Being a teenage werewolf is hard enough, but for Ippy nothing ever comes easily.
Two years after Hannah and Ippy rescued Caelum, Ippy has heard his best friend become close to the selkie. He’s glad for their connection, but wants to get to know Caelum as well. This is harder for Ippy since Caelum is in Ireland, but not impossible because this selkie has a secret—he’s able to walk into the dreams of others. Using that ability, Caelum visits Ippy often, and they soon have a connection unlike anything Ippy expected. For the past few years Hannah has been saying that someday they’d all live together, and now it seems like it might actually be a reality for them. But when his dad finds out that he cares for Caelum, Ippy’s world is torn apart. After an attack that not only leaves him broken, he’s left homeless as well.
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Irish Melody
Copyright © 2014 Caitlin Ricci
ISBN: 978-1-77111-941-2
Cover art by Carmen Waters
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
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Irish Melody
Song of the Sea 2
By
Caitlin Ricci
Chapter One
Ippy was waiting on the sidewalk in front of his house when Hannah pulled up in her new car. She’d had it less than a week, since her eighteenth birthday, and he couldn’t help but be jealous of her independence. “Hey!” she said, leaning out the window toward him. She was all smiles as strands of her long brown hair escaped her unruly braid that he could see over her shoulder. He returned her expression, though his smile wasn’t nearly as bright as hers—not because he wasn’t happy though. He just knew that it didn’t get that big. His smiles never did.
“Ready?” Hannah asked him, her smile slipping a bit when he continued to stand there.
Ippy nodded and moved around to the passenger side of her car. His backpack went in the back on the floor and he slid into the front seat.
“Do the homework?” she asked as she pulled out into the main street in front of his house.
He was trying to be better, and had been watching the kids at school to know what he should have said at this point. He wanted to tell her that it’d been required so of course he had. But that wasn’t what normal kids said. Yes, he answered her, thinking that was probably the right thing to say. By Hannah’s smile that must have been it. Thanks for taking me.
She shrugged and turned up the radio. Her fingers danced over the steering wheel as the warm summer breeze flowed through her car through the open windows. “Sure thing, Ippy. Now that I’m out of school, I don’t get to see you all the time. I don’t mind taking you. Though I’d prefer if you could ditch. We’d be able to go see a movie. The new sci fi one is out. The thing with the aliens and a crashed spaceship or something like that. Wanna go?”
He shook his head. He had to go to class. But he wanted to go to the movie too. We’ll go Saturday. Hannah’s mouth did the funny little thing where the corners pulled down when he said something wrong. Her mouth was doing it now too. He thought about it for a minute before rephrasing his response. I’d like to go with you on Saturday. If you want to.
She smiled at him. “Sounds good to me.” Hannah pulled up in front of the iron gate blocking Samson’s front drive and pressed the button on the intercom box next to her window.
“Name?” Samson said dryly.
Hannah rolled her eyes and winked at Ippy. He’d never really been able to figure out what I wink meant. “Special delivery of an escaped convict for one grumpy old alpha.”
Though Ippy knew she was likely teasing, because that’s what she did, it was hard for him to put it together. She’d lied, they had no escaped convicts in her car. At least none that he knew about. And he didn’t like when she lied. Don’t lie, he told her as the gates opened, allowing them access.
Hannah nodded and quickly changed the subject. “Want me to come have lunch with you?”
Ippy wanted her to. Seeing her broke up his day and made it almost something enjoyable at times. Other times he felt like she was the only thing keeping him sane. But he didn’t want to take up her time, his parents had told him not to do that. Busy? he asked her, his hand going to the door and hesitating to open it.
Hannah shook her head. “Daddy Liam has been talking about me getting a job or something. Not really sure what he’s thinking right now. Half the time he wants me to work, the other half he says he could build me a little house of my own in the back yard so that I’d never have to leave home. But nope, I’m not busy. Definitely not for you anyway.”
Ippy nodded and let himself out of her car. Noon, then.
“Noon. I’ll bring you something,” she promised as he stepped away from the car and closed the door behind himself.
He waved to her as she pulled around the circular drive and out of their alpha’s front yard. When he could no longer see her shiny new black car, he turned and faced the large white mansion with its multiple columns and black shutters. It was too much, in his opinion, but he didn’t live here so he supposed it didn’t really matter what he thought of his alpha’s house. It was plenty big enough for everything that happened in it anyway, all the meetings his parents went to and such. He’d only been to them a few times, even though he was recognized as an adult according to the pack rules. But he was different, and he knew that. And Hannah couldn’t be there for him all the time. Since she’d graduated at eighteen, he’d had to start doing things for himself without her around. It was harder than he’d ever be likely to admit.
Ippy went in the unlocked front door and turned the corner to go into the first office he found. This was their classroom, and had been for as long as he could remember. It was small, barely big enough for a few long tables and a dozen chairs. But there had never been more than ten students, either. He found his seat, first one by the door and in the front row, and took his backpack off before sitting down. He was early, which meant that he was on time. At least to him. Five minutes exactly.
He took out his pen, a notebook, and the book he was reading. They had assigned readings, but with such a varied class no one was reading the same thing, and as long as he didn’t have to read the same book over again he didn’t complain. He took out his phone, too, and opened a text message log that he had going with his teacher in case he had questions. Everything went in the upper right corner, from largest to smallest.
He wished everyone in class would be organized from tallest to shortest too, but when he’d asked if that could be done his teacher had said no. Then some of the girls had laughed at him. He hadn’t asked for anything since then. Hannah didn’t know about that day. She’d been home sick with the flu. He knew what would happen if she did see something like that. She didn’t put up with people mak
ing fun of him. He liked that about her, but knew he couldn’t rely on her to do it all for him. Someday he’d have to stand up for himself.
Two minutes to nine and the last of the students filed into the classroom. One girl, Sara, put her hand on his notebook and pulled it over the front of the desk. As she’d been doing every morning since Hannah had graduated. He got out of the chair and picked it up while she and her friends laughed at him. He’d told her to stop two days ago, but she’d ignored the message he’d written down on the notebook paper and he didn’t have her cell phone number to send her a text.
Everyone took their seats and the teacher came in while he was getting his notebook still.
“Phillip,” she said, sounding cross and using his given name instead of how he’d asked to be spoken to, “It’s nine. You’re supposed to be in your seat. Everyone else is.”
He nodded and retook his seat. When Hannah had been in the class, the teacher had barely spoken to him. Now that she was gone the teacher was meaner to him, too. He’d texted Samson before, but the alpha hadn’t done anything about it that he knew of. He pulled his phone close and reminded his teacher, again, that he wanted to be called Ippy.
Her phone beeped and she looked down at it. Ippy caught the pinched expression of her mouth, but didn’t know what it meant. He didn’t know her expressions like he knew Hannah’s. “Phillip, cell phones are not to be used in class. Put yours away. No one here gets special treatment.”
He did as he was told, but also quickly wrote down on the notebook that his name was Ippy. He made sure to make his lines big enough for her to see a few feet away, but she didn’t even look at him as she turned to start writing on the dry erase board in front of them all. He could hear people whispering behind him. Werewolf hearing let him know what they were saying, and they were lucky Hannah wasn’t here to hear it, too.
He put the notebook down and started taking notes, resigned to another fun filled day in werewolf school.
Noon couldn’t have come soon enough, and he was outside waiting for Hannah as soon as the teacher had released them for lunch. They had an hour of free time and though most of them ate in Samson and Christopher’s large kitchen, snacking on the alpha’s food and whatever Christopher had decided to make for them all if he was around, but that wasn’t a requirement. Samson only said that they had to stay on the grounds. When Hannah pulled up, though, Ippy wished that wasn’t a rule since the first three hours of class had been no better than the first two minutes. She’d barely turned off her car when he’d opened the door and slid inside. She handed him a burger and a milkshake before starting to chow down on her own.
“How’s class?” Hannah asked him in between bites.
He shrugged and started eating.
“I tried texting to see what you wanted me to bring you, but you didn’t respond.”
He nodded, took another bite, and then checked his phone to see that he’d missed a few texts from her and a link to a funny video of a guy that had dropped a bowling ball on his foot. Can’t use my phone in class anymore, he told her as he put his phone away again.
She frowned and turned toward him in her seat. “Why not? Doesn’t she get that’s how you talk to people?” He shrugged and kept eating. “I’ll go talk to her then. If she’s going to be an idiot about this, she gets to talk to me.”
Ippy touched her arm, something he rarely did, and shook his head. He didn’t need a crystal ball to know how badly that would probably go. He didn’t know why his teacher would do something to retaliate against him if Hannah talked to her, only that she likely would. They’d only had her for six months anyway, and she was one of the few teachers they’d had that didn’t have prickly words.
“Seriously? You don’t want me to talk to her?” Hannah asked him.
Ippy shook his head again and released her arm. She didn’t let him get far, putting her fingers through his and holding his hand. She was good about it though, not holding onto him too tightly. She didn’t squeeze or cage him in. Her hand was just there, warming his palm and letting him know she was next to him. He didn’t so much mind that, even if she hadn’t asked him this time.
Hannah kept eating and so did he. It was awkward to do it one handed, but he didn’t want to let her go, either. He didn’t get to see her as much now and didn’t want to waste the time he did get with her. “Sure you don’t want me to?” she asked him.
Don’t want you to, he told her firmly.
She sighed loudly and finished off her milkshake. “Fine. I won’t. But I don’t like it.”
Ippy nodded and counted that as settled. Bored today?
Hannah gave him a smile. “Yeah. Daddy Liam has got me going over accounting sheets and budgets and telling me how important it is to have a good financial plan already. I really want a neon sign that reminds him that I’m still just eighteen and living at home. He should bring this up when we’re moving in a few years after you turn eighteen.”
She said it matter of factly, as if they’d already planned their escape from the small town life of Pine Hollow. And, in a way they had. Since meeting Caelum a little more than two years ago they’d settled into the idea of the three of them going off together as soon as Ippy graduated. It was to be an adventure. Ippy would have his best friend and his new friend and they’d never be apart. It wasn’t going to be that simple, he was sure of it. But when faced with how his life was now he was really looking forward to it.
The alarm on his phone sounded and he knew that meant he had less than ten minutes left for lunch. Most people waited until the last minute to come back from lunch, but he couldn’t do that. He had to throw away the trash and set up his desk again.
Hannah released his hand and Ippy gathered the trash. “Hey, I might take a nap this afternoon—if I see Caelum, do you want me to say hi?”
Ippy nodded and started to get out of the car, but he hesitated, his hand stopping on the door as he stood just outside of her car. I want him to visit me, too.
Hannah looked surprised, but she nodded anyway and slowly smiled. “Sure. I’ll let him know that you want to see him, too. Hopefully he’ll be able to. He said that he could do it to anyone he was close to. Just, Ippy, if he can’t I don’t want you to be mad, okay? I don’t know if you two have the bond. I don’t even know how he and I got it, and I don’t want you to be hurt if he isn’t able to. Okay?”
He nodded and closed the door behind him before going back inside with only a few minutes to spare. He had his desk perfect when the teacher walked back into the room followed by Sara who was helping her carry a few books.
“Hey, Phillip,” Sara said once she’d put them down on the teacher’s desk. He looked up at her, wondering what she could want. She rarely spoke to him—in fact, none of them really did. He thought it was because he didn’t talk back to them. “Jessie said that you and Hannah were holding hands in Hannah’s car. She saw you when she walked by, but you were too busy to see her. Aiming a bit high there, aren’t you, mange?”
Ippy flinched at the old name that she and the others had been calling him behind Hannah’s back for the last year. He flipped his notebook to a new page and quickly wrote that he didn’t have mange. He didn’t see how she’d have been able to forget because he’d just told her, like he’d told her that he didn’t have fleas or lice either when she’d told everyone that he did.
“Sara, go sit down,” the teacher said. Sara rolled her eyes, but she did as she was told even if she did make kissing noises as she walked past him.
Though Ippy had tried to ignore her, he spent the next hour wondering what she’d meant by saying that he was aiming high. Hannah wasn’t any taller than he was. He might have even grown taller than her after his last little spurt. So what did Sara mean by him aiming high?
“Phillip, are you paying attention?” the teacher asked him, interrupting his thoughts.
Most of the students would have probably said yes. But he knew that was a lie. He hadn’t been.
At all. He’d been thinking about what Sara had said and since he never lied, he shook his head. Some of the kids laughed, another threw something at the back of his head that felt like a pencil. The teacher rolled her eyes and Ippy put his head down over his notebook, intent on following along as she turned and kept teaching again. He didn’t know what she was talking about, only that it was a history lesson, because that was the textbook everyone else had open. Usually they had individual lessons, but history was one of those topics that everyone could follow along with. The memorization was just different for each of them.
He liked memorizing things because he was good at it. The states, the capitols, then all the countries were all tests he’d done well on because he liked the system of memorizing things. They weren’t abstract concepts or strange ways of getting to the same answer like math was. It was just facts, and he liked them because they made sense and there was order in them. Like on his desk. Everything was neat. Only the states couldn’t be lined up from smallest to largest, and the presidents he’d had to memorize didn’t go in alphabetical order and the one time he’d try to present them on a test like that, even though he’d had everything else right and even explained what he was doing and put dates by each of their names, he’d still failed that part of the test because really they weren’t in order the way the teacher had wanted. And so he’d had to redo it or risk getting a failing grade because the presidents and their order was what most of the test was about, even if the presidents weren’t supposed to go in that order, not really anyway, but that’s what the teacher had wanted and so—
“Phillip, if you can’t bother to pay attention in my class I’m going to send you to the alpha to deal with you. He’s a very busy man, so I’m sure he wouldn’t like to be interrupted.”
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