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earn his keep after all: I’d been able to slip out of the house by telling Mami we were going on a walk. A long walk. One I wasn’t sure I’d return from, if the pack knew what I thought they did.
    Wolf didn’t warm up to Saja. It pined away unhappily in the back of my mind, whining over the unnatural smell. I ignored It.
    Deserted. Tables were folded up neatly against the wall; an overflowing box of Maxim coffee packets sat in the corner. No rice cake crumbs or any other sign that anyone had been here for weeks. Something…didn’t smell right. I hugged myself in the center of the room.
    Saja’s low growl made me jump. I dug my fingers into his fur just as the lights went out, drowning the room in pitch-blackness. My eyes snapped into focus, peeling back the shadows to reveal a world of whites and grays. I didn’t like this. Whistling sharply to Saja, we left.
    I knew we were in trouble when we stepped out into the street, and the sun was a red sliver between buildings. The light fled before the impending march of winter, so quick and fleeting that it was hard to remember its warmth. I bundled my scarf around my face, and then I saw it—the vampyre watching me from the mouth of the building.
    How was it awake? There was still an hour left until sunset. At least it seemed unwilling to venture from its lair. It simply watched me, head cocked.
    I gave Saja a stern jerk on his leash. Yes, Yu Li had warned me to keep an eye on him after his miraculous recovery, a feat both strange and unsettling, but anyone who hated vampyres was a friend in my book.
    The vampyre beckoned. It was the first time I’d seen one of those things do something non-violent. I stayed resolutely in my shrinking circle of light.
    “What do you want?”
    “Wolf-girl, why don’t you answer the Queen’s invitation?”
    Wolf was going crazy, picking up other vampyre presences from the surrounding buildings. A cold frost stole over my heart. The Weres’ headquarters had been transformed into a sleeping vampyre nest. When had this happened? How could Jaehoon have let this happen? Where did the Weres stand in the war? Were we…losing?
    “I never received any invitation.”
    “You did. We delivered it to your pack. We heard no word back.”
    As twilight’s shadow soldiers advanced, another vampyre appeared in the alley behind me. Then another in the apartment next door—its face pressed against the glass. Saja squirmed around my legs, frantically trying to determine how best to protect me.
    “Trust me. I never got your invitation. I would have remembered balling it up and throwing it at your feet.”
    The vampyre paused. “Then shall I relay to my Queen that you have no intention of meeting with her at the palace to discuss a peace treaty?”
    I gaped. So much for concealing my emotions. “I can…meet your queen on the home turf? You’ll take me there?”
    “Yesssss.” The vampyre was losing patience. “This is an honor, you mutt. No other Were has stepped foot in the Vampyre Court for a century. You are the least of the worthy, but your rash clan leaders have started a war out of misunderstanding. You will visit the court of vampyres in Eve for Lunar New Year, the second new moon after the winter solstice. Queen Maya hopes the new year can mark a new night in the history of Weres and vampyres, one in which we both will have a place in her twilight kingdom.”
    “She wants to talk to me about this?”
    “You have a family member who is part of the vampyre coven: your sister, Marisol. And you are young and untainted by the clans’ views. You are a good representative.”
    My heart quickened. “Your sister,” not “sister s .” That was good news about Raina, wasn’t it? And an invitation to bypass all the fruitless searching and skip right to the elusive Vampyre Court? My body would be—somewhat—safe if the meeting took place in Eve. This was my ticket to saving Raina. Why the hell hadn’t the pack told me about it? Why had