A presence hovered just beyond my reach, and pushed back at me through the fog. I could almost taste the panic on my tongue; it was so tangible in the air with each push. It wasn’t Louis. That much I knew, because what I attributed to his essence had actually been attempting to tug me forward to where I wanted to be. He was well aware that I was trying to communicate with my ancestors again.
With each surge forward, I met a wall, and then received push back. It had clearly become a battle of wills and strength that I wasn’t going to win. I was one white wolf going up against ages of ancestors on their turf. With one final push, I was knocked back hard enough that I woke up with a severe headache, and not much else for my troubles.
My room was dark when I awoke, which was troubling in itself. It had barely been midday when my mom put me under. The amount of voices I heard in my house was cause for even more alarm though. Especially since the vast majority of them were male. I had gone to sleep in a house full of women, aside from little baby Jack. It took me a minute to focus my energy, and move beyond my own mushed brain that was currently throbbing in tune with my heartbeat. A voice I didn’t recognized called out as I tried to sit up. “She’s awake.”
“What the fu…” I started, but my mom ran in at that point rambling a bunch of nonsense. The only words I caught were kidnapped and baby. A sense of cold dread washed over me as I looked around to get my bearings. “Wait, what did you just say?”
“We think they were looking for Willow, but they took Jack instead.”
“Who took Jack? Mom, I don’t understand what you’re saying. Where’s Willow?”
“Willow is fine. Your father is with her right now, but I need you to come talk to Sierra, she is beside herself right now.”
“Come talk to Sierra?” I knew I was still a bit foggy from whatever happened to me while I was in the forced dream state, but I still didn’t fully comprehend. “I don’t understand, Mom, stop.” She was pulling at my arm now, franticly trying to move me somewhere else. I literally had to pull on my white wolf abilities. I let calm wash over and through me, into my mother, so that she would lose the panicked edge, and I could get to the bottom of what was happening. I was basically pulling on her own abilities as she touched me, but reversing them back into her. As soon as I felt her still a bit, I tried to get to the bottom of what was going on.
“Where is Willow?”
“She’s downstairs, in your father’s arms, where I left her.”
“Why didn’t anyone try to wake me?”
“We tried. I tried. Nothing worked.”
“Ashley?” I thought about the fact that she had gone into town earlier, and worried that maybe there was actually more than one victim in all of this.
“She’s fine. They realized Jack was missing when Ashley came back with the diapers for him.”
“How in the hell did someone get inside my house to take a baby?” I let a bit of the angry confusion in me slip out as I spoke this time.
“Calm down.” My mother was pleading with me, and I could feel her influence trying to persuade me to do as she said. I brushed off the attempt easily since I was still connected her ability. Actually, her attempt to control my mood irritated me, considering what had happened.
“Don’t try that again, mom!” I roared as I shot to my feet and surged toward the bedroom door. My mom beat me there, and blocked the way so I couldn’t get by.
“Please, Jess, you need to listen to me first. Your dad stopped by, and when he found out I had you under a deep sleep he took advantage of the fact, and cleared a security team to sweep the house.” My mom continued talking, but I heard none of it as I pushed past her and into the hallway. I ran to Willow’s nursery, and saw Ashley there holding her, and my dad pacing in the corner now. I wondered why he wasn’t downstairs with the baby, as my mom had insisted he was, but then I heard how he shouted at someone on the other end of a phone call. He must have brought the baby to Ashley when he got the call.
“Get out!” Ashley stood, pale-faced, and shocked. She moved like she was going to leave, so I clarified. “Jameson St. Marks, get the hell out of my house, right now!”
Everything stopped. Everyone in the room froze, and then collectively turned to stare at me. I’m not quite sure what they saw there, but what I noticed was that fear reflected back from the eyes of everyone standing near me. “Oh. My. God. Jess?” Ashley all but whispered.
“You brought in a security team, against my wishes, while I was asleep? Now, a baby is missing! It was a baby that I happen to consider family. You are responsible for this.” I knew I needed to get a hold of myself, but that kind of self-control seemed beyond me at that point. “IT COULD HAVE BEEN WILLOW!” I shouted, feeling the flames of heat licking up my face. “GET OUT!” My finger shot out, pointing the way to the nursery door that crashed open with the motion of my hand. My dad flinched in place, and stood there another moment before he hung up the phone, and attempted to walk towards me instead of the door.
“Jess, you need to listen…”
“I don’t need to do anything. You didn’t listen to me, and look what happened!”
“Jess, your eyes!” Ashley hissed. I had no clue what she, or anyone else, was seeing. What I did know was that my sanity was hanging on by a thread. The rage that was stewing inside was crippling beyond measure, and everything I could see from my own vantage point, through my own eyes, was tinged in a green fire. I really needed to get myself in check.
“Give her the note when she calms down.” My father spoke to Ashley this time, not to me. Ashley nodded in agreement, as he left.
“Jess,” Ashley called out to me tentatively after a few minutes. I turned and noticed that she was still hanging back, and seemed to be guarding Willow from me. Yeah, it was definitely time to try to find my inner peace. I knew from stories that the White Wolf of legends had sometimes been known to fly into rages. There were stories about the White Wolf who had taken over by force when it was her time. Those tales were not very friendly. They were also the reason why the next successor didn’t make herself known purposely. I had just gotten a small taste of that feeling, and it scared even me. I was, however, starting to understand why the wolves had said I needed a balancing force in order to be the white wolf successfully. When Mikael was around, he truly was a voice of reason for me. Thinking of him now, and knowing that I never wanted him to see this monstrous side of myself, was one of the things that calmed me down in the moment.
The other thing that calmed me was that I noticed a faint light glow around Willow. “She’s glowing,” I mentioned to Ashley, who looked down in her arms at Willow. “Believe it or not, her glow is the only reason we found her. The blankets that the kidnapper stirred up when they grabbed little Jack hid her. I don’t know how they didn’t see her, but we definitely did. It’s a good thing too; she couldn’t have been getting much air under there.
Things began to click into place as Ashley spoke. “Oh, wow, Natalia…” I whispered as I reached closer to the point where I centered my whole being. “Natalia gave her a way to help herself, if she were in trouble. She didn’t even know what she was doing, but their blessing, the Romanian words, they were about light, and blessings… she built that into my daughter.”
“Jess, you’re not making much sense.”
“It’s okay, Natalia saved my baby. Remind me to tell her all about it. She deserves to know after I freaked out about the blessing the other day.” Ashley was still looking at me like I truly fried my last brain cell, and maybe I had. I would definitely confirm my suspicions with Serena, but I felt it in my bones. The blessing had not only helped hide Willow from the dark ones, but it had helped my family find her before she suffocated under a bunch of blankets too. I walked toward Ashley and took hold of Willow then, needing her close to me.
“What happened, Ash? I went to sleep to try to find this maniac who has been killing our women, and I wake up to find that a baby was taken from my own house. How in the hell did that happen?
”
“Sierra went downstairs to answer the door. Your mom wasn’t sure that you were completely under yet, and she didn’t want to break the link you guys had. Your dad was down there, with a security detail, and Sierra let them in. He’s her pack master. What else was she going to do?”
“Yeah.” I shrugged off the anger that was seeping into my chest towards Sierra, because I knew she would never do anything to put her own baby in jeopardy, let alone mine.
“From what Sierra managed to tell us, Jack spit up all over his clothes, and it was the last of what she had in her diaper bag. She grabbed one of the bigger shirts you had here for Willow, and put it on him after she got him cleaned up. She put the babies down in the crib together so she could get his washed and dried. Jack must have pushed the covers across Willow, in the crib, when Sierra went to answer the door. When she got back up here, she thought both babies were missing at first. Willow was just under the little blankets, that soft glow was the only reason she saw her when she turned to leave the room to get help.”
“You’re telling me that besides this glowing light my daughter seems to have developed, baby Jack is actually who saved my daughter?” Ashley nodded in affirmation. “Jesus, he couldn’t be your brother’s kid any more if he tried. Ashley’s startled half laugh, half sob let me know she felt the same way.
“My father mentioned a note?” Ashley walked over to the dresser and grabbed the little slip of paper. It was nothing more than a ransom demand. “So, basically, they want me to trade myself for the baby, but the note says I have to come alone. Do they think I’m stupid? I mean, how else is the baby to get back if I have to come alone, and they want to drain me. Also, they’re assuming I know where this portal is, because I definitely still don’t.” I rocking Willow back and forth in my arms as I paced the room “I hope Serena had some luck finding her sister while I was out earlier. We’re going to need to know exactly where to go later.”
“Jess, I know you’re still angry right now, but we have no way of knowing if this was because of your father’s security sweep or if it was something that would have happened anyway.” Ashley spoke into my ear as she came in for a hug, careful not to squish my daughter as she did so. “We can’t afford to be fighting each other here, not when there’s so much to lose.”
“I know. I panicked. All I could think about was waking up and finding my Willow gone. Sierra must be beside herself.” I pulled away from the hug to look upon my daughter. “What are we going to do?”
“Let’s get our asses over to your parents’ place, get a hold of Serena, and see if they can help us figure out our next move.”
“Isn’t my mom still here?”
“No, she left when your dad took off. Honestly, I think they were both afraid that if they stayed you would go full blown nuclear wolf on their asses.” Ashley had been trying to avoid looking at me, but then she stopped in front of me, and made eye contact. “You are one scary bitch when you get pissed off. Holy crap! I don’t know how much your abilities have grown, or what’s going on with you, but that was some crazy stuff, Jess.”
“Yeah, it was new for me too, Ashley. Like I said, I woke up worried about Willow, and got hit with a one-two punch after being knocked around in my dream a bit. It didn’t go over very well with me.”
“That’s the understatement of the year!”
~*~
“Well, I guess we don’t actually need to get a hold of Serena then.” Ashley was looking right at the witch as she spoke. Serena wasn’t the only one already at my parents’ house when we showed up. Avery had tagged along with her, which was only fair, since his pack was feeling the strain from this Fiul Sange Vampire who had been terrorizing our women. As he moved out of the way I noticed that it wasn’t just the two of them either. A blond stood perched just behind Avery, speaking very animatedly to my mother. To say that she was blond was to say the sky is only ever blue. You would be missing the descriptions of the vivid sunrise, sunsets when the sky turns to fire, or that of the night, so deeply blue it has run through with black. No, this woman was not simply blond. She was moonstruck, a pale beauty with moon-spun silvery blond hair and bright liquid mercury eyes.
“Good, you’re here, and you seem cooled off a bit. We waited while you pulled yourself together.” Serena turned her back on me after speaking, and if I’m being honest with myself, I wanted to punch her in the head. She acted as if I had no right to be angry about a baby going missing from my house. Never mind the fact that the kidnappers thought it was my baby they snatched. A sharp pinch to my arm from Ashley’s fingernails stopped my forward movement long enough for me to think sensibly though.
“Who is this?” I nodded in the mystery woman’s direction, but didn’t receive an answer until we were all seated around my parents’ large kitchen table. Both my parents, Serena, Avery, Ashley, a very distraught Sierra, Gabriel the Hunter, and myself were all there. “And why is he here?” I tossed my head towards the hunter.
“This is my sister, Layla.” Serena began the introductions
“Layla?” I questioned, and then heaved a sigh of relief. “You are a sight for a sore eyes.” She bowed her head to me in a quick gesture.
“That she is.” Gabriel spoke up, seemingly entranced with the witch. “As to why I am here, we recently acquired a dark one who gave us some rather helpful information. Avery was just catching me up to speed on your own interrogation of a dark one, and unfortunately, you have already learned all that I know.” As soon as he finished speaking to me, Gabriel’s focus returned to the moonbeam-drenched goddess to my left. At least I could rest easily around him now, knowing that his fascination with me seemed to pale in comparison next to that of the moon goddess, Layla.
“I tried to reach the white wolves through the dream world. They basically kicked me out, and wouldn’t let me back in. I need to know where the hell this portal is so I can get Jack back. He’s just a baby.” I didn’t say what was probably on everyone else’s minds. We’d all heard the rumors that the dark ones favored infant blood above all else, because it was so pure and untainted, as if the deeds of man somehow factored into the flavor their blood would take on as they aged.
“I understand what is at stake, for everyone concerned.” Layla spoke, and I swore I could hear wind chimes in her voice. It was an icy sound that sent chills up my spine, just as a her wintery scent enveloped me in a minty-cool essence.
“I will tell you where to go, but only after we’ve established a plan to get you there and back safely again.” Layla tipped her head to her sister. “She will not allow me to send you otherwise.”
We were all perched around the kitchen table, minutes later. It seemed to be as though hours had passed. Everyone had an opinion of what we should do, and none of those rescue attempts involved me going to the portal. “The only way to open the gateway to the dead is by spilling your blood, Jessica, or that of your direct line.” Layla spoke softly. “If we keep you both safe, then we needn’t worry about your blood spilling there.”
“That’s the problem. They have Jack, but they think they took Willow. If they get desperate they may attempt to use Jack’s blood. They’ll drain him dry because it won’t work. Hell, they’d probably drain him dry anyway, just for fun. We’re talking about monsters here. And all of you are acting as though I have any choice in the matter. Little Jack is family. It doesn’t matter how he came to be, how long he’s been in our lives, or anything else. The truth is, he inadvertently saved my daughter tonight, and no matter what, and he deserves a chance at a wonderful lifetime of happiness. I won’t be the reason he doesn’t get to grow up.”
“You won’t be the reason, Jessica. That’s what you do not understand. Bad things happen to people all the time, some of them are out of our control.” My father said to me.
“Only this thing wasn’t out of our control. We screwed up. You, me, every one of us screwed up, and that baby is counting on us to make it right.”
After a while of fruitless argumen
t, I excused everyone else from the room except Serena and Layla. I sat in the kitchen with the two of them while I fed Willow, and we discussed the realities of the situation.
Layla reiterated, “It only takes a willing drop of your blood and a desire to see the portal opened on your part, Jess. They don’t realize this though. When others hear that the portal was sealed with a blood sacrifice they get all dramatic and extreme, thinking it requires death. A mortal sacrifice is something I would never dabble in.”
“I understand that, but how the hell am I going to get that through Louis’s head? I mean, even if he realizes that I can open the portal so easily, it’s not likely that he will let me walk out of there unscathed. Obviously, he’s going to want at least a modicum of surprise on his side. He won’t want anyone to know what the hell he’s trying to raise from the underworld.”
“No, he won’t. That is why we are left with very few choices, and none of them are good ones.”
“We have to get him back!” Sierra choked out through her sobs as she rushed around the corner of the kitchen. Apparently, she had been perched there, eavesdropping the entire time. “Those monsters don’t care. If they find out he’s a boy, and not the baby they’re looking for, they will eat him. If they grow tired of waiting, and desperate, they will sacrifice him. I can’t lose another Jack. I can’t.”
The Ancients Series Page 74
