River Cast: Part Two in the Tale of Lunarmorte (21 page)

Feeling shy, Jaeden
mumbled, “We don’t have to wait.”

Ryder heard her anyway.
“You know we do.”

“
I told you
it doesn’t matter to me.”

“
Well it
matters to me.”

Her gaze lifted and
drifted over his strong forearms and the large hands that gripped
the steering wheel. She felt the tension in the truck thicken and
her face heated. “Maybe we shouldn’t spend too much time together
until then.”

“
Uh, you
think.”

***

Despite their
semi-resolved decision to not be around one another, Ryder found
himself following Jae into the house when they arrived at
Dimitri’s. The fact that Reuben’s car was there had nothing to do
with it, whatsoever. He shrugged off the annoyance he always felt
when the vamp was around, and greeted everyone with an impression
of his old laid-back self. Ha, he inwardly snorted, he wondered if
he would ever be that guy again.

Sure enough he found
Reuben in the kitchen with Julia, helping her it seemed with a
recipe.

“
I would
never have thought of doing that,” Julia was exclaiming happily as
she read over a piece of paper. “However did you come by this
recipe?”

Reuben shrugged. “I was
friends with a very good chef once.”

“
How many
years ago was that?” Ryder couldn’t help himself.

Julia and Reuben turned,
and Jae’s mother smiled happily at him. “I knew I heard you come
in.” She sauntered over to him and patted a floury hand to his
cheek, before leaving the kitchen to see to her daughter. He winced
at the sound of major hugging in the sitting room. Poor Jae. Ever
since she got back she only ever got peace when she went to Ella’s
to practice. Everyone wanted to see her and check on her, and she
never had any alone time in the family house. He understood her
family’s anxiety, but she must be going crazy. Nothing to be said
though, he reminded himself. He had to stay on Dimitri’s good side
or he might not give his blessing for the mating.

“
How was
practice?” Reuben asked quietly, in his sober way. Ryder disliked
the way his eyes darted past his shoulder, obviously looking for
Jae.

“
Good.”

“
I better say
hi.”

“
Why don’t we
take a minute outside?” Ryder gestured to the back door.

This was a conversation
long coming.

He knew the vamp got why
he insisted on some privacy, his dark eyes glittering with
anticipation.

Once outside, Ryder cut to
the chase. “Why are you still here?”

Reuben laughed. “You know
I actually like your forthrightness, lykan. It makes your
unnecessary jealousy a little less tedious.”

“
Unnecessary.
You sure? Why. Are. You. Still. Here?”

The vampyre shrugged and
moved further into the darkening back yard, his face tilted up
towards the sky. “For Jaeden. I want to make sure she’s OK before I
leave.”

“
She’s fine.
She’s got me.”

Reuben chuckled. “As if
you’re enough against what’s coming.”

“
What the
hell does that mean?”

The vamp seemed to
remember himself, and he shook his head, a smile of apology on his
lips. “Nothing.”

“
It wasn’t
nothing. What the hell is coming?”

Holding his hands up in
surrender, Reuben approached Ryder slowly. “I didn’t mean anything
you don’t already know. I know about Caia that’s all. Jaeden told
me everything. I can keep a secret. But we all know that Caia’s
presence in this war is only the beginning of the end of a very old
story. The penultimate episode is encroaching, and the action in
that is always as bloody for the minor characters as it is for the
major ones in the final. Who knows how bad it will get. Jae - all
of you - will need all the friends you can get.”

The vampyre brushed past
Ryder and into the house, leaving him feeling incredibly unsettled.
That guy was so weird.

Sighing in frustration,
Ryder turned and followed him back into the house. Immediately he
went on alert at the silence that greeted him, and raced towards
the sitting room to find Jae. She was there, safe and sound with
her family and Reuben, but everyone was gazing towards the doorway
on the other side of the room, where a familiar being leaned
against the doorframe.

Saffron.

“
What’s going
on?” He demanded, striding into the room to stand by
Jae.

Saffron’s mouth
immediately twisted into a moue when she saw him. “Ryder.” She
heaved a sigh. “I should have guessed you would be here. Always
sticking your nose in.”

He ignored that, knowing
her propensity for arguing childishly rather than getting to the
point. “Why are you here?”

She seemed surprised by
his complete disregard of her attempt to rile him but straightened
and gazed at Dimitri. “I’m here to kill two birds with one stone.
Lucien wanted to convey a message to the pack, and find out if
Jaeden was returned safely home.”

“
I’m Jaeden.”
She wiggled her fingers at the faerie.

Saffron rolled her eyes at
her. “I’m aware. I killed the spy that was pretending to be
you.”

He bristled at her blasé
tone and the way the blood drained from Jaeden’s face. He growled
in annoyance, as did Dimitri.

The faerie raised a
delicate eyebrow. “Was that insensitive?”

“
Just a
little,” Julia sniffed.

Saffron snorted. “Sorry.
Old habits and all that. Anyhoo, she’s safe and sound and hunky
dory. I’ll tell Lucien. And Lucien wants you to know that the
attack against the MacLachlans has been stopped by the Regent of
the Midnight Coven. However, he and Caia will be remaining at the
Centre for a few days more as Caia considers a position Marita has
offered her.”

Position?
Ryder shook his head in
confusion. What the hell kind of position would Caia possibly
consider taking after she had promised Lucien she was staying with
the pack? That didn’t sound right.

Something was
up.

“
Position?”
Reuben asked quietly. Ryder frowned, wondering why the vampyre
wanted to know.

Saffron blinked and Ryder
was sure he saw a flash of familiarity flit across her eyes as she
gazed at Reuben. When he stared harder, however, all he found was
the polite mask frozen on her face whenever she was talking to a
stranger… hell, when she was talking to anybody.

“
What
position?” The vamp repeated.

Ryder was surprised that
the faerie didn’t take offence at Reuben’s authoritative tone.
Instead Saffron shrugged.“Leader of some elite force of lykans,
apparently.”

“
What?” Ryder
snapped. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“
I’m
surprised anything makes sense to you, what with your brain being
the size of a peanut.”

Jae growled and stepped
towards the faerie. “Watch it, Tinkerbell.”

He smiled smugly at her
protectiveness and the look of astonishment on the faerie’s
face.

“
That’s the
thanks I get for unmasking the bitch that was pretending to be
you?” She sulked and looked back at him. “Well, the little ones
will be double the morons when
you
two
mate.”

“
Hey!” Julia
took offence.

Saffron shrugged. “Looks
like I’ve outstayed my welcome then.” And just like that she
disappeared before their eyes.

“
What a
snotty-”

“
Pain-”

“
In the ass,”
Dimitri finished.

***

He rushed from the
bathroom at the sound of his cell ringing and snatched it up, his
heart faltering at the caller ID. What had happened now?

“
Nikolai.
Problem?”

The Russian sighed down
the other end of the phone. “Why do you think so? You’re always
looking at the bad in everything, Kirios.”

“
Something
has happened.”

“
Da. It’s
that insect Du Bois.”

“
I thought
you had handled that.”

“
So did I.
He’s more powerful than I thought, and his hand reaches further
than I thought also.”

“
Where is
he?”

“
I can only
imagine at this moment he is on his way to attack the
MacLachlans.”

“
Then Caia
knows. She’ll be preparing for war.”

“
Da.”

His heart thudded at the
thought of what that could do to their plans. “Do you not realise
how disastrous this is, Nikolai?”

The magik cleared his
throat.“Actually, I was thinking we have been looking at this all
the wrong way. This attack, this defence... is it not the perfect
opportunity to test Caia? To see just exactly what it is she is
capable of?”

“
If we start
thinking that way, we will be just like them. That is not what we
want for the future, Nikolai.”

“
I know. But
to win this war we must know exactly what our weaponry and the
enemy’s weaponry is capable of.”

He squeezed his eyes
closed, feeling a metaphorical headache coming on.

“
Very well.
Send in a spy.”

15 - Breaking
Out

A trickle of sweat slid
down her back, hidden from the view of the others around her.
Thankfully, they were all aware she had rushed to this meeting and
she hoped that the lykans who could smell the sweat would mistake
the cause of it. Caia held her breath as her gaze swept Marita and
Vanne’s sitting room, battle plan central as it was now. She
coached herself to remain outwardly calm, to keep her eyes from
widening, her chest from heaving. Instead her face was a frozen
mask. She could tell because all of them – Marita, Vanne, Marion,
Lucien, Rose, Mordecai, Anders, Michael and Phoebe – were staring
back at her in frustrated confusion, wondering why they had been
called, probably guessing, but still annoyed by her silence. She
was silent because she was preparing her voice to come out steady,
not high and squeaky like she felt inside.

Finally, she drew a breath
and announced. “Pierre Du Bois has escaped imprisonment. Petrovksy
has no clue as to his whereabouts, but I’ve picked him up with a
few of his rebels that have remained faithful. The attack against
the MacLachlans is going ahead. Which means the attack is tomorrow
evening in Remnant Forest.”

There were a number of
growls, hissing and expletives as they received confirmation of the
news that had been clear the moment they had been called together.
To them this would be the reason for Caia’s frozen anxiety, to the
lykans, the reason they could smell the sweat that trickled under
her shirt, to the vampyre, the reason he could detect the
quickening of the pulse in her neck with his razor-sharp
eyes.

They would be
wrong.

Suddenly the double doors
to Marita’s suite banged open, and in hurried a worried looking
magik. At the same moment a feeling of triumph mixed with fear
rushed through Caia when the trace she was holding on to
disappeared from the Centre.

The magik’s eyes swung
wildly until they found Marita, who rounded the table with a look
of outrage pasted on her face.

“
How dare you
barge in here uninvited!” She exclaimed, glancing behind the magik
to find Noble pale and beseeching. “How did she get in
here?”

He blanched and gestured
to her. “This is Blair, the warden at the containment centre. She
said it was an emergency.”

Marita whipped back
towards her. “What is it?”

Blair gulped, smoothing
her hair back into its severe bun with shaking hands. “Madam, I’m
afraid it has come to my attention that the prisoner has
escaped.”

Marita snapped back as if
she had been slapped. “Prisoner? You mean the girl? The
Midnight?”

Blair nodded
frantically.

“
Have you
searched the entire Centre?”

“
All of it
Madam. There is no sign of her.”

Marita shook her head in
disgust and then closed her eyes. “Caia?”

Her heart sped up and she
willed it to slow so that the lykans present would not hear it.
“Yes?”

“
Can you feel
the girl?”

She pretended to take a
moment, and then shook her head gravely. “No. She’s not at the
Centre.”

“
Well, where
is she?”

OK, Cy, time
to draw on your best acting skills. Channel Meryl
Streep
. “I-I don’t know. I-I can’t feel
her,” she said, pretending to be panicked by the
thought.

“
What do you
mean you can’t feel her? You told me you could find anyone in the
trace?”

She pushed a few tears
into the corner of her eyes, brushing her hair off her face, making
her hands tremble. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why…”

“
Argh!”
Marita threw up her hands in exasperation. Then she took a calming
breath, turning back into the ice queen as she menacingly glanced
at Blair, her voice low and terrifying. “How on Gaia’s green earth
did this happen?”