Moon Broken

by H. D. Gordon

  To his credit, despite the fact that I was naked as the day I was born standing before him, Adriel glanced away respectably while I remembered that I could summon clothes thanks to the rose tattoo on my shoulder. As I did so, I noticed Adriel’s grin grow a fraction.

  Sighing, I placed my hand into his, and without looking at me, the Mixbreed magicked us away.

  We landed in a small room that smelled heavily of parchment and burning wood. Rather than setting me on my feet, I was transported directly atop a bed, my body coming to rest with careful ease. A thick fur blanket appeared atop me in the next moment, and at the same time, a fire burning in a small stove in the center of the room flared brighter, sending little red embers up from the wood.

  Adriel stood near it, his back to me. He wandered over to a bookshelf on the wall, pretending to examine the volumes there. “There’s a basin of warm water through that door if you’d like to wash your wounds,” he told me.

  “It hurts to move,” I answered, my eyes already slipping closed. The mattress on which I was lying was the softest I’d ever had the luxury of knowing, and the warmth of the stove and fur blanket had replaced the chill I’d been feeling since stepping into that dreadful forest. If I had it my way, I wasn’t going to move until someone dragged me from this bed.

  Or tossed me on the floor with magic, I reminded myself, and though it wasn’t funny, I almost smiled at the thought.

  Adriel turned on his heels to face me when it became apparent that I wasn’t moving from my position. The light from the fire flickered over his handsome face, the dimness of the room casting part of it into shadow. Those scarlet eyes gleamed in the darkness, the only indicator of the beast that dwelled beneath the carefully constructed façade.

  “I could heal you,” he said. “Take some of the pain away.”

  It wasn’t stated as an offer, but rather, a matter of fact.

  “No,” I said, anyway. Because no amount of magic could heal what was wrong with me. This pain was penance, and we both knew it.

  “Fine,” he said, slipping his hands into his pockets in the adoption of his usual manner. “But once you’re healed physically, you are forbidden to stay in that bed. As I said before, I have a job for you, and there’s work to be done.”

  “What are you, my Master now?” I mumbled.

  Silence followed for long enough that I opened my eyes and lifted my heavy head a bit to gage his reaction, suddenly wishing that I could suck the words right back down my throat.

  Adriel hadn’t moved from his position by the shelf. In fact, he stood so very still that once again I was reminded of the power he possessed, the dark abilities that his biology allowed him.

  “That’s an awfully mean thing to say,” he said at last, and the monotone of his smooth voice made the hair on my arms stand up.

  “You have suffered,” he continued, “but others are still suffering. You have to decide whether or not you’re all right with that, if you can sit back and let it happen, from the comfort and protection of this place. A good portion of the people in Mina do just that, and no one is going to shame you for it. They do their part here in the community, but they want no part of the war. Some people, they just don’t have the fight in them, they don’t have the will or the skill. But, if you really feel so broken about everything that’s happened, then do something about it, Gods damn it.” He shrugged. “Or don’t—whatever. That’s the thing about freedom. It means you get to make your own choices. But lying in bed eternally is not one of them. That’s my only condition.”

  I hadn’t cried since I’d left the Western Coast burning with chaos behind me. I hadn’t cried when I’d seen Amara or even Goldie, hadn’t cried when I’d told my story to Goldie, nor when Bakari had fallen from the sky and told the people of Mina that Ryker was the new West Coast Pack Master, and had murdered one thousand slaves in their sleep.

  But, for whatever reason, when Adriel said these words, I felt tears burning my eyes, and I squeezed them shut even tighter in a futile effort to quell them.

  The sound of the fire crackling in the stove hung in the space between us for a few moments that felt like lifetimes. Finally, I was able to gather myself enough to speak, but even so, my words came out a whisper.

  “I don’t know if I can,” I admitted. “This job you have for me… I don’t know if I can… fight anymore. I’m sorry.”

  He did not make a sound as he moved, not even a stir of the air, but I felt him come closer, knew that he was standing nearer the bed before I opened my eyes and saw him there.

  For the first time since I’d met him, I thought I glimpsed the male beneath the mask, the empathy behind his eyes that could only be gained through a life of crappy experiences. I found my eyes drawn to the fine curve of his mouth, following the lines of his lips… and downward, across his strong chest, his trim waist and pressed slacks, the appeal of his perpetually relaxed posture, hands in his pockets and head cocked just so to the side, making his dark hair fall across his forehead…

  I slapped all of these thoughts away as if they were mosquitos on a hot summer night. They were sure to do nothing but irritate me. The last time I’d had these kinds of thoughts about a male, it had turned into what was shaping up to be one of my biggest regrets in a life full of them. I would not make that mistake again.

  “Don’t apologize,” Adriel said, his face betraying nothing. “I’m not asking you to fight. If you’ve had enough, you’ve had enough. No one can hold that against you. But…” he paused and wandered over the bookshelf he’d been examining earlier, and plucked a book from it before heading back over to me.

  He set the book on a stand beside the bed and casually backed away a few paces. I tried not to let my cheeks go red as I wondered if he’d somehow intuited what I’d been thinking about a moment ago.

  “I need you to read,” he continued. “I think there might be answers that I need somewhere in these books, but I can only read so much at a time. Because the people of Mina are mostly former slaves and refugees, there are only a handful that know how to read at the moment. We plan to eventually open classes to teach everyone, but we haven’t had the time with everything going on… Is this something you can do? When you’re healed, of course.”

  Though it caused me tremendous pain, I reached over to the stand beside the bed and picked up the book he’d placed there. I still had questions, and I was going to be sure to get my answers, but for whatever reason, when I held that book in my hands, my eyes running over the familiar symbols, the crushing helplessness I’d been feeling eased a bit.

  It was only a bit, but it was something.

  “Yes,” I told him, clutching the book to my chest atop the fur blanket. “Yes, I can do that.”

  Adriel gave a barely perceptible nod, and disappeared before I could find the courage to thank him.

  I healed.

  Over the course of a couple days, my body closed the wounds it had sustained and mended my aching ribs. The bruises and lesions faded and stitched back together, the magic of my Wolf’s blood doing its job as efficiently as ever.

  As my body regenerated, I sat in the bed and poured over the pages of the books Adriel brought me. The going was slow, because despite my ability to read, I hadn’t had much practice in doing so over the years. I’d learned my letters as a pup from a working lady who’d taken a shine to me. Where she’d learned to read, I never knew, but she’d been insistent on convincing me that it was a skill that would be useful one day.

  And, now, here I was, doing work that few within my new community could manage. If I were a less skeptical Wolf, I might have believed it was fate.

  Ryker did not visit me in my dreams again.

  I managed to convince myself that this was for the best.

  Once I felt strong enough to get up, I took the books with me everywhere. I read as I bathed in the hot springs, while I ate meals, and while I did pushups and other various exercises to strengthen my physical body. All of the books Adriel assigned me were
about magic, and I read them with intense interest.

  The room he’d brought me to after leaving the forest opened up into a narrow hallway that led to a single door. This door opened into a much larger room. This larger room was two-storied and lined with shelves from floor to ceiling.

  On these shelves, books of an incalculable number waited like old friends. I’d never seen so many tomes in all my life, had never even imagined such a collection existed. When I’d snuck into Reagan Ramsey’s office in search of the Silver Book, I’d believed his compilation of twenty or so titles to be massive.

  Here, there had to be hundreds, maybe even thousands of volumes. There were so many books that the air held a palpable scent of parchment and ink. Tables and plush chairs had been set around the room in various locations, and more shelves with more books stood in neat rows. There were three separate fireplaces blazing at all hours, providing cozy warmth and flickering light. The walls were made of dark, shiny wood, and on the ceiling, there was a painted mural that was almost as breathtaking as the sight of all those books.

  No matter how many times I passed beneath it, I still stared in wonder at the depictions. Painted on the ceiling with meticulous detail was every supernatural creature I’d ever heard of, and many that I had not. There were Fae, Trolls, Firedrakes, Harpies, Vampires, Shifters, Pixies, Merfolk and on and on. Most, I had no name for, and could only guess at.

  Though I had a specific assignment with the books Adriel was giving me, I found myself becoming increasingly interested in the idea that the books beneath the mural held the answers to any questions I might pose.

  It was this ignition of my curious nature that led me out of my hiding spots between the shelves a week later, in search of answers to long overdue questions.

  11

  I found Adriel in one of the gardens, picking purple berries from a vine crawling up a fence and popping them into his mouth.

  It was difficult to equate him with the beast I knew he could become when he stood as he was now. Even from behind, I could tell that he was in the throes of deep thought, and if I’d been willing to wait any longer, I might not have interrupted him.

  But I couldn’t wait any longer.

  I stepped up beside him and plucked a berry from the vine. “What exactly am I looking for in those books?” I asked.

  He didn’t turn to look at me, didn’t acknowledge my presence in any physical way. “A spell to maximize magic without causing damage to the one wielding it,” he answered.

  I considered this while moving onto my next question. “Where’s the Silver Book?”

  “In the library with all the other books.”

  “How did you know how to remove my collar? Did you learn from the Silver Book?”

  “Yes, that’s why I took it from you.”

  I paused. The candidness of his answers was surprising me. I suppose I had expected some sort of resistance, but I’d gone over everything I’d wanted to ask him beforehand, so I continued on undeterred.

  “What about the other Dogs you’ve helped escape? How did you get their collars off?”

  A sigh. He plucked a few more berries and popped them into his mouth. He still didn’t look at me, his scarlet gaze fixed on something in the distance. A few pieces of his ebony hair had slipped free of his coif, and they brushed across the smooth surface of his forehead.

  “We’ve taken mostly un-collared pups,” he said. “The others, like Cavan, managed to escape when their collars had been temporarily removed.”

  My brow furrowed. “Removed? Like when the Hounds do inspections and re-fittings?”

  Adriel nodded his head, the movement so slight it was almost imperceptible. “Yes, exactly.”

  “So you’re the Conductor,” I said. “You’re the one the Pack Masters have been looking for. The one who has been freeing the slaves, taking the pups before they get collared.”

  Adriel turned and looked at me for the first time since I’d arrived. From this angle, the fading sunlight fell across half of his face, kissing his fine cheekbones and glinting in the jet black of his hair. “Not just me,” he said. “It’s a group effort… but, otherwise, yes.”

  “Why?”

  One of Adriel’s dark brows rose. “Does one need a reason to do the right thing?”

  I considered this a moment. Then said, “In my experience, yes.”

  His scarlet gaze held mine, his muscular body as still as a statue. “My heart breaks for your experience, Rukiya. But, the truth is, I just know something most others do not.”

  My throat restricted a little at these words, and since I couldn’t at all decipher if he was trying to make fun of me or not, I brushed past the statement and continued on with my interrogation.

  “And what’s that?” I asked

  He leaned forward, as if about to share a secret, and the fresh scent of soap and peppermint filled my nose. “That none of us are free until we’re all free,” he whispered.

  My brow furrowed again. “I think some people are more free than others,” I replied.

  Adriel strolled over to another part of the garden, picked up a set of sheers, and carefully began pruning the dead leaves from a small tree growing out of a large blue pot. “That may be true,” he said, “but the system controls us all, and right now, the Wolves live under a system of oppression.”

  I thought this was rather insightful, but didn’t tell him. Instead, I moved onto my next round of questions.

  “How did you remove my collar?” I asked

  “The magic in my bite counteracted the magic in the collar. When my venom entered your blood stream, the spell on the collar was broken.”

  My jaw dropped open and hung there for a few moments before I had the good sense to shut it. One corner of Adriel’s mouth tipped up ever so slightly as he continued his pruning. It took a second or two for the wheels in my brain to connect the dots and start turning, but eventually, they did.

  “It weakened you, didn’t it?” I asked.

  Adriel only looked at me, his red gaze so intense that I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to it.

  “When you bit me and freed me of the collar. It made you weak, which was why you only had enough energy to transport us part of the way to Mina. It was why we had to walk the rest of the way on foot. You were drained afterward.”

  “Clever little Wolf,” he mumbled and wandered away from the berries and toward another plant that bore tiny green vegetables that were crisp and sweet on the tongue.

  I hurried along after him, hiking up the long brown skirts I’d been given that were softer than any material I’d ever worn. They draped over my legs like blankets when I curled up in a chair and read, and I was pretty sure I would wear them until the day I died if I were allowed.

  “So these books you have me searching through,” I continued on, “You want me to look for a spell that can increase the magic in your venom, so that you can free slaves from their collars en mass?”

  “Right again, dearest,” Adriel answered, and moved on once again, making me chase him around the garden like a damn puppy.

  A thought occurred to me, and I stepped into his path so that he couldn’t escape, getting closer to his body than would most rational creatures. I could literally feel the power that rippled off him, and though my instincts told me to put some distance between us, I held my ground and stared up into the scarlet of his eyes.

  “Ryker saw you,” I said, trying not to focus on the way my stomach was flipping as I stood so near to him. This close, his eyes weren’t red; they were actually just a very unique shade of brown. “He saw you remove my collar and take me away. He knows you’re the Conductor now. And if he knows…”

  Adriel’s handsome face betrayed nothing, but he gave another slight nod. “Then the rest of the Pack Masters know.”

  “They’ll be after you now.”

  He sighed and slid his hands into his pockets, looking over at me from the corner of his eyes. “Yes, I suppose they will.”

  “
You could’ve just let me die,” I choked a little on the last word and had to clear my throat. I felt like crying again, but really did not want to.

  Adriel said nothing.

  Around us, the insects clicked and chirped. A breeze blew through the garden, rustling the leaves and dancing around the flowers and plants. The scent of peppermint brushed by my nose, and I realized that this was a smell I associated with the Mixbreed.

  Soap and peppermint, that was what Adriel always smelled like.

  “Why?” I asked when I could no longer stand the silence. “Why risk everything to save me?” Unintentionally, the words came out a whisper.

  My gut told me that rather than giving me an answer, he was a heartbeat away from vanishing, as was his usual mode of departure when he was eager to get away from me. Before he could do so, my hand struck out and gripped his forearm. I felt the lean muscle tense under my fingers, but he remained otherwise unmoved.

  “Don’t just disappear,” I said, my voice still low and my eyes pinning him for once.

  I half expected him to jerk free of my grasp. He didn’t. He held utterly still.

  “I have a meeting I need to get to,” he said.

  “Okay,” I replied. “Then, let’s go.”

  To my surprise, Adriel didn’t argue. He only extended his elbow to me and waited for me to slip my arm through his.

  All the other times I had touched the Mixbreed, apprehension of some amount had washed through me, but as I laced my arm through his now, I found myself moving without hesitation.

  For the first time, I perceived no threat at all from him, no danger. He was powerful, yes, and the thrum of magic that constantly radiated off of him was proof of that, but he was not dangerous.

  Not to me, anyway.

  It struck me as equally sad as it was flooring when I tried to recall a male in my lifetime that I’d ever felt that way toward, and couldn’t. Every male I’d ever known had always posed a level of danger. Violence was a part of Wolf culture, and females always drew the shortest stick as far as that was concerned. I couldn’t think of a single male I’d ever met who I didn’t think posed some level of danger to me. Not one.