The salt dives to the left like it’s steering the ball, and then darts into my window, before dropping to my lap. I lift it, studying it in stolen glances, as I keep most of my attention on the road.
A tiny crack, too small for even one grain to escape, is on the side, but it’s pristine other than that.
I’d given up on trying to call for one, certain all the balls had dropped and the grains had scattered out to sea.
I squeeze the fragile glass between my fingers, feeling it shatter. I’m impressed that this one survived well enough to travel to me.
A stone settles on my stomach when I feel the salt grains.
“What’s that?” Leiza asks from behind me, as I continue rubbing it between my fingers.
“Table salt,” I state quietly, my mind moving back to the first day I met Anna.
The day she rode in on my mother’s casket and jabbered directly to me like she knew I was going to meet her eyes.
“Why do you look upset about that?” Ingrid asks.
I glance down, not seeing even a hint of the subtle gray coloring it should have. “Because it’s supposed to be ghost salt.”
I should have noticed this sooner, but who actually pays close attention to salt?
The triplets didn’t leave behind ghost salt either…
What the hell is going on?
I add it to the bulletin board of things to process and deal with later, as I return my attention to the task at hand.
“What do I say to them?” I ask, briefly glancing over at Tiara.
She cuts down the music, and everyone goes quiet for a second.
“I’m trying to recall if any of the books I’ve read mentioned if they speak English or not. They were buried in Ireland, so one can presume they may speak some form of English,” Tiara says thoughtfully, tapping her chin.
“Unless they only learned Gaelic while here,” Mary states, not helping things out, as they all deliberately dodge my question.
“Gypsies traveled all over and were actually quite educated with languages of all kinds, a tool that often kept them alive, while also making them valuable, in the event someone kidnapped them instead of killing them on the spot,” Lemon adds. “It’s possible they know old English, but it’s still going to be a communication barrier. Fortunately, Simpletons seem to catch on quicker than others to languages.”
“Great. Let’s say they speak some form of English. No one has told me what I should say,” I state dryly to that long, detailed answer.
After a long beat of silence, Leiza clears her throat and glances around, as if she’s waiting on someone else to answer.
“Say hi,” Tiara states in a way that suggests she finds it to be profound wisdom.
“I’ll come up with something on my own,” I mutter, as a thousand things run through my mind of what to say and how to say it.
Mom says it’s about delivery. She’s more passionate than I am, though. She’s loud and insistent. I’m quiet and easygoing. My delivery always sounds like an aw-shucks sort of thing when I try too hard.
Probably not an aw-shucks day for them.
“Maybe this was a bad idea,” I state with my confidence on the decline.
The road I’m on dead-ends at a massive gate that is no less than fifty yards away once I top the hill. VVH is over the massive gate that is already open.
“Little too late to turn back now. They’ll still need things, and while the Van Helsings have a protocol in place that forces them to give up their home for a case like this, it isn’t likely they’ll do much else to help these people out or make them feel comfortable.”
“Do you have a pen and paper?” I ask her as we go under the gates.
“Yeah, why?” Leiza says, always prepared as she starts digging around in her bag.
“Because you’re going on a shopping spree today. They’re going to need even more than you’ve already acquired for them if no one else is going to help them. Besides, I’ve seen their cages before. I won’t see them again,” I go on, a very abrupt, somewhat crazy plan forming in the back of my mind. “And then I’m taking them home with me.”
There’s a long beat of silence where everyone just sort of stares at me like I’ve sprouted a tail and a second head. I probably needed a bridge from our conversation to that announcement.
“We’re going to need a bigger house,” Tiara finally points out, eyes on me like I’m crazy.
“We’ll put them up at Vance’s instead of leaving them here. I read that rule book Mom gave me. They can put up their House anywhere.”
“But Idun will lock site in Shadow Hills, and—”
“Doesn’t matter. Nowhere in the rulebook does it say anything about multiple Houses not being in the same location for the Neopry family. It’s a nonissue, because there’s always been plenty of territory to spread out and claim. The House has to have a three-fourths majority vote to change a law.”
I stop talking as we pull up in front of the massive, eighteenth-century, castle-like home that faces a vast field full of magnificently healthy, shiny horses. I stop just to admire the beauty for a second, because it really is a full work of natural art.
“So the guy who built this place—”
“Is Vanzuela Van Helsing,” Leiza says as though she’s finishing my sentence, her tone riddled with slight terror.
“The alphas call him Zuela. We call him the Van Helsing monster, because of how much he loves killing our kind,” Lemon says in a hushed tone. “He’s gone, right?”
“Emit wouldn’t have let Violet out of the house if he was expected to be here,” Tiara whispers like she’s convincing herself of that.
“He can’t just kill us without a reason, though, since we’re not at war,” Ingrid also says like she’s convincing herself of that, her tone even softer than Tiara’s.
She scrambles over the backseat and disappears from sight after that.
“How do wars even work with everyone so close together?” I ask, still reveling in the captivating beauty.
The castle doesn’t look old and dusty. It almost shines with glory and awe…if that makes sense. I idly wonder if Vanzuela is as much of a perfectionist as Vance.
“We all pull to various points of one country, and the alphas move to the bunkers there to rest and feed. Then they war across the land during the times in between, until someone captures a metaphorical flag of sorts, and everyone has to regroup. Then alliances shift when someone pushes the boundaries another won’t cross, and the war shifts, reigniting, and we start all over again until the alphas finally reach some sort of understanding,” Leiza says in a whisper like she’s carefully prepared that speech for me.
“That’s the gist of it, isn’t it?” I ask with a grin.
She pats my arm. “It’s an easy compromise, since I suck at remembering the fine details.”
“It’s a time of great separation and brutal sacrifice, Violet. Tensions run so high after a war that it’s not much better. If not for Arion’s tantrum, we’d be much farther along in the healing process,” Lemon adds, as we all just continue to stare up at the gorgeously intimidating home.
“Not to mention how very critically inconvenient a war would be in this era. They’ll live long enough to see the world plunge back into the dark ages, but we likely won’t. Too many cameras and touch-of-the-button technology out there. We’ll be the reason the world is plunged into the dark ages if we cause widespread hysteria, and we’ll be mostly wiped out,” Mary adds very quietly.
“Then the alphas will just pick themselves back up and start all over again, caring less and less with each stupendous failure, because it’s simply too painful and too hard to keep caring. Aside from the Vampyres, who are a little more psychotic by nature,” Tiara goes on, always getting her vampire jabs in when she can, “the alphas didn’t all start out soulless. They once cared.”
“It just did no good to care, because Idun always broke their favorite toys, or so Marta would say. It’s when they cared the least ab
out Idun. Marta mocked them for it, got in her punches when she could, even managed to kill them on occasion, when she was really pissed off at them for all the power they’d allowed Idun to garner.”
“Allowed her to garner?” I ask, confused.
“Long story for another time. You’re just stalling at this point. The longer you stall, the less time you’ll have before those Neopry skin walkers rehydrate and all hell either does or doesn’t break loose.”
Shoving open the door to the van, I hop out and stare up at the massive home’s doors, going over my semi-perfected explanation of who I am and how harmless I am, so as not to spook them.
“We’ll bring the boxes. Start with knocking on the—”
The door opens, and Leiza stops speaking, as we both simply stare with bated breaths.
A man with slightly ashen skin, who hasn’t fully healed yet, simply blinks at me like he’s shocked to find me here.
I recognize him; though he’s not as tan, flush with color, and vivid as he was in the small death window I saw of Caroline’s. A girl who couldn’t die but still had a death window open…
He was in the cell across from hers.
Blue bounces out of the door, and I startle as he comes up and almost stares me in the eye, snarling at me. I’m so focused on him, that a small yelp escapes me when I’m airborne suddenly, the world flipping around me, as I’m slung painfully hard over a shoulder.
Leiza drops her purse, eyes wide in horror on me, as the man with a hunch on his back runs inside with me, caveman style. I know four or five alphas who will never let me out without supervision ever again if this goes wrong.
The world tilts again as I’m dropped to my feet, and the man grabs me and smashes me to his chest with one arm. I feel a tickle of satin at my cheek, as my eyes widen.
Oh, shit. What have I—
“Et øjeblik, Bobo,” a man’s voice says.
Is that Danish? It certainly isn’t English.
I seriously will never hear the end of—
“Et øjeblik, Bobo,” a man says more insistently.
I manage to cut my eyes over to see that the guy holding me to him is very animatedly tapping another man on the shoulder. Both of them are just wearing robes.
I’m not sure how I feel about this situation, but I do know that this is all going in a really scary direction.
The other man knocks his hand away, getting annoyed, distracted by his struggle with a remote.
“Hvad?” the other guy groans, as he turns around, but then straightens when his eyes widen on me.
He points at me, as he jumps to his feet, causing Bobo to stumble back, his grip tightening on me. I’m forced to sway with him, growing increasingly worried for obvious reasons.
My captor is Bobo…
The man my mother had hanged, after he killed her son, who almost killed him. This all got complicated real damn fast.
“Det er hende!” the other man says with a broad grin, pointing at me.
Still not looking good.
I feel Bobo nodding with excitement.
Please don’t let me have been all wrong. I took the word of horrible monsters these people were sweet and innocent, not thinking of the danger I’d be putting the omegas—
“Um…English?” the guy in front of me asks like he’s remembering something, his accent thick and raw.
I nod, since it’s all I can do.
“Bobo, you sc-sc-sc-scare her,” he says with a slight stutter and a small tic of his mouth.
He’s really tall.
They both are.
I always felt tall until I entered the realm of monsters.
The man’s eyes water in front of me, as he slowly bows at the waist. “W-we all in y-y-your debt, V-V-Violet Carmine.”
They know my name.
I relax a little, just as Bobo releases me and gives me a little space. I glance over at him, remembering he’s mute. I guess that’s why he carried me in instead of speaking.
He gives me a huge, lopsided grin, smiling with a lot fewer teeth than one should have. Dental care back then sucked balls, I’m sure.
This is going to cost more than expected in the long run. Good thing I know a bunch of rich, guilty alphas who will be eager to pay off a debt they forgot they owed.
“Bobo does not s-s-s-s-s-speak,” the guys carries on, and then taps his chin. “I am not the best s-s-s-speaker. New English harder.” He points to himself. “Ighan.”
“It’s nice to meet you both, Ighan and Bobo,” I tell them as the omegas tiptoe in, drawing my attention just a little.
Without a doubt, they’ve been listening to find out if it’s hostile or hospitable in here.
“C-come! Come!” Ighan says, gesturing for me to follow, as he limps his way toward the doorway of another room.
The omegas hang back, and neither of the men bother to glance in their direction, as they guide me toward a large, cathedral-style opening in the middle of the house.
I spot four levels of balconies in the massive home, before a stained-glass skylight tops off the beauty.
While I’m lost, admiring the breathtaking art of the glass, Ighan makes some sort of really loud bird-like sound, startling the hell out of me. My gaze swings around, and I spot several heads timidly peeking over the balcony with wary curiosity.
Every floor has so many faces—forty-eight in total, not counting Ighan and Bobo.
This is a lot of people for one real family, but I remember reading the tree Tiara showed me. From what I’ve gathered, most of them are cousins, who had banded with the family for protection when they were all human men and women braving a harsh world together.
“They sh-shy, but I v-v-vow they grateful,” Ighan assures me.
There’s a burning warmth surrounding me with an edge of fear...but I don’t feel fear. This isn’t my fear.
These aren’t my feelings at all.
“I’m not concerned with gratitude,” I murmur quietly, still slightly confused by the growing sensation that I’m feeling someone else’s feelings. “I brought gifts you’ll need.”
Simpletons really are very empathic…
Bobo and Ighan finally dart a glance to the omegas, who are patiently holding heavy boxes stacked on top of heavy boxes, while they wait.
“I’m sorry,” I say as I quickly start toward them. “Put them down. I’ll—”
Bobo makes a surprised sound in his throat, before he almost shakes the floor with his weird running. He runs worse than I do. I’m not sure why that makes me smile.
He snatches a box from Tiara’s hands, and her eyebrows lift, as she freezes in place.
Bobo takes a long sniff of the box, squeezing it to his chest in a tight embrace.
When he groans and smiles, as though he’s happy and tortured, I add, “It’s all made from the same apples you grew. Or so I’m told. I grow the green apple trees.”
Bobo and Ighan both give me a confused look, as Bobo tears open the box he’s holding with one hand…as if it’s featherweight. He pulls out a bottle of shampoo, and Ighan catches it when it’s tossed to him, even though he bobbles it a few times, before clasping it with two hands.
He opens and sniffs the bottle, a slow grin spreading over his lips.
“Y-y-you one of us?” he asks like he can’t believe it. “B-b-but they said you a P-P-Port—”
“She’s Portocale and Neopry. Apples and oranges. You can’t really compare her to anyone else,” Tiara says like she’s informing them that I’m different, making this incredibly awkward.
Ighan and Bobo just smile brighter instead of being upset about…anything.
The alphas are still technically arguing over how much about me they’ll be able to keep a secret from Idun.
If she’s as vindictive as they claim, I doubt I have any secrets left that she hasn’t uncovered…
The stirrings of an odd memory pop into my mind.
Puddles and splatters of blood.
Numerous severed limbs.
Broken walls and crushed beams…
My heartbeat kicks at my chest in two heavy blows when I see the full image of the massacre I sat out to do the night my head was knocked off.
A face flashes before my eyes, but it’s gone before I get a good look at it. Was someone left alive?
No. Not possible. My monster doesn’t leave witnesses.
Except for Ian and those other wolves…
Shit. Why is this now bothering the hell out of me? Why haven’t I ever remembered that before?
Something hard lands against my side, nearly knocking the breath out of me, as I slam into the wall beside me. My head bounces off it, and for a brief moment, I see stars. I rapidly recover, and glare over at a wide-eyed Tiara, who has her elbow suspended mid-air, because she just elbowed me across the room.
“Sorry,” she says, blinking a few times. “I was just trying to get your attention, because you seemed to have dazed off. I’m in heat this week, so I’m a little stronger than usual,” she adds very bluntly. “I forgot.”
Great. If one’s in heat, they’re all in heat. Mom is going to kill me.
I run a hand over my face, shaking my head.
“In h-h-heat?” Ighan asks as though he’s confused. “T-too warm?”
“The temperature is great, but we’re not here to talk about that. I wanted to give you something as close to comfort food as I can cook. I also came to help you learn a little about the way the world works now,” I quickly deflect, smiling brightly at them, while rubbing my aching side.
Don’t piss off a wolf with PMS. Duly noted. Seriously, there should be some big book to keep up with all the little things people seem to find unimportant—
“G-g-good,” Ighan says, smile only growing, as he gestures to the TV. “It stopped.”
I can fix the TV, but there’s a lot more needed than I initially thought of.
Leiza steps up with the pen and paper she had earlier, ready to write, like she knew I was about to ask it of her.
“What’s the quickest way to help English along for them? You said they picked up on languages fast,” I state to Leiza, already impressed with the amount Ighan has mastered just from watching freaking TV, apparently.
“I never made it past the first course of Spanish because it was really hard to learn another language. Again, I’ve been robbed of hereditary perks, and I’m starting to feel a little singled out,” I note aloud.
Gypsy Rising (All The Pretty Monsters Book 5) Page 3