by C. J. Pinard
Shaking with anguish and still traumatized by seeing my brother decapitated by a filthy vampire, I tried to sit as still as I could in my seat at his funeral. Mom had asked me to say a few words at his memorial service. I had told her no, that I couldn’t, that I was too grief-filled to do such a thing. And then I realized that, even though my parents loved him—and us—I didn’t think anyone loved or knew Austyn like Aden or I did. But I couldn’t speak at his memorial service; that would have been too hard. That was when I realized I owed it to my brother to do him justice, to avenge him. This was the reason I sat here numb. I had expelled my grief, let go of it in screams and howls the minute I’d turned human. I hadn’t cared that everyone had fallen asleep, naked and filthy under the full moon. I had turned back to human that morning and had screamed obscenities at God and whoever else would listen.
Aden and Ryder had tried to comfort me, but I had been completely and utterly inconsolable. I had to be thrown into Ryder’s car, driven back to my house, and put into bed by him that night. I barely remembered it. Then, I was told, Ryder had gone to my parents’ house to give them the news.
When I had woken the next morning, Sanja had knocked on my door and asked if she could come in. I had let her, but I had barely been able to comprehend her condolences. I remember her hugging me and telling me if I needed anything, she would be here for me.
Aden had, apparently, told her what had happened that night. The rest was a fucking blur. I literally had no memory of the days after his brutal murder to the day of his funeral. That day—the day we laid him to rest—would forever be burned into my memory.
It would also be the reason I had become what I had become. The words sweet and innocent were no longer in my vocabulary.
Chapter 15
I had no desire to be here. I just wanted to go back to Boulder and finish college. I wanted to be as far away from my parents, Aden, and the whole nightmare as possible. It may not be right, or healthy, but it was the way I was coping—yet, my mother insisted we stay with her.
“Why can’t I just leave? Why make me stay here in this grief?” my brother, Aden, asked.
Mom looked weary, her light-brown eyes looking dull and lacking life and vigor. “Can you just be non-selfish right now, son? We’re all hurting.”
Immediately, a look of guilt and even remorse passed over his perfect features. “I’m sorry, Ma,” he said, seeming sincere.
My mom’s eyes softened a little, but I didn’t care at all as I watched their interaction with a numb sort of fascination. I could think of nothing else but killing that vampire. I had his face and body burned into my memory. I decided that I was going to learn all I could about vampires. Their strengths, their weaknesses (especially those), why some could fly like a bird in the sky, and others didn’t seem to be able to. I did know they needed blood and could not tolerate sunlight, but that was all I knew.
I looked at my mother sitting on the sofa across from me, a cup of hot tea in her slightly trembling hand while my father consoled her, his arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders. A heavy sadness covered him, too. I’d never seen him looking so distraught.
As she spoke to Aden, I didn’t really hear what they were saying. I was too lost in my own thoughts. Then suddenly something hit me, something Sanja had said. You should talk to them about this when you’re ready.
Interrupting whatever my brother was saying, I looked up with dull eyes and asked flatly, “Why didn’t you tell us you were witches?”
Aden gasped. “Ayla!”
I didn’t even look at him, just at my parents, both of their faces masks of something between horror and surprise. Mom almost dropped her tea, but Dad, with unnaturally quick reflexes, reached out and put it on the coffee table.
“I…” Mom started.
“We had our reasons,” Dad said, not even denying it. “How did you find out?”
I laughed with absolutely no humor. “My roommate’s a witch, Dad. How do you think? She hadn’t even meant to tell me. She just asked why I hadn’t told her my parents were witches. I didn’t even believe her until this very minute, by the looks on your faces.”
“Are you seriously witches?” Aden asked, standing up and looking shocked.
Mom sighed. “Maybe we should have this discussion another time.”
“No!” Aden and I shouted at once.
I was desperate to get the conversation off of the sad reason we were even here. I was selfish that way.
“I’ll go,” Dad said, putting his hand on my mom’s arm, and then he kissed her forehead. He then stood and walked over to the fireplace, where he picked up a framed photo of the three of us kids when we were little.
He stared at it wistfully, and then looked up at my brother and me. “Before I start, I want you to tell me how Austyn really died. An animal attack is only half the story, isn’t it?”
“Vampire,” Aden said flatly.
A tear dripped down Dad’s cheek, and I almost lost my shit again. I had never seen my dad cry—ever. I bit my lip to stay a sob.
Dad nodded. “I was hoping you weren’t going to say that. Damn disgusting leeches.”
“He was defending me, Dad,” I said as the sob jerked out of my chest. I sniffled. “Vamp jumped out of a tree and flew at me. Ryder, Aden, and Austyn piled on top of me. Aden and Ryder got away, but the vampire pinned Aus”—I stopped, trying not to cry again, but my bottom lip wobbled and my voice broke—“and he bit into his neck and then took his head…”
I couldn’t hold it in anymore, I let loose and started sobbing. Aden wrapped his strong arms around me. “It was so awful. I will never move past this. I will never get that image out of my mind,” I cried, dripping tears and snot all over my brother’s shirt.
“Shhh,” he said, sniffling himself. He was just as traumatized, I was sure.
Mom quietly cried.
Dad had regained his composure, and then said, “And you were in your wolf forms when this happened?”
Aden and I both immediately stiffened. He slowly pulled back from the hug and we both looked at Dad and nodded, saying in unison, “Yes.”
Dad nodded again, and looked down. “I’m sorry, kids. I’m so sorry you had to witness your brother’s murder. Wolves… they just don’t live long lives. I told your mom when we adopted you…”
“About that,” I chimed in, arming away the wetness from my face. “Why all the secrets? You knew we were wolves our whole lives, right?”
“Let’s sit,” Dad said, pointing to the sofa and loveseat.
We both obeyed, him going to sit next to our quietly sobbing mother, Aden and I on the loveseat across from him, a glass coffee table separating us.
“Listen, kids, when we adopted you, we knew right away you were wolves. We were told there were three children who needed adoption, and assumed they were regular human kids. But from the minute we touched you, we knew you were special—that you had strong werewolf blood in you. And we also knew that should a human family adopt you, or—God forbid the three of you get shuffled around the foster care system—that it would be disastrous for everyone involved.”
“Also about that,” I said, cutting in. “How come I don’t feel that weird energy when I touch you like I feel when I touch Sanja?”
“We consulted a very high priestess and asked her to cast a spell masking what we are from all supernatural creatures, minus other witches, to protect you. To protect our children,” Mom offered.
“Why?” Aden asked.
“It’s very dangerous in our community for people to know that witches are caring for wolves. For the most part, it seems most supernatural creatures such as yourselves, and us,” Dad said, squeezing my mother tighter, “are all natural-born enemies. Should anyone in the wolf community find out we had taken in wolves as children, we would have most likely been killed and then you guys taken off to some clan to live like savages.”
I furrowed my eyebrows. “But Ryder’s family are wolves. They don’t live like savages.”
“And for that, we’re very grateful,” Dad said. “But a lot of them are a bunch of uncivilized animals, living up in the mountains and out in the woods. They let what they are—what the full moon has cursed them with—define their whole lives. We didn’t want that for you kids at all.”
I breathed out a long breath. “So why not tell us, prepare us for the shift? I mean, Mom, when you were having the whole period talk with me, you could have mentioned it. ‘Oh and by the way, once you turn seventeen, you’re gonna turn into a big, hairy wolf once a month on the full moon.’”
Dad and Aden let out small chuckles.
Mom said, “We couldn’t tell you for the same reasons Dad just mentioned. If you had even known, you might have told the wrong person, and that would have been dangerous. Now that you are all adults, we don’t care if people find out. I mean, we’d rather you not go around telling people you were raised by witches, and especially not humans, but it’s not like anyone can do anything now. You kids turned out to be amazing people. Or wolves, rather.”
“Well, a little warning would have been nice,” Aden said dryly. “That first shift was very unpleasant. Thank God I had a guy on my high school football team ask me where I shifted during the full moon and that led to him taking me to Wolfe Point for the first one.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said, surprised, looking at my brother.
He nodded. “Yeah, it worked out, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I did tell Austyn, though. I didn’t even know if you were a wolf, since we were adopted, and I didn’t want to freak you out. You didn’t get the scent until a couple months before your first shift. Sorry.”
I didn’t quite know how to take that. So I turned to my parents again. “So when were you going to tell us you were witches?
“We were just discussing that before Austyn…” Mom trailed off.
“So both sets of grandparents are witches, too?” I asked, now a million questions swirling around my brain.
Dad nodded. “That’s right.”
“They didn’t care that you adopted three wolves?” Aden asked.
He chuckled. “Oh, they cared, all right. But they were gracious enough to keep it a secret. Like us, they fell in love with you three beautiful blonde babies the minute they met you. You guys were so tiny and innocent, big blue eyes looking to us to protect you. I just wish we had known more about your backgrounds.”
Aden chimed in. “I can tell you. We come from an Alpha and his mate. A very abusive Alpha who killed our mother not long after she dropped us off at that church. She saved our lives.”
Both parents looked shocked. “What? How did you find this out?”
“I was in downtown Denver a couple years ago and caught a scent that was familiar to me for reasons I didn’t understand at the time. It led me to my biological uncle’s house and he told me everything.”
“What a sad and horrible tale,” Mom said, her eyes welling with tears again. “I’m sorry you had to find out that way. Are you okay?” she asked us both.
“I love you, Mom, but I’m not going to lie; I was going to eventually seek out my birth mother and ask why she gave us away. Now at least I know, I guess,” I said, swallowing down more tears.
My dad got up and went to the credenza in the dining room and pulled open the lid on a glass decanter. He poured a measure of bourbon into a glass and then replaced the rubber stopper on the decanter. We watched as he took a long pull from the glass, and then set it down, breathing out deeply. He then opened a drawer and pulled out a small black box.
He walked back into the living room and sat down, placing the box on the coffee table. With his chin, he indicated the box and said, “Open that.”
I looked at Aden and he nodded, and I grabbed the box with shaking hands. I lifted the lid and pulled out a folded piece of paper. Underneath that was a gold necklace with a large heart-shaped locket attached. I first picked up the locket and opened it. Inside was a photo of a beautiful blonde woman holding three small children on her lap—my brothers and me. On the opposite side was an inscription that read My Loves.
With my hands still trembling, I unfolded the note and read aloud:
“My babies, Aden, Austyn, and Ayla, I’m sorry I cannot keep you. I’m sorry you will have to grow up without me, but your father will kill us if I don’t put you somewhere safe. I hope whoever raises you does right by you. I know you will grow up to be strong wolves, and even stronger people. Stay true to yourselves, and please thank your new parents for loving you. Please try to find me once you are grown so I can see how beautiful you all turned out. Love, Mom.” I looked down to the bottom of the page. “My name is Amy Renee Bliss, your father is Byron Bliss, but do not seek him out. He’s dangerous.”
A wave of emotions hit me. Sadness, disappointment that I never got to meet her, and lastly, anger. But admittedly, a small bit of happiness welled up inside of me. Now I had a name. One I would hunt down and kill once I got my hands on him.
I looked to my brother, and he had the same anger burning in his eyes. He was so angry, his blue eyes flashed yellow, and I was sure mine did, too. We would find him together.
We looked over to our parents. I said, “Thank you for giving this to us. Thank you for keeping our names.”
Dad’s face looked worried. “After we read that note, we almost changed your names. But Aden was already three and it would have been too confusing to him to have done that, so we had a protection spell placed on all of you. It worked, apparently. We never had one day of trouble.”
“How long does the spell last?” Aden asked, curious.
Mom wrung her hands together. “Until you each turned eighteen. I wanted to put another one on, but Dad convinced me you could take care of yourselves.” She looked over to the photo of the three of us as kids that Dad has brought from the mantle and picked it up, running a soft finger over the photo. “I guess I was wrong.”
“Mom, Austyn wasn’t killed because he was hunted by old enemies. He was killed because vampires are scum and need to die,” Aden said.
“And die that one will,” I said through gritted teeth. “Along with our birth father.”
“No!” Dad said, standing up. “No way. Do not go seeking vengeance for either. We cannot lose another child. Please,” he begged.
I stood up and grabbed the box, replacing the note and necklace inside. “Don’t worry, Dad, we won’t do anything stupid.”
“That’s what worries me,” he said. “That you think that going after that vampire and your biological father isn’t stupid. But it is. So very stupid.”
“I’m going to bed,” I said, heading toward the stairs and my old bedroom.
“Me, too,” Aden said, following me.
I stopped at the bottom of the staircase and turned and looked at my mom. “If you knew we were wolves, why did I keep getting in trouble for staying out all night during the nights of my shifts? You surely had to have known where I was.”
She cocked her head to the side and gave a small, sad smile. “Because I was trying to force you to tell me what you were, what had happened. I didn’t want to let on that I knew because then I would have had to tell you that your father and I are witches. Guess it didn’t work, huh?”
I shook my head and laughed. “No.”
My mother sighed. “Goodnight, kids.”
Chapter 16
Life never did quite settle back to normal for me. Between my brother’s death and the information dump my parents had laid on us, I couldn’t concentrate on school. I lasted another three semesters at CU Boulder, but just couldn’t do it anymore. The grief and anger inside me continued to bubble and brew. I even tried grief counseling with a licensed therapist, and it did me absolutely no good. I couldn’t come clean about what exactly was angering me. The human therapist wanted to know how my brother had died and telling her the same story Aden and I had told the Park Rangers and police—that some animal had torn his head off—made her suspicious. Telling her my parents had
lied to me my whole life about something made her ask what the secret was, stating I’d never move forward until I spoke it aloud. I had no problem speaking it aloud, just not to her. And guess what? Speaking it aloud, in the privacy of my own home to Sanja did not help me move forward. So I had stopped going to that ‘therapist’. What was the point?
“I can’t believe you’re leaving,” Sanja said sadly, pulling away from our embrace.
“I’m sorry,” I said, meaning it. She would be the one person I missed.
“Where will you go?” she asked.
I shifted the backpack over my shoulder and smiled sweetly at her. “I’ve got a job answering phones for a big company downtown Denver, and a small apartment.”
“You’re better than that,” she said in a scolding manner, frowning.
I nodded. “I know, but I can’t stay here, going to school, barely passing, pretending everything is okay. I need to hunt, I need to kill vampires. I need to find my birth father.”
“That’s the grief talking,” she supplied.
I nodded. “I know. But I tried the normal-college-student thing. I can’t do it anymore. I have an itch that cannot be scratched by late-night cram sessions and football games.”
She sighed, still holding my hand. “I have some essential oils, and have been practicing a spell—”
I smiled and cut her off. “I don’t want oils or spells. I want revenge. I want to feel like Austyn’s life mattered. I want my birth father to pay for what he did to my mother.” This wasn’t anything she hadn’t heard before. She had been my rock, my confidant when I had returned from a two-week stay at my parents’ house after the funeral. I felt like a broken record at times, and she never once acted bothered by my crying, having to console me after a nightmare, or my countless childhood stories about my brothers and me.
“Revenge won’t make you feel better. It won’t bring Austyn or your birth mom back,” she said for the hundredth time.
“I know it won’t, but I disagree with you on the feeling better part.” I brushed a lock of black hair from in front of her beautiful chocolate eyes with my fingertips. “I will feel so much better after I rid the world of evil.”