Becoming the Enigma (The Loup-Garou Series Book 2)

by Sheritta Bitikofer

  “Indeed. Martel is just going to eat you up when he sees you,” Julia exclaimed excitedly.

  Katey looked to her with brows arched high, but Julia tittered at herself. “Oh, I don’t mean literally, dear. I’m saying that he’s going to adore how you look. No, ma’am. You are a guest of Martel’s, so no one will ever consider having you for a meal. Even though you do smell scrumptious.” Julia giggled once more at what she thought was something universally humorous.

  Her enthusiasm reminded Katey of Lily back home. A pang of homesickness made her hate who she was looking at in the mirror. It wasn’t the real her and this wasn’t where she belonged. How many girls would have given their right arm to be made up so splendidly with the princess dress and makeup? And Katey cared nothing for it. It didn’t matter what she looked like, because it would only be for one night. This wasn’t her world.

  “Something wrong?” Julia asked.

  Katey stood up from the chair, the fabric of the skirt rustling with her movements. “Nothing, just feeling a little homesick... Why is Martel having me as his guest at all? He could have let me get thrown in with the werewolves in the basement, but he didn’t.”

  Julia shrugged her slender shoulders. “Probably because he likes you. You’re a very beautiful girl. I wouldn’t be surprised if every gentlevamp in the castle falls for you tonight,” she said as they walked out of her chamber and into the corridor.

  Katey did her best to balance herself in the new high heels that Julia slipped on her feet. The idea of catching the eye of any male vampire didn’t put her at ease. Seeing Martel again and experiencing the rush that he brought with him was disconcerting enough.

  “What’s happening tonight?” she asked.

  “Only the winter solstice ball and gift exchange,” she said, as if Katey should have known already. “Come, everyone must be waiting.”

  The mention of a gift exchange reminded Katey of what day it was. Christmas. Her mind tried to wrap around the notion that vampires celebrated Christmas, but then she remembered that they weren’t celebrating the birth of the Christian savior. It was the winter solstice they observed.

  Julia led Katey down to the main foyer and turned to the double doors across from the dining hall. Her sense of smell might have been fading, but the sulfuric stench that wafted from the ballroom was distinctive enough for her to know that it was packed with vampires, all eager for the festivities to begin.

  Martel was waiting for Katey at the door, looking dapper in his finely pressed tuxedo.

  She did her best to calm and control herself against the urge to flee the scene. She couldn’t understand what it was about Martel that suddenly seemed so different in comparison to the night before. It was like a whole new image had been created in her eyes when his lips pressed against hers. She should have hated him for the way he had forced himself upon her, but just like with Erik, she couldn’t hold onto that anger.

  A gentle but distinct ache grew low in her belly as Martel turned to her and smiled. For a moment, she forgot that he was a vampire. He was her friend again and despite everything, Katey felt the tension in her muscles ease away. She wanted to be here with him, but she didn’t understand why.

  “You look absolutely gorgeous, Katey,” he praised. “Thank you for helping her, Julia.”

  “My pleasure,” Julia replied as she cast a furtive glance to Martel, and then slipped into the ballroom.

  Martel turned to Katey with eyes that she could only describe as predatory, but attractive in a powerful way and he had just locked in on his prey. Katey blushed a deep red under his gaze and didn’t have the sense to run from him as she had wanted to just seconds ago.

  He took her hand in one suave sweep and bent down low to kiss the back of it. Katey remained speechless as her pulse quickened. His face lingered along her skin and he breathed deeply, a subtle reminder that she was a little lower on the food chain than he was.

  Martel straightened and with their hands still joined, he escorted her into the ballroom.

  The hall was elaborately decorated in rich crimson and gold tapestries. Fresh garland and holly stretched across the lengths of the room on all sides. As she drew closer, the stink of vamp was overpowered by fragrances of cinnamon and many other smells that reminded Katey of the holiday season.

  The ladies were dressed in evening dresses or ballgowns like hers. Most held glasses of blood in their hands and the women were cooling themselves with paper fans while they gossiped and chatted with one another. The men were decked out in tuxedos and suits as she had seen them in the day before. Besides the low roar of giddy voices, there was a band off in the corner of the ballroom playing tuneful classical music.

  The main centerpiece of the room was an enormous, festooned Christmas tree, complete with all the trimmings one would expect. The tree sparkled with lights, littered with an array of ornaments and topped with a bright glittering star at its peak. It was a dazzling display and Katey had never seen its equal before, not even in movies. She was so taken by the decorations that she almost completely forgot that Martel was watching her.

  She looked to him and gave a weak smile. “Is this the surprise?”

  “Indeed, it is!” Most of everyone there didn’t even know she had walked in, but some did give her a once-over, sneered, and carried on with their business. “What do you think?”

  “It’s beautiful!” Katey replied with a genuine grin as she let her eyes roam back over the elegant details of the hall.

  It was certainly a world apart from the one she had grown up in, or the one she had become a new member to. Although, loups-garous cleaned up nicely – as she discovered from the benefit luncheon in Alaska – such a scene was not their style. Their gathering wasn’t a ball or fancy dinner. It was a return to nature.

  The vampires had a culture of their own, filled with propriety and elegance that Katey could never be part of. She looked the part of a human who might belong there, but her wolf spirit told another story.

  “Come. I want to introduce you to some very important people here at the castle.” He offered his arm to Katey and she took it without a second thought. He led Katey through the crowd, which graciously parted ways for him and his human companion.

  He directed Katey toward one side of the room where three men were standing and casually conversing. All were vampires, of course, but two of them emitted a commanding aura that stuck out amongst the other guests and even put Julia’s charisma to shame.

  One was young, but still older than Martel by a couple of years from the looks of it. Though, if they aged liked loups-garous, there was no telling how old he was. He had spikey black hair and dark eyes to match while his boney facial structure seemed similar to Julia’s. Perhaps they were related.

  Another was taller, older, and appeared more confident in the way he held himself. He had a proud air about him. Even with his cold, mocking blue eyes, he seemed to know he was a cut above the rest. His hair was just as black as his younger counterpart and slicked back against his head, caked on with gel to make it stiff and shiny in the candlelight. Something in her, however, waved a red flag, telling her that this vampire was more dangerous than he appeared.

  Katey got the exact opposite impression of the third vampire. The third and last man was much older, but gentler in demeanor, and had rich brown eyes that reminded Katey of Darren’s. They were soft and caring, not void of feeling like the other vampires’. His short silver hair was combed back behind his ears with a posture that proclaimed self-assurance.

  This vampire, unlike the others, could be trusted somehow. Not only that, but there was a familiarity about him that she couldn’t exactly place in her memory. It was as if seeing him for the first time had brought back an ambiguous image from her past that she couldn’t make out.

  Everything seemed to have become blurry to Katey in such a short time. Her affections, her validity as a loup-garou, her loyalty, and memories were called into question and she was lost in the chaos of it all. The onl
y force that grounded her was the wolf that silently observed from the inside. She was watching them, studying and keeping her claws gripped tight to the solid foundation that Katey was loup-garou.

  “Katey, I’d like you to meet Raven, Lord Yaverik, and Lord Michael,” Martel announced, gesturing to the individuals he spoke of. All three bowed their heads and Katey attempted a clumsy curtsey. She smiled only to the elder gentleman who seemed to be eyeing her with peculiar interest. She didn’t want to believe that this vampire could be responsible for the imprisonment of her pack. “Gentlemen, this is Katey.”

  “Welcome to our party, Miss Katey. Martel has told me much about you,” Lord Yaverik, the cold, derisive one, greeted. He took her hand in his and kissed the back of it as Martel had. But, his touch was chilling and unpleasant as if she had just been touched by death itself.

  “I hope all of it was good,” Katey replied cordially, masking her nervousness.

  “Just that you are the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen and that’s one of the only reasons you were not our lunch the other evening,” Raven - the spikey-haired one - stated with a dry sense of humor that Katey couldn’t laugh at.

  Martel gave a threatening hiss.

  “Now, boys, none of that. This is a celebration,” interjected Lord Yaverik before he gestured to the happy crowd of vampires. Katey glanced around once more at the ballroom and finally realized how many vampires were there. There had to be close to a couple of hundred, if not more, bustling around the expansive ballroom. She was surrounded.

  “So, do you all celebrate Christmas the same as we do?” Katey inquired, purposefully pushing back her anxiety just so she could portray some semblance of normal.

  “In a way, but we don’t call it Christmas,” Lord Michael replied kindly. “It’s the winter solstice to us and it lasts for a few weeks. Tomorrow is the last night.”

  “Where we’re all going to hunt down those dogs as a last revel before the year is out,” Raven added, firing a pretend gun at an invisible target just over her shoulder. Katey could feel her blood boil just from the mention of their hunt. “Oh, sorry, I forgot you’re a dog lover.”

  “That’s enough, Raven,” Lord Yaverik barked. “As long as Miss Katey is a guest of ours, we will respect her as such. You have been taught better manners than that.”

  This dynamic almost made Katey think of the alpha and omega relationship. Lord Yaverik behaved as an alpha and Raven as the omega. She wondered where Lord Michael and Martel landed on the hierarchy scale.

  She could feel Lord Michael’s gaze trained upon her and something was telling her that he knew something more than he was letting on. She also knew Martel was eyeing her with piqued interest, but tried to ignore it, despite her fluttering nerves. If she faltered now, her cover could be blown and any hope of helping her pack escape would be lost.

  The lightheaded sensation of hunger rushed upon her so suddenly she visibly winced and wrinkled her face in pain. She took a deep breath and tried to hold the hunger at bay for just a little longer. Once she regained a bit of her composure, she turned back to the group and immediately met the compassionate eyes of Lord Michael.

  “Miss Katey, you look ill. I hope our presence isn’t bothering you too much,” he said in a bolstering, deep voice. The foreign cadence of his words sent Katey reeling at how inexplicably familiar it sounded. Where had she seen him before?

  “No, it’s not bothering me... I’m just a little hungry,” she admitted with a forced smile.

  “Ah, it has been so long since we’ve had a human guest that I have completely forgotten that they don’t eat as we do,” Lord Yaverik said with a chuckle. The others, besides Lord Michael and Katey joined in his wittiness. “I’ll have one of my servants take you to the dining hall. They’ll serve you whatever you’d like and we’ll be here when you’re finished. We still have some time before the gift exchange begins.”

  27

  Lord Yaverik waved over one of his servants to accompany Katey to the dining hall and gave explicit instructions that whatever she asked for, she could have. Just from looking at the kitchen supplies last night, she knew there wasn’t much.

  As she was led away, Martel remained with the others and continued chatting. Lord Michael’s eyes were still fixed upon Katey until she disappeared into the foyer. Now, more than ever, she wished she could have read the vampire lord to understand why he stared so intently and why he was set apart from the rest in demeanor. There was a thread of decorum about him that told her he carried weight within the community, but if that were so, why didn’t he dominate the conversation as Lord Yaverik did?

  In the dining hall were several long banquet tables in rows, almost cafeteria style, long enough to hold up to forty guests at each. The décor and design of the dining room and ballroom matched almost perfectly, from the cut of the crown mold around the edge of the ceiling to the distinct coloration of the marble slab floor. She could still smell the hint of blood from the meal the vampires shared the night before and sighed when she thought of Helga’s poor uncle who had become the main course.

  The servant seated Katey at the end of one of the empty tables and asked what she would like.

  “This is going to sound weird,” she began, “but all I want is a tall glass of water and a plate of sandwich meat or whatever other kind of meat you have available.”

  The servant bowed and hurried off to fetch her meal without so much as a suspicious look. If he had worked for the vampires for long enough, perhaps he was accustomed to strange requests.

  As soon as the servant walked out of the dining hall, Katey rested her elbows on the table and buried her face in her arms, uncaring if she messed up her makeup in the process.

  The hunger was taking hold faster than she had expected. It’d been almost a whole day since she had eaten and the wolf within her was growing restless. She wished that she could have been immune to the hunger like she was before when her loup-garou blood was fading.

  This bout of meat deprivation was turning extreme all too quickly. Katey began to perspire as every pore of her body cried out for relief from the intense nausea that swept over her so suddenly. Her vision blurred and she held on tightly to her humanity, pushing back the wolf with promises that food was on the way.

  Just moments later, Katey heard frightened squeaks like from a child or small creature, shuffling feet, and maniacal chuckling burst through the dining hall doors. Her head shot up and through her dizziness, she saw three vampire boys who looked to be in their teen years, dragging Helga into the dining hall and toward a shadowy corner. One was holding her legs and half carrying her, while one held her mouth and around her torso. The other was smacking his lips, ready for their meal.

  Helga’s frantic eyes fell on Katey and her arms reached out for help as the boys set her down and were about to partake in a feeding frenzy. The girl was putting up a good fight, but the vampire’s incredible strength kept her from escaping.

  Katey burst up from her seat and charged toward the boys, fire in her eyes and rage pumping through her veins. It didn’t matter whether she was lashing out from hunger or righteous anger. They were about to harm the maid she had grown so attached to, an unwilling victim to their thirst. These boys would feel her fury if it was the last thing she did in human form before her wolf would make an untimely appearance.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Katey roared, hoping to possibly frighten them into submission without resorting to forceful violence. Along the way down the length of the table, she managed to grab a sharpened dinner knife from a place setting.

  The three vampires looked at her with crimson eyes, irritated that some other human girl was interrupting their unauthorized snack. They didn’t know what a threat Katey could be when she was hungry, too.

  “We’re having us a snack, what does it look like?” one said as he grabbed Helga’s wrist and began pulling back her long sleeve to expose her fair and unblemished skin.

  “Oh, look! She has a knife. I�
��m really scared!” the other mocked, imitating fright. He then let out a rowdy laugh as he pulled back Helga’s ruffled collar.

  Katey growled deep in her throat and flung the knife toward the adolescents. The blade soared through the air and nailed the mocking boy’s fedora hat. The sharp tip pinned the hat to the wall he stood in front of.

  Now she had their attention.

  They looked up as Katey snatched up another knife from the table and began to rapidly close the distance.

  “Let that girl go or I won’t miss next time,” she threatened with such ferocity, unafraid to carry through with her warning.

  But their attention was not on Katey. Their eyes drifted over her shoulder to something behind her and genuine fear flickered in their ravenous faces. They slowly let go of the terrified Helga and fled out of the dining room doors in such a flash that Katey could feel the rush of air blow past her, but only saw the blur of their bodies as they left.

  She dropped the knife back to the table and hurried to Helga’s side as she began whimpering in fear, gaping at the same thing that had frightened the boys away.

  Katey finally had the sense to turn around and see what it was, though her first priority was to comfort Helga.

  Lord Michael stood with his arms folded over his thick chest, watching them with an austere gaze. Katey wasn’t frightened of him as the others were. They might have known him better, but Katey knew people and she was in no danger from the vampire lord. She turned her attention back to Helga.

  “Are you okay?” she asked gently, looking her over for any bite marks. The maid nodded urgently, tendrils of hair that had escaped from her bun fluttered around her cheeks. Katey helped the trembling girl to her feet.

  “You threatened those boys pretty boldly,” Lord Michael commented as he soundlessly walked forward to meet them.

  Katey looked over her shoulder as she supported Helga up by her forearms. “I’m not afraid of them, and I don’t mean any disrespect, but I’m not afraid of you either. Three against one is never fair and they had no right picking on Helga like that.”