Traitor (5 page)

“Is that why you’ve been so tense around me tonight?” Carl asked, looking hurt. “Were you afraid to be around me? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It surprised me. That’s all.” I tried to smile. “It’s been a while since it came on so strong. Took me off guard.”

“Did you drink the human’s blood?” Val asked. “Did he survive?”

“I cleaned him of the shadows, and he’s alive,” I said firmly.

“But did you drink?” she persisted.

“She couldn’t have,” Esther said. “She would have destroyed all of those assassins alone if she had drunk blood.”

“Then perhaps we should feed her,” Val said drily.

But Carl’s eyes were fixed on me. “Ava?” he said.

I squirmed under his stare, pleading with my eyes. “It was just a drop,” I said in a small voice. “I didn’t bite him. I just… tasted.”

“Is this going to be a problem?” he asked, sounding business-like rather than upset.

“No.” I felt about two inches tall. “I’m fine now.”

“Maybe Val’s right,” Esther said. “Maybe the time is right for you to drink.”

“No,” Carl said. “She’s not ready. Look at her eyes. If this is what one drop did to her, we can’t risk her drinking her fill and losing control.” He turned to me. “But if it has to happen, I’ll volunteer.”

“Shut up.”

“I’m serious, Ava. We can’t afford for you to bond with someone else, and I know the score. I’m willing to make the sacrifice if it means we all survive in the end. But you need to let go of the guilt first. You can’t keep tormenting yourself. Depriving yourself could be the cause of the cravings. We don’t know for sure.”

I held his gaze. “Do you think I should drink blood?”

The corner of his mouth twitched, but I couldn’t read his expression. “I don’t think you need it.”

I wished I had the same confidence in myself.

Late the following night, someone knocked gently on my door. I wouldn’t have heard the soft sound if I had actually managed to get some sleep. Fat chance of that happening when all I could think about was the way everyone had been looking at me lately.

After another knock, I ran to answer, certain something was wrong even though no warning had sounded. A familiar figure stood outside, his long black and platinum hair gleaming under the moonlight.

“Oh,”
Phoenix
said, looking surprised. “You’re up.”

“Um, you knocked.”

He glanced around at the other houses. He rubbed at his chest, and my heart ached for him.

“Do you want to come in?”

He stared at me for a couple of seconds before nodding. He followed me inside and took a seat at my kitchen table. “I wanted to warn you that we had returned. My mother bound us all to secrecy. Have there been any attacks?”

I froze. Did he know something about the attacks? “A few,” I said slowly. “Nothing worth mentioning.”

He relaxed. “Good. We only returned today.”

“Think that gets your mother off the hook?”

He scowled. “It obviously lessens the chances. Perhaps you should focus on another face for your enemy.”

“
Our
enemy. You swore to protect the twins. An attack on us is an attack on you.” I added softly, “On your children.”

“My children,” he whispered, harsh lines deepening in his forehead. “It’s a strange phrase when I remember nothing of them. Yet I find myself lying awake at night, struggling to recall a memory of my own.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why would I give up those memories when I’m haunted with trying to remember them? It’s impossible. They’re gone. There’s no getting them back because they don’t exist anymore.”

He looked so miserable that I wanted to hug him, but I didn’t dare.

He caught my eye and gave me a wry smile. “I also came to tell you that everything went well over there. The people rose up, aided no doubt by what went on here, and the werewolves ran the vampires into hiding. They were ill-equipped to deal with us
and
the humans taking up arms. They weren’t prepared for a counter-attack so soon after the fiasco here, and many vampires surrendered before the end.”

“Icarus?”

“Our favourite werewolf is safe and well,” he said with a smile. “You would have been proud to see him.”

“Maybe I should have gone,” I said wistfully, despite knowing I likely wouldn’t have returned alive. “Too much talking going on over here lately.”

He nodded. “There were those parts over there, too. Extremely boring to sit through.”

“You sound like a kid.” I grinned. “You’re probably ancient, right?”

He stared at the table. “In fae terms, I’m still a youth. Human definitions would wildly differ. I
feel
old.”

I couldn’t read his expression, but I decided I wouldn’t be able to sleep if I didn’t blurt out what was on my mind. “There’s been a lot of stuff in the newspapers. About you and your fiancée.”

His eyes darkened. “There’s been a lot made of our betrothal. Some of her family were murdered during the initial attacks by the BVA, allowing her to inherit a position of power, so my mother decided it was time for us to meet. Her son in exchange for loyalty. We all have our parts to play.”

“What’s she like?”

“Suitable,” he said. “Her bloodline uses mental magic, just like my father’s side of the family. Although my father considered its use cowardly, my mother likes the idea of how powerful our offspring could be. More importantly, the alliance between our countries will be fully established. This will strengthen both the fae and our ruling bodies.”

I thought of how unstoppable his mother would be and tried not to shiver. “How was it over there? The fighting, I mean.”

He closed his eyes and smiled, his expression softening. “It was magnificent.” He opened his eyes again before I could clear the disgust from my expression, and he frowned. “You look as though you don’t feel the same way. I saw you on our own battlefield. You are like me, born to be a warrior. Except it’s more literal for you, for your kind.”

“So I’ve been told.” I sighed. “Never mind. Want a coffee or something?”

“Okay.”

“Can you tell me more about the werewolves?” I asked as I moved around the kitchen. Pheonix’s confirmation of his mother’s plans made me nervous, and I still didn’t know if I could trust him, but that wouldn’t stop me from probing.

“I can,” he said. “You’re moving strangely. Are you still injured?”

I stiffened. “I’m fine. So anyway, I’m trying to understand why you keep them caged, and I just… I can’t.”

“The werewolves are my favourite race,” he admitted, “but like any race, some beings are wilder than others, harder to understand. They’ve been repressed in an attempt to make them controllable.”

“In what way?”

His eyebrows pushed together. “Keeping all of them close to each other is unnatural, as are the small spaces. I told you the newest generations are smaller than the last. Icarus should be their leader, you know. He’s the dominant one and the smartest. They’ve been kept like savages for so long that they aren’t anything like a human, but they’re not all beast, either. They never were, but the werewolves today are nothing like the ones my family kept in captivity so long ago.”

“Do they speak?”

“It depends on who is around.” He caught sight of my irritated expression. “Yes, Ava, they can speak. They just choose not to most of the time. They prefer to communicate in their animal form. Unlike the shifters, they are more animal than human.”

“What do you think would happen if they were free? What would they do?”

He smiled, longing in his green eyes. “They would separate into groups and run free, the way they’re supposed to. They would likely live in caves somewhere and educate their children in the ways of hunting and survival. They would kill and maim and abandon the weakest of the pack. This world can’t understand that life, and my kind has always been inclined to step on those who are stronger, so we cage the werewolves and force them to breed. We try to
domesticate
them.”

“But
you
care about them.”

A grunt was his only response. He stood abruptly and went to the fridge where a picture Emmett had drawn was stuck by a magnet. “You have a child?” he asked.

I shook my head. “He’s not mine, and he’s not here anymore.” I turned away, but he touched my arm.

“What have you lost?” he asked.

“Something that was never mine.” I shrugged and stepped out of his reach. “I grew up with my grandmother. She was human, and some angel persuaded her to lie to me about everything and treat me in a way that would keep me obedient.”

“Like the wolves,” he said. “Like me.”

I scraped my teeth across my bottom lip, squeezing my eyes shut as I pushed a half-forgotten memory back where I had locked it away. “In a way,” I said after a moment, inwardly cursing the shaking of my voice. “I only found out about my true heritage recently. Growing up, I was terrified I’d give in to my thirst, so I kept to myself as much as I could. You met Carl here. Tall, blond?”

He nodded, and we sat at the table with our coffees.

“I accidentally made Carl a kind of slave while saving him from a vampire. I was led to Peter Brannigan, who tried to help me free Carl. It’s a long story, but Peter’s son had been taken to the slave market years ago. Peter is human and worked for the Council, and we kind of helped each other.”

“You were involved with him?” he asked.

“Not exactly. I mean, kind of.” I bit my lip hard in an effort to stop rambling. “I don’t know. We were digging so hard into finding out about his son, then whoever had him just let him go, let the boy come to us. But Peter had only known a toddler, and he couldn’t deal with having an older child in his life. So I took care of Emmett for a while. We were close. Like, we bonded, and Peter ended up moving in. But it was too dangerous here, so Peter took Emmett away. To keep him safe.”

He met my eyes, and I knew we understood each other. We both held a darker part inside us, and normality would probably always evade us. We had both lost that one chance of family, which was probably why I trusted him when nobody else did.

“When you told me my children were here, I had the idea they were still children. Small. Young. Lots of memories still to make. And then I saw adults who had already made a life without my presence. It was harder to accept my son as a man. I think I would have been more willing to understand if you had handed me a babe in arms. It almost felt as though I had lost them without having them to begin with. It sounds selfish, I know.”

“I get it,” I said softly. “Trust me. I get it. But it’s not too late. It’s like Peter and Emmett. You need time to adjust, but you get to make new memories with them now. Maybe you’ll make up for what you missed out on if they become parents themselves.”

He blinked. “Do you think that’s possible? After all they’ve been through, do you believe they can have a normal life?”

I really hoped so. “They’re good people. It doesn’t matter if they have normal or not. Lorcan would find a way to be happy, no matter what. And Lucia may not speak, but never underestimate her. And they’re so… so
pure
, despite everything that’s been done to them. There’s no bad in those two.”

“I like how you make them sound, but they look at me with such distrust that I can’t imagine a life with them in it.”

He sounded desperate for reassurance, but I couldn’t give him false hope. It would take a lot to convince Lorcan to trust his father, especially after
Phoenix
had admitted to giving away his memories of the twins and their mother, even if he couldn’t remember why.

“She sees you,” I said. “In her visions. With the werewolves mostly. The same things get repeated a lot. Apart from that, she’s been coming up blank more often than not. You said Lucia’s kind of power ran in your family. Is it possible for somebody to block that power?”

He looked surprised. “Block it? In theory, yes, but it would be highly unlikely. It’s a difficult trick to perform and even harder to sustain.”

A lot of highly unlikely things had happened recently.

He leaned forward eagerly. “Maybe we have a connection. Perhaps that’s why she sees me. It’s possible that my being around has pushed everything else away.”

Or maybe there was something important involving
Phoenix
that she was meant to see. Maybe the visions were urgent because they contained a message she was supposed to understand.

“Lucia saw Koda’s death coming,” I said after a moment. “It was a while ago, but it seemed like a clear vision.”

“He’s old. His time will come soon, and the Council will be at odds as the quest for power begins again.”

“Your mother might—”

“She can’t be the one,” he said firmly, as if reassuring himself. “You didn’t see her in the
UK
. She was everything a leader should be, and she wants me to be happy. I had my doubts before, but she’s behaved so differently that—”

“She’s different because you’re playing by her rules now,” I said.

Red dots coloured the centres of his cheeks. “I should go. They’ll be wondering where I’ve gotten to. I haven’t left the werewolves alone much in a long time. There will be talk if I’m seen here. I’ve been watching my mother, and I believe there are a lot of things I haven’t learned yet. I won’t trust anyone completely until I learn more. I want an explanation as to why I gave up my memories. I’ll keep out of the way as much as possible until I can explain it to Lucia and Lorcan. Can you let them know I’m thinking of them?”

The pain in his eyes caused a lump to form in my throat. “Of course.”

I walked him outside, feeling as though I should say something but unable to figure out what that might be. I had felt a connection to the confused fae ever since we fought together with the werewolves. We were both struggling to find ourselves, both lost once we left the battlefield. Knowing I wasn’t the only oddball in the world was sort of a relief.

At my gate, he hesitated. “I should go,” he said again.

“Are you still… I mean, are you free to come and go as you please?”

He shrugged. “I’m no longer exiled. I apparently proved myself enough for that. My desire to battle rather than deal in politics was finally of some use. No longer the disappointment.” His smile lacked humour. “My mother doesn’t want anyone to know we’ve returned early, so I’m not supposed to be seen.”

I grinned. “Maybe people will think you’re Lorcan.”

His face lit up. “That would be convenient. Ava, I—”

“Ava?”

We both turned to see Leah a few yards away, her hood covering her eyes and a bow and a quiver full of arrows strapped to her shoulder.

A warning chill spread down my spine. “You okay?” I asked, sensing
Phoenix
bristle beside me.

“I woke up. Felt power,” she explained. She tipped her head, and her hood fell. She had recently turned sixteen and managed to look innocent and wise at the same time. She was an important human, and a good ally to have, but having her around was risky, considering her ability to find power. If I took Mrs. Yaga’s path, whatever that truly was, I would no longer be able to fight for people like Leah.