Page 39 of Bitter Discord

Lonan and Marcia were the only ones who didn’t join. Lonan looked openly disgusted, and Marcia was deeply offended.

I’ll have to smooth her ruffled feathers later. Lonan might be a lost cause. He’s probably here to cause trouble.

“Thank you,” Zuri called out, raising her hands and motioning for the applause to come to an end. “Jacky is very good at inspiring words. She’s a ‘speak from the heart’ type, so don’t expect them to be her last this week.” She put her hands down, looking at Roland. “I hope that answered your question.”

“It started to,” he said, smiling a little.

“Well, let’s keep this as our topic of the day. There’s more to cover.”

“Like the fact that the BSA has a mole who tried to spy on our family for the witch family. We don’t know if the person was related to them and have been unable to uncover records about it.”

“Who’s been working on that?”

“Heath and his pack, though from a distance. Clearly, finding a mole in a human organization that prides itself in outing supernaturals and controlling us with human laws isn’t easy and should be done carefully.”

“The Tribunal has been looking into it as well,” Zuri added. “Your werewolves and the Tribunal werewolves aren’t on speaking terms, so there’s no way to coordinate the two efforts. Any way we can fix that so they can work a little faster?”

“No, there’s no way to fix it right now. Blame Callahan. He’s an asshole who told Heath he had to break his pack and send them to others, including Landon. It was a bad play on his part, and he paid for it.” I gave her a look. There was a part I was leaving out, but it didn’t need to be said. Callahan would have given Heath whatever pack he wanted if he left me.

Heath made the decision I had trusted him to make and that no one else believed in.

“Again, the werecat ruling family, Hasan’s pyramid of nepotism, makes decisions about how things should be handled and by whom without consulting anyone else in the species,” Mason said, drawing everyone’s attention. “We allow werewolves and the Tribunal to take point on an investigation… as if we need any of them.”

I had forgotten about the quiet southern man. He sat in the back close to Hannah, unmoving. I had been focused on other faces and hadn’t seen his reaction to my rant at Marcia. When Marnar and Abraham had stood, they had blocked my line of sight of him.

“If you want power, come and take it,” Zuri challenged confidently, more than a little smug.

“And be butchered like my brother?” he growled. “No, thank you.”

“Who…” I didn’t mean to say that out loud. I should have known if someone here was related to a detractor of the family.

“I would like to know that as well,” Zuri said. “Who was your brother? When did we supposedly butcher him?”

“His name was Carter.”

Zuri didn’t seem to know who Mason was talking about, but I did. I recognized the name, and when it was paired with the rhetoric he had just spewed, I put the connection together easily.

“Carter… one of Mikkel’s conspirators?” I watched Mason closely as he stood.

“That’s right. My brother helped Mikkel stand against power… your power. Your father’s power. Instead of listening to what Mikkel was trying to tell you, your family hunted them down and butchered them.”

“I think you’re missing the part of the story when they invaded my territory with a group of werecats and took me hostage.” I didn’t like this. I hadn’t known any one of them had family still living.

“He’s purposefully ignoring it,” Zuri said blandly. “He would have to admit his brother wasn’t peacefully trying to disagree with the family. His brother was helping hold us hostage through blackmail and the threat they would behead you if we didn’t listen. Mikkel and his group acted as terrorists and traitors, jumping straight to an act of war. They were treated fairly in that regard and given clean deaths on the battlefield. We didn’t torture them for more information. We didn’t hunt down their families. We killed them. Sit down, Mason.

“If Mikkel deserved to lead, he would have defeated my father. Instead, he lost, even though he blew up a house on top of two of my brothers, keeping Niko and Hisao out of the fight.” Zuri smiled, but it wasn’t a smile at all. “But yes, tell me more about how we unfairly butchered your brother while you willfully ignore that he and his co-conspirators tortured and starved my sister.” Her words ended contorted with snarls, her eyes blazing with fury.

Hannah came up, grabbing Mason’s shoulder. He snarled at her, and she returned it, pulling him back.

“Let’s stay on topic. I don’t think there’s a werecat in this room sympathetic to you, Mason. Your brother is dead, and that sucks. I knew one of that group, too. Her name was Lani. I’m sorry she’s gone, but she played a game, and she lost. I don’t like their family. My father doesn’t like their family, but when you play games of war with them, you have to be in it to win or die.” Hannah shoved him into the wall, proving she was the stronger werecat. “Everyone knows that.”

“I knew Fiora,” Ysabel added. “I didn’t like her, but I knew her.”

“Sam and I fought in the war together at some point,” Roland said, including his own relationship into the mix. “He knew better. He knew how the family would fight. He knew how they would respond to taking one of their own hostage. He was stupid enough to do it anyway and still failed with all his knowledge of how they worked. I’ll miss the man, but he was foolish for involving himself in that plot. Just like your brother, Lani, and Fiora.” Roland stood and stretched. “The truth is, we let them get this powerful, and sure, they make their mistakes, but Hasan also kept us from being wiped out in Europe, which would have led to us dying out everywhere. We need the ruling family. They’re the only family to survive as long as they have and remain as powerful as they are. Most of the time, they stay out of our hair and let us live our lives.”

“And the nepotism?” Mason demanded, his face red with embarrassment and anger. “You think she deserves to be backed by the rest of them? She’s sleeping with a werewolf every night. You know, the species that tried to wipe out werecats in Europe and the rest of the world.”

“Would you have been brave enough to face a coven of witches to save a werewolf pack?” Zuri asked. “Would you have recognized the danger the situation presented to all the moon cursed or the continent?”

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