Hell Hounds novel Chapter 59

They got back to pack lands before sunrise with the news. Arianna took it straight to a meeting of the NARC ambassadors. For Yolanda and Ian, their night didn’t end either. The pack house appeared in chaos. Enforcers from all factions moved quickly through the building in various states of battle readiness.

They readied to take on the first Host of Fae. They have numbers. The mages working with the druids to force the Fae from the dream realm and keep them out. Now they must take action against them. The Host was too close to Ottawa now. They’d create too much chaos there to not get noticed. The web of protective secrets would unravel.

So Yolanda and Ian now oversaw the distribution of weapons to those trained to use them. Yolanda struggled because she’d lost control of her armoury. Not personally doing everything. Not being there every minute of the day. She just didn’t have time to cry about it. Or take it up with her superior. He’s trapped in the Ambassadors’ meeting as the head of the new forces belonging to the council.

“Do you think the council is moving too fast? It won’t be good if the Fae realizes everything we have. How can the mages be sure they got everything correct? They barely started researching things.”

“Ironically, that’s far from the truth. The mages have worked on many things related to just this situation. I think they developed workarounds and such a long time ago, but just needed time to be sure it worked. Mages are all about studying. They set their culture and society up around studying and researching. So, I think it’s more confirming what they already knew and the best way to go about it. Remember, we’ve known this would happen since the Fae left thousands of years ago.”

“It all sounds so weird because we have nothing in our history that might remotely match up to this.”

“Yes, but humans saw it as fiction and lore rather than a historical retelling. King Arthur and all those stories. Of course, they changed the names. No one wanted a Fae to accidentally become summoned to this plane, or summon a spirit of a powerful mage. Just what we could need. To give a dead mage a chance to become a Lich.”

“What?”

“Oh, the mages can exist after death and still perform magic. But it’s difficult they don’t stay sane, and it’s outlawed because of the mess these beings create with their lack of empathy and humanity.”

“Why not become a vampire?”

“Oh, they can become a vampire. But they lose the ability to use magic.” Ian looked a little surprised at this information. “What? You think we don’t have to live by rules? Magic doesn’t make things happen without consequences. So yes, if a child is born to mixed species parents, then it usually takes after one or the other parent. The survival of a child that is a true blend of both parents rarely survives long. Some species can’t produce children with other species. Like merfolk, they can’t breed with other groups. There are love stories and all that, but the cold hard fact is merfolk are just too different. Vampires are another group that doesn’t produce children the same way. They do the whole bite thing. Before you ask, they have rules to control their population, and they are harsh. But they are necessary.”

“Fine. Are we just haunting the armoury then?”

“For now, I think. If they need us for anything they can find us. Don’t we have enough to do already? Though that cult is bothering me. If a supernatural creature runs the group. What are they? Definitely something that can alter memory and intention. That’s no easy feat. I’m thinking a vampire or a Fae of some kind. Which I know doesn’t bode well for our success. Though, the Fae avoiding the group that made it possible for them to come through? That’s insane. It doesn’t make sense.”

“Maybe it can work in our favor. Think about it. Divide and conquer. If they don’t combine forces because the groups don’t trust each other. Then they’ll be weakened before our people get involved. With their inability to go into the dream realm. They’ll not be able to hide so well. By now they must know humans are a force just by the sheer numbers.”