It hit him like a ton of bricks. Daniels saw him as a sibling. She probably didn’t even realize it.

On some level he had always understood it. It wasn’t the woman he had wanted. It was what she represented. He wanted her acceptance. He wanted her to admit how good he was. He would’ve seduced her to get it and then rubbed Roland’s face in it. One way or the other, the bastard would acknowledge him then.

Validation. So simple.

At the Black Sea, Lennart had played a ruse, pretending to be interested in another woman. It was a moronic tactic, one that always backfired, and it took a lot of work to cut off all possible escape routes until Hugh forced Lennart into that path. Hugh had quite enjoyed watching it play out at the time. It seemed odd, when Hugh thought about it now, as if it had happened to someone else. It had made Daniels desperate. It had made her vulnerable.

How the hell did he miscalculate so badly? It was painfully obvious now.

“I should’ve played the brother angle.” He didn’t realize he had spoken out loud until he heard his own voice.

“Come back to your true family?” Elara asked.

He nodded. “It would’ve been so easy too. ‘Look at everything you sacrificed for Lennart, and here he is, sniffing after the first attractive shapeshifter girl that fluttered her eyelashes at him. You’ll never belong with them, but you belong with us. We are your true family. He’ll never understand you, but we will. I will. I know exactly what it’s like. Come with me, and you will have a father and a brother who love you above all others.’ Damn it! I could’ve had her.”

She didn’t say anything.

“Why the hell didn’t I see it?”

“Because you wanted something from her, Hugh,” Elara said, her voice gentle. “And it made you blind. What did you want?”

“Doesn’t matter now.”

He wanted acceptance. If not from Roland, then from her. He would never have it now, and when he thought about it, the ball of conflicting crap those thoughts dragged in their wake was too complicated to deal with.

“Should I worry about this Daniels coming here to kill you?” Elara asked. “If I were her, I’d hunt you to the ends of the Earth.”

Hugh struggled for a moment with the paradox of someone worrying about him. “No. Her hands are tied. She claimed Atlanta as her domain the night Roland exiled me. If she leaves, he will attack.”

“So she sacrificed revenge for her people.”

“That’s the way she’s wired.”

“Do you still want her?”

She’d asked the question so casually, so perfectly flat. Hugh glanced at her. She looked at the road ahead, her face relaxed, but it was too late. He’d caught that one tiny note of female jealousy in her voice.

The untouchable goddess of the castle. Would wonders never cease?

Elara turned to him. “Hugh? I need to know if you will take off looking for her if you get a chance.”

Sure, you do. You shouldn’t have shown your hand, love.

“It doesn’t matter now. It’s in the past.”

“Is it? Is Roland in the past?”

The void opened its mouth and swallowed him whole. For a moment he couldn’t even speak, then the thing that drove him into battle reared its head and he tore free.

She was waiting for an answer.

Perceptive and smart, his dangerous harpy. His lovely wife. Elara had thought about it, about him. There was a spark there. All he had to do was blow on it and feed it, and he would get her. If their fights were anything to go by, he was in for a hell of a time.

“Roland no longer matters,” he lied.

“If Roland and Daniels don’t matter, neither does the Pack.”

The woods ended. They turned down the street to the smithy.

“So much effort to keep me from blowing up your deal. I have to give it to you, you really tried. Good show.”

She bared her teeth at him. “If you pick a fight with the Pack tomorrow, I’ll kill you and bury you in those herb beds back there.”

“That’s my sweet harpy. Come on, let me see those claws.”

“I mean it, Hugh.”

“Is it Hugh now? Not Preceptor?”

She eyed him. “I’ll call you Preceptor when you’re done with your immature tantrums.”

He laughed.

Elara looked into his eyes, her gaze searching. “What is it you stand for, Hugh d’Ambray?” she asked.

He reached for the answer. It eluded him for the moment. “Good times and loose women.”

Elara rolled her eyes and peered at the smithy. “What are we doing here anyway?”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the sketch of the warrior. “We’re going to ask your best smith how hard it is to make this scale mail.”

He already knew the answer, but he wanted confirmation anyway.

She sighed.

“Come on, then, wife. Put on a happy face.”

“Ugh.” She reached over and slid her fingers into the crook of his elbow.

“Good God, control yourself, woman. We’re in public. At least wait until we’re in the bedroom.”

“Your corpse will grow lovely goldenseal.”

He laughed again and walked her down to the smithy.

Hugh stood in front of his bedroom window, leaning on the windowsill. Night breathed in his face, cool and soothing after the day’s heat. Early October had been surprisingly hot. He’d left the door to his rooms open, and the night breeze swirled past him, sucked out the door, down the hallway and into the depths of the castle.

Things used to be simple. Too simple.

He was a man who killed one father, failed the other, and left a trail of destruction in his wake four continents wide. When he looked back now, he saw bodies. It never bothered him before. He’d felt vague pangs of guilt, but never this.

It wasn’t natural. That was the only explanation. If he felt all this shit now, he would’ve felt it when he was doing it. He should’ve been bothered. That part of him had been suppressed and he wasn’t the one doing that suppressing.

An absurd urge to find Nez gripped him. Did he feel this? Was his leash longer? Was he allowed guilt?

“What is it you stand for, Hugh?”

Fuck if I know.

He wanted the bottle tonight. More than anything. He wanted to get drunk and forget all of it.

He heard footsteps behind him. “You called?” Lamar asked.

“Come in.”

The tall lanky man came over and leaned against the desk.

“Tell me what happened after my exile.”

“I thought you didn’t want to know.”

“I do now.”

Lamar pulled a cloth out of his pocket, took off his glasses, and cleaned the lenses. “The same night Roland exiled you, he went to Atlanta. There was a bargain. Lennart gave up the Pack. In return Roland agreed to a hundred-year peace with Daniels.”

“He separated her from her power base.”

“Yes. Once I was out of the picture, he began the systematic purge of the Iron Dogs. Anyone loyal to you became a target.”

“What about Atlanta?”

“Roland began building on the edge of it.”

“He was baiting her,” Hugh said. “He can’t help himself.”

“For a while he played father of the year, but Daniels never trusted him. Eventually he kidnapped one of her people, a polymorph named Saiman. She came to visit Roland at the fort he was building and demanded Saiman back. He refused. They screamed at each other in the language of power. She called him a usurper. Stoyan was there on the cross. He didn’t understand most of it, but he said the day was bright and sunny, and by the end of it, the sky turned black and lightning struck the ground. When they were done, she got Stoyan and got the hell out of there.”

It sounded like something Daniels would do. Subtle like a runaway bulldozer.

“She defended you,” Lamar said.

Hugh turned to him.

“You said you wanted to know. Stoyan memorized that part. He thought you would want to know one day.” Lamar reached inside his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper.

“Read it to me.”

“‘You were everything to him. He committed all those atrocities for you and you stripped him of your love, the thing he cared about most.’ ‘Hugh outlived his usefulness. His life had been a series of uncomplicated tasks and eventually he became his work.’”