by Jan Delima
She hissed softly, “You might as well tell Porter to find a replacement for me.”
“We’ll see. And, Enid,” he said as she stood to leave, “I do not want to be blindsided like I was tonight. Pass the word around. Anyone who has done my wife wrong should come to me first, because if I hear it from her there’ll be no forgiveness. No one other than you has earned that consolation.”
Her expression was solemn. “I will pass your word on.”
* * *
SOPHIE PEEKED IN ON HER MOTHER. FRANCINE HAD wanted the bedroom overlooking the lake; as the smallest room on the second floor it offered more privacy from the rest of the house. The gentle sound of even breathing came from the tiny lump under a country quilt.
She closed the door with a soft click. Joshua’s bags were stacked by the door of the second bedroom, still unpacked, as were hers in the master bedroom on the first floor. That project could wait until morning.
Stifling a yawn, she followed the sound of cupboards opening and closing from the kitchen. By the time she arrived, Joshua had most of the ingredients for mac and cheese lined up on the counter next to the gas stove.
“You can’t still be hungry.” She shook her head. Enid had rectified her dinner after the first course. “You must’ve had two loaves of bread with the roast.”
“You promised,” he reminded her.
“I know, sweetheart. But it’s been a long day and I’m exhausted. I’ll make it up to you in the morning.”
His shoulders slumped, disappointed. “With what?”
“Homemade cinnamon rolls.”
He turned his head, his interest piqued. “Blueberry pancakes and homemade cinnamon rolls?”
She tried not to smile but it was a pointless attempt. “You drive me crazy.”
“I make your life interesting,” he teased, using humor to lighten her mood, as he’d always done. “What would you do without me?”
She reached out and squeezed his hand, marveling with some sadness that she could no longer enclose his within hers. He was a young man now, not her little boy, and it was time to prepare him for adulthood, and for his other life.
“As long as I know you’re happy, Joshua, wherever you are, I’ll be okay. This is your time. Don’t concern yourself with me. I can take care of myself.”
“Jeez, Mom, I was just messing with you.” He shuffled out of her grasp. “I didn’t mean for you to turn all serious on me.”
She pressed her point. “I need you to watch your surroundings. And don’t trust anyone . . . except me and your father.”
“I understand.” He squared his shoulders and leveled her with a dark look, resembling Dylan so much it jarred her. “I understand more than you think. I know the woman who opened the gate, the one with the weird yellow eyes, wasn’t happy to see me.”
“Good,” she said with approval. “She is the sister of the woman I told you about. Neither can be trusted.” She turned him around and gently pushed him toward the stairs. “Now go to bed and get some sleep . . . unless you want to talk more about your father and what we learned today.”
He shook his head immediately. “Nah, I’m good.”
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
She didn’t force the issue. He would come to her in his own time, when he was ready. “Good night then.”
“Night, Mom,” he mumbled between heavy footfalls up the stairs.
Sophie returned the mac and cheese items to the fridge and cupboard and took her first good look around. Not much had changed, and unlike Rhuddin Hall, this place carried too many good memories. She had flirted with danger and lost her innocence in this house.
And gained her greatest joy.
She ran her hands over her face, feeling the weight of her choices as she walked the main floor. She loved being a mother, so much so that she’d shut off everything else, everything that threatened her place in Joshua’s life.
A custom pine bed filled the master bedroom, a foot longer and wider than a king, leaving just enough space for an overstuffed chair and a long bureau. She walked to the bed and ran her hand over the quilted comforter.
She remembered Dylan in this bed, his weight on hers, the heat of his skin, his breath across her neck, his thickness pushing into her . . .
A shudder of pure desire pooled in her stomach, eliciting a physical response she hadn’t felt in years. He had teased her body into pleasures she hadn’t known possible. They had been happy once.
They had loved . . . once.
Don’t go there, she whispered to herself. You lost that right sixteen years ago.
Leaving Dylan had been the most difficult choice of her life. In the end, fear over Joshua’s safety had been the only thing that strengthened her resolve. Returning served to remind her of what she had lost, and how weak she was in Dylan’s presence.
For reassurance, because she sensed her hard-earned resolve begin to crumble, she removed her gun and turned it in her hands. It was a .45-caliber Glock, a slimline model that held six rounds. She kept two spare magazine cartridges in holsters on both calves, and yes, the magazines held silver bullets, alternating with hollow-points. She hadn’t been sure about the myths concerning silver bullets and magical creatures that shouldn’t exist but do, however hollow-points had the capacity to shred a target upon impact, and so alternating bullets inside the magazines seemed the most logical choice.
She remembered the first time she’d held a gun, and the instructor who had taught her how to use it. She had lived in Texas at the time, and Joshua had just turned a year old. It seemed a lifetime ago, but in actuality was only fourteen years, when she had forsaken her very nature to become the person she needed to be to protect her baby . . .
* * *
THE INSTRUCTOR’S NAME WAS JULIE, A RETIRED COP WITH hooded eyes that constantly observed her surroundings. With her hard body, and challenge-me-if-you-dare attitude, men tended to watch but few approached. Sophie envied her confidence, her strength, and knew in order to protect Joshua she needed to become more like her instructor.
Julie taught self-defense lessons and a firearms safety course for battered women, and had kicked Sophie’s ass every Wednesday night for six months. Joshua usually slept in his car seat close by, never far from his mother’s sight, while she learned to kick back. Julie taught her how to use momentum and balance as a weapon, and how to use a perpetrator’s strength against them.
Their lessons advanced to Sunday afternoons at a local outdoor firing range. Joshua stayed home with his grandmother during those sessions. Empty brass casings littered the ground, an eerie combination of gilded metal, packed earth and spent power. She fumbled through learning how to load bullets, jumping when one slipped from her fingers and landed on the ground, half expecting the tiny projectile to explode. She gave a nervous laugh to hide her mounting anger.
She hated Dylan in that moment, for forcing her to become this person who learned how to kill. This was not the person she was meant to be.
Julie remained calm, ever watchful, patiently waiting while Sophie mastered each new skill. “This is a .45-caliber Glock,” she explained. “They make a slimline model that I recommend for women because it’s light and easy to handle.”
“Is it powerful?” Sophie gave the black pistol a doubting glance. More important, “Can it kill a wild animal?”
“Most people prefer shotguns for critters, but try reacting quickly with a shotgun.” Julie snorted softly. “The .45 will do the job, especially if you use hollow-point bullets. It’s gun etiquette to pull the slide open. Like this . . .” She demonstrated the proper handoff, revealing the empty chamber. “It shows the gun isn’t loaded.”
Sophie accepted the weapon.
It felt like death in her hands.
Throughout the tutorial, Julie adjusted Sophie’s grip, leveled her arms and changed her stance. “I have earmuffs in my truck if you want to use them.”
“No. But thanks.” Sophie couldn’t afford the luxury of muf
fling her senses. A paper target was stapled to a wooden stand less than twenty yards away. Her hands shook when she fired. The sound jarred her more than the kick of the gun, loud and vile, followed by a much softer sound of rustling leaves in the nearby woods. The softer sound, she realized, had been her bullet missing its very large target.
Unacceptable. She finished the round and loaded another. The acrid scent of gunpowder and lead filled the air and clung to her skin, and only one bullet out of twelve had hit the paper target.
“You’re shooting low because you’re tensing last minute,” Julie explained. “Relax, site your target and just pull the trigger gently. Don’t tense up.”
The lessons continued over the next few weeks, until one Sunday Julie asked the inevitable. “Why are you doing this? Who are you afraid of? An ex-boyfriend? Husband? I may be able to help.”
“You have helped.” Sophie gave her instructor a sad smile. “More than you know.” It would be the last time they saw each other. Once the questions began, Sophie moved on.
The following day, she bought her first gun from a little man with a ZZ Top beard who called himself the Country Cowboy. His home was located on a ten-mile-long dirt road decorated with No Trespassing signs. More important, he believed in the second amendment and in not prying into other people’s business when it concerned their constitutional rights. Afterward, she found a remote gun shop that sold the equipment to make handmade bullets; press machines, brass casings and molds all sat neatly on the shelf like groceries in a convenience store. The kiln to melt silver came later.
Within a month she could load bullets in the dark, because she practiced every night. Within six months, as long as the target was in range of her vision, moving or stationary, it didn’t matter, she never missed her shot. Never.
* * *
OVER THE FOLLOWING YEARS, SOPHIE HAD MOVED ON TO other instructors, other lessons, and other weapons. She hoped never to have cause to use them but would—without question—if necessary.
For now, she tucked the gun under the mattress. Normally she removed the magazine, but tonight she kept it in. Two knives followed, one from the holder strapped to her left calf, the other from behind her waistband; she placed one under a pillow and one under the bed. All were within arm’s length if needed.
The woman Dylan had loved was gone; the wildlife activist with nothing more than a tranquilizer gun and innocent ideals had died in these very woods. Now she was older, in mind if not in body, and not so innocent.
She felt jumpy as hell when unarmed, too anxious to sleep. To keep her mind busy, she removed her pants and placed them neatly inside the bureau. The purple scar that ran the length of her leg caught her eye. Bracing her foot on the nearest chair, she smoothed her hand over the puckered flesh, wondering if Dylan would find her scars repulsive.
Chastising herself for caring, Sophie let her foot drop to the floor. Vanity had no purpose in her life. She hefted her suitcase to the chair to search for her sweatpants and nightshirt. The brown paper bag Matthew had given her fell forward onto the floor with a loud thump. Frowning, she tugged on her sweatpants and then retrieved the bag, set it on top of the long bureau, and opened it.
Eleven
NOT BOTHERING TO KNOCK, DYLAN WENT IN THROUGH the side door of his brother’s apartments, located on the top floor of the west outer building. Paintings of animal life and wilderness lined the walls, all Koko’s. The furniture was an eclectic assortment, some pieces masculine, some hand carved from wood.
Dylan found Luc pouring a glass of water in his private kitchen.
“Your boy is healthy,” Luc said, downing the water and setting the glass in the stainless steel dishwasher. “But immature.”
“I know.” Dylan leaned against the doorway and sighed.
“His mother coddles him.”
“There are worse alternatives.”
Luc’s eyes darkened with the reminder. “Elen told me her findings.”
“According to Sophie, the changes began three weeks ago. I have no reason not to believe her.”
“Why now, I wonder?”
“From what I’ve gathered, Sophie and Joshua moved around a lot, except for the last few years.”
Luc nodded with understanding. “His move today won’t help.”
An initial shift wasn’t possible if one of their kind felt threatened, a contradiction to the Guardians’ original belief. Even simple environmental discord kept the other half dormant. Age was irrelevant. Luc had remained in wolf form until after they’d settled into the Katahdin region, almost six hundred years after his birth. Regrettably, their earlier years in Cymru had been turbulent ones, Luc’s presence barely tolerated, and only in the camps of other outcasts.
“Yeah, well,” Dylan said, “we both know once the wolf awakens, it doesn’t back down easily.” The first shift was the most difficult. After that, the wolf’s instincts often dominated. Transformations, once completed successfully, were no longer hindered by one’s environment. If threatened, the beast would most certainly emerge.
His brother gave a crude snort. Having been born in wolf form, his dominant nature was that of the beast. It was his human side that fought for control, and more often than not, lost that battle. “When will you try for a shift?”
“Tomorrow. I’m taking him to the gathering place after nightfall. I want you and Elen there . . . but no others. Not until I know for sure what Joshua’s abilities are, if any. Either way, he doesn’t need the whole village watching.”
Luc dipped his head in acknowledgment. “I’d be honored.”
“I spoke with Enid,” Dylan added before being asked. “She will be moving to Constance’s cottage in the morning, along with her daughters.”
“A good solution,” Luc replied, keeping his voice neutral. “From what I’ve seen tonight, I believe your mate has learned to defend herself. If she continues, she will earn the respect of our people without your interference.”
“In time, perhaps. Until then, I have a greater problem.” Dylan walked farther into the kitchen and braced his arms on the counter, letting his head fall forward. “Sophie informed me tonight that Siân found her in the woods . . . after my wife ran from us.” Dylan looked up and met his brother’s narrowed glare. “Siân found her and let her go, but not before issuing Sophie a death threat if she returned.”
Luc whistled softly under his breath. “And you believe Sophie?”
“I’m choosing to believe her.” His only regret was that he hadn’t sooner. “Do you remember Siân from that night?”
Luc frowned, shaking his head. “No, but we weren’t looking for Siân. Also,” he added with some hesitation, as if recalling a distant memory, or revealing a personal confidence, “Koko felt Siân had the potential for violence.”
Rarely did Luc mention his late wife in conversation. For him to do so now gave Dylan pause. “We all have the potential for violence.”
“As I’m well aware. But Koko knew the difference. She married the Beast of Merin, did she not?”
Dylan scowled. “I despise that name.” The moniker was coined by the Guardians upon Luc’s birth. “Why do you continue to flaunt it?”
“Because I can.” His sardonic smile turned serious, changing the subject back to the matter at hand. “What are you going to do about Siân?”
Dylan sighed, finding no pleasure in his next decision. “I have no other choice but to banish her.”
Luc remained silent for several seconds, his stance subdued. “I’ll come with you.”
“I want time with her alone first.” Dylan headed for the door. “Give me an hour. I’m stopping by Alise’s office before I head over.”
Alise was Rhuddin Village’s official town secretary. Her unofficial job was to create new identities every eighty years or so, over a normal human life span. Those who worked outside Rhuddin Village on assignment were more of a challenge for her. In most cases, they returned within fifteen years—before it became noticeable that they were not aging.
At that time, Alise planned a life-changing—or -ending—event to suddenly occur in their “human” lives. “Gather Taran and her brother,” Dylan continued. “I’ll allow them to say farewell to their sister . . . or go with her, if they so choose.”
“Cormack,” Luc said, his voice thick with displeasure, “is probably with Elen.”
* * *
DARKNESS HAD FALLEN ON RHUDDIN VILLAGE, NOT ONLY in the few hours of night, but also in the hearts of his people. There were no voices or laughter as Dylan walked the shadowed streets toward Siân’s cottage, just a few faint whispers filled with concern. Most of the villagers had kept to their homes.
Siân lived on the outskirts of town, secluded by choice, her driveway obscured by tall pine trees. Gravel crunched under his boots as he made his way toward her front door. She had left the outside light on, revealing faded yellow paint and rotting posts as he drew near, neglected, much like the woman who lived within its walls.
As Dylan climbed the front steps he couldn’t help but wonder if the human mind was strong enough to withstand immortality, if the conscience was meant to handle a thousand years of unfulfilled wanting.
The door opened before he could knock, and Siân stood before him in modern jeans, a white winter vest over a navy sweater and hiking boots. The red hair of a Celt hung down her back in a long plait.
She gave him a sad smile, and stood back for him to enter. “I’ve been expecting you.”
He eyed the sparse room, and the four trunks lined up by the door. “You know why I’ve come, then?”
She cocked her head to one side, frowning at his calm tone, and looking somewhat confused. Thankfully, it was not an aberrant confusion; the glint in her eyes this night was lucid.
“I’m sure that woman has filled your ears enough,” she said.
“I’d like to hear your side.”
“Does it truly matter now, Dylan?” He expected anger, even defiance, but instead found sorrow. “I saw your son,” she whispered, her words barely audible, even to his ears. “He has your eyes.”
