Page 24 of Wings and Shadowthief

He never quite knew who he was going to deal with. Goofy Becca Hunter, his mother, or the head of the huntsmen. One wanted grandbabies. The other wouldn’t hesitate to end him if it was what the job demanded.

His mother’s office was smaller than one would have thought—and no wonder. She spent as little time stuck inside as she possibly could. Jack passed by the empty office, glad to avoid being stared at from behind the imposing, red mahogany desk, and made his way toward the conference room farther into the corridor.

Through the glass doors, he could see a small crowd gathered; his mother stood at the head of the table, in front of her imposing office chair, and his father was one of her two guards, seated at her right. Jack almost grinned when he spotted Tris at her left.

Tris was nowhere high enough in the pecking order to be Becca Hunter’s guard in an official meeting. She must have begged until his mother relented and let her attend.

Around the oval conference table, four witches were drinking coffee and eating doughnuts—one man, three women. One black, with an emerald green coat thrown over her chair. Jack’s attention went to her, because though she wore a dress, had soft blond waves perfectly in place, and manicured nails painted red, there was no denying her resemblance to Blair. This must be a close relation—mother or sister, he couldn’t tell. She looked like she could be in her early thirties, but witches had a way with wrinkles.

“Jack,” Becca called as he entered. “You’re early.”

“And yet you’re already here.” Discussing him before he walked in. How typical of his mother.

Unprompted, he went to introduce himself to the witches, reaching Blair’s family member first. He offered a hand. “I’m a friend of Blair’s.”

The witch hesitated. “My daughter made a friend. How charming.”

This woman sounded nothing,nothinglike the bubbly, enthusiastic Blair he knew. Her voice was daggers and poison sheathed in velvet. Seductive and deadly.

Her hand felt cold when he shook it.

“Jack Hunter.”

“Well met, Jack. I’m Terra White, the head of the Salem coven.”

He frowned. Wasn’t Blair’s last name Lawson?

“Well met,” he echoed the stiff, old-fashioned phrase, moving on to the next witch. Each shook his hand, exchanging names he filed as irrelevant in a corner of his brain.

Jack only bothered to remember memorable people, and Terra liked to surround herself with weaker witches.

He circled the table, snatching a doughnut before taking a seat next to Tris.

His cousin reached out for his free hand and squeezed it under the table. “Definitely your color,” she whispered.

He wasn’t gracing that quip with an answer.

“Well?” Jack prompted.

There was a moment of silence. Becca nodded subtly, and Terra took it as an invitation. “We have researched the location you forwarded thoroughly, and can assure you there’s no witch presence in that area—not for miles, until Norilsk.”

“Norilsk?” He repeated, lost.

“The closest city to Kayerkan, the place where you landed. It’s surrounded by tundra. A few private airfields, some villages with a small population. The latest census of Kayerkan counted less than thirty thousand inhabitants.”

He nodded. He’d shown the picture of the town’s sign to his mother upon arrival. She’d apparently been busy.

“Anything else around there?” he asked.

Becca shot him a cautionary glance. Apparently, she didn’t want to get into it in front of his guests. He sighed. He was dealing with the High Guard, then.

“As for the sample of the blood you provided—”

“From your jacket,” Tris whispered before he could ask.

“—we didn’t get much, but we can certainly confirm it’s not from a human—or a witch.”

His shoulders, tense as steel since he’d entered the building, relaxed a fraction.

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