He did not expect his words to bring her to a full stop. “‘Moor’ is racist,” she told him. “Not to mention antiquated and imprecise.”
He closed his eyes because the snap to her voice made his wolf—already agitated—want to show her why people didn’t just contradict a dominant wolf. Especially when one is a witch.
She was a defender of the downtrodden. He would not hurt her, would not allow his wolf to hurt her.
“Tami,” he said softly, and when he opened his eyes, she hissed and took a step back. “I am very old and my wolf is generally angry and very dangerous. Arguing makes it obstreperous. I am descended from African Berbers and people from the Arabian Peninsula. I am thus a Spanish Moor, however antiquated the term. Perhaps we should go rescue the children?”
She watched him like a rabbit who suddenly sees a hawk. He sometimes enjoyed making people look at him like that. But he didn’t enjoy it from her. His wolf did, but he didn’t.
“I apologize for scaring you,” he said. “You are not in danger from me—” A promise must be kept, he advised his wolf. “But you will help me greatly if you make suggestions rather than give orders.”
When she didn’t move, he started walking toward the back of the house. A woman who worked with the homeless, where predators and prey mimicked each other, would not stay frightened of him long, he trusted. And indeed, after he had walked a few steps, she fell in behind him.
“My mother told me that some of the werewolves get really old,” she said. “Centuries.”
“Your mother was right,” he told her.
“The Spanish Moors . . .”
“I am very old,” he agreed.
“Okay,” she said in a small voice as they came to the back of the house. “Very old. I am sorry, my reaction is a hazard of the job. A lot of my people are minorities of one sort or another.”
We like her, he told his wolf. She’s a good person.
There were a set of wooden steps that rose about three feet to the only door in the back of the house. No one had attempted to clear them of snow, but there were signs that they were used. Like the picket fence, there were missing boards here and there.
This close to the house, the smells were very strong.
“Joshua said on the phone that his mother barred the window—would it be easier to go through this window?” Asil asked.
She shook her head. “The window in the girls’ room is about a square foot. We might be able to get the girls out through it, but Joshua is six feet tall and broad shouldered.”
He could go through the wall, but since there was no immediate danger, there was no reason to destroy the structure. Danger . . . he was reminded why he’d chosen to carry his weapon case on his back.
He breathed in through his nose deeply to see if he’d scented what he thought he had. And was rewarded with a bounty of odor so rich that it was hard to single out anything more subtle than rotting meat and rat urine.
“Very well,” he said. “Why don’t I lead the way, and you tell me—politely, please—where to go?”
She nodded. “I can do that.”
He turned the handle on the door, and it opened into what had once been a kitchen. He could tell because about two feet of refrigerator were still visible over the top of masses of garbage bags and boxes and totes. Asil coughed at the cacophony of mephitises and took an involuntary step back.
“The kitchen is the worst of it for smells,” said Tami in a grim tone. “At least they don’t have pets. I’ve been in places full of kittens and half-starved dogs that look like this and smell worse.”
“There are rats,” observed Asil. “But I suppose that you might not consider them pets.”
“I wouldn’t, no,” she said, looking as eager as he felt about stepping into the cave of aggregated stuff.