Carrie Vaughn - Kitty Steals the Show

The Italian wolf bared his teeth and his voice burred like a growl. “Stay out of this!”

“You’re not the one giving orders here, friend.” Caleb didn’t have to growl, or show his teeth, and he still managed to radiate anger. In response, the Italian wolf hunched his back, bracing his shoulders like hackles stiffening.

“Guys, stop it,” I said, putting myself between them, breaking the line of sight. “Everything’s just fine. You don’t really want to start something here, do you?”

People in the restaurant were staring. The maître d’ had been away from her stand, and hovered nearby, gripping her own hands, waiting for a chance to return.

“You want to take this outside?” I said, indicating the doorway.

Of course, no one wanted to be the first one to move, so I did, pushing past Cormac and Ben, then Caleb and his lieutenant, to finally reach the sidewalk outside. I didn’t know how we’d managed to all squeeze into that space. The city air smelled fresh and wild after the closeness inside.

The standoff re-created itself on the sidewalk: the Italian wolves attempting to stare me down, Caleb and his wolf staring them down, Ben and Cormac tensed for some kind of action, and Luis and Esperanza lingering on the edges, cautiously watching. We were all anxious, but no one was resorting to overtly aggressive movement. It should have been comforting—it didn’t matter where we came from, we all spoke the same body language.

I turned to the alpha of the Italian wolves. “What’s your name?”

He hesitated before answering, “I serve the Master of Venice.”

“Oh, come on, what’s that supposed to mean?”

He shut his mouth, pressing lips into a line.

“Okay. Fine. So this warning … is it a generic ‘here be dragons’ kind of warning or is there something specific I need to be looking for?”

He said, firmly, “Don’t meddle. Stay at your conference where you belong. Protect yourself—your pack.”

“My pack?”

“Them,” he said, nodding at Ben and Cormac. “Your friends. Your army wolf.”

Tyler. “He doesn’t have anything to do with this.”

“You won’t get to decide that.”

I stepped up to him. “Is something going to happen? What is it? What do you know?”

He backed away, slouching—he hadn’t meant to push me, I gathered. He didn’t want to fight. He probably hadn’t expected me to stand up to him at all. “I—I don’t know anything. Just … we don’t know what’s going to happen, none of us do. But the situation—it’s dangerous.”

“I already knew that.”

“Please believe me—my Master sympathizes. He only wants to help.”

“I’m not sure he’s the kind of guy I’d want help from,” I said.

Recovering his confidence—his dignity—the alpha wolf bowed his head in a human gesture of respect. “Then I apologize for interrupting your evening.”

He nodded at his two companions, and the trio stalked away, moving gracefully along the street and into the night. We stared after them.

“They must think you’re pretty important to be sending you warnings,” Ben said.

“I think I need to call Tyler,” I said. Not for any particular reason. Just to make sure he was okay. I turned to Caleb and pointed. “And where did you come from? I don’t need you babysitting me, you know.”

“I wasn’t babysitting you,” Caleb said. “I was trailing them.” He nodded down the street where the Italian wolves had turned the corner.

“Then what were they up to, really?”

“Exactly what that alpha said, I think. Some of the vampires want you staying out of things but are polite enough not to actually bump you off. Nice, isn’t it?”

“Real nice,” I muttered. “Now I’m going to be worried about everyone for the rest of the week. Even more worried.” The shadows all held werewolf packs, vampires, fairies. Who knew what else?

“Think we should follow them, gov?” Caleb’s lieutenant said, hands shoved in pockets of his jacket, nodding after the Italians.

“Certaintly,” he said. “Might be educational.”

“You’ll call me if you find anything juicy?” I said.

The two British wolves started down the street after the others. Caleb tipped an imaginary hat at me. “Of course.”

We watched them leave, and the multitude of shadows left my spine prickling.

“This conspiracy needs a flow chart,” Ben said.

“You were right,” Cormac added. He wore the closest thing to a grin I’d ever seen on him. “Amelia thinks this is just fascinating.”

“Great,” I said, and sighed.

Lingering by the wall of the building, Luis and his sister looked like they should have been munching on a bucket of popcorn: wide-eyed, fascinated.

I turned to Luis. “What was that you said? Never a dull moment?”

“I won’t argue,” he said.

“I’m impressed,” Esperanza said. “Handling all those wolves? That big one was actually cowering, I think.”

“It’s either that or get eaten. I’d prefer not to get eaten.”

“Jaguars are solitary,” she said. “Makes it easier.”

She might have been right. We started walking back to the hotel. I dug in my pocket for my cell phone so I could call Tyler and see if he’d gotten any mysterious visits or warnings.

When I looked up after punching in his number, the two Fae women stood on the sidewalk in front of me, blocking the way. Without Cormac’s charm, they really did look like ordinary women, excitable grad students living it up at a conference. Maybe they were that, maybe fairies had a reason to go to school. But I had to remind myself that they were more than they seemed.

And one of them was holding what looked like a tiny bottle, maybe a perfume bottle with a spray nozzle, and she was getting ready to fire.

I stopped and stared, and the rest of my party crowded in behind me. We all froze, the two women crouched like they were about to run away, us gaping in astonishment. Not many people could sneak up on a pack of lycanthropes—and a human with his pockets full of second sight charms.

“Hi,” I said finally, as if they were acquaintances I hadn’t expected to run into.

By their crinkling eyes and widening grins, I guessed that they were about to do something with that perfume spritzer, and that I probably wouldn’t like it. I brought out a little Wolf, hunched up my shoulders, and stepped forward.

“Okay, just who are you guys and why do you keep showing up in my space?”

“Um…” The one with the spritzer hid her hands behind her back. “How ’bout we pretend you never saw us?”

“But—” I stopped again, because a newcomer was standing behind them, and she’d appeared just as suddenly as the first two had.

Tall, striking, she appeared regal despite the patchwork nature of her clothing: scuffed boots, a flowing gypsy skirt, an oversized lumpy sweater, and a faded, lacy shawl. Her golden hair flowed in thick, lush waves down her back. She wore a smile like she knew secrets.

“I’ll take that, thank you very much,” she said, plucking the spritzer out of the young woman’s hand and pocketing it somewhere. “And after all that talk about not causing trouble.”

The two fairies weren’t giggling anymore. One was biting her lip, the other had her hands to her face, flinching and squinting as if expecting a loud noise. They cringed away from the woman—and who was she? I stole a glance back at Cormac for confirmation; he gave me a single nod. So yeah, she was one of them, too. Even more of one.

“Exactly what kind of trouble are we talking about here?” I said. They were avoiding looking at me, and the regal woman had put her arms around them, drawing them close. I had never seen two people look more sheepish.