Now they were frowning.…

A throat cleared to my far right, and my head swiveled so fast and hard I heard one of my own vertebrae pop. My focus snagged on a single dark beak as it Shifted almost instantly into the creased lips and chin of the oldest thunderbird I’d seen yet. She had thick white hair halfway down her back, and her hands were even more wrinkled than her face, but her eyes shone with shrewd intelligence.

“You insist that Calvin Malone is willing to compromise his honor for success in war. What evidence can you give us that you are not, in fact, doing that very thing?”

Why did they always use his full name? Did they think that was how all humans addressed one another? By both names? Or did they run the whole thing together in their minds, as if it were all one word? Like their own names…

“You’re asking why you should believe me instead of him?” My heart thudded in my ears when she nodded. I’d never delivered a more important argument than the one I was about to launch. Never before had so many lives depended on what I said next.

No pressure, Faythe…

“You should believe me because I stand to gain nothing from this except what we had before Malone interfered—the peace to assemble our troops in private and avenge my brother’s murder. I’m not asking you to attack my Pride’s enemies for us. Or to kidnap and deliver any members of his Pride to give us a political edge. Or to give up justice for your own dead by launching an attack against the wrong people. But Malone asked for all of that. He used you. Hell, he’s probably laughing at you right now.”

Okay, he was probably too busy plotting our destruction to literally laugh about the wool he’d pulled over the Flight’s eyes, but my point stood. They’d been played.

And finally, they looked mad.

“If you’re telling the truth, Calvin Malone must pay for his deception,” a disembodied voice called from overhead.

My brows rose, but I didn’t bother glancing up. “If I’m telling the truth?”

“We can no longer trust the unsubstantiated word of a werecat.” This statement came from my left, from a young female bird, whose dark-browed scowl was genuinely scary. “You will bring us proof.”

Proof. Shit. If I had that, all our problems would be over! “You didn’t ask Malone for proof.…”

“We are disinclined to repeat our mistake.”

Another scratchy voice spoke up, but I whirled too late to catch the speaker. “You will bring us evidence in two days.”

Two days! I glanced desperately from one impassive face to the next. “My whole Pride could be dead by then!” Though hopefully they’d take the thunderbird contingent with them. “You have to call a ceasefire.”

“No.” Short, simple, and spoken by the bird who’d begun this whole weird interrogation. “We will not stop the attack without proof that your people are innocent.”

A growl began deep in my throat, and it took me a long moment to contain it. “If you don’t call a ceasefire, I have no reason to go looking for your proof. What would I have to go home to?”

For a moment, there was more silence, as the birds conferred, cocking their heads at one another, and glancing from face to face. And finally they seemed to reach a mute consensus. “We will halt the attack against your Pride until you return with your proof. In two days.”

Relief surged through me, cool compared to the flames of fear and anger licking at my heart. I’d bought time for the rest of my Pride—assuming they hadn’t already launched their offensive. But my relief was short-lived.

“What kind of proof? And how the hell am I supposed to get it? I don’t suppose you have a car I could borrow?” Otherwise, it could take me two days to climb down their damned mountain and find the nearest form of public transportation.

“No. How you get this proof is not our concern, and we don’t care what form it takes, so long as it is irrefutable.”

Great. And staggeringly vague. “Well, then, I guess we should get going. We’re burning time.”

“The child stays,” said a firm, deep voice from behind me, and that time not only did I turn, but I turned Kaci with me.

“No. She goes with me, or I won’t go.”

A new voice joined the argument, from overhead again. “You will go alone, and be back in two days, or we will kill the child.”

Sixteen

Kaci whimpered and clung to my arm.

Fresh rage and terror shot through me, singeing what was left of my nerves. Obliterating my patience. “No!” I shouted, and every muscle in my body went so suddenly, completely taut I couldn’t move. “Kaci has nothing to do with this. Where’s the honor in slaughtering an innocent teenager?”

“The honor lies in protecting our interests and avenging our dead,” some faceless voice announced. I’d given up looking for the speakers. “The girl is merely your motivation.”

“But she’s just a kid!” And for once, Kaci was too terrified to insist that she was nearly grown.

“She is not our child.”

My blood ran cold, chilling me from the inside out. Were they serious? Did they care about nothing but their own people? What about right and wrong? Good and bad? And I’d thought Malone’s moral compass veered left of true north! Evidently thunderbirds had no concept of morality!

But I knew from Kai that they observed their own code of honor obsessively, even if it didn’t fall into line with mine. Or anyone else’s. Once they’d made a promise, they’d stick to it. And they’d vowed to try to protect the south-central Pride’s tabbies.…