I don’t turn around yet. I’m waiting to see how many strikes she has in her.
“Hey, Isaac—well, you seem better,” Zia says from the doorway. “Physically anyway.”
Strike two. She didn’t address me as Lord.
I hear my bed squeak as she plops down on it. “Any word on Harry?” She doesn’t want to bring up anything about Adria for obvious reasons.
Strike three. Absolutely no respect.
I turn around fully, my back straight and proper, my hands folded in front. My face shows only one emotion, easily distinguished by Zia as she swallows and carefully gets up from my bed without the usual spring in her step.
She goes into a deep bow so that I can only see the top of her white-blond hair.
I flash Sebastian a grin before Zia raises her back again.
“Forgive me, Milord.”
I can definitely get used to this.
Finally, I let the smile slowly creep up on my face and when Zia realizes she’s been had, she runs over, squealing out a laugh and pushes me in the chest. “You jerk!”
I try to keep the smile on my face, because really, more than anything it was another unsuccessful attempt to take my mind off things.
Nothing is ever going to make this better.
“I need to get dressed, if you don’t mind,” I say with no emotion in my voice.
“Oh, Isaac,” Zia says sympathetically, “Maybe she—”
“Stop,” I interrupt softly, “Not right now, alright?”
A faint smile softens her eyes. “Alright,” she says. She smiles brighter, walking over to Sebastian still standing in the doorway. “We’ll be downstairs if you need anything—hell, you’re Alpha now, so I guess all you have to do is ring a bell and we’re all supposed to come running, right?” She looks around the room. “Didja’ get a bell?”
She puts up her hands, “Alright, alright, we’ll let you get dressed.”
~~~
Things are changing in our pack. Now that I’m Alpha here in the States, Nathan will be going back to Serbia to be right-hand to my father there. No doubt, Nataša will be unhappy about this since Seth will not have the opportunity to prove himself right-hand material anymore.
Our politics are…complicated.
I began my training—battle as well as politics—before I could speak. My father’s legacy is without a doubt brutal and revered. I know our ways better than I know just about anything, but the one law we were never permitted to know in full detail was the one concerning the Blood Bond. On the third night of my healing after becoming Alpha, the Governess came into my room and explained everything. A little late, yes, but nothing I can do about that now. According to our history, which stretches back more than three thousand years, there has only ever been four Blood Bonds recorded. Adria is not counted among them. Not yet. And Aramei…she has outlived them all.
If only Adria could’ve had the same luxury and was able to be Adria for longer than a few months.
I can’t stand this anymore. Not knowing where she is, if she’s even alive.
The one thing I do know is that already I fear that if Adria dies or I find out that she already has…I worry I will rule just like my father. I can already feel the dark, pitiless walls starting to surround my mind, closing in on me and my more tolerant nature.
Adria’s death will threaten to be the death of me, of the Isaac Mayfair I grew up to be despite my father’s iron fist.
But I know I’ll have to fight it…for her sake. It will be a struggle not to become like my father, but with my plans to change the laws of our kind, to be a beginning for a new age, I’ll have to let the death of the one I love make me stronger, not weaker.
It will be hard, but I have to fight it.
I head down the stairs to the faces of my siblings, a few friends and the Governess, who is always lingering in the shadows like an old crone. And despite Zia knowing that I’m not going to treat them as my father would, still everyone bows to me as if they are all seeing me for the first time.
I kind of hate it, really. To screw with Zia’s head, sure, it’s perfect, but in general it feels awkward.
“Come on, guys,” I say coming off the last step, “I’m not ready for the formalities yet.”
“Get used to it, little brother,” Nathan says falling into the comfort of the couch with Hannah beside him. “Eat it up while you can that I’m bowing to you at all—won’t last long.” He grins at me from across the room, tossing his arm around Hannah.
Funny how I became an Alpha before Nathan, but then everything has turned out quite differently than any of us expected.
The Governess, wearing her usual blue-black robe, which covers everything from the neck down except her hands and her bare feet, steps up to me. She’s nearly as old as my father, but not nearly as powerful regardless of being a six hundred year-old female werewolf.
She bows low at the waist. “Milord, if you permit, I shall leave for New York within the hour.” Her words are always balanced, never revealing emotion. The Governess’ are the epitome of discipline.
I nod half-way and speak to her unlike I will my friends. “You are dismissed, Governess. I need nothing further from your studies.”
It shocks me some, how natural that felt.
The Governess bows lowly, taking two steps backward before turning on her heels and leaving through the foyer.
Once the Governess is out of the room, everyone else feels they can be themselves again. Other than me, only Nathan can be without fear around her. She can’t touch us, but to them, she can and will show her powerful side if she’s ever disrespected. She is an Elder, after all.
It isn’t supposed to be this way, my Ascension as Alpha. I always imagined feeling proud and doing what all new Alphas do by immersing themselves in their honorable duties, setting forth new laws and upholding old laws. I’m supposed to be making my father proud by taking charge without guidance or prompt and making my pack my own, entitling new ranks and creating my own legion of werewolves that will help establish my leadership.
But I can’t do any of that yet.
Not until I know what’s happened to Adria.
I don’t even know why I came downstairs; maybe I just needed the company. I’m almost fully healed now. Being alone in my room for nearly two weeks has put a serious black cloud over my head.
“Beverlee and Carl Dawson,” Zia says to all of us, though avoiding my eyes, “they still haven’t seen or heard from Adria.”
I grit my teeth. I can’t bear to talk about her, but I don’t tell Zia to stop. I need to hear it, regardless.
“Do you think they’re telling the truth?” Daisy says from beside me. I feel her gentle hand touch the back of my arm in attempt to offer comfort.
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure,” Zia goes on. “They’re still really messed up about it and it’s hard to fake that kind of devastation.” She adds looking over, “Might as well let them in on it, or put them out of their misery.”
“Zia,” Nathan says from the couch, “this really isn’t the time.”
She has always been outspoken, but even I had to agree with my brother on this one.
Zia sighs heavily and holds out her hands to us, palms up. “When will it be, Nathan? Adria’s gone. Harry’s gone. You don’t find that a little fucking odd?” Her tone is becoming sharp.
Nathan stands up, letting Hannah’s hand fall away from his thigh. “I said…this isn’t the time.”
“No, it’s alright,” I say, stepping up, “at least, for me it is.” I gaze to my side at Daisy, indicating that I’m not speaking for the both of us.
“I’m okay with it, too,” Daisy says. “It needs to be discussed.”
“Well, it’s weird to me,” Zia says. “I hate to say it, but they’re both human and they were best friends—maybe they just got tired of this life, that it was too much for them. I mean, if it were me, I’d probably stay freaked-out for a while, too.”
I feel Daisy’s eyes on me and I g
lance back at her briefly, letting her know that it’s probably time I tell everybody the truth about what happened.
Nathan knew all along that I had bonded Adria to me—he was the only one I told—but right now, only Daisy knows what happened the last time I saw Adria.
I walk over to stand near the fireplace and I look up at the portrait of Aramei and my father, but my mind replaces their faces with two faces closer to home.
“Adria’s no longer human,” I say with my back to the room, “if she’s even still alive.”
“What?” Zia’s mouth is on the floor by the sound of her voice.
I sense Nathan walking toward me. “Oh damn, Isaac, what did you do?”
I turn sharply at the waist in reaction to his words, at first feeling the sting of thinking he is reprimanding me, until I realize my defensive reaction is more in reply to my own guilt.
“She wanted it,” I say looking at Nathan, but seeing right past him. I inhale a deep breath and run my hand over the top of my head. “I would never have gone through with it, but the Blood Bond was killing her fast and she wasn’t going to allow herself to live like Aramei.”
“Ho-ly shit,” Zia says, plopping into the nearby recliner, her eyes staring out ahead of her. She looks up at me. “You bonded her to you?”
“Yes,” I say simply, “but that’s one thing I won’t talk about anymore, so drop it. And I mean it.” In this case, I will use my authority. What’s done is done and the Blood Bond isn’t anything that can be changed.
Not anymore.
Zia fully accepts my demand and looks away again, though completely devoid of her usual defiant sneers or comments that make Zia, Zia.
“I’m worried about her, Nathan,” I say, seeing his face now, searching for some kind of encouragement that only an older brother might be able to give. “I know that a Sire and his fledgling have an emotional bond and can communicate telepathically, but Nathan…I don’t feel or hear anything.”
“She hasn’t Turned her first time yet,” Nathan says, “and that link we have with our fledglings can’t be made until after that first time. Or—” Nathan looks away from me now. “Or, she’s already dead.”
I fight back the storm of emotions that are suddenly assailing me.
“I know…,” I say with exasperation, “I just—.” I let out another heavy breath. I already knew this information of course; I know more about our ways and our politics than just about anything, but I was only looking for some other reason why I may not be able to feel her. Maybe, like the Blood Bond, I hadn’t been told everything.
But I know I’m fooling myself.
“Well,” Zia says, her legs dangling over the arm of the recliner, “you have to admit that wherever Adria is, Harry knows about it and is probably with her. That fact couldn’t be any more plainly obvious.”
My sister, Camilla, raises her hand as if she’s in school and waits for me give her permission to speak. She’s the most submissive of my sisters and so it doesn’t surprise me.
I nod to her.
“I think Adria is strong enough,” she says in a yielding voice and when I don’t reprimand her, she seems more confident about speaking. In fact, she stands from the chair so that she has everyone’s attention. “I believe she is alive. She has always put off a certain energy and I still feel that energy.”
Camilla, I referred to her once as the ‘weird sister’, and that still holds merit because she does odd things that humans do and werewolves don’t have to: eats healthy food, meditates and does Yoga. But one thing about Camilla, being a female werewolf, she has a much stronger ability to sense the emotions and life-force of others than even I do being connected to Adria.
Her words give me hope.
There’s a knock at the door, which takes me out of my thoughts. No one ever knocks around this place; any company we ever get is brought by those who live here.
All of us look at each other for a moment, sharing the same thought.
“I’ll get it,” Daisy says.
She walks through the foyer and I see the fading sunlight fill the dark area when Daisy opens the door.
I hear their voices, but the only one I’m interested in is the one I’ve never heard before. It’s very faint and even with my keen sense of hearing it’s still hard to make out his words.
After a few seconds, Daisy shuts the front door and appears standing at the foyer entrance; clearly there is someone else behind her, but too tucked away in the darkness to be seen.
“Come on in,” she urges, and a young man, softer-looking and more petite than my brother’s girlfriend, Hannah, steps out. “This is Isaac,” Daisy holds out her hand to indicate me.
The young man bows his head, which I find a little weird because I have no idea who he is and I know he’s not a werewolf. He lifts his eyes to me, full of submission and obviously, fear.
“May I speak with you alone?” His voice is as soft as his exterior.
I glance at Daisy first and then at Nathan, who still stands beside me.
“Sure,” I say walking toward him.
I follow the boy outside, shutting the door behind me, but when I stay on the porch, he seems hesitant. His small eyes wander around, toward the windows and the front door.
I get the feeling maybe the porch isn’t private enough.
“Ummm, maybe if we step farther out into the driveway?” I hold out my hand, palm up and offer for him to lead the way.
He nods gently as if thanking me, which is also weird, and then I follow him into the driveway near the top of the bend, the same spot I stood with Adria out in the rain the night that she came back.
I force the memory out of my head.
The boy bows his head again and before I have a chance to tell him to stop doing that because it’s confusing the hell out of me, he starts to speak.
“My Mistress, Genevieve Bishop, sent me here to speak with you.”
I’m suddenly more alert than wary now.
If he’s here because of Genevieve, I know this might have something, maybe everything to do with Adria. My body stiffens with awareness and determination.
“Go on,” I say, urging him in my calmest voice, though there was still a lot of desperation in those two small words despite my attempt to hide it.
The boy has trouble meeting my eyes; he’s constantly looking toward the ground, or off to the side whenever I try to hook his gaze.
He needs to speak faster. Even the smallest hesitation between words is too long to suffer through.
“Why didn’t she just come here herself?”
“It is not safe for her here,” the boy says, looking carefully toward the house as if to indicate there is a danger inside. “She said that you must meet with her at a designated place and that if you must bring someone that only Nathan and Daisy Mayfair are allowed to join you.”
“How can Genna be in any danger here?” I say, finally meeting his gaze. “I find that hard to believe, considering what she is.”
The boy nods respectfully. “Yes, but she cannot come here. I am not at liberty to speak about it. Please, meet my Mistress on Water Street at the train bridge near the Kennebec River Rail Trail. She will be waiting for you in one hour.”
“An hour it is then,” I say without hesitation.
The boy doesn’t say another word, but bows to me, turns on his heels and disappears down the driveway and down the hill leading up to the main road. I watch him until he’s out of sight and I listen for any signs of a vehicle that he may have come here in, but there’s nothing. I hear his steps going over the pebble-sized pieces of gravel at the end of the driveway and then he’s gone.
Wasting no time, I rush back into the house.
“Yes, that’s what he said,” I whisper to Nathan and Daisy after pulling them into the back room and shutting the door. “I know it has to be about Adria, I can feel it.” My heart is pounding, my hands clenched into fists at my sides.
“Something’s not right about this,” Daisy says,
staring toward the door that leads into the den where at least fifteen of our family and friends sit.
“I trust Genna,” I say.
Daisy looks at me. “No, I mean about them,” she says, nodding toward the door. “I-It just worries me, is all.”
“And it should,” Nathan says. “There’s only one thing that a Praverian fears and that’s another Praverian.”
27
IT’S ALMOST DARK WHEN the three of us make it to the train bridge. I park my Jeep in an alcove on the side of the road and we walk up the hill and into a veil of trees toward the railroad tracks. A few cars pass by on the street below, but the traffic is thinning out as the evening progresses. I’m starting to worry about the moon; tonight it’ll be full. Tonight is the night that I will know if Adria is alive or dead. And that makes this meeting with Genna that much more important, though I’m not exactly sure why. I’m conflicted about being here waiting for Genna when I want to be waiting for Adria’s connection to me to develop.
Twenty feet from the rusty old bridge and Genna steps out in the center of the tracks. I never noticed how bright green her eyes were; the only time I ever saw her was when she went with me to Georgia to find Adria, but even then I could hardly notice anything, I was so worried about my girl.
“Genna?” I say to break the silence. Already I’m looking around for any sign of Adria.
Genna steps closer.
“You see her?” Daisy says, apparently not granted the same opportunity.
“I don’t see her, either,” Nathan adds, peering into the trees.
“Sorry,” Genna says as she gets closer, “I have to be one hundred percent sure before I reveal myself to them.”
“Okay,” I say, “how?”
“They have to speak my name,” Genna says, “not my given name, but what I am.”
I look at my brother and sister, first wondering if they can hear Genna at least, but it’s apparent they can’t.
“She wants both of you to say the word Praverian.”
Daisy’s face gets all twisted. “Huh? Why?”
“Because a Praverian,” Nathan says with extra emphasis on the word, “can’t speak their name aloud, or it’ll mark them permanently to all other Praverians.” He looks into the semi-darkness as if looking at Genna, who’s actually three feet to the right of his gaze. “I just said it twice.” He holds up two fingers. “Baby, you already know I’m full-on werewolf—what’s with the distrust all of a sudden?”