I turned to the door and waved when he came in. “Hey, Matt.”
“Hey, Atty. I’m glad you felt me coming. I didn’t want to spook you.”
“You never spook me. I can always feel you coming.”
“Great,” he grumbled, and I realized that probably annoyed him considering how his father badgered him about it.
I laughed, “Sorry, I didn’t mean it as an insult. It’s just that it’s nice to know when someone else is nearby. Your father scared the bejeezus out of me one night in here.”
Now he laughed. “Yeah, he does that to me a lot.”
“I don’t know how my heart didn’t stop.”
“Well, I’m glad it didn’t. Someone should have warned you he comes here at odd hours.”
“Oh, yeah?” Emilius had said as much, but now I wondered why.
“Yeah. I don’t know why, but when I first moved here he scared me more than once. I was in the habit of getting energy after dark. I tried not to call attention to myself at home. I decided to come down to the stables a few days after arriving and walked in to find him here.”
“Did he say anything?”
“Nope. Just told me to take what I needed and left. Then about a week later, I ran into him on the path. He was heading to the house as I walked to the stable. I almost bumped into him in the dark.”
“Weird.”
“Yeah,” he said, then trailed off as if remembering something else.
“What?”
He came back to the present and looked at me but didn’t speak.
“You look like you thought of something else.”
“Yeah, but I’m probably being crazy.”
“Well, why don’t you tell me and I’ll give you my non-professional opinion,” I said with a laugh.
He smiled and said, “Well, I was just thinking that his being here hadn’t been the only weird thing.”
“What does that mean?”
He paused again before continuing. “The thing is, for a second as I was walking in that first time, I thought I felt someone other than him here. It’s crazy though, he’s never with anyone. I probably got confused with one of the horses. I wasn’t exactly efficient at this then. Heck, I’m not efficient at it now.”
I stared at him for a moment. He tilted his head as if asking me to speak, though he didn’t say it out loud. “The other night. When I ran into him. I felt the same thing. As if there was an energy force underneath the stable. I only felt it for a second though, right before I saw him.”
“OK, that is weird.”
“Do you feel anything now?” I asked. I couldn’t feel anything other than him and the horses, but I wondered if he might. He’d been doing this longer, if only by a short while.
“Nothing.”
“Weird,” we both whispered then laughed.
“Anyway, though, did you come for a charge?” I asked.
“No, I came because you were the only one I could feel nearby, and I was wondering where everyone was. I had come by the house to ask my father something, but I couldn’t find him.”
“He went out to take care of some financial thing with Julian.”
“Oh, OK. I’m surprised that Ben left you here alone. He’s usually more guarded.”
“I promised I’d stick around. He was a bit annoyed at me ’cause of yesterday.”
He looked confused so I elaborated. “What? He didn’t tell you about what a horribly crazy thing I did yesterday? He ranted about it to anyone else who would listen.” He had told his brothers and father, and they’d all scolded me.
“Well then, I guess I’m glad I wasn’t here last night.”
“You want to know what it was?” I asked and he nodded. I knew he wasn’t going to ask unless I volunteered the information.
“I transferred to this sick patient who was on the brink of death. Ben thinks I gave the guy too much. He got mad and said I could have killed myself, but I knew how much I had. I was fine.”
“Don’t worry about Ben, Atty. He tends to be a bit crazy about you. I’m sure if you thought you were fine you were.”
“Thank you. Finally, somebody reasonable.”
He laughed, “Well, I don’t know that I’m reasonable, but I believe you if you say you were in control of yourself.”
I smiled. “So what are you doing today, other than looking for your father?”
“Not much. I could hang out.”
“That would be nice. Though, I obviously have to stay close to the house. Ben probably has Frank watching the driveway.”
“It’s possible,” he laughed. “But, I didn’t feel him when I drove in.”
I smiled, and we headed back to the house. As we got closer, something occurred to me.
“Hey, did you say you felt me from the house?”
“Yeah.”
“Wow, I can only feel you once you’re pretty close.”
“Yeah, it’s my father’s trademark as I’m sure you’ve already heard. Mine’s not that great since I’m not 100 percent Durand. I can only feel someone from about a mile away.”
“A mile.” I said more to myself in shock than in question.
“I know it seems like nothing compared with Ben’s five, but it still comes in handy.”
Five miles? I thought to myself. I tried not to react and kept walking. I didn’t want Matt to know I was unaware that Ben could feel someone five miles away. I was afraid he’d go back to thinking it odd that Ben and I didn’t know important facts about each other.
“I bet it does. So you can feel me that far away? I wouldn’t have guessed that based on previous encounters.” I couldn’t believe I’d brought that up again, but I was curious. Why had he not stopped before he got to the house rather than coming in that night he felt Ben and me fooling around?
He blushed, and I knew my subtle reminder had made him think of the same incident. “Yeah, sorry about that. I got confused by the fact I could feel my brother’s energy that strongly. I got worried something was wrong. I never used to feel him around.”
“That seems so weird to me. I’m so used to feeling Ben around.” That sounded like we were aware of each other, right?
“Well, the opposite is true for me. It’s weird feeling him. I don’t think I ever had until that first day I met you. I couldn’t have told you who was in the house until I saw him with you. I can never feel any of my brothers.”
“Really? I figured maybe they relaxed sometimes with each other.”
“No. Never.”
“That was pretty brave then, walking in when you felt two strangers in the house.”
“Not really. I knew that anyone in the house had to be there with my father’s permission. It would be dangerous for anyone to try to sneak in.”
“He’s that strong?”
“He’s lethal.” The way he said it gave me goosebumps.
“My brothers told me all about it. He can break through anyone’s shield with barely any effort. Nobody other than family and friends has even attempted to approach him in over 400 years.”
“Four hundred years?” I asked incredulously.
“Yup, since right after Ben was born.”
“What?” I said too loudly, shocked by the number in relation to Ben’s age. My intake of breath was so strong that saliva went down the wrong way, and I started coughing fitfully. Matt patted me on the back.
“Atty, what…”
I put my hand up to interrupt before he could finish the question. I didn’t want to explain why I was choking. “I’m fine,” I croaked. “Choked on spit.” It took a few minutes to stop coughing. “So what happened? With your dad?”
“Well, I won’t bore you with all the political details, but apparently he had a lot of enemies. They had territories and businesses that couldn’t cross lines. This one lord, an elite like my father, tried to have Ben kidnapped. My father was furious. Killed the men he’d sent, the lord and his entire family. Before then, the elite thought they were too strong to ever be killed by ano
ther of their kind. They thought their shields were impenetrable. My father proved they weren’t.”
“Wow,” was all I could say. The goosebumps had returned in full force. I wondered why he was telling me all this now when before he’d left it up to Ben to mention this sort of thing. Maybe he was more comfortable with me now, or maybe he realized just how little I knew about Ben.
“Yeah, wow. I still feel weird around him sometimes. He’s not exactly warm and fuzzy.”
At that I laughed, “Well, I’m sure he still loves you. It sounds like he did all that stuff to protect his son. I guess you can kind of see how that could happen, though I don’t know I would have gone as far as killing an entire family. But I guess we can’t judge until we have children. Nana always said that there was no one stronger than a parent protecting her child.”
“Well, that I have to agree with. My mother was fierce when it came to protecting me.” He said it with a contented smile, remembering her, I supposed.
I looked at the ground, a bit sad that I didn’t know my mother’s exact motives for leaving me. I hoped it was for as good a reason as she seemed to think it was. He raised his hand to my chin and slowly made me look up at him.
“Your mother is fierce too. She would do anything for you,” he said and I wondered if he had read my thoughts.
“You think so?”
“I know so.” He said it with conviction, like he really did know.
“Thanks,” I said meekly.
“Don’t doubt it, Atty. From what I could tell, she lived for nothing other than protecting you.”
“From what you could tell?”
He was quiet for a moment. He looked toward the road that led up to the house and then back at me before nodding. “I met her.”
“What? When?” I’m sure my expression was one of pure shock.
“A few weeks before I moved here. Just for a few minutes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, excited and a bit annoyed. My mother was alive! He had talked to her. I’d spent years wondering about her and all this time I’d known him, he’d never mentioned it!
“I wanted to, but Ben asked me not to. He said you had such a hard time over what happened with Nana, and he didn’t want me to bring anything up that might upset you. I argued with him about it for a while but gave up when I realized he knows you better. I figured I should listen to him.”
“Oh.” I was still annoyed, but I understood why Ben would have asked that of him. Understanding didn’t keep me from being upset with Ben, too, but he couldn’t have told me either. I didn’t know who I was until after Nana became ill. That wouldn’t have been a good time to bring it up.
I scowled and was quiet for a bit but curiosity beat out irritation. Instead of wasting time berating them I asked, “What is she like?”
“About your height and build but with black hair and light gray eyes. You have your father’s coloring, from what I’ve been told.”
“Did she say anything about me?”
He looked a bit hesitant to talk about it. After a moment’s pause, I couldn’t help waving my hands in front of him and asking, “What? Tell me.”
“Well, she did, but I don’t think she meant to. I asked.”
“Oh. She didn’t want to talk about me?”
“No. It seemed like she had been keeping you a secret for a long time. Not even my father knew about you.”
“What made you think to ask?”
“My father. Right after my mother died, he contacted me to see about moving here. He also said that some of my mother’s old friends might try to reach me to give their condolences. He said that if a woman fitting your mother’s description came by, I should ask her why she had left so quickly after your father died. He said he still worried about her after all these years, and he knew I could get the truth. If she was in trouble, he wanted to help her.”
“Wow. So what did she say?”
“Well, at first I asked her where she’d been recently, just talking about travel in general. Then I asked where she had gone after what happened with your father, and she said Chile. She seemed confused that she’d answered me. I know that look in people, when they didn’t mean to tell me something. Actually, I wasn’t completely sure that my talent would work on her. She wasn’t 150 yet, but the number is relative. If a person is very strong, they can probably ignore my questions when they’re younger.
“After a minute of discussing Chile and how she hadn’t stayed long there, I asked her why she left without saying anything to anyone. She blurted out that she had to save her baby. Then her eyes got really wide as if she were shocked by her own words. She looked at me and said, ‘Remember all your mother taught you. She gave her life so you could use it well.’ Then she said she had to go and practically ran away from me.”
“Wow,” I said again. A stray thought jumped into my mind: What were the odds that Ben would have found me so soon after Matt had talked to my mother when for all of those years none of us knew about each other? But it was just a coincidence, so I put it out of my mind.
“I know. It was a very strange conversation. I normally wouldn’t have asked anyone so many questions, especially when I just met her, but I was still a bit off after losing my mom and even more off over hearing from my father. I’d never spoken to him before, and I didn’t even know he knew about my talent. I never knew if my mother had left before or after I was born. She never spoke about my father. He seemed genuinely concerned about your mother, and after what happened with mine, I was worried something bad might happen. If I could help protect someone I wanted to try. I still don’t know if he was right about the danger, but I figured by the way she ran that he must have been. Anyway, Ben was there by that night; he was the closest to me at the time. He helped me pack and settle everything before moving a couple of days later. It was all really fast; my father said he was worried about me after I shared the conversation I’d had with Viveca. He said he wanted me close, and I couldn’t think of a reason to object.”
“Wow.”
He laughed a bit. “You said that.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’m just trying to process it all.” I was actually deciding whether to share what I knew about my mother. Matt was a good friend though, and I wanted to tell someone. I didn’t need to worry about him being offended by my previous silence.
“Your father was right,” I said after taking a deep breath. I looked toward the road just as he had earlier. I realized he must have been making sure no one was coming, just like I was then.
He didn’t ask anything, rather nodded to urge me to continue.
“My mother was in danger and apparently so was I. That’s why she left. She told Nana when she left me with her. She didn’t say what the danger was, though. Then, right before Nana got sick, I found a letter from my mother. It said that she loved me, but she had to leave to keep me safe. It gave no explanation either, just told me to be careful of people who might take advantage of my power.”
Now it was Matt’s turn to say “wow” before asking, “What did Ben say about it? Ugh, sorry!”
As he apologized for the question, I was already answering, “Nothing, he doesn’t know about it.”
He put his hand over his mouth, but I could see the next question in his eyes. “Sorry, Atty, I didn’t mean to ask. I was just really curious.”
“I know, don’t worry. I’m already impressed with how often you refrain from asking questions. I know what you’re thinking, that it’s awful I never told Ben. The thing is that, at first, I didn’t mention it because I didn’t know what we were. I wasn’t about to tell him about a letter that could make my mother sound like a crazy person. Then, once he told me who he really was and who I was, I felt strange telling him, like if not having done so meant I’d lied to him already. Now I just don’t know how to bring it up without looking like I’ve been purposely hiding it from him for some reason.”
“Yeah, I can see how that could be an issue.”
�
��Could you please not mention it to him until I figure it out?”
“No problem, though I’d appreciate it if you also didn’t mention me telling you about meeting your mom. He seemed really adamant that I not say anything, and I don’t want him to be mad.”
“No problem. Don’t worry. I’ll come up with a way to tell him about everything without bringing you up. Maybe he can help me find her if I tell him all this.”
“Maybe.”
We were about to walk in the house when we heard a car coming, so we paused to see who it was. Julian and Emilius got out and we all walked in together, though they disappeared to finish some work a few minutes later. Matt and I went to his room to watch a movie. I made sure to leave the door open, in case Ben came back while we were there. I didn’t want him to think anything was going on, though I supposed he would have felt it if there was. Still, I didn’t want to cause any trouble for Matt. Ben had seemed a bit sensitive about me spending time with him lately, and, though I found that odd since he was the one who had asked Matt to watch out for me, I didn’t want to upset him.
Then again, maybe I did it more because of my guilty conscience rather than any jealous behavior on Ben’s part. My thoughts always tended to run in the wrong direction when I was around Matt.
Matt put on an action film, and it distracted me from my not-so-pure thoughts until about halfway through the movie when it occurred to me I shouldn’t have left my sweater downstairs. Matt’s room was always a bit chilly compared with the rest of the house. He noticed me rubbing my arms and said something about it being cold. “Yeah. A bit. I should go get a sweater from my room, but I just didn’t want to make you stop the movie.”
“No need,” he said as he stood up and walked to his dresser. He opened a drawer and took out a sweatshirt, then tossed it to me. I wasn’t expecting him to throw it—not that I could have caught it anyway, I sucked at catching things—and it landed on my head.
“Crap! Sorry, Atty,” he yelled as I felt him move toward me. When I got the sweatshirt off my head he was kneeling in front of me and we were both laughing hysterically. I smacked him with the sweatshirt, and he started laughing harder.
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