Greg tugged at his sleeves as he walked over to talk to the two reporters. Thanks to the Rot, he was once again wearing his brother’s clothes: Nathan’s this time. Apparently, he had lost weight in the mountains. He’d cropped his hair back last night, too, and shaved properly, so he at least felt decently confident in his appearance.

“Ah, Mr. Feleke, we’re very grateful for this opportunity,” Dawson started. “Should we talk here?”

Greg bristled a little at the address. He was not a “Mr,” and he wondered if he should insist on this. If he didn’t – this article was sure to spread, wasn’t it? He either claimed the title now or let it go forever.

“It’s Lord Feleke, actually,” he said out loud. “My father is Baron Abraham Feleke of Courtenay, my mother is Imani of Matlia, daughter of the Balambaras of the province of the same name. The fact that I was bitten doesn’t change that, does it?”

For a second, there was consternation on their faces, but neither of them argued.

“Well said,” Mulley claimed instead. “And our apologies, your Lordship. We meant no offence. Please, have a seat. Would you be willing to talk about how you became a werewolf?”

Greg did sit, digging the nail of his index finger into the skin of his thumb to stop his hands from shaking.

“First things first,” he said. “We are offering quite a lot here, aren’t we? How many exclusive interviews have there been with werewolves who have been – afflicted for longer than the new laws have been in place?”

“Not many,” Mulley said, at the same time as Dawson admitted: “None as far as I know.”

Greg nodded; that was what he had expected. “Then there is me, the werewolf who made all of this possible in the first place. I’m sure you can see why I’m expecting some accommodation from you?”

He could feel a trickle of sweat run down his back. He felt like a fraud, like they would laugh at him – but he did have what they wanted, not the other way around, he had to remember that. He’d seen his father do it, had seen Andrew do it, had talked about it with his parents. Be calm and polite, but firm.

“Of course,” Dawson said after a second. “I’m sure we can find a consensus.”

“I want to see what you write before you publish it, and we will reserve the right to make changes. Especially if you’re going to do anything – editorial about the experience of talking to a werewolf – we would like to see it, so we can clear up any – misunderstandings.”

That was the difficult part, really. Proofreading an interview, that was standard, but asking to read the journalists’ opinions, too, that was more unusual. Mulley and Dawson slowly nodded, though.

Greg felt himself relax a little bit. “Not many of the werewolves fresh from the wilderness will want to talk to you. They’re still getting used to being amongst people, and the attack earlier certainly didn’t help. Like my brothers, I ask that you respect their right to decline an interview and do not bother them about the matter. There is a good chance that those who have been stationed here longer would be interested in an interview.”

“There’s no way we can change their minds?” Mulley asked. “You see, the more interviews we can do, the more nuanced our understanding will be, and the more thoroughly we can report. Certainly, that is in your best interest, too? Or is there something you want to hide?”

“The issue isn’t hiding anything,” Greg said calmly. “The issue is the moon phase. If you are willing to stay until full moon is over, and we have a waning crescent, you will get more takers.”

“We did hear from the scientists at Deva University that many of you folks tend to be more – animalistic – this time of the month,” Mulley went on, while Dawson took meticulous notes. “Yet nobody is in a cage yet? That’s not dangerous?”

Greg crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Animalistic is a grossly imprecise term to describe what happens. There is no danger here at all. There will be no danger until the sun sets on the first night of full moon. It is, however, more painful to turn human this time of month, and many of us simply do not choose to do so.”

“Painful.”

“Yes. If you are fine with me translating, more of us might be willing to talk to you. But they won’t turn human.”

“The wolves can still talk?”

“To other werewolves, yes. I do also have a volunteer to be your first interview partner in human form.”

“Let’s start with that – that person, yes?” Dawson said, looking at Mulley.

“There is one last issue,” Greg said. “And this has nothing to do with us, but is rather an order we will need to follow, I’m sure you’ll understand this: We cannot go into too many details regarding how exactly we fought the Rot here.”

“What? But that’s –“

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“That’s a potential weapon in the hands of the Valoise,” Greg said calmly. “I realize that your readers are deeply interested in these details, but we do need to win the war first. We can tell you what happened. We just cannot get into the finer points of why things fell out as they did.”

“We – yes, of course. We wouldn’t want to give the Valoise any advantage.”

“Thank you,” Greg said. “Let me go and get Rémy.”

Greg warned Rémy, too, against talking about how age affected a werewolf’s powers. When they reached the table where the two journalists sat, their notebooks in front of them, Greg almost thought Rémy would back out. Both Mulley and Dawson got up.

“We apologize for what happened earlier,” Mulley said. “We had no idea that man wasn’t a real reporter. We wouldn’t have travelled with him had we known. My name is Mulley, and this is my colleague, Mr. Dawson. We work for the Eoforwic Tribunal, the biggest newspaper in the city.”

“Rémy. Uh, Rémy – Pernier.” He visibly hesitated, and then smiled, looking embarrassed. “Sun, haven’t used that name in ages. Used to be a hunter, but small time. Nothing like Lord Feleke’s family. Been a werewolf for, oh, nine years now? Ten?”

“The werewolf that bit you, was it a mad one?”

“I’ve no idea. Used to think every werewolf is a senseless monster, and if you expect that, that’s what you’re going to see, right?”

Rémy shrugged uncertainly. “My partner left me for dead, thought I’d bleed out from the bites.”

“Then how did you survive?”

“Well, see, I got bitten on the day before the actual full moon.”

“And that helped how?”

Rémy glanced at Greg before he explained: “Well, you see, your first transformation, that’s when the curse takes hold for real. That’s some serious magic. I don’t know how it works, but if you live until moonrise of that night, chances are good you’ll survive whatever injuries you have.”

“Did you stay in Loegrion, or did you make for the mountains right away?”

“I ran as soon as I realized that I hadn’t actually turned into a monster,” Rémy said. “Luckily, Pierre took me in.”

“Who’s Pierre? Is he here, I mean?”

“Oh, sure. See the old man sitting with the others over there?”

Both journalists looked up to glance over at Pierre. “He – seems to be really quite old,” Mulley went on after a moment. “And he took you in? Like a son?”

Rémy laughed. “Nah. Nothing like that. Pierre’s our pack leader, he just let me join. He was the one who led us back to Loegrion, too. It’s really lucky he’s here, we’d never have beaten those Rot-queens if...”

Rémy stopped himself just as Greg moved to interrupt him. “Sorry, can’t talk about that.”

Of course, that made the two journalists only more curious. “Surely, a healthy young man – werewolf – such as yourself – would have been better off in a fight without having to guard someone as old as him? Or is he less – frail as a werewolf?”

“Nope,” Rémy said, grinning. “Not at all. Can’t tell you more, though.”

“How about just between the – the four of us?” Mulley asked.

“Yeah, no,” Rémy said before Greg could even open his mouth. “Sorry, but I’m not gonna piss off the Relentless himself.”

Mr. Mulley looked at Dawson questioningly. When his colleague shook his head, he asked: “The Relentless? Who would that be?”

“The Feleke Four?” Rémy asked. “The Old Man, the Relentless, Fleetfoot? The Mad Butcher? Ironhand? Hunters usually don’t introduce themselves by their real names to us.”

“I know of the Feleke Four, yes. I had never heard of the rest of them. They are all hunters?”

“The Old Man, the Relentless, and Fleetfoot are the Feleke Four,” Rémy explained. “Last one never really got a nickname.”

“Just Andrew,” Greg added.

“Right. I think Ironhand might be retired, actually,” Rémy went on. “Had an iron hand, hence the name. He was big when I got bitten, but he was kinda old, too. He didn’t follow me past the foothills of the Crucible Ridge. I’d be dead if it had been the Relentless.”

“My brother, Lord David Feleke,” Greg explained.

“Yeah, him. He’s the worst. He picks up your trail and he just – just doesn’t stop, until you’re dead. You gotta go deep, deep into Rot country, and even then there’s a chance that you come out a few months later, and there he is, waiting for you. Scary as hell to think that he’s the one in charge of all this. Though, having his little brother in the pack will hopefully help.”

“You wouldn’t happen to know who this “Ironhand” used to be?” Mulley asked, looking at Greg. “Or this “Mad Butcher”?”

“That’s the lady,” Rémy said. “The one who was here. Used to be her father’s name, until the Morgulon killed him.”

“Countess Lane deLande.”

“Countess deLande is... Oh my,” Mulley muttered. “Oh my.”

“Can we write about this?” Dawson asked.

“She knows,” Greg said. “So it’ll depend on the result.”

“Would your brothers be willing to answer more questions, milord?” Mulley asked.

“Andrew, likely. Nathan, I’ll have to ask.”

The two journalists went back to Rémy’s story after that, asking about his journey to the Argentum Formation and his life there in more details, and finally about meeting Greg and the decision to return to Loegrion. They took their time and didn’t ask again about the fight against the Rot-queens until they had a very solid back story on Rémy.

It took more than two hours and they thanked Rémy profusely for taking the time.

“Could we do another interview after dinner? It needn’t be quite this long, of course.”

Gertrude talked to them for about an hour. The same night, just as Greg was about to go to bed, they had their first two stories ready for him to read: A longer piece about the “Siege of the Rot-queens” and a shorter bit about the “Murderer in the Name of Mithras.”

The first article was a fairly accurate summary of what had happened during the fight, with a focus on the damages the journalists had witnessed themselves. The second one contained a brief summary of how Allard had attempted to kill Pierre. The tone was surprisingly – outraged – on behalf of the werewolves. Greg had no changes to make to either of the pieces.

“They’ll appear in the morning edition tomorrow,” Mulley informed him, while Dawson hurried off to get them on the telegraph.

Rhuad was happy to talk to them the next morning for a bit, and Oli agreed to answer some questions as long as Eyal was there, too. This was the first interview after which Greg worried if he would get them to cut some of the more problematic passages. He couldn’t deny that it was in the public’s interest to learn how the Rot-queen had called Oli out of the camp as soon as Ragna had left, how it had roped him in despite his best efforts to resist. He just didn’t want all of that to become public knowledge.

He shouldn’t have allowed this interview in the first place.

But before he could figure out a way to fix that mistake, the whole thing was pushed back in importance. In the late afternoon, just as Pierre finished up his own conversation with Mulley and Dawson, a large group of soldiers and riders reached the camp: A company of infantrymen with their train of supplies, and on horseback, David and Duke George Louis himself, surrounded by his personal guard.