltis' Destroyers. They certainly wanted revenge and would stop at nothing to obtain it. "We will protect our Queen and bring about the downfall of Baltis and all his subjects."
"We strike on Friday, the day before the full moon," Ezekiel informed his werewolf troops. "We know where the groves are and most of the older children are working there. They are our targets. We have no use for the younger ones. Our compatriots, here," Zeke nodded to the two Elemaiya standing in a corner of his trophy room, "will grab the boy they want—he works elsewhere. We'll go in full daylight so we won't be fighting vampires. Pruitt, I want you and Rutherford to go with our guests to take the shapeshifter boy." Pruitt, sitting not far from Ezekiel, nodded his understanding. He and Rutherford were Zeke's most capable and deadly among the rogue werewolves. It was their job to take the Elemaiya down, once they had Ashe in their possession. A rendezvous point had been agreed upon—in Rockport, a small town north of Star Cove. Three boats would be moored there, ready to take the entire party out to a larger ship anchored at sea. Zeke figured the parents and the Grand Master's werewolves might not suspect they'd take them that way, expecting the kidnapped children to be transported by vehicle or plane. Ezekiel had many contacts in the drug world and most of those contacts had a fleet of boats at their disposal.
"What if we meet up with any of Shirley Walker's wolves?" One of Ezekiel's werewolves asked.
"Kill them. I'm handing out the assault rifles. They won't likely be armed if they're nearby. No witnesses, got it? I don't want anybody left alive who can identify any one of you."
"What about me? I can handle a gun just as well as the next person," former Congressman Jack Howard spoke up. "I think I wouldn't mind doing a bit of murder." He cracked his knuckles pretentiously.
"Howard, it amazes me that you could actually convince people to vote for you," Ezekiel snapped. "You'll stay here. You get caught in the states; I won't be forming a posse to rescue any part of your sorry ass. Stay here, you're safer."
"Then take me along to guard the boat while you're off it," Howard suggested. "Surely you can't argue with that logic."
"Fine. You stay with Julio and guard the ship. Julio, if he steps a toe out of line, shoot him." Ezekiel nodded to a grizzled rogue who grinned, showing missing teeth.
"Hey, wait just a minute," Jack Howard huffed.
"Howard, you ceased being important to me when they froze your assets. Right now, you're as useful to me as lips on a chicken. Stay out of my way—you'll live longer. Any questions? You all know the plan?" Zeke looked at those gathered around the room. Nobody said anything. "Good. We'll travel by land to the gulf, through Matamoros. The boats will be waiting for us south of the Las Palomas Wildlife area. Be ready to carry your gear on foot for a little way. We leave tonight."
Chapter 14
"Ashe, I convinced Tony to give me a copy of what you got," Winkler called Ashe to his office after breakfast. Winkler had a copy of the three pages in his hand when Ashe sat in front of Winkler's large desk. "How many of these things can you do?"
"My dad doesn't want me to discuss those things," Ashe said. "And I really couldn't say. I haven't tried most of them." Ashe had been thinking about the one regarding Relocation. When he'd played around with that ability, he'd done it repeatedly, without tiring. The information on the pages made it sound as if the Elemaiya wore themselves out after doing it two or three times, so they held it back for emergencies.
"Kid, this has me worried. Do you think the Elemaiya know exactly what you can do?" Winkler's forehead was creased in a frown.
"I hope they don't know anything except about the bat. That's all Dad will allow, except with Marcus, Marco, Marco's mother and Micah and Greta Rocklin. Well, Nathan, too. And Cori knows. That's it. The rest of them think I'm a wimpy shapeshifter."
"Three years ago," Winkler sighed, "I hoped we'd gotten the leak, after you pegged Paul Harris. Now I'm worried that someone else might have taken over his spot, or was working independently as a spy. It bothers me that somebody seemed to know Wynn would be traveling to Amarillo to visit relatives. And somehow, their mutant creature was headed right for Cloud Chief when he killed that human boy." Winkler stood and raked fingers through his hair.
"You think somebody told him where to look?" Ashe was frowning now. "That he didn't just track us down?"
"Ashe, when you're in this business, you have to look at all possibilities. Honestly, I was keeping an eye on Ben Billings, but he's taken himself out of the game. So, if there is a leak, then it wasn't Ben. Or if he was involved, then he's conveniently out of the way."
"Mr. Winkler, that wasn't Principal Billings. Well, it was him, but he wouldn't do something like that. What if somebody placed compulsion? Forced him to do that? I don't think Dad or Nathan would even consider it. But what about another vampire?"
"Ashe, you read these pages," Winkler held up the copy he had. "The Elemaiya—some of them, anyway—can do that too. But I can't figure out why somebody would tell him to make a challenge."
"Yeah. This is so confusing," Ashe sighed. "And now he's dead. Is this the way it feels?" Ashe studied Winkler's face. "You have someone you consider an enemy, and when he dies under unusual circumstances, it's—just weird."
"Weird is a good word. Mixed emotions best describes how I feel. Billings was old school. He remembered too well the race war between vampires and werewolves. Back then, we were trained to track and kill, Ashe. Weldon and Wlodek knew both races were headed toward extinction. They hammered out a peace agreement. So far, it has held. There are a few on both sides who don't like it, but most of us see the sense in it. We both hold to our own laws, and both races have a law against killing humans. Mostly it's to keep the races hidden. If my sources are correct, the vampires don't place compulsion for unethical reasons. Your father and Nathan are trying to protect you. I know that's a little hard to accept right now, because you have talents that most people only dream about."