Cassie laughed and patted her friend’s back, walking past her more briskly than she had been moving before. Whitney stood and hurried to keep pace with her. The guys trailed behind, not interrupting the girls as they talked. Cassie’s one glance back told her enough. Nate was still chewing out Owen, and Jared was indifferent to both of them as he watched only Cassie.
Pulling on Cassie’s arm to make her move more quickly, Whitney got them to the seer’s house faster than the last time they went there. The door was open when they arrived, and the old woman was seated on the couch watching the door like she had been waiting for them.
“Come on in, children,” the older lady said to them, standing from her spot. “So nice for you all to stop by again.” She smiled at Cassie and Whitney. “And you brought such handsome company.” This time, she winked at Cassie.
Brought? Not exactly … It was more like she couldn’t get rid of them.
“So which one of you wants to go first?” the old lady asked, getting right to business.
“First?” Cassie asked in reply. Last time they all went together.
“I suppose Miss Whitney was eager to get here, so she should go first,” the lady replied, ignoring Cassie’s confusion. The old seer waved for Whitney to follow her and made her way out of the room more briskly than a woman of her age would normally walk.
‘Something wrong?’ Jared asked, picking up on Cassie’s concern.
‘No, just different,’ Cassie replied as she looked around the room.
Everything was the same. The same plastic-covered couch, the same lace doilies everywhere to make you wonder why the plastic since they wouldn’t easily be spilled on, and the same old lady that seemed to know more than everyone else, as a good seer should. It seemed the same, but to Cassie it was different. Why wouldn’t they all go back together? Was there a secret?
“So how was last night after we got back?” Owen asked as he sat down beside Cassie on the squeaky couch.
Leave it to Owen to say the one thing that would make the other night humans in the room glare at him. Owen didn’t seem to mind, or maybe he didn’t care. Then again, he might have asked on purpose to get the heat off himself.
“No princess analogy?” Cassie asked, ignoring her mates.
“Hmm, yeah, I can’t think of a princess stuck between two guys. I’d say you’ve been kidnapped by a beast, but I’m not sure which guy it applies to the best. They both get all furry at night,” Owen joked, which earned him eye rolls from both the guys.
Cassie had to giggle; she had missed her fairytale-loving friend.
Whitney came back into the room, stopping all conversation. Her previously hopeful expression was gone, replaced by her ‘thinking about it’ face. Cassie wanted to ask what was going on, but felt like maybe she wasn’t supposed to. Whitney didn’t say anything as she sat on the other side of her on the couch. Reaching over, Cassie took her friend's hand and squeezed it. Whitney looked up and gave a slight smile as she squeezed back.
“You next, young man,” the old seer said as she pointed to Owen.
“Now this one I could say is…,” Owen began.
“You better not make any reference to old people,” the seer warned him. Owen shut his mouth, and the lady gave a laugh as they disappeared into the kitchen.
Jared stood across the room, looking out the front window like he wasn’t keeping track of the open seat next to Cassie, even though she knew otherwise. Nate sat across from her, making no move to get up, yet still keeping guard of the seat. Cassie rolled her eyes at them. It was bad enough to be caught between them, but to get stray thoughts and feelings across the bonds with them made everything she would normally notice all the more amplified. They were much better at keeping their minds guarded, but not their feelings. Cassie really needed to work on that to help keep her own secrets from them.
It stunk to have everything she thought and felt broadcast to both of them. It was worse when she was reacting to a feeling from one, and the other then knew exactly if she was happy or mad at the other. It had been a long week. Whitney had tried to work with her on blocking all of it, but since she never had a bond before, she could only explain how she blocked out the alpha. Aunt Maria offered to do a spell, but Cassie didn’t want any more magic than she already had around her. The bond was enough to deal with; she didn’t need a spell that might react in some unpredictable way.
Owen returned quickly to the room with the same lopsided smile on his face as he had left with. His future seemed to be a good one. He probably asked when his next meal was or something like that. He sat back down next to Cassie. She looked up to the old woman, hoping it was her turn, but the seer was staring at Jared instead. He turned back around like he had felt her eyes on him and nodded to Cassie before following the seer to the kitchen.
“You could have warned me about the cookie,” Owen complained. The old seer could tell futures by sharing food. Cassie had experienced it once before and didn’t think to mention it to her friend. “I don’t think I’ll look at oatmeal raisin cookies the same way again.”
Nate raised an eyebrow as if to ask what Owen was talking about now. Cassie just shook her head. Owen could exaggerate anything, but this time he was right on. It was odd, but Cassie didn’t know how to tell Nate now that everyone else had the surprise set on them. And she kind of wondered if Nate would go through with letting the seer see his future otherwise. He was much more stubborn about everything than the others.
Jared returned. It seemed like everyone had just a small question to ask, or she wasn’t telling much. Cassie couldn’t wait for everyone to talk about it later. Cassie stood up. She wanted to be next.
“Sorry, sweetie, I need your blue-eyed mate next,” the lady told Cassie, bursting her bubble.
Cassie sat back down. Nate smiled at her before turning his attention back to the older lady. He offered her an arm to walk her to the kitchen like a gentleman. The seer seemed to blush as she laughed and took his arm. Jared returned to his place across the room, staring out the window. His mood was like everyone else’s and very quiet. Cassie tried to peer into his thoughts, but saw nothing.
Jared turned back to her and gave her a genuine smile. ‘No cheating,’ he told her silently.
Cassie pouted her response. Looking into his thoughts wasn’t exactly cheating. He was her mate after all.
Jared smiled more at Cassie.
‘The seer said that we can’t tell you anything. Because you can see the future, if we tell you, it might change what she saw,’ Jared explained why everyone was mum on their meeting.
‘Was it bad?’ Cassie asked, still feeling worried across the bond.
Jared shrugged, turning to stare back out the window. ‘It wasn’t completely unexpected. She told me two options to my future and that I need to make the choice.’
‘Just like last time,’ Cassie replied.
Jared looked back at Cassie like she had said something he didn’t expect. ‘There were two options?’
‘I could let the future go as I saw it and then watch you die, or I could change it and not watch that happen,’ Cassie replied. There was always an option, Cassie thought.
Jared smiled and nodded, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes. There was more, but he wasn’t sharing.
Nate came back into the room, finishing Cassie’s conversation with Jared. Cassie looked up at him, but he wore the same serious expression as everyone else. What the heck was the seer telling everyone? Cassie stood and didn’t wait for the seer to ask her to join her.
Cassie turned the corner and caught the scent of citrus as she entered the kitchen. The old seer was sitting at the table like she already knew Cassie was going to enter on her own. Well, she did probably know. She was the only person left now. Cassie sat down across from her and reached for a cookie, but the seer pulled them away.
“What?” Cassie asked in surprise.
“I can’t tell your future,” the seer replied.
“Oh.” Cassie was
hurt, but it wasn’t anything new. She had spent the past eight years with no one being able to tell her things.
“I can’t tell your future because you see like I do,” the lady explained, completely sympathetic to Cassie’s pain. “A seer can’t tell the future to someone who sees. There are just too many variables that can change.”
In that case, it wasn’t a problem. While Cassie had seen the future a couple times in her life, it wasn’t her ability. She was able to readily see the past, not the future.
“Well…” Cassie began, but the seer talked over her.
“I know your argument, and you’re wrong. You can see the future, and you need to learn how if you want to keep your friends safe.” The seer waited, like she knew what was coming, but was humoring Cassie.
Cassie wanted to complain; the expression on the old lady’s face told her it wasn’t going to matter.
“My granddaughter met you many years ago. She was friends with your mother and actually learned alongside her, until they decided your mother was a threat to the coven and stripped her powers. She was the one who told you that you would have a strong future, but you had to be brave. She was the one that was there with you when you had your first vision of the future.”
The seer’s granddaughter had to be the seer in the booth that Cassie went to with Nate and Jared when she was a kid. That was where she had her first vision. Cassie remembered that day, but only vaguely. In fact, her memories of anything after she had her first vision were all a bit fuzzy. It made more sense now, but still didn’t answer her questions or tell her much of anything.
“She’s your granddaughter? She trained with my mother?” Cassie asked, quite shocked. She didn’t know that the coven dealt with other clans, let alone trained with them.
“There’s a lot that they’ve kept from you. They thought by erasing your memories you would never know or grow into your powers. Those silly women thought that they actually could steal your family’s abilities. Silly, silly women. What people do for power is beyond me.” The seer shook her head.
“My family?” Cassie asked. The old seer knew more than Cassie did, and she wanted some answers.
“Casandra, you come from a long line of seers,” the lady began.
“But the seer can’t have a mate. How could I come from a line of them? Isn’t that why they have the rule against the seer having a mate? So they can’t all come from one family?” Cassie covered her mouth. She didn’t normally interrupt people, but the old lady was giving her just enough to want to know more.
The old seer laughed at the interruption, rather than seeming upset. “Who told you such nonsense? That coven really needs to be disbanded. Such a waste of talent.”
“Everyone around me told me that. Heck, even my vision had that part in it. Nate chose to be with someone else because I was the seer, and Jared ran off to find a solution and got himself killed over it. It wasn’t that someone told me. It was always like that in my vision.”
The old seer shook her head. “I can’t believe they would go that far. No, there’s no rule against a seer having a mate. And yes, most of the time the ability runs in families. That way the older generation can teach the next. When someone dies before the next one develops, there are people that gain some ability, but it’s temporary. I bet those power-hungry women wanted to keep it. That’s the only way it makes sense.” The old seer removed her too-big glasses and wiped them down silently. Putting them back on, she nodded her head.
“I can’t tell you the future because that doesn’t work for us, but I can tell you anything not in the future. I refuse to send you back to them unprepared to play their game.” The seer nodded again.
“What do I need to know?” Cassie asked in barely a whisper.
Things were getting too complicated, and too real, too fast. Cassie expected to come to the old seer, eat a cookie, get some cryptic message like before, and go home to mull it over with her friends. Now everyone seemed to have a different message and wouldn’t talk about it. And she was getting the icing on the cake. She was going to have to fight the coven and learn how to be a seer without having anyone to teach her.
“First off, you need to know that every seer can see the past and the future. There’s no one that has one ability without the other. How we do it is unique to each of us. You’ll have to think hard, and remember what happened that day you saw in your past. Yes, they could block your memories, but they can’t take away your ability. That was only gone because you couldn’t remember. You can remember now, and you need to go over every detail.
“Second, you need to look to your own future and see what is coming. I’m sure that with your memories, whoever was the seer for the clan is running on nothing now. They can’t see the future, but you can. When your powers came back, hers should have disappeared. Use that to your advantage. Remember that they only talk big, but they have no visions to support them. You will.
“And lastly, you need to trust your friends. I have given each of them something to think about. Their lives are all about to change, just like yours, but you can’t know what I told them. You can change it for them if you know. Right now they have decisions to make, and they will. There’s no right answer. There are hard choices, but they know now and can think before it comes. Support your friends and trust them.”
Cassie ran her hands through her hair. It was a bit much to take in. She was supposed to just be a seer. How? She spent years learning how to not read people’s pasts upon meeting them, and now she was expected, in a very short time, to just know how to look into the future. It was overwhelming.
‘We won’t let you down,’ Nate said across the bond.
Shoot, she was broadcasting everything to Nate and Jared again. Just one more thing she needed to learn how to control. Cassie’s life sucked as it was, but between learning how to deal with all the night human stuff and how to deal with the coven, she couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed. Everyone was depending on her to see the future, and she wasn’t sure she could do it.
‘Life sucks sometimes, but we deal with it,’ Jared told her, encouragingly. ‘And we deal with it together. You’ll find a way, and we’ll be there to help. I promise you. You’re not alone anymore.’
Cassie let out the breath she was holding. The love came across the bond from both Nate and Jared. She really wasn’t alone.
“My granddaughter left this for you,” the lady said, taking a small box from the chair beside her. “She said you’d know when to open it, and it would make sense to you.”
Cassie took the box that was just larger than the palm of her hand. She looked at the string tied tightly around it. How was she supposed to know when to open it? And why the heck was everyone cryptic and unhelpful? Cassie hoped her friends got more direct answers to their questions because she was lost.
There was nothing more for her to do. She wasn’t going to get any answers. Cassie stood, and the old seer nodded to her.
“I know they’ve left you untrained, but that was on purpose. They don’t want you to know the future, and they don’t want you to have the power your mother was growing before she had you. Your coven is in danger, the skinwalkers are in danger, and the wendigo are in danger. You are the one that can help all of them. Don’t be afraid to.” The seer stood and began leaving the kitchen.
That was really all Cassie was going to get from her.
Cassie followed the seer back into the living room and glanced from friend to friend. None of them were watching her except for Nate. Everyone was lost in thought, but his blue eyes were only thinking of her. Cassie smiled meekly at him, and he nodded. Whatever he had been told, he was over it and on to planning their next move.
“Come again,” the seer said, breaking into everyone’s lost thoughts. “I’d love to see each of you another time. But now I need to get supper done so I can get to bed. I don’t keep with your night human schedule. Never did, and never plan to. Enjoy the rest of your time here. I believe Turner is waiting for you,” s
he told them, pointing outside to the limo that had arrived just as Jared had turned from the window to face the older lady.
Cassie shook her head in amazement. It was like the old seer knew exactly every moment as it was going to happen. Was that what it was like to see the future?
Everyone thanked the seer as they stood and made their way outside to the waiting vehicle. As Cassie walked away last, the old seer reached out and took her hand.
“I know you have doubts, but don’t doubt those boys. They will always take care of you. They have always been a part of it, no matter what future you were going to have. Trust that it is fate and let it be. Some things you can’t change, even if you want to.”
Cassie nodded, finally receiving her semi-cryptic future from the old lady. She didn’t exactly tell the future, but it was close enough that Cassie knew she wanted to learn how to see the future. No. She needed to learn how. She had to figure out exactly how to keep everyone safe. She had seen the future once, and she didn’t want an ending like that one. This time, things would be different. She would figure it out. Everyone would be safe, and she would get a happy ending. She hoped.
CHAPTER 7
Cassie stared out the front window of the car as Whitney drove. Owen sat beside Whitney while Cassie was squeezed between Nate and Jared in the backseat. There really wasn’t room for three people, particularly when two were fairly large guys, but Nate had taken a train to town and needed a ride back. Cassie was stuck. She couldn’t look out Nate’s window or Jared’s because their truce was done, and they were back to casting jealous glares across her to the other one when anyone did anything. Cassie found the only neutral spot where she could look was out the front windshield.
The passing scenery easily drifted Cassie off into her thoughts. First off, was their visit with the seer. She hadn’t revealed much to Cassie, and no one was sharing what they had been told, but Cassie knew one thing—she needed to remember how to see the future. There was also the issue of her father. It seemed possible that he was sidhe. No, it was more than likely that he was sidhe, but Cassie wasn’t, and no one knew why. There were also the vials in her pocket that she was supposed to keep a secret, but she had no clue how. But mostly, Cassie was lost thinking about the book she had been given before they left.
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