Chapter Seventeen - The Seine

 

I took a little detour to track the gray wolf with my dagger in its chest and get my weapon back. Ripping the dagger out of dead wolf-corpse was grimly unsatisfying, and I was in a macabre mood when I rejoined my friends.

Naked Girl led us to the Seine River and then alongside it until the river curved south. There was a city wall intersecting the river at the curve that looked either badly built or beaten down by weather. Big cracks ran along the mortar lines of the stones, and chunks of rock were missing in places. One of those gaps was clearly big enough for a wolf to get through, and almost big enough for a man.

She stopped and spoke to Connor in her guttural French. He listened, and then translated for me.

“Her camp is outside the wall. The wolves are there, but she said Ringo can’t go because they’re hungry and they’ll smell blood.”

“Who is she?”

They spoke again, and Connor translated. “Her name is Jehanne.”

“Why did she let the wolves kill kids?”

Connor translated my words, and Jehanne shot me a look of pure venom but didn’t say anything. Connor used his badass alpha voice on her again, and she grudgingly answered his question.

“She uses the wolves to attack English army camps outside Paris, but there aren’t enough kills of soldiers to keep the wolves fed, so she lets them come into the city to take what they need. She says the Burgundians control Paris and they’re in league with England, so she doesn’t feel bad about it. God charged her to kick the English out of France, apparently.”

“Well, isn’t that special.”

Jehanne was speaking again, and this time Archer answered. They went back and forth a few times before he translated for me. His mouth was grim. “She only wants Connor to go back to her camp with her, since he’s her alpha now.”

I interrupted him. “No way is he going there alone to be challenged by some other pack wolf.”

“That’s what I told her. She suggested I could go, too, but that leaves you and Charlie carrying Ringo.”

“I don’t need carryin’.” Despite the blood loss and pain, Ringo was like a kid, jumping in whenever his name was mentioned.

“Shut up. You do, too.” And, apparently, I was also six years old.

Archer spoke before Ringo could argue. “You need food and rest. We all do. And if it’s possible to clean that wound properly, we need to do it. I’ve seen too many men lose legs to infection.”

That got him. Part of Ringo’s identity was wrapped up in his ability to run. I understood it, because it was in mine, too. And while I knew the advancements in prosthetic technology made limb-loss deal-able for twenty-first century athletes, Ringo’s only experience with amputation would be the painful sailor’s peg-leg that made men old before their time.

Ringo exhaled. “Right. Where are we goin’ t’ do that?”

Archer seemed to be studying the river, and I shook my head. “If the Seine is anything like the

Thames, that water is foul.”

"It can be boiled."

“If we had a fire.”

Archer’s eyes narrowed as he stared into the dark night. “There are islands in the middle of the river. They didn’t get built up until the 1600s, so perhaps we can make a camp of sorts there. Charlie can tend Ringo, and the wolves can’t cross the water.”

“Neither can we.” I was tired and coming down off an adrenaline high, and it made me whiny. “Sorry. That’s not helping, is it?”

Archer smiled at me and some of the tightness in me unfurled. I leaned into him, and he wrapped an arm around my waist.

“Guys, she’s going to leave.” Connor called to us. “I’m going with her.” He hacked at a chunk of wall with his sword, and when it came down, the opening was big enough for a person to go through.

“I’m coming with you.” I was looking at Archer when I answered Connor. Archer closed his eyes for a moment, inhaled, and then met my eyes.

“That works. I’ll find a boat, take Ringo and Charlie across, and then come back here for the two of you. An hour before dawn and not later, though, okay?”

I nodded and kissed him. “I love you.” It was a whisper meant for his ears only, but the hint of a smile tugged at the corner of Ringo’s mouth before he could stifle it.

My eyes landed on him. “You, too, wolf-bait.” He grimaced, but the smile stayed put. I fished the tin of green medicine out of my pack and handed it to Charlie. “Here. Use it up if you need to. I can make more.” Then I gave her a quick hug, which startled her, but she didn’t flinch away. “Thank you for being here,” I whispered into her ear. She nodded mutely and looked over at Ringo as if the idea of not being here to take care of him was too terrifying to contemplate.

I held Archer’s gaze. “An hour before dawn. We’ll be here.”

“Watch yourself with her.” His eyes flicked to where Jehanne stood impatiently. She was pretending not to pay attention to us, but I knew she was absorbing everything. “She’s Shifter, but she’s something else, too. I’m not sure what, but the colors I get off her are all over the place.”

Archer could read people’s intentions as colors. Kind of like an aura, only more about whether they were telling the truth than about who they were. “Was she lying about the whole mission from God thing?”

He shook his head. “It’s the one thing she believes with total certainty. Everything else is layered with omission and lies.”

“Awesome. So we have that to wade through. It’s a good thing you and Connor have British educations and can speak French. I’m completely lost about anything other than body language.”

“Then watch that and let Connor listen to the words. Her body language will probably tell more truths than her voice does.”

I gave Archer another quick kiss and then went to Connor’s side. “Right. Let’s do this.”

Just before I slipped through the wall, I looked back to see Archer easing Ringo down to the dirt and Charlie crouching down beside him. A sharp fear that I wouldn’t see them again suddenly pulsed through me, and I firmly shoved it away. It was the only down side to loving people – the terror that they would one day be gone.

 

The landscape outside the walls of Paris was almost wild. We were in a thick forest and didn’t have far to go to get to Jehanne’s camp. It was nearly impossible to stumble into, and we wouldn’t have found it without her to guide us.

Connor told me in a quiet voice that he would have to Shift when we got to camp, just to make certain his dominance over the actual wolves was solid. Also, to make sure they didn’t eat me. Which was nice of him.

I studied Jehanne as we walked. She was still barefoot and naked under the cloak and seemed unaffected by the nighttime chill. Her hair was sort of the reddish color of her Wolf coat, with streaks of blond running through the tangles. It looked like it had been cut with a knife at about jaw length and was stick straight. She was young, maybe even younger than me, but strong, and she moved like she was coiled wire, hard, tight, and ready to spring at any moment. The hardness wasn’t just in her body though. Her expressions were hard, too, and it made her look older than she probably was. She actually reminded me of her Wolf, coiled and fierce, and I had the impression there wasn’t much that had been soft or safe in her life.

It made me feel a little sorry for her. She must have sensed it, or maybe she had a little of Archer’s skill, because she turned sharply, looked me in the eyes, and spit at my feet before continuing into the camp. Charming.

A lean-to shelter was rigged against a tree. It seemed more den-like than for human habitation, and I wondered if she spent much time in her human form.

“Is she the only Shifter in the pack?”

Connor translated the question to Jehanne, and she nodded as she pulled on pants similar to ours and slipped a ragged linen shirt over her head. She put Connor’s cloak back over her clothes, and he didn’t say anything about needing it back.

“Is not caring who sees you naked a Shifter thing?”

Connor shrugged. “Sort of. We’re so used to getting naked when we Shift it just sort of loses its charge, you know?”

There were scars around Jehanne’s wrists and ankles. They looked kind of fresh, and some of the skin was pink and raw.

“What happened?” I pitched my question louder for her ears, and indicated her wrists. She spit again when she answered, but this time the phlegm wasn’t directed at me. Necessarily.

Connor translated. “When she and her people lost at Orléans, the English put her in irons. It was a week before they left her untended long enough for her to Shift. Her Wolf paws were small enough to slip through the manacles, and she escaped .”

My eyes narrowed. “Orléans? Why was she there?”

I could feel wolf eyes staring at us through the trees, and Jehanne’s gaze was distinctly wolfish when she answered Connor’s question. Even though it was in French, her answer was directed at me.

“As I said before, I was sent by God’s angel to rid France of the English.”

Connor translated rapidly between us, but our conversation was with each other.

“How did God’s angel speak to you?” I thought I did a decent job of keeping my tone even and curious, instead of revealing the weird, panicky feeling that was starting to prickle my lungs.

She hesitated before answering. “In dreams. He comes to me in dreams.”

Prickly-lung-panic turned to full on hollow-stomach-churn.

“What’s the English translation for her name?”

Connor shot me a strange look. “Jehanne? I don’t know, probably Jeanne or Joan, why?”

Certainty hit me like a fist, and my voice came out in a strangled whisper. “She’s Joan of Arc. From the true time stream.”

“The chick who got the French king crowned?”

I turned to Connor. “Does she look like she got anyone crowned?” I had a sudden thought. “Ask her the date.”

He did, and it seemed like she had to calculate before she answered.

“Near the end of July, she’s not sure.”

“The king was supposed to have been crowned on July 17^th, 1429. Ask her what happened in Orléans. How did she get captured?”

He translated rapidly, and Jehanne’s voice turned venomous again when she answered.

“They anticipated our arrival at the city, and they captured us before we were able to deliver the aid we brought to the people of Orléans. It was as if they could see the future and know the exact location of our camp.” The bitterness in her voice was palpable.

“They could have had a Seer with them.” I didn’t really believe it, but I wanted other possibilities besides someone messing with the time stream.

Connor shook his head. “That wouldn’t make two different histories.”

“You’re right. I just don’t want to admit that some Clocker screwed up. Because then I’d feel like I have to fix it.”

“You said it yourself, though. Why do you have to do anything? What’s been done has been in our history for hundreds of years. What does it matter if Charles doesn’t get to be king this year?”

I tossed my head at Jehanne. “It matters to her.”

“How do we know that? Maybe she goes on to live a boring, peaceful life now that she’s not messing around in French politics.”

I snorted. “Right. She’s terrorizing Paris with a pack of wolves. How is that going to end?”

Speaking of wolves …

“Um, you may want to do your alpha thing now. We’re pretty much surrounded.” While we’d been talking, the wild pack had been creeping closer, and I could see more eyes watching us from the woods beyond the camp’s perimeter.

“Here, hold this. And either turn around or learn to deal because I might be doing this a lot.”

Connor quickly stripped out of his clothes, and I just held out my arms to be a hanger. If I’d had a brother, I’d probably be used to a guy’s naked body, but I also refused to be embarrassed or squeamish. Thankfully, he was a fast stripper and Shifted almost immediately.

I found myself watching the transformation with fascination. There was something so beautiful about the shimmery air around his body as it blurred and changed. Watching Connor Shift gave me an entirely different perspective on a human body, and I found myself appreciating the Shifting process with my artist brain. The animal form he wore was so striking that for about a second I wasn’t so terrified of the Shifter side of myself.

And then he growled, and all the warm fuzzies evaporated into thin air. Connor’s Wolf was lethal. He was dominant, and alpha, and about to throw down with any wolf who dared to challenge him.

Two of the wolves, a big dark one and a scrappy-looking reddish one, were edging closer while the others kept their places surrounding the camp. I couldn’t back up very far to give Connor room because it would put me in range of two or three other beasts, and the idea of all those teeth at my back sent goose bumps up and down my spine.

Not that the teeth in front of me weren’t doing the same thing. But the wild wolves had frozen in place. And then I realized why. Connor’s big silver Wolf stood, more massive than I’d ever seen him, hackles up and teeth bared, like he owned the clearing. Like every inch of it belonged to him. Even I felt the dominance of his stance, as if I had to ask permission to be there. I knew what alpha meant, but I guess I’d never really seen what it looked like. He wasn’t terrifying, I think because he wasn’t trying to be. Connor was just the boss, and even Jehanne, who had been leaning against a tree in a seemingly casual pose, had lowered her head and wouldn’t meet his eyes.

He snapped his teeth at two or three of the wild wolves for good measure, and they flattened themselves to the ground. None of them would meet his eyes, and when he turned them to me, I fought the instinct to do the same. I squared my shoulders and looked straight back at him.

I wasn’t sure why I’d done it, and if I’d been a Wolf I don’t think I could have. But I don’t think my Lion would let me look away, and I was glad. I understand that wolf pack hierarchies exist to keep the peace, but I had spent a fair amount of time on city streets when I was growing up, and there are times that confidence is the only thing that will keep a person safe. Especially a free-running tagger girl whose playground was storm drains and deserted alleys.

Then Connor’s Wolf walked to my side and stood there in silence, glaring at the wild wolves, and especially, at Jehanne. She scowled when she looked away, and I could tell his proximity to me chapped her. The goose bumps on my spine went away, and I realized what he’d just done. The new alpha Wolf of this wild pack had just established my own dominance to make me safe among these wolves. I didn’t really know much about lupine politics, but I hoped it would hold even when he wasn’t with me.

“We need to get back to the river.” I spoke under my breath, but Connor’s Wolf ears had no trouble hearing me. He took one last fierce look around the clearing at the pack, growled menacingly in his chest, and then Shifted back to his human form.

I tossed him the trousers first and looked away to find Jehanne watching me with open hostility. “What’s your problem?” It didn’t matter that she didn’t speak English, she knew from my tone what I’d just said.

She spit on the ground and said something in French that made Connor scoff as he translated.

“She said they burn women like you.”

“I’m the witch? She’s the one who has visions and changes into a Wolf every five minutes.”

Connor stifled a laugh and Jehanne spoke again.

His mouth tightened into a grim line at her words, but he didn’t automatically translate for me. She just watched me with glittering eyes.

“What? What did she say?”

He finally answered. “Any woman who mates with a devil and consorts with a Wolf deserves to burn.”

“So, Archer’s the devil, obviously.” I couldn’t help the snort of derision. “But how am I consorting with you?”

He sighed deeply. “I had to effectively name you ‘mate’ so my alpha standing in the pack would extend to you. If I just named you dominant, than any wolf could challenge you for your position, and probably would.”

I stared at my fourteen-year-old, tall, skinny, blond friend and couldn’t help the laugh that barked out. He winced, and I realized I wasn’t being very nice.

“I’m sorry, that was mean. I appreciate what you did, and I hope it doesn’t mess you up in some way.

He looked confused. “Mess me up, how?”

I grinned at him. “I don’t know. Jehanne’s been looking at you like she wants to lick you.”

The look of disgust on his face was priceless. “You are so not funny. C’mon, let’s get out of here.” He spoke quickly to Jehanne and she tried to talk back, but he snapped at her sharply. She finally cowed and then nodded sullenly to whatever he’d just commanded.

He did some human version of his Wolf’s growl as a parting shot, and then we left the clearing. Connor led the way, and I could feel at least two or three wild wolves traveling with us.

“What’d you say to her before we left?” I kept my voice low, although the wild wolves obviously couldn’t understand me.

“I forbade them from going through the walls into Paris.”

“How can you enforce that? If they’re hungry, they’ll go for the easy meat.”

He shot me a look over his shoulder. “They’re not hungry, Saira. It’s summertime and there’s plenty of meat in these woods. She took them into Paris.”

A sudden rage surged through me – the kind that made me more quiet and fierce. “She can’t possibly believe her God told her to murder children! I mean, it’s bad enough to believe an ethnocentric God is going to throw his weight behind one king over another. That girl is completely nuts.”

“No argument here.” Connor’s voice was quiet, too. “You’re kind of scary when you get righteous.”

I grunted, still annoyed. “Yeah, well, you’re a scary alpha Wolf. What’s your point?”

He chuckled and led the way back to the crumbling city wall.

Archer was just landing a primitive wooden skiff when we arrived at the river. The small splashes from his paddles were the only man-made sounds I could hear in the pre-dawn night. The little flush of heat that filled my chest at the sight of him felt like an internal happy dance, and I know the size of the smile on my face was completely inappropriate to the excursion we’d just been on.

“You found a boat!” My whisper was too excited, and I had to tone it down before I sounded moronic.

“You made it back safely.” There was happiness in his voice that made me think I wasn’t the only goofball in the group. He helped me in and then kissed me lingeringly on the lips. The happy dance music had turned into a rocker’s acoustic ballad and a slow dance took over. Connor cleared his throat dramatically behind us.

“Move along, move along.” He flashed a wolfish grin at me when I turned to growl at him. Archer just laughed and pulled Connor into the boat before shoving off with a paddle.

“Is Ringo okay?”

The smile faded from Archer’s face and my heart constricted. “I don’t know. His flesh was torn and I stitched it up as best I could, but if an infection threatens, you’ll have to take him back for treatment.”

I stared at Archer. “Back where? Mr. Shaw’s locked up, and Ringo doesn’t have anything even close to ID or the kind of papers he’d need in a hospital. And that’s if we’re even safe at Elian Manor, which I’m not convinced of.”

Connor looked stunned. “I just assumed any one of us could go back any time if something went wrong. But you’re right. None of us is really safe at home right now.”

Archer looked thoughtful. “I suppose, in the worst case scenario, you could take him to the Missus. But you’d have to go back to before he was born.”

“I guess she wouldn’t freak out too badly about me just showing up before I’ve ever met her, since it’s basically what I did with you and Mom when the cellar collapsed. But I can do a lot of the plant medicine now, so I’ll only take him if he starts to infect.”

The river was so dark and quiet that being on a boat in the middle of it felt like I imagined the world did to Archer when he slept. I had tried to wake him from his daytime slumber before, and it truly seemed like he just wasn’t there. Like he had departed his body and his soul had gone wandering. I knew there were people who didn’t believe Vampires had a soul, which was ridiculous. The thing that made them Vampires was cell-death suspension, so to say they were soulless would be to say the soul was cellular. It was one of the few things in life I took on faith – the idea of a soul being something sort of infinite. As if souls could, and did, go on even after the body died.

I snickered at the philosophical conversation I was having with myself, and I could feel Archer’s eyes on me.

“Just debating the existence of the soul.”

His soft laughter whispered on the air. “Some of the deepest conversations I’ve ever had happened just before dawn.”

I leaned my head against him and settled in, feeling his muscles ripple with very pull of the oars. “Like what?”

He chuckled. “You want a story?”

“Yes, please.” The motion of the boat on the river and the nearness of Archer were making me sleepy.

“Who, besides us, is crazy enough to stay up this late?” Connor was tired, too. His voice was heavy and fading fast.

“Well, during the war there was Ravi. We had the night shift, and since even the enemy had to sleep sometimes, there was very little code breaking to do from two to five a.m.”

“Code breaking? You mean you were at Bletchley Park?” I forgot Connor hadn’t been with us when Archer discussed his experiences during World War II.

“It was one of my favorite jobs. And Ravi – even then he was deeply interested in history. We had long discussions about how civilizations became technological first-world cultures or stayed backward third-world cultures, always on the brink of starvation.”

“That’s easy,” Connor said. “It had to do with geography. If food and shelter were easy to get, people had time to develop art and innovation. If they lived in a desert, or in extreme temperatures that made food scarce, life was all about trying to survive.” His confidence made me smile, and I was content to just lie back and listen.

“You’re very wise, Master Edwards, for one so young,” Archer responded. “But now take that a step further and it gets more complicated. What if you apply the same principle to individual people? Compare those for whom money, food, and shelter are easy to those who have to struggle for every meal and work endless jobs just to keep shelter over their heads. Do the innovators come from hardship, or from ease?”

“I think some of the more interesting people I know came from some pretty harsh childhood experiences.”

“What makes them interesting?”

I loved this conversation Archer and Connor were having. To my tired brain it was like being lulled to sleep by classical music – lyrical, complex, fascinating, and ultimately, soothing.

“An interesting person learns how to deal with the hard stuff constructively. They tend not to fold under pressure or stress, and they can usually laugh at the small stuff. They also value the intangible things more, like family and friendships and loyalty because they can’t be bought, they have to be earned.”

“What about the privileged people you know. Are any of them interesting?”

“Yeah, the ones who aren’t defined by what they have. Adam and Ava are totally interesting, even though they take monthly trips to Paris and live in a huge townhouse.”

I thought I could feel Archer’s smile. “It seems to me, Connor, that it’s the people who haven’t allowed their circumstances to define them - the ones who choose their own paths, regardless of what’s come before – who interest you.”

Connor thought about that for a long moment. “I had to think about who my friends are, and yeah, you’re definitely right. Ringo obviously came from nothing, but he soaks up information like a sponge. You came from money, and you’re the best educated guy I know, but you got attacked by a Vampire. And Saira pretty much raised herself with no dad, no place to call home, and no clue as to who her family really was.”

“What about you, Connor? What makes you so interesting?”

Connor laughed a little, but I wasn’t sure how much humor there was underneath the surface. “Let’s see – dad’s dead; mum’s family is considered inferior and damaged because of something a distant ancestor didn’t actually do; I had to start being the man of the family before I was ten, so I’m far too responsible to be considered “fun” by most kids at school; I’m smart and therefore either a know-it-all or a giant geek to most people; and my best friends are criminals and outlaws. So, take your pick.”

“I’m not an outlaw,” I mumbled.

“You’re totally an outlaw, and when it’s the Mongers you’re running from, it’s cool to be an outlaw.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“We’re here.” Archer’s whispered tone shifted from conversational, and suddenly both guys became all business, beaching and tying up the boat with quick efficiency. The sky was starting to color with something other than black, and I knew the sun was probably about twenty minutes away from full rise. In the dim darkness I was able to make out a little of the landscape. It looked pastoral, like literally, a pasture. We were walking through wild grass across fairly even terrain.

I whispered to Archer, “Does anyone live here?”

“As far as I can tell, no. They’ve brought cattle over here to graze, so people do come, but I didn’t see any signs of permanent habitation.”

There were a couple of small trees giving some variation to the landscape, but no buildings. “Where will you sleep?”

Archer had said the sun on his skin felt like radiation burns might – he could survive it, but it wouldn’t be pleasant. “There’s a lean-to for storing hay, and a cloak draped over me should make up for any deficiencies in its shade. Maybe you can make sure I’m still in deep shadows when you wake up so I don’t spend the next few days walking around like a Chernobyl victim?”

He said it so casually, but I had the feeling it cost him a lot to need my help. “Of course.” But then I remembered and wrinkled my nose. “We’ll have to be under your cloak though, mine is covered in Ringo’s blood.”

“Charlie rinsed it and it’s hanging up to dry.”

We were approaching a big tree, and under its heavy branches was a sort of shepherd’s lean-to hut. There were bales of hay near the open side, and behind them was a space that seemed fairly well-protected. Charlie looked like she had just sat up and was blinking herself awake when we entered the lean-to. Ringo was still asleep on a padding of loose hay next to her.

“How is he?” Archer whispered to Charlie as he bent down to check Ringo’s head for fever.

“’E’s not stirrin’. I keep checkin’ ‘e’s breathin’ though, and ‘is temperature seems good.”

Archer shifted over so I could crouch next to them. Ringo’s skin was cool to the touch and his breathing was deep; he was just really deeply asleep. I didn’t think ex-thieves ever slept so well. “His leg is still bound?”

“The cloth wrappin’ ye had in yer bag was clean, and it’s well packed with yer salve after ‘is lordship stitched it closed.”

Archer winced. “It’s Archer. I haven’t been a lord in a very long time.”

Charlie’s chin tipped a little higher, and she said proudly, “Well, yer ‘is lordship to my lad, so ye are to me, too.”

I smiled at her in the darkness. My lad. I liked it. I reached across Ringo to squeeze her hand quickly. “C’mon guys, let’s get some sleep in while we can. We’ll need some daylight to scout the Hôtel de Sens in case Bishop Wilder really is there.”

Charlie nodded and settled back down next to Ringo. She put one hand on his arm, but otherwise slept as close to him as was physically possible without actually touching. Connor curled up, half-seated, against a bale of hay and was asleep in maybe thirty seconds, tops. Archer spread part of his cloak on the hay for us to lie on and wrapped the rest of it over us like a blanket. He pulled me in close to him, my back to his front, and draped his arm across my hip possessively. His other arm cushioned my head, and I settled back into him. When the others’ breathing had deepened, he whispered into my ear.

“It’s just you and Connor later today in the Marais.”

He was right, and it was the first time I’d actually thought it through. Ringo was out, Charlie had to stay with him, and Archer would be down until sunset. And if Wilder was at the Hôtel de Sens, sunset was when he would rise, too.

“Yeah.” I knew how much he hated to go down during the day because it meant he couldn’t be with me.

“He might not want to admit it, but he’ll need you to watch his back. He’s responsible, but he doesn’t have the experience surviving that you have.”

That surprised me. I hadn’t expected Archer to be more worried about Connor than about me, and I liked it.

“He can always turn Wolf if he has to run.”

“They have some firearms in this time. If they see a lone wolf in Paris now, they’ll kill it on sight.”

I tried to put myself in the Parisian’s shoes. If I saw a wolf running through the streets, especially after all the children who’d been taken, I’d probably kill it too.

Which reminded me that I hadn’t told Archer what Connor and I had learned in the woods. “By the way, Jehanne is Joan of Arc.” I heard his breath catch. “She was captured by the English outside of Orléans and only escaped from irons when she was finally able to Shift into her Wolf.”

His silence lasted a long time.

“So, time has split.”

“We’ve known that since we saw the old book.”

“True but we weren’t so close to the split before.”

“It’s not really what we came here for.” I tried to believe that, really I did. But even as I said it out loud, I knew I was lying.

Archer chuckled. “So you’d step over a fallen child to chase the purse-snatcher?”

“You know I wouldn’t.”

He kissed my hair. “I know you wouldn’t.”

“I don’t like her.”

“It’s hard to like someone who would lead wolves into Paris to kill people.”

“Connor told her she couldn’t bring them back into the city. She didn’t like it, and some of her wolves started coming at me. He had to go dominant Wolf on them to get them to back off.”

Archer’s hand stopped its absent-minded stroking of my hip. “So they believe you’re his mate.”

I turned to face him, surprised. “Wait, how do you know that’s what he had to do?”

He frowned. “Our estate was surrounded by woods. As a boy, if I wanted to wander I had to know the rules of the wildlife in whose territory I ran. Pack hierarchy is very well-known to farmers and their sons.”

I was silent for a moment, absorbing the idea that it could possibly bother him. “She basically accused me of witchcraft for being with both of you.”

“And how did young Connor deal with all of this?”

“Like an embarrassed fourteen-year-old with too much responsibility.” I faced him and wrapped my arm around his waist. “Does this bother you?”

Archer exhaled, closed his eyes, then finally smiled tiredly. “The caveman in me doesn’t care for his claim, and the caretaker in me is concerned that he’s so used to being responsible he’s in danger of losing the joy and freedom of being young.”

I couldn’t help the quiet scoff that slipped out. “When’s the last time you got to feel joy and freedom?”

I felt his smile. “Every time I hold you in my arms.”