Raene and the Three Bears (The Alder Tales Book 2)

by RS McCoy

  Raene and the Three Bears

  RS McCoy

  Book Two in The Alder Tales

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2016 by RS McCoy

  www.rsmccoyauthor.com

  Cover Art by Kit Foster Design

  © 2016 * http://www.kitfosterdesign.com/

  Edited by Courtney Whittamore

  www.themoralofourstories.com

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted by the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database, retrieval system, or torrent web service, without the prior written permission of the author.

  For my boys

  Table of Contents

  Gone

  Transformation

  Vengeance

  Introductions

  Punishment

  Lost

  Traitor

  Trade

  Envious

  Cavern

  Huntress

  The Dancer

  Envoy

  Stupid

  The Fold

  Daughter

  Bonded

  Amnesty

  Works by RS McCoy

  About RS McCoy

  Connect with RS McCoy

  Gone

  RAENE’S STOMACH continued to twist in useless circles as it had for the last week. Something was wrong—so, so wrong. It hung over her like a dense cloud of smoke, choking the air and obscuring her vision.

  But until Kaide agreed to see her, there was nothing she could do.

  Her fingers skipped over the closetful of silk gowns and shawls, black Pyro pants, and short scarlet tops. So many luxurious pieces, yet nothing to wear and nothing to do. Endless waiting.

  Something had happened with Blossom. That much she knew. It couldn’t be a coincidence that her uncle shut her out the day of Blossom’s transformation.

  Or, maybe, he was angry at Raene herself. Tomorrow, for her own transformation, she would travel to the capital and earn her totem animal—a tiger, no doubt. She would finally be a fierce predator like the mother she never knew.

  Maybe Kaide hated that she would get her mother’s tiger when he got only a monster.

  Or maybe his silence was for something else entirely. Tomorrow, with her tiger totem secured, Raene would be in prime position for a marriage arrangement. She’d spent the last two years researching good families with influence and connections—and with eligible, attractive sons, of course. For any young woman of her class and pedigree, a trade was inevitable, and Raene wanted her alignment to benefit Kaide in his political career. After all he’d done to keep her safe, agreeing to a favorable arrangement was the least she could do for him.

  For the thousandth time, Raene thought over the short list of suitors she’d presented to Kaide only months ago. There was the Porsten Clan with their son Corson. Poor guy. Corson Porsten. But he had a lion totem, and his parents were both involved with the security training facility. They held an annual gala to raise money for new equipment and uniforms. An alignment with their family would give Kaide sway over the use and distribution of Pyro security details across the realm.

  The Ignala Clan was a viable option as well. Their youngest son, Armis, was more than ten years her senior, but he seemed kind and pleasant enough when she met him a few months ago at a formality course. His obscene wealth and position as Pyro Commissioner of Interrealm Affairs didn’t hurt, either.

  But Raene knew which candidate Kaide would pick. Emile Lagrada was the obvious choice. He was classically handsome with dark eyes and hair as sleek as a raven’s wing. He was only twenty-two, but he had a cheetah totem, a respectable position as Syndicate Liaison, and was known for the finest and most-selective parties in the branch. As his wife, Raene would wear stunning gowns and attend the most lavish events. Emile Lagrada was perfectly aligned to help Kaide while also offering her everything she could want in a husband.

  She couldn’t stand waiting to start the rest of her life—a new home, a new role in society, a new family. She would no longer be held under Kaide’s protective wing. So much would change in the next few days. The anticipation was enough to make her fidget, snaking her fingers through her hair over and over again.

  Raene only wished Kaide would let her know what he’d decided. She was confident his selection would maximize her safety and happiness. She had no greater faith in anyone.

  But until she knew for certain, she was stuck in this nothing. Only waiting for a call that never came and a transformation that couldn’t come soon enough.

  Raene sat on the edge of her modest bed and ran her hands through her lengths of blonde hair, mindlessly tucking strands into a sloppy braid. Afternoon light shone in through the narrow-slit window, casting a yellow rectangle on her rug. She traced its outline with her toe two, three times, when she heard a noise.

  “Rain Drop?” Her father’s rough voice sounded from deep within the stone house.

  Raene abandoned her musings and set out in search of him, more than eager for a distraction. “Yes, Papa?” Trotting through Naiden’s lava stone home, her expensive crimson shoes picked their way around the meager furnishings: a low crimson sofa with matching chair, porous stone floor covered with threadbare rugs, a maple wood table cluttered with glasses and mostly empty bottles of strawberry wine. The whole place stunk with the sweetness of old wine, but it had been that way all her life. It was the smell of home.

  While Kaide showered Raene with dresses, jewelry, fine linens, and all manner of luxuries, he refused to share his wealth with Naiden. She didn’t know why her entire family—even her estranged grandparents—so detested her father, but Raene could guess it had to do with her mother’s death some seventeen years before. Whatever the reason, it put Raene’s life in a strange split between Kaide’s extravagance and her father’s poverty.

  Before she found him, Raene heard the beep of her panel—the sleek handheld device that could connect her to the world but only connected her to Kaide. Raene’s heart leapt to her throat, and she broke into a desperate jog. “Papa?” she called out just as she found him in the kitchen, his feet shuffling to find her.

  Raene grabbed the device and answered it in a single motion. Naiden tried to look disinterested, but he stood only steps away, watching as she held out the panel and waited for Kaide’s face to fill the screen.

  But it was only Norsa. Kaide’s head housekeeper let a weak smile play with the corners of her mouth. “He’s asked to see you.”

  “Why didn’t he call me himself?” Raene asked. It didn’t make any sense. Up until the last week, she and Kaide had been as close as siblings. They had no secrets. They hid nothing from each other. Why this sudden chasm between them?

  Had she done something wrong?

  Raene rubbed at the lines that creased her brow. After this week, she’d have a wrinkle for sure.

  “He didn’t say. Just wants you to pack a bag and bring enough clothes for a few days. Can you get here in an hour?”

  Raene couldn’t fight the smile that spread across her cheeks. “A few days?” she squealed. He wanted to see her. He wanted her to stay over, like she had several days a week for her entire life. Whatever had grown between them, it was over. “I’ll be right there.”

  Raene ended the transmission and clutched her panel between her hands with glee.

  “Everything all right?” Naiden asked. A low-bred Pyro with a
python totem, Naiden was the opposite of Kaide—small, nervous, quiet. For the thousandth time, Raene wondered what her mother had seen in him. Or had she seen someone else entirely? Maybe before her death, Raene’s mother had known a different Naiden Randal.

  Now, his hands were clasped before him, a motion he used to try to hide the uncontrollable shaking. His eyes were clear, and his jaw trembled in a rare moment of sobriety. Raene would have asked if he could manage on his own for a few days, but she didn’t want to know the answer. It was selfish, she knew, but Raene didn’t want to be delayed by yet another of her father’s habitual breakdowns.

  “Everything’s fine, Papa. I’m going over to Kaide’s for a few days. You’ll let me know if you need anything?” She leaned forward and kissed his cheek. Naiden Randal was almost a full head shorter than her—clearly she’d gotten her height from her mother’s side—and he looked up at her with those sad, empty eyes he always had.

  Raene didn’t know what had happened to her father, what had made him this empty shell of a person who could only be filled with drink, but she knew no amount of sitting by his side or watching over him would change anything. She’d tried that for years and years. He would drink himself sick and spend his night on the couch like he always did.

  So she was going to see Kaide. After only a week away, she missed him. She didn’t even care why he pushed her away anymore, as long as he let her back in—not just into the manor, but back into his life, his confidence.

  And she’d get to see Blossom. With her own transformation on the horizon, Raene was eager to see her new sister and hear about the process first hand.

  While her father lingered in the living room and searched through his pile of bottles to see which was the most full, Raene darted to her room and pulled out a small bag from under her bed. Then, she filled it with three sets of the wide-legged pants and scarlet tops, the colors all Pyros wore. After that, her night clothes: a thin-strapped top and silken shorts, always black. At the last minute, while wondering about the possibility of a big surprise party or an intimate wedding ceremony to her selected husband, Raene collected her newest gown—a floor-length scarlet dream with a low-cut bodice covered in elegant, shimmering beads. Her mind raced to think who she would wear it for.

  As she left her room, Raene pulled the bag over her shoulder and adjusted her waist-length hair so it wasn’t tangled in the strap. She kissed her father’s warm cheek one last time before she jogged out the door and started up the hill toward Kaide’s manor.

  Her feet couldn’t carry her fast enough. She’d walked the short path between her father’s modest home and Kaide’s considerable estate so many times, she could do it with her eyes closed. As always, she kept off the streets and wove through the dense wood, as Kaide insisted. It was safer there, away from the crowds of Pyros, prone to anger and violence as they were.

  Raene would be one of them tomorrow.

  She would have a predator’s blood flowing in her veins. All her life, she’d known she would be a tiger—like her mother—but now that it was only a day away, her nerves were on edge. What would it be like to be so volatile? Would she be able to control it?

  Afternoon light peeked between the towering alders and blossoming fruit trees. The hot summer air had yet to permeate the cool shade of the woods, and for that she was thankful. Heat only made everything worse.

  Raene raced along faster than usual. But even at such a pace, her ears perked to the sound of boots in the distance. She stopped and scanned with eyes and ears, searching for the source.

  “It’s only me,” Olin called.

  Raene’s reflexes quieted when she saw his dark hair and rough features as he approached “Did he send you after me?”

  Olin shook his head. “Norsa said you were on your way.”

  When she was close enough, Olin pulled her against his chest and kissed her head, a fatherly gesture he’d adopted long ago. While her own father was lost in drink for most of her life, Olin had filled that role—for her and Kaide. He was the steady rock in their racing rivers.

  “How is he?” Raene asked as they continued toward the manor, walking under the alder and peach and cherry trees weighed down with flowers and fruit.

  Again, Olin shook his head, his eyes cast down. A sullen cloud loomed over them.

  “What happened?” She searched his face for any sign but there was only the heaviness of worry and fatigue.

  “You’ll see,” he said, leaving it at that as they climbed the last hill, the one that rose up to the west of the manor. When at last they had the manor in view, Norsa already stood waiting on the front step.

  Her features were downcast, her skin dull where usually it was vibrant. Her grey-streaked hair looked even lighter, like she’d aged years in the last week.

  At the sight, Raene’s stomach sank and twisted, consumed with a nervous knot.

  It was then Raene ran. Fear and worry propelled her across the clearing and toward the woman who was closer to a mother than any Raene had ever known. “What is it? What happened?” Raene begged for answers when she was close enough to get them.

  Norsa put a comforting arm around Raene’s shoulders, though Raene had outgrown her years ago. “Come in, child. I’ll tell you what we know.” In her late fifties, her hair having already turned grey, Norsa looked like a sweet little grandmother, but Raene knew better.

  She let Norsa walk her down the guest wing and push her toward a stool at the island in the kitchen, a steaming cup of tea already waiting, filling the air with a soft, sweet aroma.

  Violet berry tea. For calming.

  Raene was scared just at the sight of it. “What’s that for?” She jabbed a pointed finger toward the little metal cup.

  “Thought you could use it. Sit, child.”

  “What happened? Why won’t anyone tell me what’s going on?” Raene sat tall and voiced a week’s worth of concerns in a single breath. Her chest couldn’t take much more of this nervous pounding.

  “I’m going to tell you. Now sit and drink your tea.” Norsa glared with piercing eyes until Raene conceded. Only when she had taken three sips of tea did Norsa begin. “She never came back.”

  Those four words were all it took.

  Blossom was gone. She never came back. Raene’s heart sank like a rock thrown from a cliff’s ledge. She knew Kaide better than anyone. She saw how he was with Blossom, how they were together. If Raene knew anything in the world, she knew Kaide cared for Blossom with an intensity that rivaled the volcano legends.

  And she knew he would never recover from this. Not in a hundred lifetimes.

  “What do you mean, she never came back?” Raene asked, failing to keep the desperation from her voice.

  “She left with Druma for her transformation. They arrived in the capital. Druma’s sure she made it there. She went up to earn her totem, but no one has seen her since.” Norsa’s eyes darkened, and she shook her head to banish such thoughts.

  “But—” Raene stammered. Druma had been Kaide’s serviceman for years. They both trusted him greatly, but Raene couldn’t make sense of it. “But people don’t just vanish. She has to be somewhere. Did she get her totem? She has to be in the databases!” Raene launched from her chair, encouraged by the sudden realization. “We can go check to see what her totem was and where—”

  Norsa sighed with disappointment. “He already checked. She’s not there.”

  “Not there?” Raene was slow to grapple such news. She couldn’t fathom what would keep a person from being in the database after transformation. They were kept up to date and used for all sorts of reports, like those for Kaide’s work.

  There could only be one possibility. Raene felt the shocking realization as if it was a barrel of cold water dumped over her head. “She didn’t go to transformation.”

  Norsa shook her head with a solemnity Raene had never seen from her. “She ran home would be my guess.”

  Raene’s brow creased but she didn’t have energy to rub it away. Her thoughts
were too scattered. It didn’t make any sense. Blossom wouldn’t have left—not like that. Raene remembered the look on her face when she saw Kaide’s transmission not two weeks ago. There was something strong between them that couldn’t be thrown away so easily.

  But she had no other explanation.

  Blossom had used her transformation as a means to leave Kaide and go home. Something made her leave, and Raene knew it wasn’t Kaide himself. Of that she was certain.

  Raene had to concede to the horrible truth of it.

  The last time she’d seen Blossom—headed toward an alder tree on the outskirts of the clearing that surrounded the manor—they’d spent the day in the market discussing totems and transformation. Blossom had asked about Raene’s tiger totem and how she got the scars—the ones Kaide had given her after his own transformation.

  Raene couldn’t help but question every word of their conversation, examining her memories under the light of Blossom’s departure. And the more she remembered, Raene knew it was her fault Blossom was gone.

  She hadn’t meant it. She had only tried to be a good sister, to be honest as Kaide had asked, and she could never have predicted how those words would prompt such a reaction, but the events spoke for themselves.

  Despite her intentions, Raene had pushed Blossom away. A black pit of guilt took root in her chest.

  And the more Norsa talked, the worse it was. “We were supposed to have a wedding. Not a big thing, but he ordered flowers and picked out all the meals. Planned to take her to the Hydra Gardens to celebrate. Did it all himself. I suppose he thought—”

  “He’s totally destroyed, isn’t he?” Raene withered at the thought of Kaide attempting to put together a wedding for a bride who’d gone missing. How desperate he must have been.

  “I’ve never seen him like this. He sent Druma away. Valenta was scared, left a few days ago. Just me and Olin now. That uncle of yours got a dark look in his eye. His temper—” Norsa poured herself a cup of tea from the kettle and blew away the wisps of steam before she took a sip. “At least he’s asked to see you. Maybe he’s coming round.”