Page 45 of Hell and Hexes
Chapter 18
Sylvie
“You’ve got to tell me what happened Monday at the mediation.” Tink giggled and folded her legs up crosswise on her chair as she sipped her drink. “Dallas came home totally unnerved, covered in icing.”
She’d showed up at my office right on time for her appointment with no mention whatsoever about what had happened last night. I guess Dallas had decided to keep that as well as my part in it a secret, and that he’d showered before coming to bed or Tink would be wondering why he was covered with hornet stings and bird poop.
“We met at a McDonald’s playroom,” I told her. “There wasn’t supposed to be anyone there, but things got screwed up and in came this birthday party with a dozen kids. Let’s just say chaos ensued and there was a bit of a disaster with the cupcakes.”
Tink threw her head back and laughed. “Oh, Lord. Dallas don’t like human kids at all. He don’t like human adults either, but he’s especially afraid of their kids.”
I shook my head. “Not all werewolves are so nervous around humans, are they? I heard that you go outside the wards sometimes and don’t seem traumatized when you get back.”
“Oh, the first time I was scared to death, but it got easier each time afterward. You just have to get used to the humans and how they do things. It’s different here in Accident, and it’s really different in the compound up on the mountain. Most of us don’t come into town all that often, and a good many of us have never been outside the wards in our lives. We’re raised with stories of humans killing us or locking us up until we go moon-crazy. They’re our boogieman stories, and unless a werewolf gets out and actually sees the human world, that’s what they believe.”
I shook my head. “So, what’s your impression of life outside the wards?”
She shrugged. “I like humans. They’re crazy and unpredictable and dangerous, but I like them. They’ve got good ideas, and some really good shopping and art, and I like how they live their lives. I kinda wish we could make the pack more like human life, but too many werewolves are stuck wanting things the old ways. Too many are afraid to change.”
“Like Dallas?” I suggested.
She shot me a naughty grin. “Oh, Dallas is more open to change than he lets on. He mated me knowing what a total train wreck I am. He compromises on lots of things and is pretty intrigued by modern life. But he’s alpha to a pack of traditionalists, and he feels like he needs to represent them. Plus, he doesn’t like being wrong one bit, so you have to word things so they sound like they’re his idea and that they’ll benefit the pack. And heisafraid of humans. I don’t think he’s been outside the wards more than a dozen times in his life. I aim to change that.”
I had no doubt in my mind that Tink would in fact change that. I thought about what she said and wondered if there was a way to spin this thing between Dallas and Clinton where they both could compromise a bit, and no one would end up in a humiliating position.
Tink and I had a nice long session about the very unusual kink she’d read about somewhere, which frankly I did not quite understand. We finished up our session with a brainstorming session of less extreme, fun sexy-times things she could surprise Dallas with, then we both settled in for a cup of tea and a nice long gossip.
“I half expected you wouldn’t come today,” I confessed.
She grinned. “Because of what happened in the woods? Dallas didn’t tell me about it, but I saw the bunch of them going out and I figured they were going to do a raid on Clinton’s compound. When they all came running back, full of wolfsbane boils and covered with bird poop…well, it doesn’t take a genius to realize witches were involved.”
“You don’t blame us? Because Dallas sure does.”
She shrugged. “You didn’t kill anyone or hurt them bad, and Dallas needs to know that he’s not the big wolf he thinks he is. Yeah, I’m sure he’s mad, but that’s mostly ‘cause he’s embarrassed.”
“I really screwed stuff up last night, didn’t I?”
Tink looked at me over the rim of her mug. “I don’t know. You did get them to turn back from attacking Clinton.”
“And now they’re focused on us witches. What’s going to happen, Tink? You know the werewolves and Dallas better than I do. Are they going to cut themselves off even more from the rest of Accident? Declare the mountain a sovereign nation behind the wards? Attack us?”
She sat down her tea and eyed me for a long moment. “Are we still bound by all that privacy stuff?”
I scooted forward in my chair. The session was over, but I’d be happy to extend it and the confidentiality it ensured if it meant Tink would tell me something I could leverage to fix this mess.
“Yes. What you tell me stays between us.”
She took a breath, blushing a bit. It made me wonder if we were going to discuss something weirder than lemon zesters and hemorrhoid cream.
“Dallas don’t know what to do. He’s stuck, Sylvie. He needs a way out, and if someone don’t give it to him, he’s gonna have to make a stand against you witches as well as keep on with this war against Clinton.”
“I tried, Tink. I tried at the mediation session to find a solution between the two of them, and it didn’t work. When I asked him where he’d be willing to compromise, he wouldn’t budge. The closest he came to it was saying Clinton could come back and be disowned and punished, and of course Clinton wouldn’t go for that.”
“You need to give him the way out, Sylvie.” She picked up her mug again and fiddled with it. “Dallas can’t propose the solution because he looks weak if he compromises. The only way he can back down on this is if he’s doing it to protect his pack against a bigger threat or as a boon because someone did something that went above and beyond to help the pack.”
I thought of Eshu last night on the mountain. “Like if Clinton and his pack joined Dallas to fight off a pack of lions or save them from an erupting volcano or something,” I mused.
“Exactly.” She shifted in her chair, blushing again. “With Dallas, it’s always a bit of carrotandstick. The carrot alone don’t work, and the stick alone don’t work. You need both.”
