Page 67 of Blood Bearon
A cloud of steam formed around her face as Rachel blew out air from her nose. “You’re sorry for not telling me you intended to kill someone. But you’re not sorry about wanting to kill Korred?” she asked, her tone as frigid as the air around them.
Khove’s own anger rose to match hers. “Of course, I’m sorry about that,” he snapped, sending Rachel back a step, in surprise. “How can you ask such a question? I’m incredibly sorry it’s come to this. Do you haveanyidea how many friends I’ve buried in the past four months? How much my family has lost? The pain we’ve suffered and that we carry around on a daily basis. Do you?”
She started to respond but he wasn’t finished.
“I would just as soon not be responsible for more of the same,” he ground out, pulling himself up to his full height. “You have to understand something, Rachel. We are not like you. We are not human. I look it, but I’m not. We have a different society, different rules and customs. We don’t live by yours. Death is the only justice in our world.”
He unclenched fists he hadn’t realized he’d been holding and forced himself to walk back and forth. Rachel, to her credit, stayed silent this time.
“If Korred were to be spared, there’s so much more to it than you can understand. It would bring about more death. More pain and loss. Not just for the innocent humans that would be affected by his actions, but to my family. To our rivals.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked, and he could see the confusion writ on her face.
“Our politics rarely spill over into your world,” he explained. “But the other Houses, Canis, Raptere, Panthera, they would see us as weakened. Unfit to rule, if we let someone like Korred go, after all the death he’s inflicted upon us. They would come for us. For our holdings, our lands. And we would be forced to fight them. More would die, because Ursa wouldnevergo down without a fight.”
“Then we would arrest them too,” Rachel said, but he could tell she didn’t believe it.
“Right,” he scoffed. “Rachel, we’ve lost over 100 of my brothers and sisters since Korred first instigated the uprising four months ago. How many arrests have you made for that?”
She gasped at his statement. “100?”
“At least. I don’t even know the final count,” he admitted. “It hurts too much to know. How many of those did you know about? How many of our rivals did you arrest? None. Because youdon’t know about it.”
“Khove, I am so sorry,” Rachel said. “I truly am. But I cannot just let you cold-bloodedly murder someone. I can’t have that on my conscience, do you understand?”
“I’m not thrilled about it either,” he admitted. “But I understand why it must happen. Still, perhaps in the meantime we can accept a truce between us? Finding him and stopping him is the most important now, we must do that before he hurts anyone else.”
Rachel didn’t reply right away while she considered his proposal. It was the best Khove could offer her. He had no intention of letting her take Khove into custody, but if she could accept that he meant to at least consider the idea while they found him, then he would have to accept that burden as well.
Just another weight of responsibility that leadership had to bear. Already, he hated it.
“I don’t like it,” she said at last, holding up a gloved hand before he could protest. “But I don’t have a better plan. Like you said, protecting the town is the most important thing in all of this. Korredmustbe stopped.”
He nodded in agreement.
“Speaking of which, any ideas?” she asked, clearly wanting to move beyond the subject of Korred’s death.
“Nothing,” he admitted.
“Great. What about any of your family? Can they help? The more manpower the better. The Sheriff’s office is stretched pretty thin these days.”
He shook his head. “No. They are at the Manor, manning its defences, protecting it against the attack we know Korred is building toward. There’s not much to deploy to Plymouth Falls.” Khove shrugged. “You’re going to have to make do with me.”
Rachel’s mouth twisted into a ghost of a smile. “Well, it’s not much,” she said, caution underlying the joking tone. “But I suppose I can make it work in a pinch. Let’s get to work.”
Khove didn’t respond verbally, simply inclining his head, but internally his heart was soaring at the lighthearted attempt at banter. It wasn’t much to go on, but perhaps there was a chance they could sort this out after all.
Maybe.
33
“Why are we here?” she asked as Khove directed her to park in front of the local animal clinic. “Are you sick?”
All she got in return was a glare from two silvery-gray eyes beneath drawn eyebrows.
“What? I thought that was a good one,” she muttered.
“You should have asked me if I had rabies before you kissed me,” he fired back.
