“Vera!” Grud hollered as he entered the house. “Is the food ready?” The smell was great. The old woman was an excellent cook.

“It’s almost done, dear. Don’t you want to wait for your Uncle Harold? We can all eat together when he comes back. It’s so nice to have lunch as a family.”

“Fifteen minutes. If he is not back by then, I want my food on the table.”

“Yes, dear.”

Grud plopped on the couch, leaned back, propped his feet on the coffee table, and clicked the remote to change the channel from the boring cooking show the woman had been watching. He needed to check the local news.

It was only his second day at Vera and Harold’s house, and already the novelty of the arrangement that had seemed so sweet was starting to wear off.

The woman was fussing over him as if he were her real nephew, which was what he’d thralled the old couple to believe, but it was annoying as hell.

There were advantages of course, like Vera cooking all of her signature dishes for the beloved nephew, and old Harold running around and buying everything Grud was asking for.

Yesterday, he’d sent the old guy to the mall to buy him clothes, shoes, a new phone, and a wallet, which Harold had also kindly filled with cash.

Grud had even considered having them buy him a new car, but their bank account didn’t have enough money in it. Not a problem; when he left, he was going to take Vera’s car, same as he’d done an hour ago.

With his curiosity getting the better of him, Grud had driven to the facility and had gone to investigate.

He’d been careful, parking Vera’s car next to another building that had several cars in its parking lot, and then strolling casually to the facility he’d spent the last several months at.

It had been very low risk.

Even if Wonder had been there and seen him, she would not have recognized him. With most of his beard gone, the neat haircut Vera had given him, and the new clothing Harold had bought for him, Grud could barely recognize himself.

But just as he’d expected, the building was vacant.

The front door had been locked, but apparently no one had checked the office he’d escaped through. The window had been still open, and the screen had remained torn. Grud had gotten in the same way he’d gotten out.

What he hadn’t expected was to find the hole he’d made in the wall all patched up as if it were never there. The mattresses and blankets and spare clothing were all gone too, as was his stack of books.

Someone had taken great care to erase all evidence of anyone other than the apes ever being locked in those cages.

Why would anyone go to all that trouble?

Not the human police, that was for sure. They would’ve wanted the evidence to stay intact.

Whoever had done it must’ve wanted to protect Wonder and cover up her criminal activity. Using the facility without permission was no doubt a punishable offense even in the West, where the laws were lax and civilians were allowed way too many personal freedoms.

Humans weren’t meant to be free. Mortdh’s teachings said that it wasn’t good for them. They’d been created to be slaves to their betters and needed a firm hand to guide them.

But if not the police, then who could’ve done it?

Grud had been watching her for months and collecting the little bits of information she’d let slip. Wonder didn’t have friends, human or immortal.

Maybe it wasn’t about Wonder at all?

Maybe it was about Dur?

What if Dur had overpowered Wonder, taken her phone, and called his people?

As a spy, Dur probably belonged to a secret division of the Brotherhood, and the men Grud had seen leading Shaveh and Mordan out had been from that unit.

That could explain the cover-up job, but it didn’t explain why Shaveh and Mordan had been taken away in handcuffs. Although it did explain why they hadn’t tried to get free.

“Gary, honey.” Vera pushed the kitchen door open. “Harold is back with the things you asked for. Would you like me to set the table?”

Grud waved her off. He really hated all these cutesy names she called him. He was a warrior, not ‘dear’ and not ‘honey.’

“I said I was hungry.”

But in case someone came to visit the old humans, he had to keep up the nephew named Gary charade. A few more days of repeated thralling and the couple would not remember their own names, let alone the invented nephew’s. By then he would probably be gone.

Vera smiled. “It will be ready in a minute.”

After the woman’s interruption, it took him a few moments to gather his thoughts again.

Why would the Brotherhood arrest Shaveh and Mordan?

Getting caught by a female was humiliating, but it wasn’t a crime.

The other possibility was that Dur wasn’t a Brother at all. He might have been a clansman, and those who’d arrested Shaveh and Mordan had been Guardians who came to rescue him.

The spy story might have been a clever cover to hide who he really was while he pretended to be one of them. That would also explain why he’d seemed odd for a member of the Brotherhood.

The guy was too polite and too charming, behaving like a human male who was practiced in wooing females rather than just taking what he wanted from them.

Still, if he were a Guardian, the bastard was a very convincing liar.

Grud shook his head. All that thinking was starting to give him a headache. He had a hard time combining all the possible threads into something that made sense.

If Dur was a clansman, and those who’d arrested Shaveh and Mordan were Guardians, they would have taken Wonder with them. Why would they care if the evidence of her trespassing was discovered?

Fuck. Thinking in circles wasn’t going to solve the puzzle for him. Besides, his rumbling stomach was too distracting for him to think clearly.

Maybe once he was full, the answers would come.