by Dean Murray
She nodded, but I could tell she wasn't completely happy with my excuse. I thought about potential poses and backgrounds for a moment before hitting on one that felt right. It took only a couple of minutes to get her arranged how I wanted her. She was sitting so that the painting perspective would be looking down at her from a couple of feet higher as she looked off into the distance. It wasn't quite a profile shot, but it was close.
I adjusted the lighting inside the studio, making it brighter and adding in more yellow, and then started mixing paints.
"I know I ask this every day, Alec, but how are you feeling? Are you back to full strength?"
"Yeah. I'm a little stiff still in a couple of directions, but I'm good enough. Is your mom coming under pressure? Does she need the boys back in Tucson sooner than we'd discussed?"
"No. In some ways, it would be ideal if we were able to send them back before the next challenger arrived, but she's still willing to leave them here through the end of the weekend. Believe it or not, I asked just because I don't like to see you injured. So much depends on you. You're carrying a pretty heavy load. It's got to be hard enough to deal with when you're healthy. I can only imagine that it's a lot worse when you're unable to get out of bed."
There it was again. Every time I was tempted to dismiss Tasha as some kind of cold-hearted manipulator, she turned around and said something like that. There was a kinder, more vulnerable person lurking under the armor that pack life had forced on her. I needed to find a way to strip the armor off and get a clear view of the person beneath it if I was ever going to have a prayer of moving forward with this alliance, with this marriage. I knew it. I'd known it for weeks now, and yet I still hadn't acted upon the knowledge.
I deftly sidestepped the opportunity she'd just provided, and instead of taking the conversation into deeper things, I guided it back to the stuff that wasn't important. Safe stuff like finances, rumors about the dispossessed, and the Coun'hij. We covered a variety of topics for several hours until Jasmin burst into my studio with power arcing off of her like an electrical storm.
"Alec, I need the plane and I need Isaac. I'd really appreciate it if you didn't ask questions."
I took a deep breath and wished for a second that Tasha wasn't here. Jasmin was hard to reason with at the best of times. When there was someone else around, getting her to see sense became even harder. I couldn't just send Tasha packing though, not without giving Jasmin too much control of the situation. I had to keep the upper hand or I risked her beast making her even more stubborn than normal.
"I'm sorry, Jasmin. This isn't a refusal, but I need to know what you're up to before I say yes."
Jasmin's eyes flickered over to Tasha, wordlessly asking, but I slowly shook my head.
"Out with it, please."
"Dom and...well, Dom's found Ben. He's in New York. They actually found him a couple of weeks ago, but he didn't want anything to do with me, so they've been keeping it a secret. I need to go to him right now."
"Jas, what's changed? He didn't want to see you before, why would he want to see you now?"
I hadn't meant the reminder to be cruel, but she still flinched. I suddenly wondered just how much of the crazy erratic behavior I'd seen out of Jasmin could be traced back to Ben in some form or fashion. I'd been guilty of some pretty irrational things when Adri and I had been dating. I should have keyed into the possibility that Ben was the reason Jasmin had been so difficult, but I'd been so wrapped up with my own issues that I hadn't even considered it.
Jasmin took a deep breath and then told me the piece she'd been hoping to keep a secret.
"He's gotten involved with some vampires. It sounds like they've got their hooks in pretty deep. One of them must be a mentalist because they've made it so he physically can't make himself run away. I need Isaac so I can go in and get Ben out."
It was exactly the kind of thing the Coun'hij had been trying to stop when they'd issued their prohibition against anyone traveling east of the Mississippi. There were several thousand shape shifters in North America, but the last time I'd seen any estimates on projected vampire populations, it had put it at between five hundred and a thousand of the blood suckers just in New York City alone. That would have been bad enough all by itself, but the bit about them being able to make more vampires by biting humans was at least partially true. It meant that if they ever felt really threatened, they could grow at a nearly exponential rate.
"How many vampires are you going to be up against, Jas?"
"I don't know, Alec. I wish I did, but I don't. It doesn't really matter though. I'd go if it was a hundred and just hope I could find a way to sneak in and out without running into problems."
"Okay, here's the plan. You can have the plane, but get the one in New York headed back this way so I've got options if I need to get somewhere quickly. Leave Dominic out there to help you guys. You do surveillance until you have a way in and out with a minimal body count, and Ash decides what's minimal and what's not. I don't want to lose any of you."
"Thanks, Alec. Can I ask for one modification to the plan?"
"You can ask, but I may not be able to give it to you."
She didn't look like she wanted to ask, but something compelled her to do it. "Can you call Dom back? It gives you a little more cover while we're gone, but more importantly, I might need James to make this work. I know you won't agree to both him and Dom, and I'd rather have him than Dom. She's still pretty wobbly. Besides, Ben might have accidentally created some extra visibility for...the person Dom is there watching. Ash is saying that he could use some help back here managing the damage control efforts to keep...a certain individual off the vampires' radar."
My beast ripped free in a shower of clothes. I grabbed Jasmin by the throat with one clawed hand and slammed her into a wall. "This isn't the first time, is it? She's been in extra danger and none of you have said a damn thing to me."
Jasmin grabbed my hand with both of hers, but she wasn't trying to get free, she was just trying to make sure I didn't choke her.
"I'm sorry, Alec. I just found out myself. I know you're pissed, and probably worried, but I'm not the one to take it out on, and you don't want to be jostling Ash or Dom's elbows right now."
She was right. Even my beast knew it. I forced my hand open and let her drop to the floor. It took a couple of seconds of deep breathing to force my beast back into its metaphysical cage, but when I looked over at her again, I was back to the 'me' I wore most of the time.
"Okay, take the plane. Send Dom back here, and then look for a way for you and Isaac to get Ben out. If you have to, you can add in a couple of Ash's hired guns. It's not very likely that I'll be able to send James though, not with current circumstances."
"Thanks, Alec."
Her mouth said thanks, but her eyes said that I could do more. It would only take one small word to change the status of the pack and put us in a place where it wouldn't be risky to send James along. The only problem with that scenario was that it would require me to give up on my hopes. She didn't have the right to ask that, not just to save her hopes, and she knew it.
I started gathering up scraps of clothing and then saw Tasha still sitting on the stool exactly where I'd arranged her. I'd nearly forgotten about her.
"I need to get some pants on. Do you want to call it a night?"
She let her gaze dance across my bare chest and then smiled. "No, I'm perfectly happy for us to continue."
I slipped some pants on over my ha'bit and then went back into the studio and picked my brush back up. The banter from just a few seconds ago seemed to have evaporated, and apparently neither of us was really in the mood for the shallow conversation we'd been having before that.
I worked in near silence for another couple of hours. Tasha was a good subject. She held very still, and I only occasionally had to adjust her back to the original position I'd put her in. I knew something was up though when I looked back over and saw her staring at me rather than looking off to the
side like I'd posed her.
"Alec, you know you could have guaranteed that you'd be able to send James with her. All it would take is for you to agree to the alliance. Mom could be up here a few hours later and drop any and all challengers until we got the rest of the logistics sorted out."
"I know."
"So why won't you do it? I saw the way you looked at Mom the night we went hunting. You've seen that she's able to keep the pack headed in the same direction without the constant infighting that exists in most other packs. She can guarantee your people won't get roughed up too badly in the transition as the new power structure gets worked through."
I didn't have a good answer, not one I was willing to give her. The silence stretched out for several seconds, and then she pulled her knees up under her chin. She looked the most vulnerable I'd ever seen her.
"It's okay, I already know the answer. You're impressed with what my mom has put together, so it has to be me that's the problem."
I shook my head. "It's still bigger than that, Tasha. It's not just about you. It's still a big risk for my people. Maybe not physically, but we're talking about upending everything they know. Your mom will impose an artificial power structure. It's one of the things I admire about her, but who's to say Peter won't come out above James because Peter has the experience tracking werewolves? Your mom can enforce that kind of artificial dominance, but that doesn't mean it's going to make James very happy."
Tasha shrugged. "It's not necessarily about any one person being happy, Alec. If that's what's best for the pack, then that's what Mom will do. If James, for instance, ends up in a position he hates then he's always free to leave."
"He'd be dispossessed. It's rare for one of the dispossessed to find another pack, at least not without challenging."
"My original statement still stands. If it's what's best for the pack then it's the right thing to do."
I was still skirting around the issue, but I needed to buy some time.
"So if I were to say yes, how would I know that I'd still be able to send James to New York to help? Once your mom is top dog there isn't anything to stop her from recalling Jas and Isaac and refusing to send James anywhere."
I got another confused shrug. "Put it in the negotiations with Mom before you agree. She wants you on board in a big way. She'll give on a lot of points to make that happen."
I shook my head. "It's not about tomorrow or the day after, Tasha. It's about the fact that I won't have the ability to chart the course I think is best for my people. At some point, we'll be up against a situation that isn't covered by the terms of my agreement with your mother and then I'll just have to do whatever she wants done."
"She's not an ogre, Alec. She'll listen to reason."
"Eventually we'll disagree, Tasha. It's inevitable. I know that I'm risking my people by leaving us out here exposed to additional challengers, but I can't get around the fact that handing off my responsibility to your mother feels wrong."
The vulnerability was gone, and the fire was back.
"I think that's just ego talking, Alec, but I think we should park all of that for a minute and talk about me. Don't think I didn't notice your very careful evasion a couple of minutes back. This is as much or more about me than it is about my mom."
She was forcing my hand. I opened my mouth to respond, but I didn't know what to say. The silence stretched into several seconds and then Kristin burst into the studio.
"I just had another dream, Alec!"
As both of us turned to look at Kristin, I caught a look from Tasha that said this wasn't over.
"Calm down, Kristin. Just tell us what happened and we'll come up with options that we like better than whatever you saw."
She nodded, but I could see the panic still lurking behind her eyes. "You were somewhere else, somewhere I'd never seen before, and you were fighting another hybrid. You were hurting him and he was hurting you, but your wounds were bleeding more than they should have. He...he killed you, Alec."
It wasn't a very promising view of the future, but I tried to keep my voice even and coax more details out of her.
"What else can you tell me? Other people that were there, details of the surroundings? Anything might help."
Kristin shrugged. "Mostly they were just people that I'd never seen before. Big guys with lots of tattoos and piercings. I think I saw James and Dominic there. Ash was there, but I'm not sure about anyone else. The focus of the dream was on the fight."
"No split timelines showing us a way to win?"
Kristin shook her head. "No, just a sense of inevitability. I don't know how we got there or what led up to the fight, but whoever that is, he's going to kill you, Alec."
"You're positive I was dead? I wasn't just unconscious?"
"Yes. You...you weren't breathing. That and your opponent made sure you were dead."
I looked back at Tasha and I could tell she was thinking the same thing I was.
"Thank you, Kristin. You can go back to sleep now."
After it was just Tasha and me in the studio again, I found myself cleaning my brushes. The silence grew uncomfortable after a couple of minutes, and Tasha was the first one to crack.
"It had to have been Agony, and he had a full complement of Coun'hij thugs with him."
"Yeah. The wounds bleeding like she said they were would match up with Agony's power."
"What are we going to do about it?"
I found myself shrugging. It wasn't that I didn't care; I just couldn't imagine a world where there was anything I could do about the future that Kristin had just seen.
"We aren't going to do anything, Tasha. If Agony finds a way to maneuver me into a fight then I'll die just like Kristin says. My dad wasn't a match for him and I'm not as good of a fighter as my dad was. With Agony, it's always a question of fighting him or sacrificing something you care about. It's just the way he works. If he asks for something I can't give up then I won't have any choice."
Tasha shook her head violently. "No, there are other options. Get Mom up here and have her shadow you. Agony can't take her. If he pushes the issue, she can step in and stand in your place."
I was suddenly tired. Tasha was older than me, but she didn't understand what it was to be dominant. She understood intellectually, but she didn't really know. Not deep down inside where the beast made decisions and the man had no choice but to try and shape things to an outcome that was acceptable to both.
"Nothing has changed, Tasha. Your mom isn't going to want to buck the Coun'hij, not unless we've agreed to merge the packs. Even if she were willing, I don't think I could let her bring that kind of penalty down on her pack, not unless I was willing to stand shoulder to shoulder with her and help weather the storm."
Tasha had been slowly walking towards me while I was speaking. As I finished, she reached up and slapped me. Not hard enough to rile my beast up, not hard enough to injure me, just hard enough to tell me she wasn't happy. She walked out of the studio without saying a word.
I finished cleaning up and then closed my bedroom door and stumbled to my bed. It was too early for me to go to sleep. There was a decent chance that Adri was still asleep, but I couldn't bring myself to care. We hadn't shared a dream yet and surely we'd had some overlap over the last few weeks.
Interlude
I knew I was dreaming almost instantly. Given the state of things right now, I couldn't imagine any other circumstance where I'd waste time with a stroll through our estate. I recognized my surroundings, and I found myself shaping my course through the hedge maze so that I'd end up at the pond.
It was another of my refuges that I hadn't visited since Adri had left. Just like so many other things, it had been poisoned slightly by the knowledge that I wouldn't be able to go there with her ever again. The pain had lessened a lot lately though. Kristin's news from earlier had pretty much put the final nail in the agony.
It didn't matter so much anymore that she had left. I didn't have much time remaining to me. I could eithe
r spend it hiding from my past, or I could embrace it and try to squeeze whatever enjoyment out of it that I could.
The pond was just like I remembered it, a lush sandy beach with freshwater fish darting back and forth in the warm water. I stepped up to the edge of the water stripped down to my ha'bit. A few minutes later I was floating on my back in almost perfect stillness.
I heard Adri approaching from within the hedge maze for several minutes before she actually arrived. I knew it was her even before I could see or smell her. There was no explanation for how I knew, I just knew. I used a flick of my wrist to move me around so I could turn my head and see her as she walked onto the sand. She stood on the sand for nearly a minute watching me float, watching me watch her.
I was still wondering how long we'd stay there without speaking, when she stepped forward into the water and suddenly wasn't wearing jeans and a white top. Her street clothes had been replaced with a lovely, light green two-piece. I watched as the water crept up her beautiful white legs and swallowed her firm stomach. A couple of seconds later she was floating on her back only a couple of feet away from me.
"Have we done this before, Alec?"
"Floated here together or shared a dream?"
"Both...neither. I'm not sure. I guess this just feels familiar. Kind of comfortable—like I've done it before."
It seemed the threat hanging over my head was going to cut through my normal defenses. I opened my mouth to 'talk about the weather' and instead found myself turning so I could look her in the eye.
"How have you been, Adri? I mean, how have you really been? I've missed you. I knew I would miss you after you left, but I didn't realize it would leave this kind of gaping hole inside me. It seems like I no longer have the will to do what needs to be done."
Adri held my gaze, and for a second it was like she sucked me into her eyes. There wasn't anything else but the two of us, and that felt like it was how things should be.
"It's been hard for me too. I...I guess I'm kind of stuck. It's like I made the wrong choice, and now I can't get past it."
