A Shade of Vampire 32: A Day of Glory (5 page)

A
s horrid
as it was to return and discover that several of Bastien’s tribe members had been murdered, finding the Mortclaws under the control of Mona couldn’t help but fill me with optimism—optimism that I had not felt for a long time. After all of Bastien’s and my troubles, maybe things were finally turning around. Maybe we had almost reached the elusive light at the end of the tunnel.

I hadn’t gotten over murdering Yuraya. The thought that I had claimed another person’s life was traumatizing. It didn’t matter how evil she was or what she had been trying to do, I had still shed blood. It would probably take weeks for the act to fully sink in.

But for now, I allowed my mind to wander to a happier place. Bastien and I had been through hell and back. As we returned to The Shade with Brock, I allowed the excitement to bubble up within me. I could see my parents and family again. That was, in fact, the main reason I’d wanted Bastien and I to accompany Brock back to The Shade, because we weren’t exactly of any use to Brock in his mother’s spell room. We had no idea about ingredients or equipment. I’d just wanted to get a ride back with him—however brief—to check in on life back on our beautiful island.

So much must have happened since I left. We wouldn’t have much time to catch up, since I doubted it would take Brock long to gather up everything he needed. Bastien and I would have to make the best use of the time we had.

As Brock manifested us outside The Shade, we were forced to yell for someone to let us in because Brock didn’t have special permission to enter.

Ibrahim came to our rescue swiftly and, after an identity check, settled us all down on the forest ground.

“What has been going on with you?” he asked.

Brock was already vanishing himself to his mother’s spell room—I had told him that I wanted to go with Bastien to see my parents and that once he was done gathering everything he needed he could collect us. “Everything’s going okay,” I said confidently. Perhaps a little too confidently. “But we don’t have time to talk now. We’ve only dropped back here so that Brock can pick up some of his mom’s equipment, and then we need to head back to The Woodlands. I’m sorry, but I promise we’ll update everyone as soon as we can.”

I caught Bastien’s hand and we left Ibrahim frowning after us. I led him to the Residences, to my parents’ treehouse. My heart was racing as we ascended in the elevator. It felt like an age since I had last seen my mom and dad.

Arriving on the veranda, I peered through the kitchen window—nobody was visible—before knocking on the door.

I had to knock a second time before footsteps sounded. It was my father who came to the door. His hair looked mussed and he wore pajamas. I’d probably just woken him up. But his eyes soon sharpened. “Vicky!” he gasped, relief rolling over his expression. He scooped me up in a hug before turning to face Bastien.

He didn’t know that there was anything different about me yet.

As he let go of me, my mother came hurrying to the door. “Vicky!” she exclaimed. I threw myself into her arms. She held me tight and showered kisses down on my face.

“Mom,” I managed, my throat feeling constricted.

“You found Bastien!” she said.

My parents turned their attention to the wolf. He bowed his head respectfully. Then they ushered us inside.

We took a seat on a sofa in the sitting area, while my mother asked if either of us was hungry or thirsty. We accepted something to drink but there was no time to eat.

“We have to return to The Woodlands,” I said. “Mona is still there.”

I proceeded to explain to them what had happened since I’d last seen them—everything except my marriage to Bastien.

They stared at me, dumbstruck. “‘You drank more from that vial?” my father clarified.

“Yes, but look at me. I’m okay.” I lifted myself in the air before them, demonstrating my power.

“Oh, my,” my mother said faintly.

I figured it would take a long time for them to get used to this… And I hadn’t even told them yet about the marriage.

I glanced at Bastien, and it was as though he had read my thoughts. He looked quite nervous all of a sudden—something I found quite endearing. I smiled, taking his hand in mine before looking from my father to my mother. “I’ve actually become a Mortclaw in more ways than one,” I began, tentatively.

They frowned at me, and I almost felt bad for hitting them with this along with everything else I had just revealed. They already looked close to breaking down after learning that I had morphed into this strange, new creature.

“What are you saying?” my mother dared ask.

I had no ring to show them. Instead my fingers twined with Bastien’s before I brought his hand to rest on my lap.

A wide grin settled in on my face. “Bastien and I are officially a couple… More than just a couple. We’re married.”

“What?” both of my parents asked at once, staring at the two of us, disbelieving.

At this, Bastien cleared his throat and spoke for the first time. “I hope you will excuse me for taking the liberty of asking your daughter to be mine, even in your absence. But I love your daughter. And I promise that I will take care of her.”

“You… you had a wedding?” my mother asked incredulously. “In The Woodlands?”

“No,” I said. “We had a small ceremony on the boat as we were traveling back to The Woodlands from The Dunes. Cecil was there to witness it.”

They both fell silent.

They looked not only sore, but also shocked that I’d gone forward with something like this without even a word to them. But what word could I have possibly gotten to them? When Bastien had proposed to me back on the ship, I couldn’t help but accept. Everything about that moment had felt right. The last thing I’d wanted to do was stretch it out. At that point we’d still had no idea whether we’d even make it back to The Woodlands safely. Not to mention what was going to happen to us next. For all I knew, we could’ve been ripped apart again within a matter of hours.

They were being so quiet all of a sudden, I wondered whether they might even be thinking that marrying Bastien so soon was a mistake.

I wanted to stay longer to talk through everything with them, but Brock arrived too soon, carrying a huge bulging backpack over his shoulders. We had to leave.

Bastien and I rose, and so did my parents. But before we could leave, my mother moved over to Bastien and took one of his hands in hers, before she looked him deep in the eye.

Then she turned to me, and to my relief, she finally smiled.

“I think you made a good choice, Vicky,” she said softly. “And when you get back, we will give you both a proper wedding. Shade-style.”

G
oing
to see Victoria’s parents was more nerve-racking than I’d thought it would be. I felt vulnerable all of a sudden as they eyed me. I was the man who was taking their daughter away from them, whom they were expected to trust to keep her happy and safe for the rest of her life. Victoria’s father especially had been sizing me up. And I would’ve done the same if I’d had a daughter as precious as Victoria.

But they seemed to approve of me in the end—or at least, Victoria’s mother did. And for that I could only be grateful. Victoria and I had enough trouble from my side of the family to start receiving more from hers.

As we traveled back to the supernatural dimension from Earth, and then back to where we had left Mona outside Blackhall Mountain, my chest felt lighter than it had for a long, long time. In spite of the loss of Blackhall lives, and the fact that we still had my family to deal with, I couldn’t shake the feeling that we might finally be nearing the end of the tunnel.

After all, Victoria and I were bonded already, and no matter what physical distance might be put between us, our hearts would remain as one.

Mona was waiting exactly where we had left her, a few feet in front of the line of frozen Mortclaws. She looked relieved to see us. I imagined it must be quite intimidating to be standing here alone guarding these beasts, even if she was a powerful witch.

Brock offloaded the backpack, which looked like it weighed a ton, and placed it gently on the floor in front of his mother.

“Thanks, Brock,” she said, “and I’m glad you didn’t take too long.” She bent over the bag, unzipped it, and began rummaging through it. She murmured inaudibly as she dove deeper.

“Where do you plan to begin your experimentation?” I asked her. “I could take you to a room in the mountain.”

“Yes,” she said, “Good idea. Let’s do that.”

And so I led them into the mountain, to an empty chamber on the ground level which held a table and a few chairs. Mourning was underway now among the wolves, and most of them would be locked away.

Mona placed the bag on the floor, leaning it against one of the table legs before she began to offload its contents. I assumed that if she needed fire, she could manifest that on her own.

She retrieved the vial and placed it in front of her before lining up an array of glass bottles filled with multicolored and multi-textured ingredients, along with a mixing bowl.

“I’d like Brock to stay with me, but you two don’t have to hang around here while I figure this out,” she said. “I’ve no idea how long it will take.”

I exchanged glances with Victoria. She shrugged.

“All right,” I said.

“We will check in on you in a short while,” Victoria added.

I looped her arm through mine and we headed out of the chamber and up through the mountain. I wanted to visit my quarters. We didn’t pass a single wolf on the way as we climbed to the top floor. We moved through the apartment until we reached my bedroom, where we gazed out of the window at the rolling meadow below. She slipped her arms around me and leaned her head against my chest. I wondered what was going through her mind as she heaved a soft sigh.

I was contemplating my parents, naturally. Assuming that Mona managed to find a way to remove their brutality and unfair advantage over other werewolves, I wondered what would happen next. I was still officially the leader of the Blackhall tribe. They were still relying on me and yet, after everything, I didn’t think that I could bring myself to uphold those duties here anymore. The Woodlands had brought only bad luck for Victoria and me so far, and now that we were married, I couldn’t subject my wife to a long-distance relationship. If we survived this, I wanted to return to The Shade with her. Which meant that somebody among the Blackhalls was going to have to take up my post…

“Oh, what about Rona?” Victoria asked suddenly.

I felt a slight panic. Rona! I’d almost forgotten about her. She was still waiting for me in that old boat by the shore. I needed to go and retrieve her. Though she had been waiting so long already, I figured it was best to just wait a while longer to see what ended up happening with the Mortclaws. Then Victoria and I could go together to let her know the situation.

If Victoria hadn’t mentioned her name exactly when she had, while I’d been in the middle of contemplating the future of the Blackhall tribe, it might never have even occurred to me that, of all the wolves who could possibly take up position as leader among the Blackhalls, Rona might just be the perfect candidate.

The Northstones were extinct now; she had nobody, and once she finally got out of that boat and returned to live on land, she would find herself all alone, with very few allies.

Yet she was the daughter of the two Northstone leaders. Leadership must run in her blood. Although I, too, was the son of leaders, it didn’t come as naturally to me to command and lead. I suspected that Rona would do a good job in my place, and most importantly, I trusted that she would be a better woman than Brucella ever was. It seemed that she had taken after her father, Sergius, more than her mother and he had always been a decent man.

Victoria was probably also wondering what was going to happen to the Blackhall pack—whether I would still insist on staying to uphold my duties—but I held back on mentioning my idea about Rona just yet. I wanted to talk to Rona about it first, to see what her response would be, before raising Victoria’s hopes for a solution.

“We’ll go and find Rona soon—let’s just wait a little longer and see how things play out with Mona,” I replied, a little belatedly.

Then I’d have to hope that the Blackhalls would accept her as their leader…

Victoria and I waited together in my apartment for the next hour. We moved to the windows in my sitting room (whose windows had been fixed since Sendira smashed through them), which afforded us a view of the Mortclaws. I thought it might be interesting to watch them for a while, while Mona was working on her spell; perhaps we’d even start noticing some visible changes in them if she was on the right track. After a while, Victoria pulled me back to a wide, comfortable chair. She sat beside me and, her arms draping round my neck, kissed me tenderly.

“Whether or not Mona succeeds,” she said softly as our lips parted, “we’re going to find a way.” She pressed her palm against my chest. “Nothing can keep us apart now.”

I smiled at Victoria’s serious gaze, still not quite believing that she was mine.

Her brows rose in question at my smile. “What?” she asked.

“Nothing, beautiful,” I whispered, drawing her closer to me, “just keep kissing me.”

W
e ended
up spending some time lying in my bed together. We had too much on our minds to be in the mood for anything more than kissing, but there was something endlessly satisfying about simply lying with my mate, relishing the feel of her body close to mine, the way our forms melded. I could be in the middle of a storm, but Victoria made me feel at peace with the world.

Finally we made our way downstairs. Mona and Brock were still standing by the table, both of them gazing down into the mixing bowl which now held a brownish liquid, filled almost to the brim.

“How are things coming?” Victoria asked tentatively as we stood on one side of them.

Mona and Brock appeared to have been so absorbed in what they were doing they didn’t even detect our entry until she had spoken.

“Oh,” Mona murmured, pulling her eyes away from the mixture for but a moment. She inhaled. “Well, I can tell you that I’ve had no luck yet.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” Brock told her. “We haven’t even opened up the vial yet. We need to take a drop and test it to see how it reacts with what we’re brewing up,” he added on noticing our confused faces.

“We should be ready to test the first drop very soon though,” Mona said, her eyes narrowing in concentration as she dipped down to sniff the concoction she was brewing.

I had no idea what all—or any—of the ingredients were that Brock had brought back to her. And in all honesty, I didn’t care. I wasn’t interested in distracting the witches by asking them to explain their process; I just wanted to see the result.

We needed to solve this Mortclaw problem, once and for all.