The Ballad of Aramei (21 page)

~~~

“Why do you serve him?” I say to Raul sitting in the driver’s seat of a black SUV. Isaac had to go to Augusta and deal with another challenge made by a werewolf who apparently wants control of the Maine territory. I, knowing the nature and the importance of these types of challenges, understand that Isaac had to leave and deal with it.

I was still under with Aramei when Isaac left.

Now, Raul has been appointed my chauffer and is taking me back to Hallowell. It could’ve been worse; I’m happy I didn’t get stuck on a long drive with Trajan as my company. I like Raul and Isaac trusts him, and so do I. I’m pretty sure Isaac had words with Raul before he left about watching over me.

“He is the Sovereign,” Raul answers, glancing over at me. His enormous, muscled arms look awkward out ahead of what appears to be a tiny steering wheel; his giant hands grip the wheel on each side. I’m surprised he can fit in the seat.

“He is a bastard,” I say.

If this were any guard other than Raul, I likely would not have said that out loud.

“I know,” Raul says and it stuns me.

I turn my head to look at him.

“To be Vukašin doesn’t mean for a goddamned second that anybody has to like you.” He laughs a deep, rumbling laugh. “Someone like him has more enemies than friends.”

“I can’t imagine him having
any
friends,” I say, looking out the windshield now.

It’s late in the afternoon and the sun will be setting soon.

“Nah,” Raul says, “he doesn’t, but that’s best being in his position. There are no such things as friends in his case.”

“Well, serves him right.”

“Other than their fear of him,” Raul says, “he associates with no one by his own choice. If I were the Sovereign, I would befriend no one just the same. Too risky.”

“Oh, so you’d shun me?” I cross my arms and scrunch up my nose looking over at him, trying to lessen the bleakness of the conversation.

I’ve had enough of bleak.

A giant grin etches across Raul’s big face and he wriggles his bushy brows at me. “Oh, no ma’am! You’d be my
only
friend.” Then a sneaky look appears and he adds, “I’d let you be anything to me that you wanted.”

Even Raul knows that I’d never give him the time of day, but I’d also never dream of not going along with his innocent teasing, either. I love me some Big Raul.

“Yeah, yeah,” I say, “you couldn’t afford me.”

Raul throws his head back against the seat and laughs.

“Baby, after one night with me, I wouldn’t be able to get
rid
of you!”

I laugh right along with him, never uncomfortable with his sexual comments. The truth is that I don’t think I ever could be. He’s totally harmless.

The sun has set by the time Raul drops me off outside at the Mayfair house.

“You be careful on the drive back, Raul,” I say standing outside at the driver’s side window.

He draws his square-shaped chin in a circular motion, looking out at me with an awkward, thoughtful expression. “Well, thanks for your concern.” I realize that Raul may have never really experienced a genuine human gesture of concern like that before. I can see all over his face that he’s contemplating it and his smile seems to deepen.

“Thanks for the ride,” I say, pat him on the shoulder and head toward the front porch.

Raul drives away and in no time I hear the big tires on the SUV braking over the little pebbles at the very end of the driveway.

I step up onto the first concrete step but then halt in my tracks.

Something’s not right…

All of my senses have suddenly gone into overdrive. The tiny hairs on my arms rise and the back of my neck all the way down my spine prickles with alarm. My eyes shift black out of nowhere and it completely shocks me because I’ve only ever known it to happen in times of rage or lust, not when I have no idea what’s going on, or which emotions to act upon. I take a deep breath, close my eyes and calm myself, letting the blackness fade. And then I open up my ears to the sounds inside the house. There are voices in the den that are muffled by grave whispers, a flurry of words that I can’t make out because they are all talking at the same time: “…to kill her,” I hear one voice say. “Where is Isaac?” and then another, “…maybe she’s a spy.” And the last one I hear says, “Hope she’s still in the cabin,” which causes me to burst inside the house to find out what’s going on.

I walk quickly into the den and all of the whispers cease in an instant; more than a dozen pairs of eyes are looking across the vast room at me.

“What’s going on?” I say; my eyes jerk around in every direction searching for some sign.

Isaac’s sister, Camilla, and Zia both walk toward me. Zia’s smoky gray eyes peer at me solemnly. She steps up in front of me and whispers, “Rachel caught someone snooping around the woods behind the house.” She glances toward the hallway which leads into the kitchen. “They’ve got her in the basement and they’ve been more or less beating the shit out of her for information for the past hour.”

“Really?” I say, my eyebrows knotted. I look toward the kitchen briefly and then back to Zia because I sense she’s not exactly telling me everything.

Then Zia leans in even closer to my ear and says, “I think she could be that Praverian you guys have been looking for.”

I gasp and my face freezes in all of its stunned glory. As Zia’s face gradually moves away from mine, all that I can move are my eyes to follow her. I feel like I’m trapped inside my own body and have lost my ability to control any part of it.

Oh my God, she said it. She said Praverian. At least I know now that she’s not the traitor, but how did she know?

I look down at my shoes and then out at all of the eyes peering back at us, Camilla standing just a few feet behind Zia. Not one of these faces can look at me fully. It’s as if every time I make eye contact, their glances stray away from mine.

I grab Zia by the elbow and pull her into the dimly lit hallway.

“How did you know about the Praverian?” I whisper harshly through my teeth. I can’t help but continuously glance down the hallway in both directions to see if anyone might be in earshot.

I still haven’t let go of her elbow.

“Girl, you can’t hide stuff from me,” Zia says, grinning. “Don’t you know that by now?”

“Tell me how you know,” I say and I’m not smiling. I don’t give in to her natural humor. Not yet. My eyes are wide and focused as I stare intently at her.

Finally, Zia pulls her elbow gently from my hand.

“Chill the hell out, Adria,” she says. “Look, I don’t like being left in the dark and I knew that for you to keep secrets from me that it must’ve been something really serious. So, I did what any nosey girl would do and I listened in on a conversation between you and Isaac—.” She grins deeply and adds, “I guess you thought I was still in Augusta with Sebastian that night, but we came home early.”

I’m not liking where this might be going. I rip through my mind, trying to figure out what night she’s talking about and what Isaac and me might’ve said.

“Well, what did you hear?” I say, still showing trepidation about her knowing anything at all and she’s starting to take offense to it.

The grin disappears from her face and she looks at me confused and maybe even a little snubbed. “Just something about a Praverian being a traitor—I don’t know why you never let me in on it and I won’t lie and say it doesn’t bug the shit out of me, but come on, I know now. What’s with the paranoia?”

The ‘paranoia’ is anyone else other than those who already know being aware of what Harry is. It’s too risky, even for one more person to be let in on the secret. We have gone to great lengths to protect Harry’s secret because if the Dark Praverian gets wind of what he is, he’s as good as dead. We can’t afford even those closest to us knowing. All it takes is one person, one slipup and this whole plan will fall apart.

I grab Zia’s arms and pull her toward me, “Zia, have you told anyone else about what you heard? Sebastian? Anyone at all?” My voice is harsh and desperate, almost on the verge of being more than a whisper.

Zia’s eyes fall under hard wrinkles, stunned by my reaction.

“No,” she says and I’m not sure I believe she never told Sebastian at least. “This was just a few nights ago and me and Sebastian don’t do a lot of heart-to-heart talking…if you know what I mean.” That playful grin creeps up on her face again and I know exactly what she means. So, maybe she’s telling the truth after all because she and Sebastian have always been more ‘hands on’ than conversational.

“Good,” I say, only a fraction relieved. My hands slide away from her biceps. “You can’t tell anyone, okay? And because I was ordered by Isaac not to talk about it, I can’t tell you more than you already know.”

That is a total lie. Isaac never ordered me to do anything, but using him as my excuse is the only way I’m going to get out of having to tell her anything else. Because she knows that even me being Isaac’s girlfriend, I can’t go against his orders since he’s Alpha. I just hope she buys it. I’m so unbelievably relieved that Zia isn’t the traitor; she was one of few that if it had turned out to be her, it would’ve seriously broken my heart, but still, I can’t confide in her about it. Until we know who the traitor is and after we trap it, only the five of us need to know the details. I hate keeping things from her and I just hope she believes that.

Zia sighs and says, “Alright, alright. I won’t say anything.” She smiles and adds, “But you owe me, girl. Uh huh, I might have you cleaning my room for a month or something.” She wrinkles her nose and looks up in thought. “Or, I could make you cook me breakfast or give me a pedicure—Yep! I’m totally going to call in a pedicure.”

“Fine. Whatever,” I say, having no time to joke around with her right now. “I’m going downstairs.”

Zia grabs me and her smiling face shifts gravelly. “Why don’t you just let Rachel handle this?”

I jerk my arm away from her and suddenly feel like she may have been trying to distract me all along. Something in her eyes puts me on edge and I get the strangest feeling that she doesn’t want me going into the basement.

Chapter 16

GENNA. OH NO….

I tear my way past Zia, accidently shoving her against the wall and I throw open the basement door, taking two steps at a time as I fly down them. I leap off the last step and stand before six girls who I recognize instantly as Rachel’s underlings. One girl, known mostly for her bright red hair and millions of freckles, puts up her hands to stop me. She’s the same girl who helped Rachel set me up to walk in on Rachel in bed with Isaac months ago.

“You can’t go back there.”

“Move out of my way,” I demand, “or I’ll move you myself.”

The other five girls step in closer and I wait before making any sudden movements. I gaze off toward the back of the basement near the area where the wall has already started being repaired. A band of light stretches across the dark floor and spreads out in a cone-shaped pattern. It leads just around the rock wall where mold is starting to grow within the moisture. A figure is moving back and forth across the light, blinking it out every few seconds. I hear Rachel’s venomous voice and the sound of heavy breathing and the familiar chains embedded in the wall as they clink and scrape across the floor. And then a loud
whap
resonates through the air, followed by the crunching sound that only a crushed bone can make.

“Get out of my way!” I shout and start to move through the six girls.

The red-head grabs me by the back of the hair and my body instinctively whirls around at her. My eyes shift black and I glare at her with all of the warning my body can muster. I don’t have to say anything and all six of them back away to let me pass.

I round the corner to find Rachel standing there in front of a body huddled on the floor against the rock wall. I can smell the blood from her wounds rising up into my nostrils and my pores and taste buds immediately open up to it.

“Oh, this should be interesting,” Rachel says with a wicked, hateful gleam in her eyes.

“Who gave you permission to torture people?” I say.

I’m trying to get a glimpse of the girl who I’m starting to believe isn’t Genna, but Rachel is making it a point to stand directly in front of her, obscuring my view.

“
Permission
?” she says with disbelief as though the very thought of it is absurd. “Isaac’s not here. I do what the fuck I want.”

“Dria?” I hear a voice say weakly.

The air is suddenly sucked from the room. I can hear my heart beating so loud and so fast, but I can’t feel it. My lungs feel solid and without breath, yet my chest heaves rapidly behind a rattling ribcage. I feel nauseous. Before I have a chance to move to stop her, Rachel throws out her leg and buries it in my sister’s neck, causing Alex’s head to slam violently against the wall and her battered body slumps over onto the floor.

Blinded by a hot white light of rage filling my head, my black claws protrude in the same split second it takes me to dive across the length of the room toward Rachel. I scream out in rage, my voice exploding in my ears just as my claws spear Rachel’s shoulders and chest. We crash into the wall and rotted wood from the beams holding up the ceiling splinters and falls around us as the foundation shakes and trembles.

I wail on her, raining down on her face blow after bloody blow, my body latched to the wall, holding hers in place beneath me. I don’t have time to stop and contemplate how I’m able to defy gravity and sit with my knees pressed vertically against the stone wall. I just keep pounding her face with my fists, letting the fury take control of me.

The pain of one rib cracking just below my breast throws me off course, thrusting me back into the reality of what will happen if I don’t calm down. But this sidetracks me just enough to give Rachel the upper-hand. In seconds, I feel my body whirling across the room with my legs out in front of me. My back collides with a wooden beam and my body crashes right through it, tearing the beam completely apart. I crash down in a pile of old wooden crates and bicycle tires and vintage glass bottles. Shards of thick glass prick and stab the backs of my arms and the palms of my hands.