Shards of Hope (Psy-Changeling 14)

“You spoke of punishment,” Aden said, seeing in the child’s response to the alpha an answer to a problem for which he so far had no solution. “How do you punish a child so she isn’t broken or hurt? Especially a child that could do serious damage?”

“Tell me that’s not how you train your children.” Snarling anger in Remi’s words.

“It’s how we were trained,” Zaira answered. “Now we want to change things, but we must have a framework.”

•   •   •

REMI couldn’t imagine harming any cub, any child. Whether that child belonged to his pack or not. Deeply disturbed at the idea that the Psy had done—might still be doing—that to their young, he picked Jojo up from his shoulder and held her against his chest. Curling against him, she began to purr, the contented sound easing his leopard’s agitation.

“Punishment depends on age,” he said when he realized the Arrows were serious and waiting for his response. “For the littlest, making them sit alone in a corner without toys for a few minutes is enough.” He stroked Jojo’s soft fur, her body fragile under his touch. “They don’t really remember what they did wrong if the punishment goes on any longer, but if we’re consistent in punishing them for bad behavior in that way, they eventually make the connection.”

“A kind of conditioning,” Aden said.

Remi shrugged. “It’s about instilling discipline, teaching in a way that suits their age and ability to learn. You want to call it conditioning, go for it.”

Aden and Zaira looked at each other, and while their expressions didn’t change, it was clear they were silently considering the matter as a pair. Remi wondered if the two knew how often they did that. If they hadn’t been Psy, he’d have thought they had something going on. Then again, things had apparently changed for the Psy race recently—for all he knew, these two were having dirty, sweaty sex every night.

His leopard grinned at the idea.

“What about older children?” Aden asked after about thirty seconds.

“Longer periods of time-out usually work for those of elementary school age,” Remi said. “We also start limiting privileges.” He rubbed the spot between Jojo’s ears and her purr increased. His own leopard purred in his chest in reply.

God, he’d missed cubs when he’d been roaming alone, missed the sense of family that was at the core of a healthy pack. He’d needed those solitary years to realize how little such an existence suited him, but every now and then, he wanted to give himself a swift kick in the ass for taking so long to understand his own intrinsic nature.

“Older cubs also start being hauled up in front of the maternal females, or the alpha, for bigger transgressions.” His grin grew wider at the memory of his teenage years. “I was once assigned to dig outdoor latrines for a camping trip, then fill them back in. By myself. In winter.” The ground had been like rock. “At least it didn’t smell.”

“What did you do to earn the punishment?”

Aware of the sharp little ears listening to him, he shook his head instead of answering Aden’s question. “Doesn’t matter. And the details of specific punishments don’t matter—what matters is that the cubs understand they did something wrong, and that people care enough to correct them.” Kissing Jojo on top of her head when she rose up on her feet, he put her on the ground.

She padded over to her older brother and began to pretend-attack his leg.

The teenager pretended to growl back.

Seeing the Arrows watching the interplay, he waited until they returned their attention to him. “The most important thing,” he said, “is that the child knows he or she is loved, is wanted, belongs. It makes the toughest punishment bearable.”

He held Aden’s gaze, the other man’s expression unreadable. “It’s the alpha’s responsibility and his privilege to create that environment—we are the guardians of every heart in our care.” Aden Kai might not be changeling, but he was an alpha and he held within his hands the power to change his people from the inside out.

•   •   •

THE most important thing is that the child knows he or she is loved, is wanted, belongs.

Zaira didn’t know what it was to be loved, didn’t understand the emotion, though the insane girl in her had often pressed its hands to the windows of her eyes in wordless yearning as it watched those of the other races. Living in Venice, Zaira had seen fathers and mothers with their children, siblings laughing arm in arm, lovers walking wrapped in one another, and she’d sometimes imagined a future in which she, too, had someone who liked to be with her just because she was Zaira.

Her brain had trouble with that concept, but oddly the rage creature coveted it. Even when it appeared to Zaira that love was as huge a thing as rage, that it would fill her up should she ever understand it.

Not far from them, the boy Jojo had “attacked” was laughing as he picked her up by the scruff of her neck and nipped at the tip of her nose.

Rage was a selfish, covetous emotion that wanted to swallow her whole. Love, it appeared, spread outward. And still the twisted, deformed girl inside her, the one filled with rage, looked at that scene and cried. The tears were old and silent and hidden deep in the vault of her mind. Zaira hadn’t cried true tears since she was maybe three, but deep in that vault, the girl shaped by rage sometimes did so surreptitiously.

Zaira tried to ignore her, but it was hard, her cries echoing in the silence in her head. Stomach tensing, causing her new skin to ache, she waited till Remi left the table before saying, “How can we teach Arrow children about love if we don’t understand it?”