“How safe do you think Kaci is with them? With the birds?”

“Having second thoughts about leaving her?” Jace’s smile was gone.

“No,” Marc growled. “We had no choice. I just want to know how bad off she’ll be when we get there. Does she have anyone to talk to? Anything to do? Do they even know what to feed her?”

“Assuming we make the deadline, she’ll be fine.” I had little doubt about that, after seeing Brynn with her daughter. “They’ll stand by their word, unless I break mine. I made sure she has plenty to read, but there’s nothing I can do about the company. Fortunately, they seem inclined to leave her alone. They don’t like outsiders, and as weird as it sounds, they think of us as practically human.”

“Meaning what?” Jace asked.

“They look down on us, and they don’t trust us. Including Kaci. But they don’t want to hurt her, either. She’ll be fine, so long as we make it back with the smoking gun in two days.”

“What about food?”

“She’s a teenager, not a baby.” Jace swerved to pass the first car we’d seen since leaving the gravel road. “She eats the same things everyone else does.”

But I knew what Marc meant; Kai had asked for carrion. “I told them to make sure her food was fresh and well cooked.” In animal form, our stomachs can handle raw meat, but even a cat won’t eat rotting flesh. And in human form, Kaci couldn’t eat either one.

Marc nodded, apparently mollified, and scooted onto the driver’s side of the backseat, so he could see me better. He leaned against the window, and when he blinked, his eyes stayed closed a little too long. He looked exhausted, and I realized then that he and Jace probably hadn’t slept at all since Kaci and I had flown the coop. My father had sent them west immediately, hoping they’d be close enough to help by the time he heard from us.

“How did you guys get out?” I asked.

“Huh?” Jace frowned at me, and Marc blinked slowly in incomprehension. They really needed sleep.

“From the ranch. How did you get out? That was before the ceasefire.”

“Oh.” Marc rubbed both hands over his face, then blinked again. “Your dad went out the front door again, gun a-blazin’. While the birds were all flocking around him, we snuck out the back door and into the woods in cat form, each hauling a backpack.”

“Why the hell would they fall for that again? They’d just caught us sneaking out!”

“They didn’t fall for it.” Jace gave me a lopsided grin. “It was a hell of a race, but they didn’t follow us into the woods. I think they’re totally helpless when they’re earthbound.”

“Well, at least now someone can go out for food and supplies. So, how did you get your car?” I ran the fingers protruding from my cast over the door handle, then stopped and glanced at Jace again. “Wait, this isn’t yours.” Now that I’d warmed up and eaten, I realized that the upholstery was dark gray, when it should have been black.