Page 19 of War Games

“I’ve been working on that myself,” Hasan answered, not looking at his camera. “But, if I find myself out of options, I will have a request for you… and the government you have to work with on occasion. A DNA test… but I want to exhaust all of my options.”

“What about the Mygi Pharmaceutical connections?” I said, hoping for anything. That boy deserved justice. Somewhere, there could be parents wondering where their little boy went and what happened to him.

“I’ve already been working on that, but since much of that information was destroyed, it will probably continue to be a dead end,” Davor said, his words sympathetic. “I’m sorry. I only find references, but the way they did it was well hidden away from Mygi entirely.”

“Callahan and Corissa have been looking into it for years and have been only finding dead ends,” Hasan said, shaking his head. “No reason to be sorry. I know we all want that boy to be given peace. I have never met a child werecat I didn’t know the origin of. I find it just as disturbing as everyone here. There’s one more option after a DNA test, but…”

“I would be unavailable for an entire month,” Subira said. “If nothing else works, I will do that spell. His body is secure, right?”

“I’ve had the fae keep it from deteriorating,” Hasan confirmed. “I went to Alvina for the right fae to do it, not Brion. It’s in the Tribunal in a secure location. Only I’m allowed to access it. They can only go in to refresh the spell with me and Alvina there.”

“An entire month, Mother?” Zuri was the one who dared ask.

“A blood memory spell that will leave me living the boy’s memories for a month,” Subira explained. “Easier to do with family, where I am blood-related, but a species relation is not much more difficult. I couldn’t do it to an unrelated fae, forexample. It would be too difficult. I haven’t cast it in fifteen years, and before that, it had been hundreds. I don’t do it often, and generally, only for my own purposes.”

“I thought you always saw the past dancing on the water’s surface,” Zuri said, curious about our witch mother. It wasn’t often, as we all knew, that Subira talked about real spells and how much magic she could really do.

“I do see visions of the past on top of the water, sometimes even against my own will when I would prefer just to go fishing. I do this spell when I want to look deeper,needto look deeper, for either more understanding or more knowledge. My visions on the water decide themselves many times while this spell is targeted, expanding on my natural ability and helping me control it for a specific use. Took me years to develop. I would teach you, but you never showed an inclination for the sight that I have, so I’m always wary about how the spell will work for you.”

“Oh, it’s fine. Not the type of magic I would prefer to do.”

I understood Zuri. Spending an entire month living out someone else’s life or all of their memories sounded terrible.

“If that’s everything for today, I should go. Expect another email later. I have another meeting with Callahan and Corissa about what the werewolves have been doing. They’ve been active, but we haven’t been able to discuss progress while we’ve also been trying to get these files for everyone.”

“Be home before the sun comes up, please,” Subira said, to which Hasan actually smiled before he said goodbye and disconnected from the call.

“Anything else we want to talk about now that Father is gone?” Zuri asked.

“Not that I can think of,” I said.

Davor and Niko quickly agreed with my sentiment.

“Tell Heath to feel free to ask me for any advice. I’m not a werewolf, but I’ve fought enough of them to tell him anything effective I saw from packs,” Jabari said before he disconnected.

“I guess I’m doing that later,” I said. “Talk to you all later.” I disconnected from my end and looked at Niko.

“That was fun,” I said, giving him a strained smile.

“It was better for me to give him the news than anyone else afterward,” Niko said patiently, shrugging as my eyes narrowed on him. “Including Subira. I know we’re all adults, and we like to do our own things, but Hasan gets more pissed off when everyone knows something before he does. And look, there wasn’t anything for him to say about it. Subira thought it was a good idea and made a point of asking you to work with the werewolves here more than you even considered. Telling him at the same time as everyone else eased the blow.”

“You put a lot of faith into that idea of Hasan,” I said with a soft, frustrated growl. “And you took me off guard.”

“I said I would use my position here to smooth things over about this plan without other werecats. They didn’t even mention the reputation issue involved. That’s a good thing. Let me do this for you and Heath, so you two can handle other important things.” Niko paused, then nodded sharply. “I’m going to look over the list he sent me tonight. I’ll leave on Sunday once I decide the route I’m going to take. Do you mind if I take the plane in Dallas?”

“Go for it,” I said, shrugging. The plane didn’t matter to me, and he clearly wasn’t going to hear my complaints about how he blindsided me in front of the family.

“I’ll visit werecats I know along the route, using it as a chance to tell them about what you and Heath are doing here, which might not surprise them, but they should know. Keep ahead of things. In those conversations, I can ask them to help look into witches near them to ease some of the work off Davor and Dirk.”

“Sounds like a good plan,” I said, letting Niko continue his hunting plan. That’s what it was. He was actively hunting witches who might be involved, and being able to recognize that was integral. It made me realize just how well Hasan actually knew all of us. I was looking into people close by who might represent a danger to me immediately or had before and got away. Niko was searching for rarer prey, witches across the continent who think they’re too far from me to be noticed. Zuri was getting to play with magic while Jabari was gathering what was essentially a special forces group to lead.

“I’ll see you tomorrow with my idea, and I’ll need someone to schedule those flights for me,” Niko said, heading to the door. He was halfway out of the office when he turned around, his eyes no longer human but werecat. “And next time, keep all Dirk and Landon gossip away from the rest of them.”

“Sorry. It was an accident, and I didn’t account for Zuri’s naturally meddling energy putting things together so easily.”

“A mistake we all make every so often,” Niko said, sighing. He didn’t move, though. He lingered in the doorway, drumming his fingers.

“Is there something you need to tell me?” I asked, crossing my arms as I studied him.

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