Shifting Boundaries

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Everett

After Felix left, I called my mom, who was working in the daycare today. "Everett, are you safe?" she asked as soon as she picked up.

"I'm fine. Griffin and I are in a saferoom in our cabin. Felix is out looking for the invaders. Are you safe?"

"We're all fine, dear. There's a fully-stocked saferoom in the daycare and we have our own guards here in case the daycare is targeted." I remembered Felix mentioning once that the daycare was a frequent target for attacks, so hearing that my mom was in a saferoom didn't make me feel as good as it could have.

"How many guards are there?" I asked.

"Four. We have our normal two guards and another two came after the sirens started blaring. We'll be okay, dear. Don't worry about me."

But I was worried. I was worried about my mom, about my mate, about myself, and my son. I was worried about Meleri and Magnus, though I was sure they could hold their own in a fight. I was worried about Spencer and Molly, who would definitely be targets if the invaders could get anywhere near them. I worried about Paula, who had worked so hard to help Felix heal when he was in his healing sleep.

The sirens were muffled in this room, which I was certain had some soundproofing, so Griffin finally stopped clutching at his ears and was starting to calm down. It gave me a little more room to think, which wasn't a good thing – my thoughts were full of fear. What if someone broke into the house and found us? I wasn't a fighter. I couldn't protect us.

Griffin stood and pressed his palms to my cheeks. "Errit, read a story," he said.

I looked over at the stack of things Felix had brought for us and found a couple of books. I held them out to Griffin and said, "Which one do you want to read?"

Griffin took one from my hand and opened it up. He started pointing to the pictures of animals and telling me what they were called. It didn't take much attention on my part, which was good since I was tapped into Felix's mind. He had all of his barriers completely down, so if I really focused, I could hear his thoughts.

Felix had just reached Spencer's office, which was empty. He ran out of the building, heading for the training grounds. It was a frequent meet-up in situations like this. Griffin said, "Cow," and I didn't even check to see whether he was pointing to the right animal. Instead, I followed along as Felix made it to the training grounds, where he found Elspeth. This was my first time seeing her, though Felix had brought her name up several times.

"Where were you?" she asked him.

"I had to get Everett and Griffin settled," he said. "What's the situation?"

Elspeth started jogging into the woods and Felix kept pace next to her. "Three wolves attacked our eastern border. Jeff and Mila were on duty and took them out, no problem. At the same time, Alexa and Bryant fielded off four wolves in the south. They took out three, but the fourth got away. He ran out of our territory and we're on lockdown until we're sure there won't be more attacks. This feels organized, but they had to know that seven wolves wouldn't be enough to get through us. Something isn't adding up."

I was so relieved, I lost my focus on Felix and his thoughts faded from my mind. Spencer was just being cautious right now with the lockdown. No one was in our territory and no one in Lakota had gotten hurt.

"Errit!" Griffin shouted.

"Woah, no need to yell. What's wrong?" I asked.

"Read book," Griffin demanded.

"Okay," I agreed, and looked down at where his hand was resting on a picture of a pig.

"Pig," Griffin said, looking at me expectantly.