Bound (Dark Reflections Volume 1) (3 page)

Brandon had taken to breaking that guideline on a regular basis lately, but I was pretty sure that he was doing so today as a way of making the point that Kaleb valued him a lot more than me. It wasn't a particularly welcome reminder, which was of course exactly why he was doing it.

As we neared the house I tried to determine whether or not anybody was watching us approach. The house looked just like it always did, a massive block of stone and glass. Most of the manor was a single story, the natural result of building such a large structure back before air conditioning had been invented, but even the single-story sections were nearly as tall as a normal two-story house. The vaulted ceilings meant that during more peaceful times it was possible to open up the windows during the night and cool the house down enough that even July summers in Sanctuary were still bearable.

Kaleb had paid to have air conditioning units installed and piped into a number of key rooms sometime before I'd even been born, but by and large they were redundant. Sometimes the gray rock exterior walls managed to look inviting, but this wasn't one of those times. For all of the luxury and comfort contained inside of the manor house, it wasn't really a home. It was more a prison than anything else.

Mallory met us at the entrance to the suite of rooms that Kaleb used as his command center for all things pack-related. As usual she was dressed in dark colors—jeans, a utilitarian top, and a leather jacket. Mallory didn't need piercings and tattoos to look like she could have belonged to some kind of outlaw motorcycle gang.

"Shift back into something less ominous, Brandon. You're scratching up the stonework on the floor."

"What if I don't want to shift back?"

Mallory looked up at Brandon with a bored expression on her face. "Then you're an even bigger idiot than I thought. You've recently asked for a rather large boon from Kaleb, and I expect you're probably here to try and get Alec into trouble with his father. Do you really think that now is the best time to be trying to flex your muscles?"

Brandon bent down until his huge, hybrid face was only inches from Mallory's human features and when he talked it was in a low growl that humans wouldn't have been able to hear.

"I'll play nice right now, but you'd be smart to stop mouthing off to me. You're no match for me and sooner or later things are going to change around here."

Mallory was either a much better bluffer than anyone else I knew, or she really wasn't bothered by Brandon's threat. He was right, in a dominance fight Mallory couldn't hope to beat him. She was a hybrid, and she'd been around long enough to have the skills that came from dozens, if not hundreds, of challenge matches, but while she had manifested a power, it wasn't one that directly improved her odds if she came to blows with Brandon. With anyone else I would have figured that they were just an incredible liar, but Mallory was closer to my dad than any of his other advisors, so it was possible that she knew something that Brandon should be worried about.

I watched as Brandon followed the same trail of logic and I suppressed a small flash of satisfaction at Brandon's frown as he shifted back to human form. It would have been more satisfying if I'd thought that Mallory was a possible ally, that she wouldn't stick a knife into my back just as casually as she'd stick one into Brandon.

Mallory looked us all over and then grunted at Nathanial and Simon. "You two get Vincent to whoever is on medical duty. By the look of him he's going to be down for a couple of days at least, but at least go see if someone can get him back on his feet in time for his rotation down to the border."

Nathanial and Simon nodded unhappily and then headed down the corridor, at which point Mallory made a shooing gesture at James, Jasmin and Jessica. "It's not like we need any extra witnesses or anything. Go find something useful to do or barring that, at least get out of my sight."

Mallory watched until our respective friends had disappeared and then motioned with her head back towards the rooms she'd just exited. "Whoever was on duty saw the eight of you coming this direction fifteen minutes ago so Kaleb is expecting the two of you. He said to have both of you sent to his office."

I filed the information away and nodded. If she'd told us that he wanted one or both of us incarcerated until the next regularly scheduled public audience then it would have been a definite sign that we were headed towards big trouble. Anytime punishment was dished out in a public venue it was because Kaleb wanted to make an example of the offender. That wasn't to say that he didn't occasionally dish out spectacular beatings, literal or otherwise, in private, just that at least in private there was a
chance
that you weren't going to end up bleeding and wishing you were dead.

I waited a second to verify that Mallory wasn't planning on accompanying us in and then started towards Kaleb's office with Brandon only a couple of steps behind me. I didn't make it very far before Mallory stuck her head back into the foyer. "I'm well aware that you've been ducking me for the last few days, Alec. If I didn't have somewhere I needed to be, I'd be sitting you down right now for our session. Don't think that you can keep avoiding me forever."

Kaleb was leaning back in his chair waiting for us as we stepped into his office. I would have said he looked like a successful businessman in his slacks and dark blue polo, but there was something hard behind his eyes, harder than could be explained by just cutthroat business dealings. "Sit down so we can talk like civilized people."

The chairs were leather which meant that it would be relatively easy to clean my blood off of them once I was gone. I sat down and attempted to give off an air of unconcern. Brandon on the other hand looked like he was trying to come up with a way to remain standing or at least to make sitting down appear as though it had been his idea all along.

"I said sit down, Brandon. Trust me, you don't want to turn this into a pissing match."

Brandon frowned again and then nodded and sat down. I hoped that I was managing to keep my astonishment off of my face. Brandon was usually more of a smooth operator than this. Whatever he'd asked Kaleb for must be something he needed pretty badly in order to be so far off of his game.

Kaleb seemed content to wait for one of us to initiate the conversation, but I'd decided on the way down that I'd be best off acting as though I'd done nothing wrong. I hadn't technically violated any of the pack's rules, unwritten or otherwise, so I wouldn't be served by spouting off a bunch of justifications before Brandon had even had a chance to start making his case.

Brandon took a couple of seconds to gather himself and then launched into his accusations. "It's become apparent to me that Alec is directly working against you. He seems to be trying to create a splinter faction inside of the pack, probably in the hopes that he can set himself up as some kind of tin god out in the middle of nowhere."

I revised my estimates of Brandon's ability to lie upwards slightly. He'd put in plenty of qualifiers to cover himself, but I still would have expected his heart rate at least to go up slightly given that he knew I wasn't actually trying to tear the pack apart. Kaleb leaned back and gave Brandon an appraising look.

"I think that I just heard a whole lot of supposition, none of which justifies me taking time out of my day to see the two of you."

Brandon leaned forward with a smile on his face. "This piece isn't supposition, it's fact. Alec interfered with a dominance challenge between Jasmin and Vincent, which is the kind of thing that has always been the domain of pack alphas, not a second- or third-tier hybrid who happens to be your son."

"Interesting. Given that Vincent seems to have come off second best in that fight it would appear that the pack's 'second- and third-tier' hybrids are much more dangerous than I realized. Maybe I should be looking to have the pack expand its territory and spend more time down at the border killing those damn cats if the pack's pool of talent really runs so deep."

Some of my anxiety evaporated. I wasn't entirely out of the woods, but it appeared that whatever hold Brandon might have over Kaleb wasn't sufficient for the older hybrid to just roll over and give him whatever he wanted.

"Well, Alec. What do you have to say for yourself? Brandon's accusation, for all that he's more than likely elaborating on the truth, is a serious one."

"I've done nothing to splinter the pack apart." Mostly because it was already coming apart at the seams. "Furthermore, I in no way acted outside bounds of the position in the pack that my skills have won for me. Vincent lost our last several matches and I found that I didn't like his manner today, it wasn't properly respectful towards one who is clearly his better, so I informed him that I planned on challenging him." All of that had been inferred, even if it hadn't been explicitly stated.

"After he'd already challenged Jasmin!" Brandon's outburst was yet another sign that this meeting wasn't going the way he expected it to.

"I gave him a choice, it was entirely his decision to put off his dispute with Jasmin until after he'd dealt with me."

Kaleb gave me a dark look. "You're walking a very fine line there, Alec, but you're right, technically you've done nothing I can censor you for."

Brandon opened his mouth to protest, but Kaleb kept talking. "You've had your chance to file your complaint, Brandon. Your unhappiness has been noted. You can get out of my office now."

I would have just beaten a relieved retreat, but Brandon stood up and let loose a flash of power that made my skin tingle.

"I'm not some nobody to just be dismissed from your presence like that, Kaleb. My unhappiness can have very long-term ramifications for you and everyone else in the pack."

The natural response for any shape shifter when faced with the kind of metaphysical wind that was lashing out from Brandon was to counter with a surge of energy from our own beasts, but Kaleb was too controlled for that.

"You are a valuable member of this pack, Brandon, but don't think that I've failed to notice the way that you've been politicking lately. If anyone is trying to set themselves up with a power bloc it's you. You're unquestionably the best fighter in the pack, but that doesn't mean that you're irreplaceable, and it doesn't mean that I can't have you put down if you get too far above yourself."

Brandon laughed the threat away. "You just said it yourself. You don't have anyone else in the pack who can beat me. The only reason that you're still running the show around here is that I haven't decided to take over."

"No, I still run the show around here because you're too inexperienced to run things yet and you know it. I'm the pack alpha, which means I can kick you out of the pack at any time with the most threadbare of pretexts. If that happens it's the entire pack against you and while you're really quite good, you can't take on the entire pack at once, not by yourself."

"I wouldn't be by myself. There are people in the pack who would support me over you if it came to that."

"Sure there are, but for the most part they are just a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears kids without much real combat experience. Mallory and I are keeping a very close eye on where the wind is blowing and you're still a very, very long way away from having a chance of pulling off some kind of coup d'état."

"I don't have to overthrow you, I could always just take my people and leave."

Kaleb shook his head. "Let me give you a free bit of advice about these kinds of things. You never get all of the people you think you're going to get. There is always a larger contingent than you think who are happy to talk big, but when it actually comes to striking out, leaving home and going off to establish a brand-new pack they end up chickening out. You don't have anywhere near enough people to actually create a viable pack that would have a chance of holding its territory."

I'd expected Kaleb's remarks to put Brandon even further on his back foot, but if anything he seemed more confident than before.

"It's only a matter of time. Eventually I'll have enough, and then I'll either take this place over, or I'll take my people and leave. Eventually you won't be able to stop me."

Kaleb sighed. "This is the last freebie, kid. There isn't anywhere you can go where you'll be safe if you piss me off. I run the Coun'hij. Do you really think that there is a single pack anywhere in North America that would raise even the slightest fuss if I had your entire pack destroyed? If you continue to work with me I can make it very worth your while, but if you cross me I'll bury you."

Brandon was actually speechless for the first time I'd seen in months. It took nearly a full minute before he shook off the shock. I suspected that he was smart enough to read between the lines and understand that Kaleb was threatening to unleash Puppeteer on him if necessary. Brandon was good, but Puppeteer would swarm him under without even breaking a sweat.

"I understand your position. Does that mean that you're refusing my request from the other day?"

"No, I haven't decided with regards to that yet. I meant it when I said that you'd be rewarded if you work with me, and I understand that on some level rewarding your people is the same as rewarding you, but I'm not entirely sure about this particular reward. There are obviously some…complications with that sort of thing. You're going to have to be patient for a time still."

Brandon shot one last parting comment back over his shoulder as he left. "My patience isn't infinite."

"I'm well aware of that fact."

I started to stand to follow Brandon, but Kaleb waved me back down into my seat and then watched the closed-circuit monitor to verify that Brandon left the suite rather than staying to eavesdrop.

"Close the door, Alec."

While I saw to the door, Kaleb turned on the white noise generator that had sat on his desk for as long as I could remember. I hated the crackle and hum that it created, but it was a necessary evil in a house full of shape shifters if you really wanted privacy.

"What you did today was reckless and I want to be clear that a repeat will be punished very severely."