His words have the same effect as cutting me down where I stand, and even though my brain doesn't compute it, my body reacts just the same, and my legs give out. Crumbling but his grasp on me tightens, he holds me up and to him as I break all over again. Nausea choking me, and I wretch and sob simultaneously, unsure how else to respond.
I'm not part vampire, diluted from my mother's side. I'm half of a freaking vampire, and for the first time, it suddenly makes sense why my eyes are red and hers never were. Why my gifts are strong, and yet, I never saw them in her. Yes, she was part vampire, but no, she didn't give this to me... he did.
I shake my head repeatedly, and the only noises are my pathetic gulps, gasping for air. My wails of shock as my entire life history burns to the ground and crumbles to ash. Everything I thought I was. Who I thought I was, was never real. I was never a Whyte. I'm not even bigger percent wolf anymore. I was never Jasper's sister... I was an invading half-breed, and they all knew and kept it from me the entire time. I can't sense any lies or deception in him, and even I know he has no reason to tell me this if it isn't true. Jasper was never a liar.
"Alora, your father is the vampire who has been waging war against the wolves for two decades, taking over where his ancestors gave up. The thought fuels his wrath and hatred that wolves took his lover and his child, not once but twice. He thought you both perished almost two decades ago and created an army to fight a war. Only then to find that no, she was cut down in the war of his own doing, and his child was taken at ten years old."
His words stop my uncontrollable deterioration, and I grasp Jasper’s clothes as what he says pulls together in my head. Reason and sense bring sudden calm to my body, and I jerk my face to meet his eyes on mine.
"He started the war because of her.... us?" I blink, instantly still. My brain is hitting some weird lull of hysterics to get this, and I realize Leyanne is standing right behind me. No longer waiting in the car but here to confirm what he says.
"He did. She ran to protect her baby from her own pack, and he never knew what had happened to her. When she imprinted, she never returned, thinking he would forget her. But he never..... he thought she was dead, and so was his bairn, so he came after your kind to avenge you both." Leyanne touches my shoulder and makes me jump with the contact. Weirdly soft for her, as though she's explaining to a fragile mind, and all I can do is shake my head. My eyes round out in bewilderment as I stare at her and then Jasper and then swallow hard as it hits me again
"And ten years later...." I blub, grasping at it all.
"He rebuilt his army after finding out the truth, with intentions of avenging you both. This war is all about you. He knows she fell on that battleground; he thinks you were murdered on the mountain right after." Jasper releases me from his tight embrace to give me room to breathe, giving me a moment to pull myself together. Stunned by this new history, no longer capable of feeling anything more while so much hangs inside of me.
"I don't believe you.... it can't be real... I couldn't be the source of all this death and pain. All those who have died in the battles." I don't want to carry the guilt or believe this.
"Lorey, vampires have kept me alive and safe for a decade on the strength of being Marina's adopted son and your sole living wolf family. The high lord favored me and gave me Darrius as my eternal companion to make sure I remain unharmed..... he takes no part in his son's war. He doesn't care what he does, but if he knew his heir was still alive... He would intervene."
"You could end a war by merely existing... the high lord would exert his power and recall his son. His son.... would be tamed with the knowledge his child lived. You, my pet, are the one to bring peace to two kinds by just breathing." Leyanne's words sit heavy on me, and I stare between the two of them at the long distant road we came here on. Mind spacing out as I pick apart and process every single detail with eerie stillness. The prophecy that I would end a war was always within my grasp, and it was never anything to do with my gifts.
Almost twenty years alive on this earth, all my losses connected to this enemy, only to find they're all linked, and my loss was for nothing. I was the center of the storm, and if the fates had only revealed me sooner to the vampire lord, then maybe no one would have died at all. It can't be that simple. None of it can. My mother died for her own cause, and my pack continues to suffer because of my existence. All I ever needed to do was stand up and be seen.
"I can't..... I need to think." I spew out my rush of words and push away from Jasper's proximity as though he's causing my lack of air. Dizziness overtakes me as my vision blurs while I stumble to the verge and crumble into the grass to sit down and put my face between my knees. Taking deep breaths to cool the sudden heat crawling over my body like fire ants. It's all happening too fast, and it's so beyond crazy and farfetched. My brain is close to exploding, and it's all too much to compute in such a short time.
"Not all vampires are at war with your kind. Some of us just don't care. The Lord has been left to run rogue for twenty years.... it's' time my people took their kind in hand." The low rumbling voice of the dark stranger pulls me out of my posture, lifting my chin unsteadily, and I realize I'm being shadowed by the one from the car in all his huge glory. He's tall, wide, and impressively terrifying when standing like an imposing tower over me. Yet, he's standing in full sunlight, even if he is wearing a dark hood and gloves. That's the only part I seem to focus on.
"Your kind? Aren't you all the same? Vampire is vampire." I hesitate, trying to gauge if his clothing is enough to protect him but stare in shock as his naked tanned wrist peeks out from under his coat as he stretches and pulls his hood back down without reacting to the light. He smirks, and somehow, despite all that's going on with me, I gawp at his sudden exposure and complete lack of pain.
Blinking in a daze that it does literally nothing to him, and swallow hard this new piece of information. We've seen Vampires in the sun when we caught some as prisoners to extract intel. They burn and die in horrifying cries and screams of pain, then dissolve to ash like a bursting powder puff. We have the advantage because of this weakness, yet here's one, and he's fricken fine. Walking in sunlight could be a complete game-changer to the wolves' upper hand.
"Vampire is a loose term for a varied species... we can be born or made, and it makes a difference. Birth keeps us pure and strong... it's also heavily monitored to ensure no child is born without purpose... except for the occasional accident. The ones who are turned are more like dumb lab rats. They're weaker and slower and have nothing of our gifts and abilities. Also, easier to kill with such basic things. Lord Varro's army is borne of turned halflings. Pale-eyed, weak, bloodthirsty, sun fearing .... pawns. Consider them an abomination and an embarrassment to our bloodlines. My kind is royalty, and we stay far from the mongrels to preserve our existence." His superior tone, weird accent, and blood-red eyes all surround me with a heaviness that causes me to pause and listen without response. My heart thudding and my head swirling, taking in his words.
Vampires can be like humans that can walk in the light, have warm and tanned skin, and look relatively passable, despite teeth and red eyes. Does this also mean they can control their blood hunger? Don't need it to survive and can ignore the impulse to feed? He seems controlled to me.
"The pure breeds are rare, Lorey. Compared to other species, they are still only in their hundreds globally..... Darrius here is from the house of Danesti, one of the oldest in the vampire hierarchy, second to Draculesti... The high lord's bloodline. Your bloodline." Now that makes me snort and choke in disbelief as lame movies we watched in the orphanage appear in my head.
"You’re saying freaking Dracula was real? ... I'm a descendant of some horror story vampire?" I exclaim at the absurdity and laugh insanely with a head shake. The bubbling giggle of someone having a really hard time processing reality. Sure I'm having some sort of midlife crisis brought on by the trauma of my mate abandoning me to some stupid cursed fog. Or maybe I've had a mental break, and all of this is only happening in my mind.
"All stories come from somewhere, and his bloodline was created long before his fable was. The house of Draculesti, well, they have ruled the vampires since the dawn of time... It was the child of Draculesti that first started these troubles." Darrius gazes off towards our truck, and I follow, glimpsing both my femmes staring this way and eavesdropping in as best they can. Still immobile, and I guess Leyanne is keeping them tied to their seats even now. Leyanne follows my line of vision, and I hear her sigh before I look away and dismiss the sight of them.
That renders me mute, and I gulp down any reaction. The memory of so long ago, Sierra telling me a story of a half-breed child who died at the hands of the wolves... She was the child of the vampire king, and the Lycans spilled her blood. If she was Draculesti and I am too, the fates are trying to redress the balance and restore things to rights. It's all slotting into place, and if this weren't about me, I would be fascinated and excited at the piecing of the puzzle, but instead, I can't breathe. I have to force my face back between my legs to catch it before I suffocate to death
"If this is all true, then you can end it... all you have to do is tell him?" Meadow's voice startles me out of my stupor, and I snap my chin back up to see them moving closer to me. She and Carmen have been let out now it's obvious we are not in danger here, and Leyanne trusts they will behave. Meadow comes to me in a flash to catch my hand and hold it tight. Giving me her strength, her support when she knows I'm struggling, and surrounding me with that sense of safe I need right now. "The fog... if the vampires give up, the spell is taken back?" She nods toward Leyanne for confirmation of a possible solution to our problem, and I turn in expectation, seeing that she might be right.
"It's not that simple. Lord Varro has been out there for a decade, and no one knows where he is currently. And if we need to go to the high lord, we need proof of you... That means my going back and letting the mind link show today's events. That I saw you, that I know it's you. If he's to recall the vampires, it's not a case of commanding a halt. His son leads the halflings. They won't just come to heel without his say-so. So, after carrying a message from his father, we then need to show Varro you lived, as he's cut off any psychic linking from anyone who would stand in his way." Jasper sits down beside me, answering for the witch. All eyes are on me, and he slides his arm around me, getting a wary look from Meadow. The mistrust is evident that a male is touching her Alpha's woman. She stares at him for a long moment and then sighs, seemingly relenting that he has a right to touch me without suspicion as my brother.
"I remember you... Jasper. Nice to see you alive, compadre." Meadow reaches out and gives him an awkward handshake, and he throws her a half-smile and shrugs back at her. It's weird, given the circumstances, but it's also sweetly heartwarming. My brother, who's not really my brother, and my sister, who's not my sister, are meeting properly for the first time. I doubt they knew each other back when we were younger, as Santos and Whytes didn't interact.
"Meadow... and that's Carmen." She nods behind her at the hovering figure, who edges closer with apprehension, and Jasper glances up, laying eyes on the new figure for the first time too. It's an instinctual, almost polite response to greeting someone he's being introduced to. Nothing in it other than reaction because he was raised with manners, but the next second sends everything into chaos. His whole body slams to an unnatural halt that sends a shiver through me as he's touching my body with his, and I feel it firsthand.
One moment, one look is all it takes.
The spark, the clap of tension, the forced eye lock as both open wide in shock. Bodies riveted to weird stiffness like an electric voltage has been administered. The hold of breath, the panicked gasp, and the sudden look of realization on both faces, seconds before both fall backward in dramatic release and crumble to the ground panting. Like tumbling matchstick towers, both end up on the ground. Shell-shocked and crumpled, blinking at one another as though only each could hold the answer to what just went down. It's a moment felt by all around. The heavy atmosphere is zinging with the emotional fallout that something major has just happened between them, and the air is zinging with an electrical current.
Seeing it from this side is way less intense than being the one going through it, and it stirs up so many sudden emotions as I click on what this is. Colton is shooting through my mind's eye but also a little inkling of warmth and joy. It doesn't alter the shock factor, nonetheless. Jasper just imprinted on Carmen, and things got a lot weirder and more complex.