Shift

Kai stared back steadily. “That is not our concern.”

“It’s in the interest of justice,” I insisted. “If you guys value honor so highly, shouldn’t you be interested in justice?”

“For Finn? Yes.” The bird nodded without hesitation, his good hand hovering protectively over the open wounds on his torso. “That is our only motive. For you? Not in the least.”

“But you’re not getting justice for…Finn?” I raised my brows in question, and he nodded. “…if you’re attacking the wrong Pride.” Not that I was trying to pin the tail on another cat. I was just trying to get the name of our accuser. “Right?”

Kai actually seemed to consider that one. “I agree. But that’s not my call.”

“Whose call is it?” My father stepped up to my side. Marc was our backup, a constant, silent threat.

“The Flight’s.”

I frowned, uncomprehending. “So who decides for the Flight?”

Kai scowled at my ignorance. “We do.”

“All of you?” I couldn’t wrap my brain around it. Without a leader—someone to spearhead the decisionmaking process and keep the others in line—how could they function?

My father had gone still, and I couldn’t interpret his silence, or his willingness to let me continue questioning the bird on my own. But I wasn’t going to complain. If I messed up, he’d step in. “What if you disagree? Isn’t there some sort of…pecking order?”

The thunderbird nodded reluctantly. “It is only invoked in extreme cases.”

“Like this one?” I spread both arms to indicate the bird’s assault on our entire Pride.

That time Kai smiled, showing small, straight teeth he hadn’t possessed in bird form. “We were unanimous about this.”

I shook my head as if to clear it, and my hands curled into fists. “You unanimously decided to hold an innocent child responsible for an unfounded allegation of murder that has nothing to do with her? How is that honorable?”

The prisoner’s expression twisted into a mask of contempt. “We would not have hurt the child, even if she is our natural enemy. Nor would we have hurt you, if it could be helped. Finn was killed by a male cat, and in exchange for that information, we also agreed to try to remove the female cats from your encampment before the true melee begins.”

Melee?! Were these ninja birds? Green Berets with feathers?

My father went stiff on the edge of my vision, and Marc growled at my back. And for a moment, I was actually too surprised for words. But then indignation surfaced through my shock, singeing my nerve endings with infant flames of anger. “You agreed to remove us?” I turned to my father before the bird could answer. “I told you it was Malone.” He’d initially tried to get his paws on Kaci through political maneuvering, and when that didn’t work, he’d breached our boundaries to take her by force. My brother Ethan had died defending her, and Kaci’s blossoming sense of security was shattered. As was her confidence in our ability to protect her.

“I think she’s right, Greg.” Marc stepped between us and I could see that he wanted to put an arm around me. But a public display of affection would be unprofessional in front of the prisoner. Even simply comforting me would make me look weak.

My father nodded, convinced. Then he turned toward the bars. “You have no phones? So how can we get in touch with your Flight?”

That cruel smile returned, though this time it seemed less confident. “You can’t. They can only be reached in person, and even if I told you where to go, you couldn’t get there on your own. And in this shape—” he lifted his broken arm, jaw clenched against the pain “—I can’t take you.”

“Then how did Malone do it?” I demanded, stepping close enough to touch the bars. I wanted to wrap my hands on them, shake them in anger. But I knew from experience that they were too strong to rattle, and that gripping them in my current state of desperation would make me look like the prisoner rather than the interrogator. Especially since he currently had the upper hand. And damn well knew it.

“If you mean our informant, he was never in our nest. Our search party found him with Finn’s body.”

“How did you make a deal with him, if you weren’t all there to agree?” Marc asked, and I was relieved to realize I wasn’t the only one who didn’t understand this hive mentality thing the birds evidently had going on.

Kai shrugged again. “We function as a unit. A promise from one of us will be honored by all.”

“So, if we were to convince you of our innocence, you would promise to stop dive-bombing our toms, and the rest of you would honor that promise?” I could work with that. I was good at convincing.…

But Kai shook his head, and his lips tightened beneath another grimace of pain. “I cannot offer my word in contradiction to a standing agreement. Even if I wanted to. It would dishonor my Flight.”

Damn it!

My father turned away from the thunderbird without a word and headed for the stairs, which was our signal to follow. On the third step he paused and glanced at me over his shoulder. “Feed him, then close the door, but leave the window open.” Which would make us look merciful for the moment, and ensure that we’d get maximum effect out of closing it later, if we had to.

I nodded, and as my father left the basement, I turned back to the caged bird. “Do you eat normal food? People food?”

He grinned nastily. “I don’t suppose you have fresh carrion?” None that we were willing to let him eat. My stomach churned at the very thought.

But Marc only smiled coldly. “Personally, I feel more like poultry. Extra tasty crispy.”

Six

“No one leaves the house in groups smaller than three,” my father said, and I groaned on the inside, though I acknowledged the necessity. We’d had similar manpower restrictions in the Montana mountains during my trial, thanks to the psychotic band of strays trying to forcibly recruit Kaci. But at least then we’d been able to fight back.

Unfortunately, we had no idea how to fight the thunderbirds, and no way of knowing when or where they’d strike. And we could neither chase nor track them. We were out of our comfort zone and out of our league, unless we could find a better way to defend ourselves. Or a way to contact Kai’s Flight.

“And if Kaci’s with you, make that four,” my father amended, as his gaze fell on the young tabby pressed so closely against me I felt like I’d grown an extra four limbs.

We’d assembled in the living room this time, because it was bigger than the office and because this was a mandatory briefing for every cat on the ranch. My dad had left the door open, to make it easier for those in our makeshift triage center to hear. They’d carefully lifted Charlie into Ethan’s bed, after stabilizing his neck as the doctor had instructed. Ideally, he’d have been left where he landed until Dr. Carver could examine him, but it was too cold on the ground to leave him there, and none of us were safe outside at the moment. With all the questions still unanswered, that much was clear.

I sat on the couch, smooshed between Kaci and Marc. Jace sat on Kaci’s other side. Around us, the room was full of toms and Alphas, though only Blackwell sat, in the white upholstered armchair. The old mule looked like he was about to collapse, and only sheer stubbornness kept his spine straight. Well, that and outrage over our latest crises.

Rage buzzed throughout the room, and the word shock didn’t begin to describe our bewilderment over the sudden invasion from above.

“Although, Kaci…” my father continued, his voice stern but gentle, “I think it’d be better if you stay inside for a while.”

Kaci nodded mutely. I could only imagine how she must have felt. A few months earlier, she’d been a normal thirteen-year-old, largely ignored by her older sister and crushing on human boys her own age. Now she was priceless, when she’d once been common. Coveted, when she had once been merely accepted. Fragile compared to those around her, in spite of her exponential gain in strength, when she’d once been considered strong and healthy for a girl her age.

Everything had changed for Kaci, and she had yet to find balance in her new life. Peace and acceptance of her past would be difficult to come by when someone was always trying to snatch her from her home.

Especially this most recent attempt.

“Here’s what we know.…” All gazes tracked my father as he began to pace across the center of the room. “The thunderbirds think we killed one of their young men.” He held up one hand for silence when questions were called out from all over the room. “We’ll get to the particulars of that in a moment. But first, the bird Owen captured is named Kai. No last name—they don’t use them.”

“How do they tell one another apart?” my uncle asked, leaning against the far wall next to a morose and silent Ed Taylor. Jake’s family would not have time to truly mourn him until life returned to normal, and no one was willing to hazard a guess on how long that would take.

My dad shrugged. “My theory is that there are too few of them to necessitate repeating names.”

“Or they have a bunch of names,” I suggested. Dad started to frown at me, but I held up a hand to ask for patience. “I’m serious. They keep themselves completely set apart from human society. If we did that, even with our relatively large numbers, including the strays—” Blackwell scowled at that, but I ignored him “—would we need last names? We can tell at a single sniff what family a fellow cat is from, and if we didn’t live and work within the human society, why would we need last names?”

To my surprise, though Blackwell still scowled, everyone else actually seemed to be considering my point. “All I’m saying,” I continued, aiming my closing statement at Blackwell, “is that just because they only have one name apiece doesn’t mean there aren’t bunches of them. If their population was really that small, would they risk picking a fight with us?”

“Okay, that’s a valid point,” my father conceded. “We’ll hold off any assumption about the size of their population until we have further information from Mr.…Kai.”

“Did he give you anything useful?” Blackwell tapped his cane softly on the carpet.