“He took blood samples from Robyn this morning, and he wants to do an exam and a shift observation after lunch.”
Abby groaned. “This is exactly what I was trying to avoid by keeping her a secret. She’s having enough trouble adjusting to the fact that she’s not fully human anymore. The last thing she needs is to be poked and prodded.”
“All strays have trouble with the adjustment. You should have told us—”
“This is different, Jace.” Abby pushed back the covers and folded her legs beneath herself. “Other strays don’t wake up one day and realize they’re responsible for propagating a species they didn’t even know existed.”
“So, you just decided not to tell her?” Robyn had been hysterical and nearly incoherent in the minutes after we’d met her. Some of that was because she’d just narrowly survived a home invasion by a psychotic shifter-hunting cop. Some of it was probably due to the fact that her first encounter with the local Alpha—yours truly—included seeing him rip that cop’s throat out. But it soon became clear that the bulk of her shock and confusion was because she’d had no idea my men and I existed.
Robyn knew what she had become and what she could do, and she knew there were other shifters in the world, somewhere. But she’d had no idea there was any governing body around to hold her responsible for her actions. Or to help her.
“No, I decided to delay telling her,” Abby insisted. “But I taught her about everything she needed to know immediately—shifting, and instinct, and enhanced senses. About keeping everything a secret. I just left off all the social and political stuff. Alphas, territories, Prides. Procreation. I was trying to give her time to adjust to all the physical stuff first before I threw everything else at her. I was trying to help her. She was having a lot of trouble with the transition.”
“That’s normal, Abby. That’s why we monitor strays during their first weeks, whenever possible.”
Unfortunately, that was rarely possible. Most strays are infected by other strays, who know little to nothing about their own species, including how transmission works, how to prevent it, and the fact that it’s forbidden by long-standing council decree. Most of them don’t realize that they have a responsibility to help their victims through the transitional period, because they weren’t helped by the shifters who infected them. It was a vicious, violent cycle, which we had no way to stop unless strays in the free zones were taken into the fold. Given authority, official standing, and organization.
They needed to be counted, educated, and kept in line to protect our secret. Faythe, Marc, Titus, and I were trying to make that happen through our proposed resolution, for the good of our entire species.
But there was resistance from the more conservative members, who believed most adult strays were a lost cause because they lacked the shifter upbringing that would have tempered and informed their feline instincts in the early stages. Certain council members, namely, Blackwell and his supporters, thought the best we could do for strays was to eliminate those who demonstrated uncontrollable violence and leave the rest to their lives. Unaffiliated with ours.
They were wrong, and Robyn was an extreme example of just how badly things could go when strays had a limited—even if well-meaning—support system.
“Abby, you should have told me. I could have helped you.” Then we’d only be dealing with the infection issue, instead of insubordination and murder. Not to mention hiding a stray from the council. I couldn’t think of an official rule forbidding that, but I was sure they’d be pissed.
“If I’d told you, you would have had to report her to the council, and they would have taken her.” Abby grabbed my hands. Her eyes were wide, her voice strained. “They would have pulled her out of school and put her through a bunch of tests, and they would have locked her up. I couldn’t let them lock her up, Jace. Nobody deserves that.”
That’s when I understood. Abby’d spent nearly a week in that cage when she was seventeen. She’d been raped and beaten, fed whatever and whenever her captors thought she should eat. She’d had a bucket for a toilet, and she’d lived in utter terror of dying the same way Sara Di Carlo—Vic and Mateo’s sister—had. She couldn’t willingly put her best friend through that. Even part of it.
But her fear was unfounded. We were talking about the territorial council, not a band of warlords.
“They wouldn’t have had to lock her up if you’d brought her to us immediately, because she wouldn’t have killed anyone yet.”
“No, they would have locked her up to stop her from killing.” Abby shrugged, and the gesture carried doubt. “Maybe I should have let them.”