Becoming a Legend (29 page)

“
I’m not sure how to explain this without showing you. Let’s do it this way. Sit over there.” Andrew motioned to the bed while he stayed by the door. Arianna tentatively moved to the bed and sat down, waiting.

“
Look at the essence of the night humans around you. You know the part you see when you decide what type and how powerful a night human is. Look at your own essence. Do you see it?” He waited. He’d been in the auditorium the day Gabriel first taught her about night humans. Even then, before he first talked to her, he couldn’t keep away. Something was always drawing him to her.

“
Yes. It’s like a faintly-colored light, flickering around the edges of your skin,” Arianna answered.

“
Now, close your eyes and watch my essence,” Andrew commanded. After her eyes were closed, he began to walk slowly toward her. Once he was close enough, about five feet from her, the pull to touch him became overwhelming.

“
Do you see it?” he asked quietly, reaching for her hand. He felt compelled to touch her as well.

“
What am I looking for?” she replied, opening her eyes and peering up to see that he was now towering over her. Andrew shimmered back to the door. “I don’t know what to see.” Arianna was truly confused by what she was to look for.

“
Sorry. Let’s try this again.” Andrew took a deep breath, trying to shake the feeling that he needed to run back over to her. Arianna closed her eyes again and waited.

“
Look at my essence again, but this time also watch yours,” Andrew explained better. Doing his best to walk slowly, Andrew crept across the room at a snail’s pace, giving each step several moments before taking another.

Arianna’s
essence reached out to Andrew as he neared. The very edges of her light were trying to grasp at his, and his were doing the same. Once he got close enough, the two lights wrapped around each other, intertwining little tentacles of brightness so that you couldn’t see where one began and the other ended. At the touch of the light, Arianna felt the urge to grab Andrew and press herself tight against him as if it was the only way to keep herself sane. Andrew stepped back and the lights broke away from each other and the urge was only slightly suppressed. He moved back to the door and waited. A small trickle from his essence still lingered behind, barely touching hers.

“
Um,” Arianna said as she opened her eyes. “That’s not normal, is it?”

“
What did you see?” Andrew asked, bracing himself on the door. He wasn’t sure he could do it again so quickly. The need to touch her always increased when they were alone. Going to and from her was draining on him.

“
It was like our night human essences were hugging. I’ve never seen that before.” Arianna wrapped her hands in the bedspread to keep herself on the bed and not running over to him.

“
I’d like to think it’s more than hugging,” Andrew teased and her cheeks flushed bright red.

“
To answer your question, no, that’s not normal if that’s what you want to call it. That’s your night human picking mine as a mate or vice versa. That’s what Seeger saw back there in the room finally. It’s a very subtle thing for anyone that’s not directly being pulled to the other. For us, though, it can be quite powerful.” Andrew slowly walked back over, and it was obvious now to Arianna the moment the light touched.

“That’s
a bit of an understatement.” Arianna reached over and passed her hand through the area where the light met. She pulled back a little but the lights stayed connected.

Andrew reached over and came closer. More of their light merged. Arianna felt the urge to touch him and Andrew
didn’t stop her as she reached for him. As her hand neared his hand, wisps of light from Andrew reached out for her. Arianna’s hand hovered near him as the light licked at her. She didn’t physically feel his touch, but she couldn’t stop from moving forward to touch him.

“
How long has it been like that?” Arianna remembered first meeting him over a year ago. It was quite powerful. He was in his baku form there to judge her power. She remembered the urge to kiss him and how they both acted on it before she could say no.

“
I don’t know. It’s been like that for months since I noticed it. It’s a good thing my uncle didn’t.” Andrew chuckled as he moved his arm around her waist and pulled her closer.

“Will it always be like that? Or when you get mad at me, does it go away?” Arianna asked.

Andrew laughed. “Choosing a mate is a life time commitment in our world, just like marriage. Once your night human finds its partner, that’s the only one you will ever have.”

“Even if something happens to one of them?” Arianna was curious. Had he parents been mates? Was that why her dad never even considered remarrying?

“Even if something happens,” Andrew replied, trying not to think of such an outcome. “You’re stuck with me for life. I hope you’re prepared.”

“
So what now? There’s obviously no need to worry about the vrykolakas, since it looks like I already found my mate,” Arianna used the same term as Andrew, though it now sounded different than before.

“That’s
the problem.” Anger boiled beneath the surface again. Andrew was losing control of his emotions.

“
Explain?” Arianna asked, not understanding where his anger came from.

“
The clans don’t recognize the mates our night human side chooses.” Arianna kissed his bare chest and his anger boiled off a little at her touch. The thought of Andrew choosing someone else would make her angry too, but Arianna was still naive of the night human world. She assumed there was a solution to be reached.

“
Then we make them listen. I’m the head of four different clans. I’ll decide who I want to be with,” Arianna logically replied. Andrew huffed a bit and kissed her forehead.

“
That would work fine if you had more support and were at full strength. You have neither. The rest of the clans will unite against you, no matter who your choice is. They would rather have one ninth chance of winning you than zero chance with you choosing.” Andrew sighed. The situation was not good right now. “And you can’t just go into hiding. Gabriel can handle the Grace clan, but you’re needed at the Randolph estate. Devin can do the work alone, but you’re the head. They will revolt without you there. If Seeger takes over, then that would mean trouble for everyone you care about.”

“Then
we need to just run off and elope?” Arianna replied, going back to their original solution.

“
Miss Arianna, are you asking me to marry you?” Andrew tried to lighten the mood. Arianna smiled and didn’t blush this time. She didn’t care if everyone in the house heard her. She now knew what she felt was beyond real; it was part of her. While it was strange to think about it, Andrew was her other half and always would be. It took seeing it with her own eyes to finally admit what she had been feeling for months when she was around Andrew.

“
I don’t think asking is necessary when you can’t even tell one from the other,” Arianna pointed to her light wrapped around his.

“
I suppose not.” Andrew nuzzled into her head and sighed. “We need to talk to Devin. He knows the politics better than I do. If running away and getting married will do it, then we will be gone before the noonday sun sets. I plan to be beside you forever Arianna Grace, as I can’t live without you.”

TWENTY-FIVE

Devin and Turner were at the computer in the dining room while Devin was typing away. Turner was using his superior hearing to listen in to Devin’s headphones without having any of his own. Devin didn’t notice Arianna approach, but Turner did. He quickly moved over to make room next to him for her and Andrew so that they could see everything as well.

“
Your new guest is unquestionably a child of the Katsulas family. He isn’t the heir, Nik, but probably his younger brother. We don’t have any facial recognition on the rest of the family aside from the dad and oldest son. The rest are kept hidden from the public. It would be either Cadmus or Polo since he’s close to turning age. They are less than a year apart.”

“
From our sensors, I can say he’s a fairly strong night human, but nothing compared to Arianna or Andrew. He’s young and undeveloped. He will probably top out around Turner’s strength. Rumor has it his older brother ranks in just below Andrew. Good thing Seeger didn’t run into that one!” Mori said sarcastically.

“If he did, we might not be planning now,” Turner replied, actually a bit sad Michael didn’t run into someone that might have stopped the events from happening.

“Thanks Mori,” Devin said while signing off the computer.

“
So what do we do now?” Arianna asked. Devin stared at the blank computer screen, deep in thought.

Devin
didn’t reply and instead nodded to Andrew. Andrew momentarily disappeared but quickly returned. He bobbed his head at Devin before Devin would speak. Arianna moved to ask what had happened, but Andrew slid his hand up to the back of her neck and lightly squeezed, indicating he put all the guests in the house to sleep.

“
How long?” Devin asked Andrew, gauging how much to talk to Arianna about.

“
Fifteen minutes, minimum,” Andrew replied. “I’ll keep track of them and tell you when the first awakes.”

“First off, d
id you get in touch with Gabriel?” Devin asked. “Any idea what he’s planning for her safe keeping?”

“
No, he hasn’t responded,” Andrew answered. Devin and Andrew had already been planning. Arianna looked over to Turner, and he was already in on the conversation. The three boys were already thinking as one but leaving Arianna out of the equation.

“
Wait one second.” Arianna put her hands up to interrupt their talking. “Is anyone going to fill me in here?”

“
I’ll explain in a minute,” Andrew promised, trying to get as much said and out in the open as he could before the hostages woke.

“
Do you know where Gabriel went off to?” Devin asked Andrew specifically, but also included Arianna in his question.

“I’m
guessing the lodge,” Andrew replied. “It would be where I’d take her. It’ll buy us some time, but not much. They found her here, and no one was supposed to know where this safe house was. They’ve obviously been tracking her while they experiment on gaining the power to take her by force.” Arianna looked between them as Andrew’s idea that the whole mutant experiment everyone was trying was just to get to her. It never occurred to her that people would have to experiment to get enough power to take her by force. She just assumed that since she had her team protecting her, no one would try again.

“Is it safe for me?” Arianna was concerned. Her first experience at the
Randolph estate ended in her kidnapping, and she wasn’t eager to try it again.

“
We already have one traitor, maybe we have another,” Turner suggested, sitting at the table across from Devin and the computer. “We need to be positive she’s protected before we do anything.”

“
Then we shouldn’t take everyone with this time,” Andrew replied, pulling out a chair and joining them.

“
That would be a bad idea. We’ll need all the manpower we can get when we defy them.” Devin checked his phone. Gabriel hadn’t called in yet. Gabriel was setting up where they needed to go, but there wasn’t much time to act. If the Katsulas family was any good at tracking, they’d be at their door looking for the prisoner sometime tonight.

“
Please, someone explain to me,” Arianna begged. She needed information, but she also needed to be included on their cryptic talk. Information wasn’t helpful if she only understood a sentence here and there.

“
We are going to move you to another safe house once Gabriel gets back and avoid the Katsulas boy,” Devin explained. “You’re far too sick for us to even consider confronting the clans at this point. If they find us now, they’ll start a fight because you can’t help us fight back.”

“
Maybe sick would be better,” Arianna suggested, grasping at straws. “If I was sick, who would want to marry me?” She heard her own words and hoped they would be true.