We needed that week to justify Sam's reprieve to the other wolves.
"Stay by the phone," he said, and hung up.
Sam looked at me and sighed, then flattened out on the floor on his side like a big fur rug.
When the phone rang next, it was Charles, Samuel's brother and Bran's enforcer.
"Mercy?" "Right here," I answered.
"Tell me about Samuel." "Is it safe?" "I won't know until you tell me, will I?" Was he trying to be funny? With Charles, I could never tell.
Of all the Marrok's wolves, his younger son was the most intimidating--at least to me.
"I meant for Samuel," I said.
"I'm under orders," he said, with a cool smile in his voice, "to keep the contents of our conversation to myself." "All right." I cleared my throat and took Charles through my discovery that Samuel had tried to commit suicide all the way through Kelly Heart trying to apprehend Adam.
"He played with the children?" Charles asked.
"Yes.
I told you.
Maia got on his back and rode him like a pony.
It's a good thing for him she wasn't wearing spurs." Still flat on the floor, Sam thumped it with his tail twice-- otherwise, he might have been asleep.
"That's good, isn't it?" I asked.
"It means he has some time." "Maybe," Charles answered.
"Mercy, for werewolves--all of us have different relations with our wolves." Charles didn't usually talk a lot, and when he did, his speech was deliberate, as if he thought through everything twice before saying anything out loud.
Bran sounded that way on the phone, but Charles did it all the time, even in person.
"Think of werewolves as conjoined twins.
Some of us are quite separate, barely sharing anything at all with our wolves.
Just two entities under the same skin--we all start out that way.
When our human side is able to take control, wolf and man work out a .
.
.
`Truce' is the wrong word.
`Balance' is better.
And just as our human soul loses parts of what it was to be human, our wolf loses part of what it means to be wolf." "So Samuel's wolf isn't dangerous?" "No," he said quickly, and Sam picked up his head, rolled up to his belly, and took a more sphinxlike stance.
"Never think that.
He's not whole anymore--he isn't equipped to be in charge.
Like a conjoined twin, he shares his heart and head with Samuel.