Queens and Monsters Awakening (The Blood Falls Book 1)

by India Amare

  Bridge rolled her eyes. “His ego is this big.” She held her hands out wide.

  “So where do you fall in the pecking order?”

  The twins traded a look as if they always confirmed with each other before speaking. I’d seen twins—human twins—do the same many times. “We’re the babies of the family,” Cass said.

  “So let me see if I have this straight. Dray is oldest, then Bo. I haven’t met Leena, then Gigi, and I still need to meet Kris, Aethel, and Vic.”

  Bo clapped. “Bravo. We know we’re an unruly bunch. Your efforts are commendable. Here, let me introduce you.”

  As I moved beside Bo into the crowded room, I caught sight of Dray as far away as he could get while still keeping his eyes on me. And make no mistake, that’s exactly what he was doing: watching my every move. I might not have tapped into this Plane yet, but I sensed Dray more than anyone else and I knew when he was watching me.

  “Leena. Kris. Meet our dear Miss Rhysa.”

  The pair before me were darker than their other siblings. Both had dark brown eyes, olive skin, and dark brown hair. Their other features were identical to the fairer blondes and even Dray and Bo with their striking blue eyes.

  They also seemed far less pleased to see me.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” Leena said.

  Kris smiled like he was forcing it onto his lips. “A pleasure.”

  Bo leaned down and whispered, “They’re not members of the Rhysa Fan Club just yet. But don’t worry, it’s only because they haven’t met you and they worry about your grandfather destroying the family.”

  “Oh, is that all?” I turned and stared at Bo, marveling that he was able to say all that with a straight face.

  He stood back up to his full height. “I met you before you Awakened. Back when you helped Gigi find a book and made her incredibly happy for no reason other than a shared love of reading.” He shot his younger siblings a withering stare.

  So Bo had that Big Brother energy as well. At least Dray wasn’t alone at the top all the time. “I perfectly understand your worries and I don’t blame you one bit.”

  I stood my ground as Leena studied me. “Crap. I can’t hate her. She really is as sweet as you said.”

  He said I was sweet? After fifteen minutes in a bookstore? That was really nice.

  Kris didn’t crack though. “I don’t hate you. I just hate what you represent and right now my family is more important than anything.”

  “I respect that.” I really did. The Wren family loyalty was admirable and, if I was being honest, I was jealous of what they all had.

  Aethel and Vic were equally wary of me, but open to getting to know me. Then I met a string of aunts, uncles, and cousins I would never remember. I noticed that people seemed to be moving in and out of the house in waves.

  I came to a stop in front of two identical Aunt Bethany’s. “I’m really confused right now.”

  Both women smiled the same way at the same time. “Twins run in the family. I’d like you to meet my twin, Belynda.”

  Fertility and twins? The Wren’s really were making lots of babies. The hair on my neck rose up and I knew Dray was behind me. Then both women looked over my shoulder and smiled.

  “There you are.” Bethany waved him over.

  “Aunts. What do you think of our new recruit?” He clasped his hands behind his back, standing ramrod straight beside me.

  “She’s very nervous, Draygus,” Belinda scolded him. “Stop being so aloof. You know how terrifying you get when you’re like this.”

  “You have no idea,” he said under his breath. Then louder, “I’ll try harder. If you’ll excuse me?” He nodded to his aunts and then to me before disappearing into the crowd.

  Belynda shook her head. “The stress is eating him alive.”

  “He won’t listen to me,” Bethany replied. “It’s not like when he stole my car.”

  “Dray stole your car?” I couldn’t believe Mr. Broody would do anything so against the rules.

  “Oh yes. He was a stubborn child who decided he was the man of the house and would take over getting groceries and supplies from town. Back then I was his guardian and had more power. I simply returned the car to the garage and disabled the engine so he couldn’t go anywhere. These days he’s his own man. A stubborn man.”

  Of course he didn’t steal it for a joyride. Only Dray would steal a car in order to be more responsible.

  “Lou!” Bethany waved at someone, then turned her attention to me. “I want you to meet someone who I think will be very helpful to you.”

  Lou turned out to be a gorgeous woman. At least two or three inches taller than me with dark brown eyes, jet black hair, and a long, slender body. She also had the most perfect lips I’d ever seen in real life. I kind of had a girl crush on her.

  “So this is the famous Rhysa. It is good to meet you. We have a lot in common,” she said.

  I glanced at Bethany. “Lou is a member of the House of Sato. She is also a cousin of the House of Axl.”

  “Like you, I’m forced to walk the line between friend and foe.” She articulated her words very carefully, the rhythm of her sentences staccato. “Perhaps I will see you at House of Axl in the future?”

  I nodded, my mind whirling. Was this the Lou that Gigi mentioned so long ago? The one who was kidnapped? Oh sure, the rest of the story was a cover—the real estate mogul part—but the kidnap and ransom part sounded entirely genuine.

  “I trust Lou. Completely. She will be a good ally for you inside your grandfather’s house.”

  Lou smiled warmly at Bethany and Belynda. “They often watched me when I was small. I played with Dray, Bo, Leena and sometimes Georgiahana.”

  It would be nice to have an ally behind enemy lines. “What were they like as kids?”

  “Oh, Bo has always been a playboy. He was born with that smile and unshakable confidence. Leena was always covered in mud. She hated the indoors. And Dray...well he was once the sweetest boy I ever knew. He always had flowers for his mother and aunties.”

  “Yes, well, he’s still sweet. It’s just harder to find.” Bethany smiled, but it was the sad kind.

  Gigi came running over. “Have you seen the library yet? Of course not. When would you have time?”

  “Maybe now would be good? I’m sure Rhysa needs a break from all this,” Bethany suggested.

  “Bridge!” Gigi waved over my head. “Now!”

  I let Gigi pull me away. “It was nice meeting you, Lou!”

  “I’ll be seeing you,” she called after me.

  “Lou’s good people,” Gigi said. “Super calm all the time. It’s pretty freaky but it serves her really well moving between the houses the way she has to.”

  “Is she the Lou you told me about?”

  Gigi paused, confused. “When did I tell you about Lou?”

  “The second night at the book shop when you told me you knew someone who’d been kidnapped.”

  Her mouth rounded. “Oh. Yeah. I wouldn’t have told you that if I’d known who you were.” She chewed her lower lip. “The answer is yes. Now let’s get going.” She yanked me even faster down the halls of the House of Wren.

  I glanced in the open doors we passed. Everything was nice and clean, and even in the more formal rooms there was warmth. And then Gigi and Bridge stopped in front of an enormous room.

  The walls were blue, the shelves dark wood, in the center was a large rug with two couches back-to-back, armchairs in the corners, and every shelf covered in books up to the ceiling. Floor to ceiling windows dotted the corners.

  “Paradise.” Bridge danced into the vacant room, arms wide.

  I stood in the doorway with my mouth hanging open. It was like I had stepped into the Beast’s library, or some other fantastical movie with the perfect library. “Can I sleep in here instead?” The couch looked perfectly comfortable.

  “I have many times,” Gigi said. “Look over here.” She tugged me toward a shelf where the entire Murder, Mayhem, and
Mischief collection was shelved, including the copy from my store.

  I let the sisters give me a full tour. It took several minutes just for the overview. And then we got to the fireplace. Yep. There was a fireplace in here too. It really was the perfect library. “Did you know everything here has been built by us?” Bridge gushed. “The stones for the fireplace were set by Wren’s, every board that built this house was planed, cut, and hammered into place by our family. Even the furniture. The bookcases, chairs, and couches were all made by us.”

  I touched the stones. Gorgeous stones of dark grey and imperfect striations. “You are all very talented.” Intimidatingly so.

  “You want to know a secret?” Bridge made her eyebrows dance on her forehead.

  “Of course.”

  “Over here!” She skipped across the room to the full wall of books and waited for me to catch up. Then, with a grin, pulled the bookcase open.

  Inside was a secret room!

  I gasped. “No!”

  “Yes!” She nodded quickly. “It’s my favorite place in the whole house.”

  Behind the bookcase was an entire hidden room with an armchair, side table, a rug, and more bookshelves. I stepped inside slowly like I might be stepping into another dimension.

  But no, it was simply a room hidden behind a bookcase.

  “And here,” Gigi pulled open another bookshelf, “is the passage back to the main hallway.”

  A secret passage.

  “You all got up to lots of mischief, didn’t you?”

  The pair nodded, grinning.

  “Bridge! Gigi! Where are you?” Aunt Bethany called out.

  “In here!” Bridge yelled back. Everyone seemed to yell in this house, even with dozens and dozens of guests over.

  “Ah, I should have known.” Bethany stopped at the entrance to the secret room. “Have you shown her the tunnel?”

  They shook their heads.

  My brain short circuited. “There’s a tunnel, too?”

  “Oh yes.” Bethany moved through the room to the other bookcase and pulled the bottom half open revealing a dark staircase hidden behind. “I need the girls to help me get Great Aunt Khathryn to her car. Why don’t you explore on your own and get some real quiet time?”

  “You don’t have to ask me twice. It’s been a fantasy of mine to live in a house with secret passages.” I peered into the dark.

  “All bookworms dream of this,” she said, reaching inside and up. “This is the key to the door below. Just make sure you return it to the hook when you come back up. Enjoy. Come on girls. You know how Great Aunt likes to see you.”

  They groaned, but followed Bethany anyway.

  I bit my lip. A real secret passage. Ever since we arrived at House of Wren, I felt like I was floating through a fairytale from the gorgeous homes to the woods to Blood Falls. And now this. I knelt down and slid into the opening. There was just enough light from the secret room to see the stairs and the door below. I crept down the first two so I could get enough space to stand and then slowly descended the stairs. Why I was walking slowly and carefully I didn’t know. They were sturdy and appeared to be regularly maintained. Maybe it was because I felt like I had stepped into a book and that maybe each step took me further and further from reality.

  Either way, I reached the bottom. The door looked heavy and old. The lock had been updated at some point, but it was still older than most modern keys. I held my breath as I slid it into the keyhole and twisted. The mechanisms tumbled with a thud and the door gasped open a fraction of an inch.

  I let out a little of my breath as I pushed open the door. I expected it to be black inside but instead there was soft yellow light that blanketed the racks of wine bottles and stacks of food supplies. In the center of the room was a table made out of wine barrels. And standing at that table with a glass of wine in his large hand was a frowning Draygus Wren.

  Chapter 9

  “Wine?” he asked as he stared at the key in my hands.

  “I’d love some.”

  He grabbed another glass and poured some dark red liquid into it. “I take it the bookworms introduced you to the library.”

  I stepped toward the table, wary of the unease coming off Dray. He came here to escape. Whether it was the party or me, I was intruding. “They did. It’s a beautiful space.” I tucked the key into my jeans pocket and picked up the glass of wine. “How did you get down here?”

  He pointed to another door on the other side of the space. “Stairs go up to the pantry in the kitchen.”

  That explained why there was food stored down here. “The wine is good.”

  “I opened an expensive one.”

  “That bad of a day?” I didn’t dare look at him.

  “Just overwhelming.” I felt his eyes on me during the pause between sentences. The heavy, tortured gaze.

  Torture I was causing.

  “I love my family, but I can only take so much of their constant conversations before I need a break.”

  He didn’t mention needing some space from me, but it was implied. I examined the room. There were hundreds of bottles of wine, a few shelves with different kinds of liquor, garlic, onions, potatoes, and more. And then my gaze fell on the other wall.

  It hadn’t occurred to me until just then that somewhere on this property there’d be a place where swords and armor were kept. High on the wall, on full display, was a large, ornate sword.

  “That’s Dreadnought, my family's sword from the dark times.”

  “What are the dark times?” A large green stone was embedded into the ornate silver, just above the dark wood of the hilt. The blade itself was a dark metal I couldn’t identify.

  “Thousands of years ago our world and another were at war. War is dark so I assume that’s why we call it that.”

  I stepped closer so I could get a better look at the armor. One set in particular seemed to be made of the same metal. “What other world? Like aliens?”

  While I moved from piece to piece, Dray stayed locked in place at the table. “No. I mean our metaphysical world and another. A world with ghosts and dragons, demons and angels.”

  I shuddered to think those stories were true as well. “What happened?” I turned to see if Dray’s expression had any clues, but his eyes were unfocused, his mind somewhere else entirely.

  “There’s always a little overlap where sometimes you think you see or hear something, but when you look again, it’s gone. There are special places where our worlds are so close you can step through.”

  “Have you stepped through?”

  He shook his head slowly. “No one has since the dark times. We pushed them back and sealed the doors forever.” Pain washed over his face.

  There was more to this story.

  “Why does everyone keep the armor? Why did my grandfather’s guards wear it?”

  He blinked and brought his focus back to this room, to his wine. He took a sip and let out a slow breath. “Like I said before, we’re a species that is very tied to our traditions and rules. Sometimes that’s a good thing. It means everyone follows the same code. But it also means sometimes we’re stuck in the past. All rituals and holidays, we put the armor on. Any meetings between the houses, the armor goes on. The House of Axl is the most traditional. They wield the past over the other houses as a reminder we aren’t human and we need peace to survive.”

  I went back to Dreadnought. “What is this metal?”

  “The stone is a dragon’s egg and the metal is said to have been forged in the fires of hell. Our family history calls the metal Izi. It means fire in Sumerian.”

  Just as I felt walking down the stairs, every minute I seemed like I was drifting further and further from everything I thought I knew. “Dragons?”

  He chuckled. “Of everything I said, that’s what you picked out?”

  I drifted back to the table and set my wine down. “It’s the funnest?” I didn’t want to tackle the idea there were really ghosts, demons, and angels.

 
; “Dragons are terrifying,” he said, his voice low. “According to the histories.”

  There was something off about that statement. “So these doors are closed and we’re all safe here?”

  His focus changed again and his eye twitched. “That is certainly the hope, but nothing is guaranteed in this life.” His hand slid across the table to mine, moving the tips of his fingers over mine.

  The barest of touches and yet I felt it everywhere. I had no choice but to close my eyes and take a moment to recover.

  “There is so much you don’t know about me, Rhysa.” His voice cracked a little at the end. “You should get to know me before you make choices you might end up regretting.”

  That sounded like a totally reasonable course of action. And I hated it completely. “What won’t I like?”

  Our gazes locked again. “Who I really am.”

  I had no idea what he meant by that. I knew he was insinuating something, trying to tell me without actually saying, hoping he could scare me off, but it was all lost on me. “Maybe you won’t like who I really am.”

  He covered my whole hand with his and ran his thumb over my skin. “You’re like a magnet. I can’t help myself. No matter how hard I fight it, I end up losing. I get closer, I touch you, I want more.”

  I felt the same way.

  But I hated how much it hurt him. The last thing I wanted was to force myself on him against his true will, all because I couldn’t control my natural instinct to be with him.

  “I’m tired. I should go to bed. It’s been a long day.”

  He didn’t move his hand. It was as if he couldn’t. So, even though it took every ounce of willpower I possessed, I slipped my hand out from under his. “Good night.”

  “Good night, Rhysa,” he gritted out.

  I somehow managed to get through the door and up the stairs. I slipped the key back on its hook and closed the bookcase. I skirted the stragglers remaining to drink and socialize.

  The moment I slipped into the soft bed exhaustion hit me. As I drifted off to sleep I thought of the gorgeous armor, of Dreadnought, and of how Dray said dragons were terrifying like he knew from experience.