Undying Hope. Emma Weylin
can do a lot of damage to inanimate objects.”
“Right,” she said. Why hadn’t she thought of that? “And he didn’t take you with him?”
“Kyros,” Memphis said as if the name answered everything.
Maybe it did. “I didn’t hear either of you talking about anything.” The elevator door opened. When the wolves came in with wet fur from playing in the snow, she understood how Quinn and Memphis had exchanged information. “Never mind. How long have you known Quinn?”
“If you don’t mind,” Nikon said as he padded up to her and rubbed against the side of her leg. “Can you get our breakfast? Look on the bottom shelf in the cold box.”
“I’ll get it,” Memphis said as he went to the refrigerator. “Roughly two thousand years.”
“Oh.” She needed something to do. “They eat their food raw?”
“It’s better for them,” Memphis said as he pulled out two packages of wrapped meat. “What do you know about us?”
“Nothing,” she admitted after a moment. “Do you want me to help?”
“Do you need to help?” Memphis asked with an edge of humor in his tone.
“I do,” she said and moved to the counter space he was using to unwrap the wolves’ breakfast. It appeared to be beef chopped up into large, bite-sized chunks. “You wouldn’t happen to know where their dishes are, would you?”
Memphis stilled from getting tomorrow’s wolf meal out of the freezer and stared at her.
“Just get some plates,” Medea said. “Eating off ceramic won’t hurt us.”
“Oh,” Haven said. She still felt silly talking to a wolf and knowing she would get an answer. “Would you prefer just having the paper?”
“Cadeyrn is very efficient and doesn’t like to wash dishes.” Medea rubbed the side of her head against Haven’s thigh. “Eating from a dish would be wonderful.”
Memphis reached over her head, pulled down two plain black plates, and set them on the counter. Haven served the wolves the meat on the floor.
She waited until they started eating before she went back to talking with Memphis. “Why is everything at giant height in this kitchen?”
Memphis chuckled. “Because a giant lives here alone?”
“Good answer,” she said. “All right. This is making me nuts. Start pulling things down. I have got to get this kitchen functioning for standard-sized people if I am the only one the wolves are going to let cook.”
To her utter surprise, Memphis did exactly as she asked. There weren’t many things that needed reorganized, and that had her hunting down a notepad and pen to start making a list. They had enough food to last Bastian one, maybe two meals. She was just putting the last cup into the cabinet next to the sink when the apartment rattled. A moment later, Quinn stepped out. His shirt was torn and the look on his face was heartrending.
Memphis paused.
Haven rushed over to Quinn. Her hand dipped into the hole in his shirt and came out red. “You’re bleeding. Memphis call—”
Quinn grabbed her wrist as he handed his sword off to Memphis. “I’ll heal.”
She studied his face. Part of her knew what he’d done. “He was…”
“Aye,” Quinn said. His glacier eyes bore into her. “It had to be done. Like when a werewolf turns. They don’t turn back.”
That was something she understood from her grandfather. “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“I’ll be fine. I’m going to get cleaned up. Stay with Memphis.”
Her shoulders slumped as he walked out of the room. “How am I supposed to help him if he won’t let me?”
“Go. Even if he won’t let you,” Memphis said. “I can man the frying pan if needed. Nikon won’t kick me out for cooking.”
Haven flashed a worried smile before running up to the room after Quinn. She figured she had as much right to be in there as he did since her stuff was there, but she did knock before she entered. A large, arching laceration covered his beautiful chest as he pulled on a clean black T-shirt, but the wound appeared like one that had been mending for a few days.
“I don’t need anything right now.”
“But maybe I do. What happened? I don’t understand.” She quietly padded over to the bed and sat down on the corner. She could guess he had to put down one of his own, but she hoped talking about it would help him.
“There is a new Cadfael in Denmark. I had to put down the last one,” he said wearily. He sat down on the bed next to her and rested the side of his head on the top of hers. “That part never gets easier. I guess, at least, it doesn’t happen very often.”
Right, of course he didn’t want to talk about this. Haven decided to ask questions about something else to distract him instead. “Cadeyrn, Cadfael, Caden—what do all those terms mean?”
He let out a short laugh as his arm looped around her. “A Caden is like a clan lord, for lack of a better explanation. We have the world divided up into provinces and territories, and the Cadfaels…” He made a face, as if he didn’t know what he should be saying next. “We don’t exactly rule over them. It’s like guarding them and presiding over the Undying who live within their province.”
“And your title,” Haven whispered, not sure she wanted to know.
He winced. “I preside over the Cadfaels.”
“Oh,” she said, trying not to let that sink in too deeply. “You’re their king.”
“Something like that, but not exactly.”
She lightly ran her hand down the side of his chest she knew wasn’t marked. “Then what, exactly?”
“I help them. I guide them. They are my people. When everything else fails them, I cannot.”
The weight settling down on them was tangible. “And you think you failed this Denmark Cadfael? Could he not come to you before he went down the wrong path?”
“Haven, don’t—”
“But I will,” she snapped as she stood and moved in front of him. “Yeah, I am sure it royally sucks right now, and I’m not going to tell you not to grieve, but you can’t let someone else’s failing also be yours. Would you have been able to help him if he’d have come to you?”
* * * *
Donovan blinked at her a few times. No one came into his personal space when he wanted to be left alone. They sure as hell wouldn’t yell at him not to feel however he wanted to feel after having to put down a meirlock. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does.” She stamped her foot and put her fists on her well-curved hips. “You’d help Bastian anyway if I wasn’t attached to him. Right?”
“That’s different,” he said, unsure if he should be amused or pissed off.
“No. The Denmark Cadfael chose not to ask you for help while you could still help him. That is not your fault.”
He opened his mouth to protest, but he realized she was right. “I’m trying. This is never easy.”
“Nor should it be,” she said as her voice went soft. She sat down on his lap and hooked her arms around his neck. “But you should only take on the parts that you had control over.”
He looped an arm around her. This was foreign to him. He wasn’t used to anyone taking the time to help him muddle through the feeling part of life’s darker necessities. “I’ll work on it.”
She