“Mace,” the boy muttered, turning his head to give Virgil a quick look before hiding his face again.

“Our mischief-maker is Zane Coyotegard.”

The Coyote grinned at Jesse, revealing a missing tooth.

“And this is Maddie,” Kenneth Stone said, his hand on the blood prophet’s shoulder.

“That one was a stray too?” Virgil’s amber eyes held flickers of red.

The men hesitated. Jesse sucked in a breath.

“What we did was wrong in the eyes of the law but right in terms of the heart,” Kenneth said.

“I helped her hide,” Mace said.

“We all helped,” Charlee said, reaching for Maddie’s hand.

“The young man wasn’t wrong about the belt,” Evan said. “The child was reported missing. The whole neighborhood was searching for her. When we found her hiding with our children … The welts and bruises told a different story from the tearful parents pleading for help in finding her.”

Kenneth took up their story. “We began to wonder when they didn’t have a single photograph of her to put on TV. The people claiming to be her parents weren’t Intuits, and she’s …”

“We know what she is.” Tolya gave the men a smile that bordered on terrifying. “We can tell by her scent. Unlike the rest of you humans, her kind doesn’t smell like prey.”

Kenneth swallowed hard. “We’d already been planning to leave. It was a human town, and the children couldn’t always hide their true natures. When we left, we smuggled Maddie out and took her with us.”

“I did not believe the parents’ tears,” Evan said. “I did believe the child’s desperation not to be found. I felt, and still believe, Maddie would not have survived much longer in that house.”

Silence. No one spoke. No one moved.

Finally, Tolya said, “What work can you do?”

“I am a priest,” Evan said. “I have worked in several Universal Temples. Kenneth is a teacher.”

A sound of disgust came from one of the Simple Life women.

Virgil bared his teeth at the woman, effectively discouraging her from making another sound. Then he studied Mace. “You know how to shift, pup?”

Mace nodded.

“You remember living with a pack?”

Mace gave Virgil a defiant look. “This is my pack.”

Throughout the whole exchange, Joshua’s focus never left Maddie. “A place with no memories, no stain of darkness. In a clean place, birds return to sing.”

Strange boy, Jesse thought. She wasn’t sure Joshua could speak prophecy the way the girls who were blood prophets could, but she had a feeling he was more than an Intuit if he was seeing images rather than having feelings about his surroundings.

“Can you recognize this stain of darkness?” Tolya asked.

Joshua stood, then blinked as if coming out of a light nap. “Yes.”

Tolya looked at Virgil, then turned to the two men. “We don’t have a priest yet or a teacher.”

Jesse saw Kenneth hesitate and knew the reason. “You don’t have to open the whole school building for the handful of children currently living in Bennett. There is a community center next door to the Universal Temple. One of the rooms in that building could be turned into a classroom for now. In fact, it would be good to open the center so that everyone could use it for a number of activities like a quilting circle and … and …” She fumbled. What did she know about such activities? She preferred target practice and reading to handcrafts.

“Candice taught Quiet Mind classes,” Lila said. “She’s interested in doing that here too. And she can teach frontier dancing.”

“I … uh …” Candice glanced around, then nodded. “I could do that.”

Lila beamed. Virgil grunted.

“Did you bring luggage?” Tolya asked the men.

“We left everything at the train station,” Evan said.

Tolya nodded. “Nicolai will look after it. Sheriff Wolfgard and Deputy Paniccia will escort you to the hotel. Afterward, you’ll come to my office and review what is required to be a resident of Bennett. If you want to stay after knowing our rules, we’ll take a look at houses tomorrow and see what can be done about moving you into one quickly.”

The men looked hopeful and stunned at the acceptance. Jesse felt stunned too because she had a very bad feeling that Tolya had just lied. Whatever the terra indigene were feeling about these men, acceptance had no part of it.

* * *

* * *

Jana would have been all right with Virgil putting the men in one hotel room and the children in another if there had been a connecting door between the rooms. But there wasn’t, and she didn’t have to be an Intuit or a blood prophet or anything else to know what that meant.

She kept a chokehold on her temper and her heart until Virgil closed the door to the children’s room.

“You can’t separate those children from their parents. They’re a family.” She kept her voice low to avoid being overheard, but her anger came through loud and clear.

“They’re not family,” Virgil growled. “They’re human males who have taken—”

“They didn’t take those children in the way you mean. They gave those children a home, gave them love, protection. Taught them. That’s what parents do.” She looked at the anger on his face, in his eyes. “What? A Panther can raise a human boy and that’s all right, but a human can’t love a child who is terra indigene?”

“There were reasons Joshua ended up with the Panthergard.”

“And there are reasons those children ended up with Evan and Kenneth. Who are you to judge?”

Virgil leaned toward her. She leaned toward him, balancing her weight and balling her hands into fists.

“You know nothing about it,” Virgil snarled.

“I know you don’t have to give birth to a child to love it,” Jana snarled back. “I was raised by foster parents. I loved them and they loved me, and we were family. Those men love those children, and the children love them. I can see it, even if you don’t. Or won’t.”

Virgil stepped back and studied her.

She hoped by all the gods that she could find the right words to get through to him. “Kenneth and Evan brought those children here because they knew there would be terra indigene here. Wolves and Coyotes and Hawks and so many more. They brought those children here to learn to be who they are, where they could be who they are. This is Bennett. Who will care if a boy can shift into a Wolf? Here they don’t need to be a secret in order to be protected.”

We learned from you.

A chill went through her as she remembered the sign and gave a fleeting thought to how those children had ended up with two human men in the first place. Orphans, Evan had called the children. But not because of the recent killings. Lost or abandoned by their original family—or stolen from their families—they had been taken in by Evan and Kenneth a few years ago. Except Maddie.

“Maybe you should talk to the children before you make any decisions about their futures,” Jana said.

Virgil released a gusty exhale that sufficiently expressed his annoyance. “Fine. We’ll talk to them.” He went to the hotel door, wrapped his hand around the knob, and then looked at her. “Come on. It’s your idea.”

The moment they walked into the room, Mace and Zane leaped toward them, growling.

“What did you do with our dads?” Mace demanded.

“Give ’em back,” Zane said.

“They’re in the next room,” Virgil said, giving no indication if he was annoyed or pleased by the youngsters’ challenge. “They have to talk to the mayor about work and finding a house for all of you.”

Mace cocked his head. Since he hadn’t seen Virgil do that, Jana figured it was something Wolves did.

“All of us?” Mace sounded like he didn’t quite trust the sheriff.

Virgil gave the boy a curt nod. “All of you.” He looked at the girls, who were on the floor near one of the beds.

The girl Tolya Sanguinati had said didn’t smell like prey stared at nothing. Vacant eyes that Jana found unnerving.

If the Others refer to a girl as a sweet blood or say she doesn’t smell like prey, they’re talking about a blood prophet. That was one of the things Michael Debany had hurriedly told her about blood prophets before she got on the train.

Gods. What were they supposed to do with a blood prophet in their midst?

The other girl, the Hawk … Well the other girl was a young Hawk who had her wings caught in the armholes of a sleeveless shirt and the rest of her clothes bunched under her taloned feet.

Zane looked back at the girls and sighed. “Charlee does that when she’s scared. That’s how Dad Evan found her. The humans thought a girl had gone missing at the orphan place, and Dad Evan was there that day and was helping them search. When he saw the Hawk beating at a window, trying to escape, he knew she was the missing girl and couldn’t stay in that place, so he opened the window, thinking she would fly away. Then he realized she was too young to be alone, so he went outside and found her and took her home.”

Jana wondered if Zane’s and Mace’s stories would be similar. They’d already been told that the blood prophet had been taken from the people claiming to be her parents. Had run away, with Mace’s help, and was hidden by Evan and Kenneth.

“Deputy Jana will ask Anya Sanguinati to bring up food for you,” Virgil said.

“Meat?” Mace asked hopefully.

“Meat.”

Mace looked at the girls. “Charlee likes meat too, but maybe you have fruit for Maddie?”

“She doesn’t eat meat?”

“She does, but she likes fruit better.”

Virgil walked out of the room, leaving Jana to follow. He rapped on the next door, which was immediately opened by Evan Hua, who looked frightened—and resigned.

“I’ll take you to the mayor’s office now to talk to Tolya.”

“The children?” Evan asked as Kenneth joined him at the door.

“Deputy Jana will arrange to have food brought to their room. They will be safe there.”

“We’ll just be a moment.” Evan closed the door.

Jana felt relieved. She’d prevailed. Virgil had listened. She …

Looking at her, Virgil bared his teeth and said quietly, “Those youngsters better be safe with those humans.”

“They will be.”

“If they’re not, I will tear out the throats of those two humans—and then I’ll tear out yours.”

Moments later, Evan and Kenneth left their room and followed Virgil for their meeting with the mayor.

Jana stood in the corridor, waiting for her heart to stop pounding, for her body to stop shaking. When she finally regained control, she went downstairs to find Anya Sanguinati and arrange for some meat and fruit to be sent up to the children.