The Truth
“Ten years ago, it was about all wolves… a species that dared to kill his woman and unborn child for merely existing. When he found out she lived and died at the hands of the Santo pack, and he thought his child too, he concentrated his hatred on one pack alone.” Leyanne wanders casually across the floor, shrugging as she goes, and all eyes follow her. An awkward quiet around the room instantly as we all digest this.
“That’s why the fog stayed only with them and us… nothing further out. We saw no vampires in our entire trip to find Leyanne.” Meadow fills in the blanks, adding to what I guess she spoke to the witch about, and brings my mind to the truth of her observation. In eight hours of cross-country travel, we never picked up on a single vampire outside the Santo domain. Not one sense of them, no scent in the air at all. It’s why Leyanne didn’t care about leaving us alone in the darkness. She knew we weren’t in danger so far from the mountain because vampires weren’t hunting any pack that wasn’t Santo. It makes sense now.
“Correct. Because there were none, I told you. Vampires dwell where people don’t and only venture where wolves are when they have a bone to chew. This time, that bone was buried in your father’s garden. Under his patio….” She seems smug at her euphemism, smiles with a hint of sarcastic glee, and dusts the mantle as though she’s merely made a small joke. Her accent makes it sound more like a mocking sentence than an important proclamation. Her calmness grates on my growing nerves, and I shuffle in my seat.
“So, the attacks on the home, the tests with the weapon? We weren’t just unlucky…. we were always the target!” Cesar pipes in, repeating the obvious, and Leyanne nods, turning slowly to face us as a group and moving back against the mantel to get comfy. I stare at her surreally, feeling like this is all a weird dream and digesting it slowly.
If only the vampires knew how ironic that was, what they did. They almost killed the reason they were even there in the first place. If it not for Colton and his pack saving me that night, my father would have seen me dead at his own hands. It’s almost funny.
Their weapon and tests hit the home that concealed his child for almost a decade, yet the pack he hated protected me. If only he knew how close he was to taking down his daughter, the Santo heir, Juan, and their Luna simultaneously. My death would have ended it all by taking the three of them with me. Yet it wouldn’t have balanced anything at all. I would have died at vampire's hands.
“They’re shadowing us here…. because of our bloodline. No wonder they never left. They stalked us. They persisted. And yet the war never progressed. They were waiting and biding time, even if that took years to get past our boundaries.” Matteo runs a hand across his face, his voice deflated as minor shock reverberates around the room's stillness. I sense Colton tensing beside me and glance up, catching his eye on me as he swallows noticeably, and then he turns and looks at all the faces, locked on the witch and the eerie pause to our normally humdrum group.
“There was no war intended. It was always about avenging Marina and Alora. And now he knows about her, so he focuses on avenging her mother instead. He knew I’d take care of the witches in no time and that the mongrels he left were no real threat to his child. With Alora’s brother in tow, and his need to avenge Marina, they aren’t walking away quietly as we hoped. He still wants to address the balance. Darrius warned us because he knows you have people there that still shouldn’t be part of this, and Vampires don’t lay down grudges when vengeance has been their path for decades.” Leyanne sighs heavily.
“Why would he warn us? What does he care?” I finally find my voice and question the motives of that dark weirdo. He didn’t seem all too invested in wolf lives back on that road.
“Darrius is a strange one, honor bound. He’s a Shadow Knight commander of the highest order, and he’s never agreed with Varro’s need to crush your kind in revenge. It goes against his code. So he stood back, lifted no finger in the war of the past, and kept the Shadow Knights out of it.” Leyanne’s voice softens, and I can tell despite her relaxed manner and indifferent tone and Darrius’ obvious darker disposition, she has respect for him even if she makes it out like it’s a flaw he has morals.
“What do we do, Cole… those are our people?” Radar sits down suddenly as though shock weakens his legs, pulling my attention to the eyes around the room, and I swallow hard as I try to compute all this. I feel like crying, yet something more terrifying simmers inside that we should be worried about.
“He doesn’t know that if Juan dies… I do.” I point out, mumbling it loud enough for those around to hear, and Colton slides his hand over mine and sits on the arm to press close to me. Giving me his comfort because he can sense my anxiety, confusion, and fear. Leyanne exhales heavily, an expression of minor irritation crossing her face as she focuses on me.
“It’s not a detail Darrius would have excluded, but that won’t stop Varro from wiping out everyone else who’s there and making Juan watch. I don’t think Juan’s death is his goal ….. It’s vengeance he seeks. Even if he must kill everyone to get to him and then lock him in a cage for the rest of his days. Varro is cruel, and torture is better suited to his personality. I believe he’ll make Juan suffer until the end of his days.” Her words soothe and yet horrify me at the same time.
“We can’t let them kill everyone at the mountain. There are so many innocents.” I choke out the words. My head bombarded with so many faces as my eyes mist over at the thought of losing them because of my mother. These were people she fought alongside to protect. How was she to know the war was because of us?
“I told him that, but Darrius, he’s not exactly the warmest of souls. His response was merely that many innocents had died in the past. What was a few more if we wanted an end to this? All Darrius cares about is that he no longer gets dragged along watching his future king waste his time on an inferior species. He wants him back where he belongs, back where he is to rule eventually. He warned us, so we know what’s coming, but he won’t sway Varro either way.” Leyanne shrugs with one shoulder, clarifying that Darrius will not be useful to us in this. He’s an information passer at most, and his loyalty is with Varro, even if his actions are against Darrius’ code.
“Son of a bitch! That’s what you get for trusting a cold-blooded monster like them. Fucking vampires, man!” Remo is the one to explode, throwing his arms out in agitation, but Leyanne doesn’t seem offended.
I dare say she doesn’t trust Darrius any more than we do, and he’s more of an acquaintance for her benefit than a friend. I’m not even surprised that cold-blooded demon doesn’t give two craps about innocents. I got the impression he doesn’t feel at all like he has no humanity. He can stand back and watch many die over these decades and do nothing when he has an army that could have intercepted in some way so many times.
Shadow Knights… pfft. What good are they? It’s as much a crime to stand idle and do nothing as it is to be part of the attacks and kill innocents.
“If we want to save them. Then it must be done by us. We have to go to the mountain and protect them ourselves. With us, they stand a chance; without us… they die.” Colton gets up, lets go of my hand, and starts pacing to match Cesar. Both are seemingly intent on passing by one another as they walk back and forth on the rug.
My anxiety elevates thirty million times more watching the restlessness of the two most tactical-minded among us. I know his head is in overdrive as he thinks this through, and I squeeze my eyes shut to get my breathing under control. Knowing what he says is fact, they don’t stand a chance as a fractured pack. We took the strongest, and they don’t have any real leadership left.
I thought we were done fighting, and now, less than a day later, we’ll have to do it all over again. Only this time, my brother is on the other side. We’ll have to side with Juan against everything we feel for the sake of the people and march out there to unify. I can’t believe this is what we’re even contemplating, but I know in my heart that Colton’s right.
“And when we get there…. can we be sure that Juan won’t mount an offensive against us, even if we’re trying to help?” Radar, who always sees flaws in our plans, points out the discrepancies and questions the angles. I look to Colton with a nod that it could be a very plausible outcome, and we should seriously consider this before we decide. Juan vowed never to let his son take back his power… Juan won’t see us as anything but an enemy if we go home, even if we fight to save them.