by L. C. Davis
“However long it takes to take care of a few bounties and dig up something we can use on the hunters along the way,” he said, tossing some clothes haphazardly into his bag. I grabbed one of his shirts and rolled it up for him. He took it and placed it inside, then started rolling up the others in stacks. Good enough.
“Please be careful, Sebastian. Everything I've learned about the hunters says they're nothing to mess with.”
“I'm not planning on going toe-to-toe with any of them,” he admitted. “I'm not that reckless.”
I wasn't sure about that, but arguing with Sebastian only set his determination. “Have you told Ulric?” I knew he hadn't, but it seemed like a less bossy way to ask if he was going to.
“No, but I'll call him when I get where I'm going,” he said, throwing a few more things in his suitcase before he zipped it up.
“And where is that?”
“I'll stay with friends,” he said in a tone that made it clear he wasn't offering any further details.
“Don't you need Ulric's permission to leave?”
He gave me a look. “He's our alpha, not our god. I'd need permission for something that directly affected the pack, not this. I'd appreciate it if you kept this between us until I talk to him, though.”
“You're not even going to say goodbye to anyone?”
“Nothing to say. Look, if it's that important to you, come back later tonight after I've tied up all my loose ends.”
“Thank you,” I murmured.
“Just you. Not a word to Victor.” He stared me down. “Promise.”
“I promise.”
“Alright, now get out of here. I appreciate the first aid and the packing lesson, but I've got shit to do and it's been way more than five minutes.” He pulled the door open and I left, smiling back at him.
“You know how I feel about keeping secrets, but I'll at least bring you some stuff for the road. You'd better be here when I come.”
“Goodbye, Remus,” he said in a tone of waning patience, leaning on the door frame.
“Bye, Sebastian,” I sighed, reluctantly heading down the hall. I heard his door close behind me and something deep inside me feared that it might be for the last time.
9
Victor was already knee-deep in his workday when I found him, so I made myself scarce. It was a relief that he was no longer insistent that someone had to be watching me at all times. I also knew that if I was around him for more than five minutes I was doomed to spill Sebastian's secret. I still wasn't sure if I should tell anyone, but there was enough time before nightfall to decide.
In the interim, I chose to keep myself as busy as possible. Finding the laundry room in the basement was easy enough. Brendan had come through and delivered the hamper, but it sat in a sea of laundry that hadn't been touched for weeks. Taking care of the mundane chore proved to be a nice distraction and for the first time I felt like I was doing something useful in the Lodge. While the clothes were going, I decided to explore the rest of that corner of the basement.
There was a supply closet just off the laundry room, filled with everything from excess pantry goods to the supplies Brendan and I had picked out at the grocery store. They were still in bags, so I decided to occupy myself with putting everything away. I took a few of the empty bags and filled them with Sebastian's favorite snacks, some first aid supplies and an extra charger for his phone so he had no excuse not to call home.
By the time I was finished, the clothes were ready to go into the dryers and a fresh load could be started. It still wasn't everything, but the laundry room looked a lot better than it had. Satisfied, I headed upstairs with the bags of things for Sebastian and tried to think of a place I could store them in the room I shared with Victor without giving away what they were for.
“There you are!” Foster called to me, appearing a the top of the stairs. He was slightly out of breath, which was saying something for a wolf. Even a little one. “Clara sent me to find you, I've been looking everywhere.”
“Is everything okay?” I asked, jogging up the stairs the rest of the way. My heart lurched when he told me it was Clara who had sent him. As bright and refreshing as she was under normal circumstances, she was not someone you wanted to have calling for you in an emergency.
“Everything is fine, but you're really late for your session.”
“Session?” I frowned in confusion. “All my sessions were canceled for the week.”
Foster shrugged. “All I know is there's a guy in your room who says he has a session with you at five. Should I ask him to leave?”
“No, I'll take care of it. Thanks for finding me,” I said, stepping out into the dungeon. “Victor probably arranged it and forgot to tell me.”
Foster shivered a little and tried to cover it up with a cough. Poor kid. He knew exactly what my sessions entailed and it was far more disturbing to him than anything else that went on in the dungeon.
“Did he give you a name?” I asked hopefully.
“Oh, yeah!” He snapped out of his barely veiled horror. “It was a weird name. William Grimm or something.”
I glanced at him warily. “Wilhelm Grimm?”
“Yeah, that was it. I knew it was weird,” he said without a hint of jest. “You know him?”
“Let's hope not,” I breathed, rushing towards the room I usually held my sessions in. “Foster, go find Victor. It's very important,” I said, coming to a stop outside the room. There were two people I feared it might be and I didn't want him on their radar.
“Is it an emergency?” he asked worriedly.
“I don't know,” I said, glancing at the door. “Just hurry, please.”
He took off right away and I steeled myself before opening the door. If it was Sarah or one of her troupe, how had they gotten past an entire house full of werewolves without notice? She was strong, but she wasn't that powerful. There was only one other supernatural who had the ability to slip past werewolves unnoticed and a love of literary references...
No one. When I opened the door, the room was empty save for some kind of jacket draped over the back of the donor chair. I picked it up hesitantly to reveal a sleek red velvet cloak with a golden chain across the neck. The material was exquisite, but it had heft and the gradually worn texture of the cloth made it clear that it was very old.
I draped the cloak over my arm and reached out to pull out the wooden stake that had impaled piece of parchment to the chair just like the note the Family had impaled Hunter with.
“Dearest Red (Abomination sounds so needlessly formal),
It was lovely seeing you the other day. I'm glad to see you've traded up from vampire escorts to wolves and I'm quite impressed with the restraint you showed towards my blood. To answer your unspoken questions, yes, I've been following you for a long time and yes, I've known what you are even longer than that.
Perhaps you don't know. Wolves aren't a particularly cerebral bunch, so I'll fill you in. You are the point at which thousands of years of supernatural history have converged, and the great irony is that you're an outsider to all of it. All you need to know is that you have the potential to unite the Kingdom of Night, which is exactly why you must be stopped.
Unfortunately, the white oak stake in your hand is not enough to still the wretched heart that beats in your chest through only the darkest, most perverse magic. Neither is a silver dagger. A hybrid is more than the sum of a werewolf and a vampire and it takes on certain emergent properties. It can only be killed once fully awakened and its blood becomes potent for a variety of supernatural purposes. Unfortunately for all of us, you aren't even a true hybrid yet. You're stuck in a stage of stagnation between vampire and werewolf while a hybrid is fully both. Spilling your blood now would be meaningless.
But don't fret! Just because I can't kill you now doesn't mean I never will. The vampires had it half right, but their interpretation of the scriptures has always been self-indulgent and nearsighted. I know what it takes to wake the hybrid. Do you? I wonde
r how many of your friends I'll get to kill in the meantime.
Give the Big Bad Wolves my regards.
Yours,
The Huntsman”
My hands shook as I stepped back from the chair. I stood there for long enough to lose sight of the passage of time until Victor rushed into the room. “Remus! What's wrong?” he demanded, snatching the stake out of my hand first. Can't trust the suicidal vampire with pointy wooden objects. I showed him the letter and his eyes widened as he began to read.
“This is bullshit,” he snarled, slamming it down on the table. “How the hell did he get in here?!”
“He walked in, Victor! He's not a vampire, he's undetectable,” I reminded him.
“Not for long,” he muttered. “This entire place is getting locked down. No one else gets in or out, not Prentice, not anyone.”
“Have you seen Sebastian?” I asked suddenly.
“What? No, not since this morning.”
“I have to warn him,” I said, running out of the room. Victor's footsteps were right behind me.
“Wait, warn him about what?”
“Prentice is threatening the pack, and everyone else I care about,” I told him, flying up the stairs. “Sebastian!” I cried, running towards his room.
“Wait! Why would Sebastian be in any more danger than the rest of us?” Victor demanded, grabbing me by the arm.
I slipped out of his grasp and started pounding on Sebastian's door. “Sebastian!” I screamed, jiggling the handle. It was locked, so I turned back to Victor. “Break it down, please.”
He looked at me like I'd lost my mind, but I think my desperation got through to him. He dug into his pocket for a universal key that unlocked it easily. I guess that worked, too.
I rushed inside and looked around. His suitcase was gone and the rest of his drawers were cleaned out. “Shit,” I muttered, looking around for any signs of a note. Then again, Sebastian had never really been the note type. I collapsed on his bed and knew there was no use searching the rest of the house. “He's gone.”
“What? Gone where?” Victor asked, kneeling in front of me. “Remus, if you know something you need to tell me.”
“He promised he'd wait to say goodbye,” I said hoarsely. “I can't believe I actually believed him.”
Victor's expression fell. “Where did he say he was going?”
“He said he just needed to get away. He wanted to make it easier for Ulric to choose you. He said he was just going to take some jobs and watch the hunters from a distance,” I said, recounting everything I could remember.
He cringed. “Sebastian never does anything from a distance. We need to find Ulric.”
“I'll check the lot to make sure his car is gone,” I said, heading towards the parking lot before he could argue. When I made it outside, the entire lot was filled, including Sebastian's reliable old truck. My heart skipped a beat as I ran towards it only to find his suitcase in the passenger's side seat.
My phone buzzed in my pocket and when I swiped the screen, there was a message from Sebastian.
“Sorry, but I only promised you a goodbye and you got one. Don't bother responding, this phone will be at the bottom of the river by the time you get this message. I need space and having any link to you right now is only going to screw with my head.
Take care of Vic and my old gal. Keys are in the bag.
-S”
My throat was tight and my fingers trembled as I struggled to type out a response I knew was pointless. That didn't mean I wasn't going to try.
“Please come back. Prentice was in the Lodge. He's going after my friends first. You're not safe out there.”
I opened the door and found his keys on top of his clothes. I grabbed them and sat in the truck as I watched my phone diligently for any sign of a reply. Nothing. Seconds turned into minutes and I started to lose track of the minutes, too.
“Hey!” I looked up to see Hunter at the side door door, waving to me. “Your dads sent me to tell you to come in.”
I stood to brush the gravel off my knees and walked over to him. “Victor? Has he told Ulric what's going on?”
“If you mean the big guy going missing, yeah,” he said, shrugging off his jacket to offer it to me. “It's cold out here even for me, aren't you freezing?”
“No, thanks,” I said distractedly, heading back towards the Lodge. If I was cold, I hadn't noticed. He yanked the door open and waited for me to pass before he followed me in.
“You look like you've either seen a ghost or you're becoming one. What gives?”
“Sebastian sent me a text. He threw away his phone,” I said. My voice sounded hollow even for the new me. “That hunter was just here. He'll go after Sebastian first, I know it.”
“Yeah, I saw the note,” Hunter sighed. “I figured something like this was bound to happen, just didn't think it would be so soon.”
I stopped in the hall and turned to him. “It's the same handwriting, isn't it? The hunter who attacked your pack and the one who sent me that note.”
“Yeah,” he said somberly. “It's the same one.”
My stomach churned at the thought that I had spent so many hours working so closely with someone who was capable of all that. Now he was going to track down everyone who had ever cared about me and...
“Whoa,” said Hunter, catching me before I even realized I had swooned.
“I'm alright,” I said, regaining my footing. He was reluctant to let go of me and kept a steadying hand on my back as I climbed the stairs. I grasped the railing firmly for good measure. It was growing difficult to see ahead of me with a mental image of the wall transposed so strongly over reality. The ivy was creeping deeper. What had started as a few buds of ivy poking through the cracks was turning into an infestation.
“You shouldn't move so fast, you almost passed out,” he said worriedly.
“I have to warn them,” I said, glancing back at him. “You of all people have to understand what he's capable of. He's going to go after everyone I love. He's already been here once, and he'll get in again.”
“Yeah, but I've been using Ulric's library and I think I have an idea to keep the Lodge safe,” he said, sparking the first bit of hope I'd felt in a long time.
“But Sebastian is still out there,” I said, stopping in front of Ulric's study.
“Trust me, I don't think even a hunter is gonna see Sebastian as an easy target,” he said, snorting.
There was a single familiar voice coming from the study, speaking in a low murmur. I knocked when listening proved futile. The voice quieted and a moment later, Victor opened the door.
“There you are,” he murmured. Ulric was behind him at his desk. “Thank you for getting him, Hunter.”
“No prob,” he said, his hand still resting on my shoulder. “He's kind of woozy, you should probably get him to lie down.”
Victor's gaze flickered over me with concern. I tried to tell him I was fine, but my voice wasn't working anymore. Instead, I held up my phone and showed him Sebastian's message. He looked upset but not surprised. “Come in, both of you,” he said, lifting me into his arms before I could protest. He placed me gently on the chaise and started arranging pillows behind my back.
“We don't have time for this,” I said, finding my voice. “Sebastian is out there. You've all seen the note, we have to bring him back or at least warn him.”
“I can't send anyone out right now, not with active hunters in the area and he's shut me out of his mind if not gone completely out of range,” said Victor. “I'd go myself, but I can't leave you or the Lodge, not now.” He noticed my look of protest before he had even finished speaking. “Sebastian left of his own free will. I'll do whatever I can to get word to him, but he can take care of himself.”
“I'm inclined to agree,” said Ulric, placing a classic black phone back in its cradle. “I've just finished speaking with the other pack leaders in Oregon and Washington and told them to keep an eye out for him as well as the hunters.”
<
br /> “Okay, but Prentice said he's going to start going after people I care about,” I said, sitting up despite Victor's best efforts to keep me lying down. “That means Maverick and Arthur are in danger, too.”
“Arthur. There's a name I haven't heard in a while,” said Victor. “That's the kid who brought him to the contest.”
“Ah,” said Ulric. “So a good influence, then.”
I rolled my eyes. “He helped me when I went to find Victor last year and he's been an amazing friend. I've just been avoiding him and Maverick since I'd rather not turn my friends into juice boxes.”
“Speaking of which,” said Victor, darting out of the room for God only knew what.
“Like I was saying.” I looked intently at Ulric. “These people are in danger because of me. I have to do something.”
“I agree,” he said, tapping his fingers together as he always did when thinking deeply. “We'll bring them here. I'll send someone out tonight to get them.”
“Let me go,” I said, standing. “This is my fault, no one else should have to be put in danger.”
He gave me a look. “You know damn well neither Victor nor I are going to let you step foot out of this Lodge.”
“You read the letter, Prentice doesn't want to kill me,” I insisted. “Not yet.”
“He has a point,” said Hunter. “He's reckless, but he has a point.”
Ulric gave us both a look. “I'll go get them myself, starting with Maverick.”
“I'll go,” said Brendan, stepping into the study.
“Does anyone knock?” Ulric groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You could at least try to pretend you weren't eavesdropping.”
“I've never been a good actor,” Brendan said, winking at me. “I've already been to Maverick's house once. You grab the other kid, I'll bring him back here no problem.”
“It's dangerous, Brendan,” said Ulric. “This hunter is the same one who decimated the other pack and he managed to get into the Lodge earlier today.”
He shrugged. “If he's that bad, I'm in as much danger in here as out there. Might as well be a badass hero and rescue the cute guy while I'm at it.”