Promise Forever: Fairy Tales with a Modern Twist

by Pauline Creeden

  “We have a serious national security issue on our hands.” She’d have to meet with Kalinda, who’d have more questions for her than she’d posed to Solange. Oriana wasn’t looking forward to that discussion. When it came to certain topics, Kalinda had a one-track mind. She viewed all Muraco as irredeemable werewolves deserving of death. Their own laws prevented Kalinda from executing the Muraco without a damn good reason.

  Werewolves, even under a Matriarchy, weren’t without their civil rights—even Muracos. Black werewolves may have had no more use for Muracos than Kalinda did, but the Matriarchy would have a full-scale riot on their hands if they attempted to deny the white werewolves basic human rights. Kalinda was too wise not to avoid the perception of a slippery slope that would embroil them in an avoidable war.

  Still, they had to be stopped. She would attempt to bring them in alive, but if Kalinda ordered the Crimson Hunter to execute them all, Oriana would have little choice but to obey. She both gave orders and took them. Being Matriarch didn’t shield her from the latter. Although only Kalinda had the power to compel Oriana to do something she didn’t wish to do. Killing over a thousand werewolves, even Muraco, ranked high on her list of a distasteful order she would follow, her stomach and mind revolting the entire time.

  Solange pushed another report to Oriana, which she slid to Marrok to read. “That’s a list of the highest crime areas in Steelcross and Irongarde.”

  Marrok tore the report into four pieces. Oriana wished he hadn’t. When he’d balled and thrown away Solange’s first report, it had come across as more anger at the content than a challenge to Solange. The ripping of the second report didn’t.

  “A werewolf knows another werewolf, even when in human form.” Marrok tapped the side of his nose. “No way could a Muraco hide among black werewolves, and us not know. But they could among full-humans. Apelion Umbra and Perilune Rille. I’d suggest looking there first. Magerun would allow them to slip into Steelcross or Irongarde, kill a witch here and there, without local enforcement thinking more of the crimes than the normal ones committed by witches and full-humans. It isn’t as if only Muraco kills. As long they don’t kill while in werewolf form, law enforcement wouldn’t have a reason to focus their investigation on the werewolf citizens.”

  Solange tapped the table with her forefinger, pointing in the direction of the wastebasket. “Did you happen to read the date when the Muraco went missing before you crumpled the paper?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Notice anything, Cyrus of Steelcross?”

  “Captain.” Oriana let Solange’s title be warning enough. Her friend didn’t dislike Marrok on a personal level. Where they diverged was the role they played in Oriana’s political life. She treated them as informal advisors. Until her marriage, that role had fallen to Solange. “Make your point without the sarcasm.”

  “My point is that the Muraco went offline three years after the signing of the Blood of the Sun decree that made it legal for werewolves to go without their collars while in Janus Nether.”

  Per the new decree, the Rage Disrupter tracking system had been adjusted. Serial numbers of disrupters for all werewolf residents of Janus Nether had been moved to its own file. The system was reconfigured to release Silver Snares when werewolves reached a certain endorphin level and when disrupters registered travel beyond Janus Nether’s borders.

  “Sure, Marrok, maybe the Muraco did go to one or both of the full-human realms, but I don’t think they intend on hiding there indefinitely.”

  “I wasn’t implying they were, only that it would’ve been impossible for them to conceal their true identities without questions being raised. One, they would’ve had to keep their shifts limited to their homes, erasing a major plus of living in Janus Nether. It being a witch-free zone means we don’t have to worry about spending lots of time in our natural form. It’s freeing in a way I can’t begin to explain.”

  Marrok brightened, as he spoke of Janus Nether. Watching him, Silver Snare around his neck, she realized, for the first time, how much she’d given him with one hand but had taken with the other. She’d worked hard to convince her mother to make Janus Nether a collar-free territory then she’d married Marrok, taking him away from the first place he’d experienced a semblance of the freedom witches and full-humans took for granted. Even as Cyrus of Steelcross, she couldn’t grant Marrok the same freedom he’d known in Janus Nether, making him no different from any other werewolf in Steelcross or Irongarde.

  “Two, after a while, someone would’ve noticed their lack of a Silver Snare. We all trigger our disrupter. It’s impossible not to. We aren’t robots, Solange. We get angry, just like everyone else. We fight, can even throw a few punches before the magic from the collars kick in and calms us down.”

  Marrok refilled first Oriana’s glass of water then his own. Holding out the stainless steel water pitcher to Solange, he offered her more than a drink. Solange rejected the water but not Marrok’s unspoken offer of a truce, her nod and smile communicating as much.

  “I know I have a lot to learn but I get what you two aren’t saying.”

  “Which is?” she asked, mouth poised to take a drink of water. “What do you think we aren’t saying?”

  “Being feral only means the Muraco are more violent and bloodthirsty than the average werewolf. They are so bloodthirsty their rages can’t be easily contained by their collars. Sure, Crimson Guards can always track them, putting them in a Muraco-only prison. But that’s not until they’ve attacked or killed a witch. Being a white werewolf doesn’t mean they’ve lost their ability to think and act rationally.”

  “There’s nothing rational about their need to slate their urges with the blood and magic of witches,” Solange all but snarled.

  “Marrok is only saying what we both know. Muracos are as intelligent as anyone else. They’re more than their bestial urges, no matter how convenient it is for us to reduce them to their primal acts of barbarism.”

  Oriana drank down the cool liquid, content to stay silent while Marrok picked up his train of thought.

  “For obvious reasons, Muracos aren’t wanted anywhere. They have no community, no family or friends who still claim them. They want to live without constraints, to have something of their own. But they can’t because they only know how to take and destroy.”

  “You’re talking about a rebellion.”

  “It’s what Oriana meant when she mentioned a national security issue.” Marrok looked to Oriana for confirmation, and she nodded. “Yeah, they’re biding their time, living among full-humans until they have what they think is a solid plan to challenge the Matriarchs. When they do, they’ll move to Janus Nether, infecting as many black werewolves as they can. The region is close to Irongarde but doesn’t have any witches living there to oppose them. They can attack the black werewolves and, because of the collars, the black werewolves won’t be able to fight back.”

  Yet another way the Matriarchy had diminished their males. They couldn’t even protect themselves because witches had built a system around their own defense.

  “What makes you think they aren’t already in Janus Nether?”

  “Call it a hunch.”

  “A hunch we can prove or disprove.” Oriana may not have enjoyed the not so subtle tug-of-war between the two, but they challenged each other to dig deeper, to think harder, and to be more critical. “It’ll be several investigative teams tedious assignment, but I need all Magerun footage examined since the Muracos went offline. We have their names, not that they’re likely still using them, but we also have their DNA on file and images. Between the two, the teams should be able to determine if, when, and where they used the transporter system. If they have moved to Janus Nether, I doubt they did in large numbers. That would’ve been far too obvious, but a few here and there and stretched over months, that’s more likely. I also need to speak with everyone with access to the tracking system.”

  Marrok tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, sending inconvenient fris
sons of awareness through her. “You can use the word interrogation in front of me. I know what you do as Crimson Hunter.”

  No, he didn’t. At least not all of it. He soon would, though. This meeting wasn’t the time to disabuse him of his assumption. That would come later. Later but also far too soon for Oriana’s liking.

  “We have a lot to do.” Solange grinned from Oriana to Marrok, her shit-starter friend shining through. “So, Cyrus of Steelcross, while Oriana is organizing every detail of our investigation that will leave you plenty of time to jump over to Irongarde Skyrise and provide Matriarch Kalinda with an intelligence report. I’m sure you know she prefers her updates made in person.”

  “Sure, I’ll go, if you’re the one, Whisperer of Echoes, to jump me there, staying in the room with us until the meeting is over.” Marrok returned Solange’s smile, no heat in either of their tones but plenty of playful sarcasm about a task neither of them would volunteer to complete.

  “Cut it out, you two, or I’ll take both of you with me.”

  “No thanks, Matriarch.” Solange stood.

  “Oh, we’re back to Matriarch. A minute earlier, I was Oriana. Where’s your spine, Captain?”

  “Right where it belongs. In my body. I’ll need it when we go hunting, and for well, walking and living.”

  “Coward.”

  “A coward with an intact body.” With another smile, she stepped away from the conference table, pushing in the plush, leather chair. “Seriously, Oriana, if you want us to go with you, you know we will. Your mother is going to go ballistic, and I can’t blame her. We dropped a huge ball. She gave you Steelcross, made you Crimson Hunter, promoted me as your Captain, and accepted Marrok as your consort. I know none of us takes any of that lightly.”

  “We don’t. She’ll be angry and disappointed. Just as we all are. But Mother’s made plenty of mistakes during her time as Matriarch.”

  Marrok coughed-laughed. “That’s what you’re going with? Really, Oriana? She’ll eat you alive, and you’ll be the one returning home with parts of your body missing, not just the spine she’ll rip out of you.”

  “Okay, Consort, what strategy would you use?”

  “Consort, huh? You’re going with that play. Fine, add all of Kalinda’s poor decisions and mistakes together, add about twenty more for good measure, and tell me what you come up with that rivals us losing track of thirteen hundred Muraco.”

  “Point taken. Just so we’re clear, you two are blameless.” They began to protest, but she raised her hand, and they quieted. “It doesn’t matter that you’re my captain or that you’re my consort. I’m Matriarch of Steelcross and Crimson Hunter. I’m accountable for everything that happens in this realm, just as protection of Earth Rift’s populous falls to me.

  Oriana didn’t know if she’d become the leader Earth Rift needed and deserved. What she did know, however, was that she needed to get a handle on the threat level then neutralize it.

  Then there were her betrayers. The thought of what they’d done hurt worse than being injected with liquid steel.

  “I’ll leave you two alone to talk. Find me after you return from Irongarde Skyrise. We have a lot to do before we can set out. The more I think about it, Marrok’s probably right about the full-human realms. But we don’t take action on hunches. I’ll pull together three teams. When they finish, we’ll have data we can make strong decisions around. Try not to jump into a locked closet this time.”

  “Once. I did that once, when we were ten, you mage cow.”

  “Once is all it takes. You were in there for three hours because you cast a looping spell.”

  Oriana slapped her hand over Marrok’s mouth. “She’s not funny. Stop laughing.”

  “After a housekeeper found her, she told everyone we were playing hide-and-seek and she won.”

  With that, as well as a smirk, Solange threw her braids over a shoulder, stuck her tongue out at Oriana, and then left.

  “Yuck, you got saliva on my hand.”

  “That’s what you get for covering my mouth.” Marrok wiped away laugh tears, his grin big, beautiful, and so very sexy.

  Oriana kissed him.

  Winding his arms around her waist, he slid her from her chair onto his lap. “Kiss me with your magic.”

  “You know that doesn’t work.”

  “It does, just not as much as we want it to. But it does work, just as Matriarch Helen wrote.”

  “We aren’t having that conversation now.” She tried moving back to her chair, but strong arms kept her put. “Marrok, no.”

  “Why not? The little magic you feed me through our kisses helps with the hunger pains.”

  Opening the first three buttons of his shirt, Oriana’s fingers hovered over the red rash that began at his nipples and ended at his belly button.

  “It’s nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing. Stop saying that. When I burn you, when we make love, at least you heal soon afterward. But this, Marrok. It stays with you for days. You’re allergic to my magic.”

  “That’s not what your grandmother wrote.”

  “I know what she wrote.” Oriana tried pushing from him again, but his arms tightened around her. “Dammit, Marrok, I don’t like hurting you, even if the magic kisses give you enough where you don’t feel a need to take short breaks from me and this tower of witches.”

  “I’m not allergic to your magic. I’m allergic to the steel in your body. It comes out in any magic you use. That’s what Matriarch Helen wrote. We both read it.”

  “We also read everything else she wrote, including the entry before the day she died. I’m positive Mother never read Grandmother’s journals. If she had, she wouldn’t have given them to me.”

  “You aren’t your grandmother, and I’m not your grandfather. We don’t have to go to the lengths they did. I can take the rashes, if it means I get to stay with you and Keira.” Warm lips nuzzled her neck. “Rashes heal but our hearts won’t if we’re forced to stay apart.”

  “We still don’t have a solution to our ticking time bomb issue. Hmm, yes, that’s good. The things you can do with your lips and tongue.”

  “Don’t tempt me. I’ll have you on this table and—”

  She kissed him again, pushing wisps of magic from her mouth into his. Careful, she emitted a measured dose, enough to hold him while she was away from home, hunting Muraco with Solange. Too much, he’d be in bed with a fever, painful rashes all over his body.

  Through trial-and-error, they’d learned, just as Helen and Tuncay had. Helen had recorded every experiment in her journals, noting the amount of magic used each time and details of Tuncay’s reaction. Helen had theorized the amount of magic a witch could “safely” use on a werewolf depended on the strength of the witch’s magic, the werewolf’s age and overall health, and how much he craved. The last condition boiled down to how hungry the werewolf was for witch blood and magic.

  Helen’s formula for her consort was more of a guide than an exact recipe.

  The way Marrok gripped her waist, claimed her mouth, swallowed down her magic, fierce and desperate, she knew he wanted more. Not sex, although he’d take the offer. He always did. But more of her magic. His need pulsed in the air around them, could be tasted on the tongue plundering her mouth.

  She yanked her lips away from his.

  “Don’t,” he said, the word pronounced through suddenly elongated eyeteeth.

  Oriana touched a fang then it was Marrok pulling back from her repeating, “Don’t.” But added, “I don’t know what’ll happen if you cut your finger and I smell your blood.”

  Fangs retracted as quickly as they’d appeared.

  She trusted he wouldn’t hurt her, but why tempt fate. She went to move back to her chair, and Marrok finally let her go.

  “Thank you.”

  “You won’t be thanking me when you break out in another rash. This isn’t our answer.”

  “And you doing what Helen attempted is?”

  “I won’t ever do tha
t. I promised you I wouldn’t.” Oriana didn’t have a death wish, so keeping her promise would be easy.

  “We’ll work something out before Keira turns twelve.”

  “I hope so, Marrok.”

  “We will. As soon as we deal with the Muracos, we can turn our attention back to our research. Are you positive we have all of Matriarch Helen’s personal records?”

  “I assume you don’t think we do, if you’re asking.”

  “I’m not sure. Some entries are daily then the next is weeks or months later.”

  “She was busy. Most days, I’m lucky to get home before you put Keira down to bed.”

  “That’s only because you’re also Crimson Hunter. But, yeah, I know matriarch’s schedules are tight.”

  “But you still think journal entries are missing?”

  “Not just single entries. I mean entire journals. They’re all dated, so it’s easy to follow. Haven’t you noticed how one journal will end with a topic but the next will pick up with a different one?”

  “Yes, but, as I said, I took that to mean she was too busy to fill in what happened in the interim. It’s not as if she wrote her journals for anyone other than herself. Grandmother was her only audience, so it makes sense, at least to me, that she wouldn’t write every detail of her life in her journals. They read more therapeutic than informational, although that’s how we’ve been using them.”

  “I know, I know.”

  “You’re frustrated.” Touching the side of his face, she smiled when he turned and kissed the palm of her hand. “I’ll ask Mother if there are more journals. Based on what we’ve read, I think it’s safe to conclude that Grandmother figured out why Alba destroyed so many historical records.”