"Is that why he kissed Nerida at the winter solstice?" another drawled.
"James loves me. Our bond is strong."
"OK, OK, I don't want this to devolve into wild speculation," Kelly said. "At the moment, I'm sharing the eye witness reports."
"She's right," I said. I felt every eye swivel around to focus on me. "I'm sorry, I don't know your name, James' partner?"
"Molly," the woman said stiffly.
"Hey, Molly. Is James an older guy, supervises the Stores team? Would have had a clipboard?" She nodded. "Look, you're right. He was absolutely horrified to be affected. I don't remember him getting involved in the debacle that took place. He was on his phone, probably calling you."
She nodded, her eyes shining before taking her seat again and glaring over at the woman who'd made a comment.
"Thank you, Julie. So as I was saying—"
"It's the black wolf," I said. I wasn't going to play whatever game they had going here. Chaining me up, talking about stopping Finn from coming in, and sending him through the gate—that wasn't how this shit was going to go down. "I heard him in my mind throughout the incident."
I saw then why Kelly was trying to take another tack. My information was the fox and the Women's Council were the chickens, all squawking and twittering. She looked at me steadily for a moment, and said, "If you'd let me deal with this."
I nodded slowly and then flexed my wrists within the cuffs, meaningfully.
"You may as well uncuff her. From all accounts, she didn't touch anyone before setting off the men, so keeping her bound is just adding insult to injury," Ophelia said. Kelly and the other matriarchs all looked at one another for the moment, making me wonder if there wasn't some sort of psychic component to being Tirian. "Are you afraid all of you
are unable to overcome one woman? Because that's what you're saying to the rest of the council."
Kelly sighed and produced keys from her pockets. Asher went to say something, and Kelly froze, then looked back at the woman. She fell silent at the glance from her alpha.
"Stay in your seat," Kelly said, and then removed the cuffs.
I rubbed at my wrists as she recounted what had happened. In some ways, it was an interesting process to watch, as the different stories were added to and discussed by the women until most people were satisfied they had the truth of it. It was hard for me to judge, being kinda out of it for most of the event. But not others, evidently. Some women looked down at me with narrowed eyes at tales of the infectious sexual rampage I'd apparently gone on.
"Is this part of the human taint?" one woman stood and asked. "We know the weaker hybrids seem to have no discrete times for the heat, choosing to mate on impulse."
"I have the 'taint'," Carissa said, standing next. "This has not happened to me, nor any of the other members of the diaspora who made it back to Sanctuary. Julie mentioned the black wolf. What has been done with him? The fact he got past our defences for one has never been sufficiently addressed, nor what will be done with him other than leave him in his jail cell. Has there been an attempt to interrogate him?"
Kelly wanted the attention of the group, well now she had it.
"Attempts have been made, but with little success."
“Why should we bother with this? Execute the black wolf and exile the girl. If her mates decide to go with her, then more fool them,” another woman said.
“Because we need women,” Nancy said. “We excluded many just as you say, creating the diaspora, and now our problems have come home to roost. Your sons, my sons, all of our sons do not have enough mates to choose from, some even deciding to embrace their female-less existence.” It felt like every woman’s eyes slid towards Kelly. “We need women, no matter what form they take, along with whatever problems they bring, or we lose our strength, our children.”
A silence settled over the room, the last few women taking their seats.
"Let me," I said. Kelly's eyes snapped down to meet mine. I saw the fire raging within them, but I needed to get to the bottom of this. "He spoke to me when I went to his cell. Has he spoken to any others?" The matriarchs were curiously quiet. "He hasn't, has he? Look, I'm sorry for what happened. That has to have been your sons, your husbands, your grandsons, cousins, brothers that were involved in the incident at Stores. I was horrified by the whole thing. Imagine if there'd been kids around..." I looked down for a moment at the red marks on my wrists. "I felt completely out of control of my body. I didn't want to do what I did, but it was as if someone else was calling the shots. Not hormonal crazy like the heat, like an alien consciousness was inside my head, pushing me to one side. No one wants to get to the bottom of this more than me, no one. He spoke to me throughout it, said I needed to lure men to my side." Murmuring started at that but quickly died away. "And when I asked him what he wanted, he said, me." I scanned the women around the room. "Cuff me, bind me, do it in the company of whoever you want, but let me get the answers we need from him, so we can ensure this doesn't happen again."
"Sounds like a motion is being put to the floor," Ophelia said. "Alpha?"
Kelly nodded. "We'll have a fifteen-minute discussion of the motion and then put it to the vote."
18
"We'll set up the interrogation for tomorrow," Kelly said as we all walked out. "I need to give the commanding officers some time to set things up. In the meantime, you will remain inside your house." She looked up when Finn, Slade, Brandon, and Aaron came rushing over. "Aaron, some of your unit mates will be guarding the house tonight. She can't leave under any circumstances. Just giving you a heads up."
"Guess you get out of dinner tonight, love," he said to me. He tried smiling, but I could see the tension around his eyes. The rest held their tongues, with some effort.
"No bonding party for you," I said to Finn. I wanted to smile, but my face wouldn’t obey. This wasn't fair, none of it was. "You deserve better than this."