Slade’s sentence under the sun required two days despite the one in its title. It started from noon. There was a cruelty to it—burning a vampire who couldn’t die from midday till sundown, then leaving them tied down all night to ensure they’d heal somewhat, only to burn them again in the morning.

There would be no relief because even after her release at noon the next day; she’d have to endure the sun, or the presence of it, until nightfall.

Eli watched, silent and helpless. Trixie, at least, could find refuge in Eli’s apartment with Manny.

But Eli, the dimwitted werewolf who was already walking on thin ice in his pack, waited in the square all day.

There was a big crowd in the beginning when Slade was first strapped down. Dried flesh still stained the cuffs—they could have at least cleaned those from the previous vampire.

Most people stayed for the start of the process. By the time most of Slade’s flesh turned red and faded in the wind, people started to leave. There was no fun in watching something slowly die, again and again, without it perishing.

Eli was the last one at sundown. Boredom. He told himself people hadn’t left because Slade refused to whine or cry and that her stoic expression and motionless response wasn’t boring for them. He told himself that, but he was wrong.

The moonlight helped repair some of the damage, but it was hard to stomach. Eli stood more than once with the intent of unchaining her.

Each time, he sat down again and made excuses as to why that was a bad idea.

None of them mattered now. At midnight, he made up his mind.

“Not a good idea,” Lomos said from a nearby pillar. Wherever he came from, he still wore his Wolf Brigade kilt and gun harness. “Turn fugitive and this gets messy. Endure the pain and hold your head high.”

Eli felt less anger and more hurt.

Lomos scoffed, “You don’t even retaliate verbally, huh? I keep forgetting that you were and will always be just her pet—her dog.”

After casting him a glance, Eli turned his attention back to Slade. Everyone always had an opinion of them, none good.

“I’m a wolf. Just like you,” Eli countered. The words made him feel sick. He needed no defense.

“Yeah, but a wolf, like a dog, can be broken. And that’s what you are. Broken. A perfectly domesticated mutt. You go where your father says—”

“Call me that again, and you won’t need to doubt me anymore.” Eli’s heart raced. He was posturing but he couldn’t figure out why. Rarely could he muster up enough fucks to give about what his pack or extended pack thought of him. As it stood, with Lomos’s skill and ranking, Eli’s six-foot two frame was just a yapping infant in the presence of a five-foot six wildebeest. He wouldn’t stand a chance. Still, he wasn’t backing down, especially now.

Lomos was fair in most things, and he allowed Eli his big talk by breaking eye contact to instead focus on Slade.

“It’s hard to watch it,” Lomos admitted. “I claim her as my Sovereign, too.”

“And you arrested her.”

“Well, what was I going to do?”

Admittedly, there wasn’t much anyone could have done. And Lomos himself had done far more for her than any other Brigade leader would. But it still seemed wrong.

“It’s your fault,” Lomos said, gravel in his voice. “Your fault Dresden’s sovereign got hurt. It’s your fault.”

Those meager words stole Eli’s power of speech. He could only stare at the man, awestruck.

“Heard whispers. Some informants here and there. Fae pissed in the blood as a joke. A fucking joke. That’s all. No big conspiracy, nothing malicious, just a joke. So the vamps gathered there sought to bleed her pet wolf dry.” Lomos eased off the pillar and sauntered forward. “Don’t know bout you, sir, but the only pet wolf of Sovereign Dresden I know of is the useless runt of the litter.

“The one werewolf who wouldn’t—couldn’t shift into human form that she took a liking to—the one who, when every other wolf in his family was dragged out and put in silver and...snipped, managed to keep his balls on his body thanks to hiding under a woman’s skirt. You.”

Eli trembled. It was both his proudest and worst memory. And Slade hadn’t gotten her way unscathed, either. Some nights Eli thought back to that event and fell in love with her all over again. Despite being older than her, he was tiny as a wolf, and he’d been content to remain as one forever if allowed.

And when they all got dragged out, one by one, forced to shift into wolves, and mutilated, he wasn’t spared. They’d gotten him, too. Slade came running. Deep down, he knew it might have been the impudence of a petulant thirteen-year-old refusing to let her toy get harmed and not a big rescue, but he didn’t care. The way she held on to him, taking whip after whip until she could barely move.... It resounded. It resounded even now because here she was...taking a beating on his behalf yet again.

“Don’t let it be in vain, sir.” Lomos reached him and cast his eyes to Slade. “You let her survive this, and she’s off. I knew she couldn’t pay that gold. But if I treated her lax, then those miserable fairies would have called for someone worse. Figured she’d just never pay that coin and I’d just pretend I never noticed.”

Eli hung his head. His knees gave out, so he crouched again. Eventually, he had to sit least he breakdown right there.

Lomos crouched as well, kilt dragging on the cobblestone. “She’s tough as nails, though. Ain’t she?” he admired. “I was always jealous of you. So jealous.”

Shamed, Eli watched the moonlight bring some comfort to Slade’s skin.

Despite all the ills of the day, something stuck with Eli even now. “Sovereign said there were twenty.” He asked Lomos, “Everyone knows it’s two hundred. You—”

“I’m fine.” Lomos nodded to Slade again. “She locked a good ten of us in the pantry and literally ate that key.”

Eli gagged. In time, they both laughed. “She really was a terror,” Eli admitted.

“I think she was actually trying to get back at her brother for something else. That’s why.”

Manny. No wolf in this area would dare utter his name, even now that he’d gone mad. He’d been the sovereign. He’d been the one to order the neutering. He’d been the one to set this upheaval in motion. And now...now he was being cared for like some innocent bystander.

“What if there were just twenty?” Eli asked. As far as he knew, he could confirm five—he’d seen the blood as he cowered in Slade’s arms. “Why would Dad say there were two-hundred. How many other vampire clutches communicated with us back then?”

Lomos shrugged. “Plenty. Your woman’s clutch especially.” He was sure to ask, more than hinting, “How is Sarah? Bet she loved seeing you on the news.”

Eli ignored the question. “When’s the earliest I can get her a doctor?”

“No doctors for vamps. New orders.”

Meeting Lomos’s yellow eyes, Eli gritted his teeth and said, “Why this cruelty? This is insane.”

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“It’s the law. And the legislative order is eighty-percent Fae. She was right stupid to beat the fairies. Better if she went after me and my lot. No wolf of mine’s gonna bite out the throat of my own sovereign. We only get the one. Once that oath’s said, it can’t be undone.” He paused for some time then asked, “How many of us you reckon’s left?”

“Of us?” Eli wasn’t sure he understood but hazarded a guess. “Us sworn to this sovereign? Outside of vampires?”

“Vampires’ got no loyalties. That’s why they can serve under any sovereign. But the rest of us: wolves, harpies, any other children of Rune.”

Eli considered those words. “After today?”

Lomos snorted out a laugh. “You’ve got a point. No way anyone’s supporting her now. Not publicly.”

Letting out a sigh, Lomos stood.

There was no custom but Eli felt compelled to stand with him.

“Thank you,” Eli said, “I know what you risk.”

“I risk nothing.” Lomos gestured his head at Slade. “I’m fulfilling my oath, and I can do that so long as it doesn’t interfere with my work. But don’t act like I’m on their side. Vamps were a terror. An awful terror.”

Eli countered, “And what have we become with how we’re treating them?”

The werewolf stared through him and shrugged. “My brother got fixed that day. Hell, so did all of yours.”

With no further protest to give, Eli nodded.

“But you love her; I get it.” When their eyes met, Lomos tried to smile. “And she loves you. I mean, look what she’s doing for you.” Despite the words of flattery, the tone held no joy. “Look what she’s doing for you,” he repeated.

It was a warning Slade herself had already given. Let her go. That was what they were both saying. Eli considered those words.

The first day he ever shifted into a human was the day he had to drag himself from under Slade’s bloodied, limp body. She took a whipping on his behalf so strong that she appeared dead. It was the only thing to force Eli to want to be human bad enough to become one for her. It was the last day he’d stayed in wolf form longer than a few hours.

As a wolf, back then, he couldn’t do much more than run. As a human, he could half pick her up, half drag her to a safe hiding spot. He could tend to her wounds. He could clean her off. He could catch rabbits and bring them back alive for her.

And now? Now he wasn’t leaving her without a fight.

Lomos’s brown eyes took him in. The brigade captain debated speaking up. Finally, he said, “There’s gonna be a raid...of the vampire reserve.”

He waited, but Eli waited, too. He welcomed being included but took insult. “You expect me to just leave her here and go run interference—?”

“Keeping the peace is what the brigade does. So if there’s anything that needs to be hid, now’s the time to hide it—”

“I’m not leaving her. Even if I’m just her pet.”

Lomos, though disappointed, relented. “No. Don’t suppose you would.”

Shortly after, Lomos departed.

All the better for the heads up. Eli still had faith in common decency.

Vampires weren’t the only ones once in power that fell from grace. Ancient races had something similar. But though the oppressor feared vulnerability, once down, their victims often retained their compassion and punished in a fair way.

The vampires’ inability to die was what people feared because there was power in immortality. But all beings were capable of corruption under the wrong conditions. Eli believed that firmly.

The vampires he saw in the barn were weak, crazed, suffering. No one with a heart would find a reason to add to that misery. Once people saw them for what they truly were, harmless, they would react in a natural way—with empathy. They’d find a more just punishment for Slade and her kind.

Eli’s phone vibrated in his pocket.

Ten missed calls from Sarah. As he scrolled through, another one came in. He let it go unanswered.

The next time his phone vibrated, he made the mistake of looking.

His father.

Eli closed his eyes and swore under his breath. He knew better than to ignore it. Summoning up his courage, he accepted the call.

He didn’t even say hello; a barrage of cussing came his way.

“You ungrateful bastard. Who do you think you are? Dragging my name in the mud. Who the fuck do you think you are? You think you can get away with this? Huh? You think I won’t find it? Huh? You think I won’t? I’ll find it. I’ll fucking find it and then I’ll fucking find you.”

Beep.

Eli lowered the phone and swallowed hard.

He made a call right away.

“Trix, hey. Where are you?”

“Oh, Trix is here enjoying your ice cream. Where else?”

“Get out of there now. Fly if you have to. Take her brother.”

“How many times I gotta tell people? Harpies can’t fly with no people. A dangling body’s heavy cargo. Now...a baby, a baby I can snatch up.”

“Will you stop with the baby thing, already? You’re just as bad as the fairies,” he grumbled.

Trixie took insult. “Fuck you, wolf. We ain’t sick like the fairies. All we do is take ‘em for ransom. All right? And we say pay us in runes or we’ll drop it in the ocean, but that’s just for effect. Name me one harpy’s done it—wait, make that two. Because there was this one time—”

“I said get out of the house.” Eli let a growl come from the back of his throat when he told her, “Werewolves are headed there. And they’re fit to kill.”

“What?” Trixie paused. “Wait, werewolves are coming? Lead with werewolves are coming.”

Beep.

Eli sighed. At least that was taken care of.

The next phone call came from Sarah’s father. The words future father-in-law flashed. If Sarah’d entered it, Eli’d feel better. But he’d entered it himself. He had been the one stupid enough to think he could go through with this arrangement. He had everyone’s approval for it—even Slade’s. Hell, she’d been the one to select Sarah as the best match for him before her fall from grace.

Back then, it had hurt. It felt like her way of dismissing him or giving him away. Now, he saw it for the gift it was. Joining Sarah’s faction to his own was pivotal.

Everything in Eli screamed to answer—smooth things over. At the very least, he should let it go to voicemail. That was better than hanging up.

Despite that, Eli clicked on the end button.

He felt sick. That was it—that was that.

“Goodbye, future father-in-law,” Eli grumbled.

It was hotter than hell at noon when Slade was finally freed.

Eli stood back, watching her charged, blistering remains peeled from the bindings.

“What is with the wolf, anyway?” one minotaur muttered to his ent colleague.

A wooden eye glanced at Eli, waiting close by, and muttered, “Oath to the sovereign. I feel bad for the guy. Stuck in a debt like that.”

The minotaur got the binds at her legs. “Can’t believe I’m here having to touch a vampire.”

“Tell me about it.”

Once they were finished, Eli picked up the folded blanket at his feet and spread it on the ground. “Bring her here.”

The officers shared a glance with one another and walked away. Eli watched after them, open-mouthed.

Left with no choice, Eli put the blanket over Slade’s remains and rolled her onto her side. The groan made him groan in return. The middle of her back wasn’t as tender but her sides were.

An alarm on his phone went off and he checked it. The words he saw made his eyes widen. His breathing grew shallow and slow.

“Oh...shit,” he whispered, biting back his panic. He dismissed his troll driver and sought to work alone.

Getting her into the car was easy after that, but hard to bear.

Today he traveled without a driver because as soon as he got out of town, he ditched the car and waded into the stream. Slade’s body slung on his shoulder, he trudged through the water for a good hour. He had to cross two more rivers and double back to make sure he wasn’t followed.

Once he arrived at the little house it was well into the night. The structure was cement, sturdy and sound.

He hadn’t had time to decorate it, but he’d managed to get a matrass this far out in the middle of nowhere.

After lowering Slade onto it, he peeled the blanket from her skin. Most of her blisters had popped, staining the fabric in yellow as he pulled it away. Sadly, his actions took some flesh with it.

“Shhh,” he soothed. But there was no helping it. She wasn’t coming out of that blanket, not easily. He made a hard choice and lay next to her, cooing, “Hey. Hey, do you hear me?”

Eyes burned shut, Slade groaned.

With this much damage, Eli doubted she could say anything coherent.

He brought her mouth to his throat and waited. Nothing. When he tried a second time, she turned her face away.

Eli sighed. That was just like her.

A thought occurred and he whispered, “Legion? Are you there?”

He received no answer.

“Legion? This is your chance to feed. Don’t you want to take it?” He wasn’t sure this would work but he prayed there was a reason that Trixie, who apparently had the ability to control the thing’s awakening, chose to let it rein. “You either feed now or remain like this. Remember the barn, there’s no healing coming to you. With no way to heal, how long do you think it’ll take to get you something worth drinking? Hours? Days? Weeks? And in that time, you remain like thi—”

The bite had Eli crying out. It was a slow suck at first, the force of it making Eli feel lightheaded. It was a mistake to allow a vampire to feed this close to the head. Much needed blood wasn’t reaching its destination.

But Eli endured for as long as he could before he put his thumb in Slade’s lips and pried her mouth open.

“That’s enough.”

“Hungry....” Slade whispered.

“I know.” Eli eased off the mattress and watched her. “But I can’t let you feed unabated.”

Werewolves’ blood just didn’t have much potency for vampires. Even a small rabbit’s blood was a better choice. Still, within a few minutes, most large listers began to shrink down.

Slade was finally able to open her eyes an hour later.

Eli, who was nodding off, sat up. “Hey.”

When she tried to move, he hurried to stop her.

“No. You’re still not nearly healed. This just closed most of the scabs. And...it kinda gave you a thin layer of skin. It’s weak, though.”

Slade opened and closed her mouth again and again. In time, she gave up and scanned her surroundings. “This isn’t your apartment.”

Eli smiled. “So observant.” She had no eyebrows, but she raised one at him regardless. “I had it built some years back in anticipation for this.”

“For this?” Slade struggled to sit up and managed it with his help. “For me?”

“No.” Eli hesitated then nodded forward to the thick glass wall and the thing beyond it. “For that gorilla.” He met her gaze and said, “I bought him for you. His blood’s going to help you heal.”