bloodlines and families became the new power units of society. When a family produced two Primes in three generations, it could petition for and be formally recognized as a House; an honor that came with life-changing benefits and drawbacks.
On average, seventeen new Houses emerged every year nationwide. Of those, a quarter survived the first eighteen months after their grace period was over, and only a third of the survivors made it to the five-year mark as an independent entity. As soon as they were fair game, their competitors killed them off or the more powerful families dismantled them, scavenging their Primes for their own uses. Some voluntarily entered alliances, like the one Augustine had offered me, and became vassals, eventually absorbed by their patron House or killed, used as the first line of defense in House warfare. A grand total of 1.42 families lived through the melee.
The next year would be crucial. Our first case with me as the Head of the House would be equally important.
This morning, sometime between turning off the alarm and jerking awake, I had dreamed that Arabella burned to death. In my nightmare, I was holding her charred corpse to me, looking at her picture on my cell phone, and crying. I woke up with my face wet. For Runa, it wasn’t a nightmare, it was reality.
“Venenatas are combat mages. Runa Etterson would make a formidable ally,” I said. “I’ve looked at our schedule, and if Leon closes the Yarrow case today, we’re wide open.”
We were wide open because for the first time in the last three years we had decided to lighten our load for the holidays. We had mostly succeeded, except for the Yarrow fraud and the Chen case. The Chen case was a nightmare. Someone had stolen a van with three prize-winning boxer dogs in it on Christmas Eve. The van was found abandoned the next day, all three dogs missing, and the breeder was beside himself. Cornelius, an animal mage and our only nonfamily investigator, had taken that one, and we hadn’t seen him or Matilda, his daughter, since the day after Christmas. He’d emailed me yesterday to inform me he was still alive and working.
Bern smiled. “That’s a solid argument, and if I wasn’t your cousin, I would totally believe it. You’re making an emotional decision. You would help her if her magic consisted of conjuring up cute garden gnomes.”
“Bernard,” my mom said in her Mom voice.
“I want to help her as much as anyone,” Bern said, “but my job in this family of Care Bears is to provide logical analysis, so humor me.”
“I understand your point. It’s valid.” I sipped my tea to buy time. Bern could be swayed, but you had to present your arguments in a methodical fashion. “You’re right; the grace period is almost over, and I’m an unknown commodity. It would be different if Nevada was the Head of the House.”
“If Nevada was here, I would give her the same assessment,” he said.
“Either way, we’ll be watched and our first case with me in charge will be scrutinized. I considered it carefully and I like the message this case is sending.”
“What message?” Grandma Frida asked. The coffee must have finally kicked in.
“We stand by our friends,” I said. “We aren’t a House who abandons allies out of convenience. If you earn our trust, we’ll honor it.”
Bern nodded. “Very well. As long as we’re all clear on what we’re walking into. Two Prime Venenatas may have been burned to death in their home, on their own turf. We all know what that means.”
“What does it mean?” Runa asked from the doorway. She wore a big T-shirt and a pair of leggings. Her hair was a mess, dark circles clutched at her eyes, but some of the stiffness in her posture had eased off.
“House warfare,” Mom said.
House warfare had its own rules. When people who could incinerate entire city blocks and throw buses around fought to the death, the government turned a blind eye, as long as all reasonable precautions against civilian casualties had been made. You went to the courthouse, filed some paperwork, and walked out with carte blanche to murder your enemies as you saw fit. If your House was in a feud and people with guns and magic were storming your home, 911 wouldn’t take your call. If you were running down the street with a pack of summoned monsters on your heels, the cops wouldn’t stop to help you. That was one of