by Jill Haven
“What did you do to the mountain lion?” Evan’s eyes shone with wet tears and I gave him a reassuring smile.
“Are you joking? I ran!” The two of them burst into hearty laughter and I flashed Ten a warm grin in the rear vision mirror before I touched Evan’s leg. “And I let it be, of course. It’s not my place to interfere with nature. Humans do enough of that for all of us.”
“Hm.” Evan pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them as he stared out the window. “I’m relieved you didn’t end its time here. I hope it’s having a happy life in the woods. Oh! Do you think it was the same one we saw back there?”
“That one looked smaller than the one that got me.”
“Smaller? They get bigger than that?”
“Twice the size, at least.”
“What?! Goodness. We have to go looking for them.”
“You want to get pounced on?”
A sly grin spread across his pink mouth. “Maybe not by a big cat…”
Ten coughed and made garbled choking sounds, sending us into another round of laughter.
We left Ten at his residence and headed for the barracks in Winter. With just the two of us in the van, a silence enveloped us as we drove through the darkening woods, but it was easy and almost comforting to be together without chatter. I slipped into a deep introspection as the headlights danced across the bumpy back roads, almost hypnotically bringing myself deeper into my consciousness. The space behind my breastbone felt stuffed full and satisfied in an odd way, until I worried about what might happen if Vince found Evan, and then it clenched tightly. Almost painfully.
It was one thing to refuse to give up the Divine Omega willingly and be branded a rogue for it, but what if his uncle descended on my property with the full force of the Redcaps behind him? I could only defend us for so long if that happened. When that happened. And what of Carlisle? Would he turncoat against me after the earful of disrespect I’d given him on the phone earlier, and send his men our way too? Would they be waiting to ambush us at the barracks that very night?
What at first felt like paranoia quickly shifted into something I’d refer to as heightened awareness. It wasn’t just possible that Vince would soon find out that I had his nephew by my side, it was likely. Inevitable, perhaps. And I knew very well that he would stop at nothing to get him back; not just a matter of familiar love and protectiveness, but a matter of pride. No alpha had touched his Divine Omega kin, and it was humiliating to him that a low-class mercenary with a busted nose and a body full of scars would be the one to steal him away after all these years of keeping him as a secret. He’d built a stronghold in the middle of nowhere to keep him away from the noses of alphas, and I was the one who dared break him out. Once Vince found out, he wouldn’t let it go. He’d fight me to the death. Mine, most likely.
I stole a quick glance of Evan’s profile, his upturned button nose, and his soft blond halo that glowed in the dim light, and my guts clenched protectively. Maybe we were true mates… there was no denying that what I felt for him was stronger than anything I’d ever experienced before, in my near three hundred years on earth.
I knew that if we were torn apart, we’d find a way back together. Like all of the most certain things in life, we would be compelled to do so by need. We’d do it because we’d have to.
But we hadn’t yet mated, I hadn’t given him my mating bite. And perhaps that was a good thing. If we were going to be ripped apart by Vince or his Redcaps, or even Carlisle’s betrayal… well, I was certain that we’d still survive. In fact, it would be less painful than if I’d given him the claiming bite last night, the way that my mouth had itched to do so.
This time, Evan buckled his seat belt as soon as we neared Winter. I took the winding tracks that cut through the woods to the highway more carefully in the van than I had in the Jeep, but he still braced himself with a firm grip on the dash.
“Home, huh?” he said wistfully as the security lights of the barracks came into view. My heart raced and I grabbed his hand without hesitation. Home… and no sign of the Redcaps. For now.
12
Evan
My life of independence continued as domestically as it could in a house that was far from being as cozy as the stronghold in which I was raised. But I hadn’t misspoken when I’d called the barracks ‘home.’ The simple, easy nature of the building quickly became a comfort, and my chest surged with affection whenever I snuck out from under Bishop's watchful—bordering on paranoid—gaze for a quick walk around the perimeter, and spotted its tin roof shining through the trees. Its small, minimalist design initially struck me as being akin to a stable house, and I appreciated how easily I could navigate the space. No slippery stone staircases and no claustrophobic corridors.
Most importantly, Bishop was there. A glance at his profile as he busied himself by organizing his weapons gave me comfort. Waking beside him was a delight; and when he roused before me, I simply had to listen and I would find him with my hearing; the sounds of his tinkering with his motorcycles gave me as much comfort as the warm embraces he held me with each night.
We managed to eat meals together sitting on the bed, with cutlery limited to one fork each and a spoon between us, and our plates precariously balanced on our laps. Bishop introduced me to strange foods which he gathered on his occasional trips into town for rations. A sweet treat that was named something like ‘popping tarts’ was a particular favorite of mine, and a snack food called ‘popcorn’ was as joyful in its preparation as it was in its eating.
Of course I longed for finer linens, more windows, a hearty nutritious meal, and a touch more privacy in the bathroom, but the longing was tempered by my affection for all things Bishop. The barracks’ building was a reflection of many things I adored about the man—they were both practical, utilitarian, strong, and protective. Being held by its sturdy walls was an extension of being held by his thick arms.
But while we were safe, life between us wasn’t exactly what I had anticipated it would be when I’d asked Bishop to keep me by his side. To say that the fortnight that followed our arrival back in West Virginia was stressful would be an understatement.
It wasn’t lost on me that my uncle was searching for me, and that it weighed on Bishop like a sword above his head. Soon enough, that sword swung to me and I became deeply worried that each day would be my last with Bishop; with freedom. My dreams became filled with horrific gore and images of blood-soaked violence that the Redcaps brought on Bishop in the name of my honor. We were living underground and constant paranoia had its grip on our bodies and minds. Every unusual sound made the hair stand up on the back of my neck, and Bishop would grab at the nearest weapon at the slightest suggestion of an intruder—which usually turned out to be a rat, or a curious fox sniffing around the perimeter of the building. I learned the locations of all of his hand weapons, of which there were a terrifying number strewn throughout his abode, from switchblades to broadswords, crossbows to guns.
He was determined to keep us safe, and he wanted to equip me to do my part too.
Bishop cracked his knuckles and held up the top rope of the wrestling ring. From the sidelines, I blinked at him and wrapped the warm fleecy ‘hoodie’ he’d let me wear tighter around my shoulders. The training space was frigid and the echoey area made it feel even colder somehow, but he was only wearing ‘sweatpants’ and a sleeveless shirt. Torn between staring at the outline of his crotch and his bulging biceps, I looked at his face instead. He cocked the side of his mouth and motioned for me to join him. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”
“Er, I don’t have anything.”
“Get in here.”
The ring seemed bigger on the inside and I paced around, nervously unsure of where to stand. Bishop waited patiently in the middle of the mat until I approached him.
“Throw your best punch.”
“At what?”
“At me.”
“What? Why? We’ve done that dance before. You block all of my attem
pts, and I’m not going to do something so… futile.”
“I won’t defend myself. I just want to see your form.”
With my hands on my hips, I tilted my head and pursed my lips in disbelief. “You’re just going to let me hit you?”
Bishop nodded with sincerity, and a hand on his heart.
“No. Absolutely not.”
He scoffed and smirked. “C’mon. I’m the commander of the Blood Dragon Sentinels. I can take it.”
My first attempt landed a gentle thud on his arm. The sleeves of his hoodie fell down around my fists and softened the blow even further. I sighed in defeat and Bishop’s lips twitched but he didn’t laugh. I waited for ridicule, but he simply tugged the hoodie off my shoulders and threw it to the side.
Goosebumps pricked my skin and I rubbed my arms frantically. “It’s cold.”
“So try again. Hit me. You’ll warm up.”
“But I like you!”
“Find some anger. Imagine that I’m someone you hate.”
Shockingly, it was a short list to draw on. My interaction with violence had always been at a distance—arrows and javelins. The concept of a hand, a fist, causing physical damage seemed very intimate to me and carried a higher degree of cruelty and insult that should only be used on the most villainous of traitors. Even my Uncle Vince didn’t really deserve a punch in the face. And who else had angered me? There had been a few cruel comments about me thrown around by Redcap guards in the dining hall one night after plenty of ale had been swilled, but those words had just hurt my feelings… they were entitled to their boozy opinions. I wasn’t one to hold a grudge.
Bishop took pity on my struggle to think of someone I detested and gave me an adoring smile while he diagnosed me. “You are soft of heart.”
“How can I help it?”
“Don’t change. Let’s approach this logically instead. Close your eyes—”
“You’re not going to hit me, are you?”
He glared at me like it was an offensive question, and I slowly fluttered my eyes shut.
“Imagine you’re back in your room at the stronghold.” The visualization was crisp and clear, and I flinched—I felt painfully, suffocatingly trapped. “You have to break your way out of there with your fists. I’m a stone wall and on the other side is freedom.”
Energy tingled down my arms and the palms of my hands glowed warm. I thought of never seeing the modern world again; I thought of losing Bishop forever. My breath caught and a little anger bubbled up. Maybe I could do this.
“Very well, I will try my best.”
“Good. Hit me.”
I swung wildly with my eyes closed and almost lost my balance as my fists caught nothing but air, but eventually three of my punches landed against firm flesh. Bishop didn’t even grunt from the impact, and I started to lose momentum when I realized how weak even my best swing was.
He was a good mentor and noted the way my arms fell slack. “I’m a wall, remember? Break through.”
With a sudden inhale and a surge of determination, my knuckles hit muscle and I roared as I smashed through the imaginary barrier between the present and the rest of my life. Finally, Bishop grunted, and quickly blocked my incoming punches and caged my arms.
“Good.”
I opened my eyes and he nodded in approval. He squeezed my shoulders, and a warm thrill spread across my chest. Had I really made him proud?
“You’ve never trained in hand-to-hand combat before?”
“Never. Everyone said I was too fragile.”
“Do you believe that? Do you think that you’re too fragile?”
I shrugged and tugged on my braid, suddenly a little shy.
“You’re not. Get rid of that idea right now. Let’s start with what you did right. The energy coming through your shoulders was good. Your fists were well positioned, and you intuitively block after you’ve thrown a punch. Let’s work on your balance.”
He ran me through drills and my nervousness shed like a second skin. Bishop was a good teacher and I considered myself an attentive student. I was eager to learn the broadsword, the dagger, and the pike but he assured me that we would work from the ground up.
“Fists first,” he said.
Our days were soon filled with combat training, adjusting my technique, sparring, and the introduction of the wooden staff. My muscles ached at the end of each long day, but I couldn’t get enough. Throwing my body around the training space kept me out of my mind’s prison where I was already back in the stronghold.
But while we were spending our hours together training physically for a fight, we should have been preparing for the emotional fallout of a loss. The glaring truth was that we were hiding from a certain fate. We knew that our time together was limited. My abduction was bound to occur as soon as my uncle received intelligence about our location. We were bracing for the inevitable, but we weren’t talking about it and it was making us emotionally frail.
I woke up one morning to Bishop gripping me tightly and huffing in my scent from the nape of my neck. It was only when I rolled over to face him that I realized he wasn’t just taking in my smell. Before he shoved his face into the pillow, I glimpsed the shine of tears in his eyes. My heart cracked open and I threw my arms around him before my own tears started to flow.
He was right to cry. What if I was taken away that very day? What if I never saw him again? It wasn’t just possible; it was likely.
Worse than heartache, we started to snap at each other. In an attempt to burn some of the tension out of my muscles, I practiced my hand-to-hand combat on a dummy in the garage while Bishop sharpened his knives and watched me out of the corner of his eye. I landed an impressive flurry and smiled at him with pride. He simply grunted and looked to his wet stone.
“What? That was good.”
“I taught you to do a right-hand jab, then an uppercut. You went left every time.”
I huffed and pinned my fists to my hips. “So I improvised. Isn’t fighting like dancing? You learn some moves and then you string them together into a symphony that looks beautiful and complicated from the outside—”
“Fighting is not dancing. You shouldn’t be thinking about how it looks.” His tone was so sharp that it was like he’d cut me with the blade in his hand. I turned from him to hide how my chin trembled, and shot back a sharp insult.
“Some of us care about how we look.”
He fell silent. The continued scraping of his blade across the wet stone echoed through the garage and raked up my spine. I shivered and my stomach turned. Thud. I went back to smacking the dummy and switched off my brain. Defiantly, I led with my left.
The barracks that had once seemed too large and cold had become oppressively small. Our close quarters were itching under my skin. As I landed hit after hit, I realized that this was unsustainable. With adrenaline pumping through me, I smacked the dummy with a brilliant uppercut and reveled in how strong it made me feel. A thought broke through my calm mind… If I wanted to be a man, like I kept telling myself I did, if I wanted to be an adult… then I needed to take true responsibility for myself. Hiding was a child’s game.
I switched to leading with the right and considered my options. In all of my years living there, Uncle Vince and I had never had a conversation about me leaving the stronghold. I had simply known that it was an unacceptable proposition, and the last thing I’d ever wanted to do was piss off my uncle. It had always been clear to me that the only peaceful way out of there was to sneak off without alerting him to my intentions. But clearly, I was wrong… I’d been thinking of short-term peace, and I had been thinking selfishly. Now that I had someone I cared about, I had to think long-term. Like a man.
Clearly, the mature thing to do would be to speak to Vince myself. If I could approach him as a man, as an adult, and appeal for my freedom with a strong enough case then he would surely relent. And wasn’t love the strongest case of all? If I showed him that I was a grown man now and had selected a mate of my choosing, th
en he’d surely leave me to live my own life in peace.
With one last punch, I knocked over the dummy. Good. Decision made. Now to tell Bishop…
The woods directly surrounding the barracks were well lit, and the scraggly pine canopies overhead let in broad swatches of spring sunlight. We walked well-worn tracks most afternoons after training and in theory it was romantic, but Bishop was constantly on edge and preoccupied listening out for trespassers and sniffing out any hints of a Redcap. I was basically walking alone.
On this day, however, after I’d knocked down my dummy and he’d finished with his sword sharpening, he seemed more attentive. Had he picked up something in my body language? Did he know that I was harboring a secret? I wanted him to ask me flat-out what I was thinking. Instead, he took me under his arm, and my will almost melted. Why would I ever leave this comfort, even for only a day to speak to my uncle? But I lifted my chin and shoved my fists under my armpits as we walked into the dense part of the forest where the light was all but blocked out by the thick canopy of evergreen foliage overhead.
“I’ve made a decision.”
We kept walking in silence.
“Do you not want to know? My decision?”
“You want to go home,” he said as though he knew all about it.
I startled and stopped short. His gaze stuck to the wet bark of the trees behind me. “Well, no I do not. Why would you think that?”
“Life here is rough.”
I clenched my jaw and swallowed down my bruised pride. I thought I’d adapted quite well to the limited comforts of our quarters. “Life without you is worse. I’m only going back to the stronghold to tell my uncle that I’m alive and well, and beginning my own life as a man.”
The argument that ensued was exactly what I had anticipated. He believed my Uncle Vince wouldn’t approve of our courtship and would do everything in his power to keep me from Bishop. I had countermeasures ready—optimism, evangelical belief in my mission, and mostly, stubbornness. After three days of my unabating instance, we again walked the woodland tracks and he relented. “I’m not going to keep you against your will like he did. Approaching him, especially on his home ground, is a stupid idea, but you’re free to make it.”