Heart heavy, he’d accepted her decision. His lawyers had complained that she wouldn’t travel into the city for her deposition, but he’d reported how much she’d suffered at the hands of the tribes during the rebellion—the loss of her entire family to disease and starvation, the years she’d endured working as a tribe prisoner. When the grim details of her ordeal hadn’t silenced the grumbling, Nick had reminded them a third of the treasure in the Wallach trust would be theirs. Wasn’t an hour’s drive into the countryside worth every penny? Apparently, it had been, because his mom had given her statement from the comfort of her living room.
Wheeling down the clinic’s sterile hallways, Nick envied her that, but he’d signed up for indignities far more excruciating once he’d resolved to reclaim his name. He could have stayed silent and finished out his life in the lands of men where nobody cared he was tribe. He owed his mom and his dad that. So did Rolan. Most occupying the mountains neighboring the tribes could trace tribal ancestors in their family trees, although few possessed enough tribal blood to manage a shift to wolf form anymore. Before the borders closed, the tribes mixed with men and sired children with them so the population wasn’t as fiercely bigoted as humans in the cities. Here, orphans from the war could grow up and live in peace. Nick had been born into unimaginable wealth and power, but until his adopted father had sneaked him into the lands of men, he’d never known safety. As long as he never shifted and thereby revealed the solid white pelt of nobility, he could pass for another refugee from the war. Enjoy a long and fruitful life, too.
Ah, but there was the rub.
As long as he never shifted.
The nurse slowed the wheelchair when they approached a conference room guarded by uniformed security, who opened the door so Nick could be rolled inside. He entered, and a group of severe, unsmiling men and women stood, retaking their seats at a narrow table only after Nick had been positioned at the opposite end, closest to the door.
“No,” Peter said, stopping Rolan from taking a chair next to Nick. The lawyer scowled, resting a restraining hand on Nick’s wheelchair handle. “We agreed my client would meet with each interviewer one-on-one.”
Though the others had sat once Nick had been rolled into place, one member of the party remained standing. “I thought a brief introduction before the interviews begin would be appropriate.” His mouth quirked in derision, and he tipped his head at the rest of his group. “The family, of course, are eager to meet the boy they believed was lost to them.”
Nick smothered a snort. “You refer to my family as a plural, but I only see Aunt Hannaras. As I recall, she tolerated children in small doses on the rare occasions she could be bothered to deal with kids at all. Her brother, her emperor, couldn’t persuade her to visit us children beyond required social functions, and she kept her distance from us at formal events, too. She wouldn’t know me.”
His aunt widened her eyes, but the leader of their group wiped his features into an expressionless mask, giving away nothing.
“Referring to my relatives as a plural is inaccurate unless you count our servants as family. Mother and Father wouldn’t have, although a few retainers stayed with us to the end and were executed alongside us, but we children developed different feelings on the matter. Averlee was more beloved by us than any of Father’s sisters, for instance. Probably because we were isolated from everyone—including our relatives and other nobles—to preserve the secret of Toly’s deformed leg. We infrequently saw anyone who wasn’t a servant.” He smiled down the table. “Greetings, Kaya and Dorn. I’m glad you survived the war. Dorn has been a vocal critic of the rebel council, so I knew he’d survived the genocide, but I often wondered about our other retainers. I’m happy Kaya survived as well. Too many friends and allies were slaughtered in the purges.”
The group’s leader flinched. “The tribes never sought to punish those who served nobility, only to free them.”
“Unless our retainers did not wish to join the rebels, in which case they were murdered or forced to flee.” Nick widened his grin, focusing his attention on Dorn. “Did you know the couple who adopted me bought a farm not four hours from the location you chose for your exile?” he asked the man who had privately tutored him and the emperor’s other children in the common tongue, Greek and Latin, Moorsha, and two local dialects still spoken within the tribes. Nick dredged up unfond memories of Nan, the tongue spoken by the tribe into which he had been promised to marry and had been taught since shortly after his birth. “Dad kept my hair short and my physical appearance changed a lot as I grew, but I didn’t dare leave our village until my teens,” he continued in the more guttural Nan. “I was too nervous to wander far. If you’d seen me, you might have recognized me. I couldn’t risk it.”
Gray-headed, his old tutor frowned. “You drag out your trailing ‘es’ suffixes, as he did.”
Nick dipped his head in acknowledgment. “To be fair, I’ve had no use for Nan or any other language other than the common tongue the past twenty years.”
“Lack of practice.” Dorn sniffed in contempt. “How many times did I urge you to speak other languages in your private rooms to perfect your accent?”
“Mother wouldn’t allow it. She claimed anything other than Moorsha was either pretentious or barbaric.” Laughter bubbled up inside Nick’s chest at the old complaint, but his joy died at the abrupt pallor of his adopted brother seated next to him. “Rolan?”
“You speak Nan?” he asked with a gulp.
Surprise arrowed through Nick. “Do you?”
“Not anymore,” Rolan replied in the common tongue, head down, shoulders hunched.
Sick regret twisted Nick’s stomach. Had Rolan been born in the Ural tribe in which Nan was still spoken? Growing up, Nick hadn’t asked his brother’s origins, and Rolan had never prodded into Nick’s history either. Traumatized boys forced to run from cruel and bloody war, they’d only wanted to leave their shattered lives behind them. Building a future with the man and woman who had rescued them from the carnage had been difficult enough. Alone, they’d mourned the birth families they’d lost, and when the stress of leaving the tribes for the lands of men overwhelmed them, they’d each turned to their individual rescuers for comfort, Nick to Dad and Rolan to Mom.
The only time that wasn’t the case was when Rolan roamed their farm in his animal form. Rolan’s wolf wasn’t shy about seeking out Nick, sitting with him, cuddling or playing. That Nick never shifted too hadn’t bothered Rolan. His beast wanted only to be with Nick in whatever form Nick chose to take. The snowy fur of Rolan’s ruff, as well as white patches booting all four paws, and Rolan’s compulsion to accompany him, proved his adopted brother had emerged from the noble families, who had fought relentlessly, though ultimately failed to reach their emperor during the war. His primarily gray pelt indicated Rolan’s origins could be found in the lower aristocracy, where mixing with the peasantry prevailed, but he was noble nonetheless, with instincts prodding him toward the high alpha of the tribes—his emperor.
Rolan presented no danger to Nick. That was all Nick had needed to know.