Chapter One Hundred and Twenty-Four

Havermouth, Present Time

Aislen began to feel shitty about herself as Heath continued the drive to where Charlotte would be found, and by the time he pulled up out front of a farmhouse deep in the countryside, she was contrite enough to push her pride to the side. “I’m sorry,” she said to him as he undid his seatbelt.

He looked at her in surprise. “You are?”

“Yes, I’m sorry,” she said and put her hand over his. He released the seatbelt and took her hand in his, his hand so much bigger and stronger than her own. She looked down at their linked fingers for a moment, before meeting his eyes. “I shouldn’t get angry at you about this. You’re a symptom, not the cause. You have been raised believing something, and that’s not something that a person lets go of quickly. I can’t expect you to agree with me straight away.”

He leaned forward and kissed her, cupping the back of her head with his free hand. The kiss was sweet, gentle, and hopeful. As he eased, he stroked his knuckles over her cheek. “Thank you. I am sorry as well. Talen was right, I am not looking at the situation from the other point of view. I have been choosing not to, deliberately, because…” He paused. “If I look at it, Aislen, and you are right, what does that say about me?”

Her heart ached. “Heath… I am sorry.”

He nodded. “So am I. So am I.”

As they got out of the car, she looked around and raised an eyebrow. “What the fuck is this place?” She asked.

The farmhouse was made of logs, the porch strung with drying herbs, and the plant pots around it filled with flowering herbs. Beyond the house, she could see people in sunhats moving between tidy rows of garden. A sign hung from the porch: Haven Farm.

“It’s a commune,” Heath told her. “Though they prefer not to call themselves that. People come and go, live around the property in various log cottages, tents, or caravans. I believe someone lives in a treehouse, though I haven’t gone that far in. They do tours, charge ten dollars a head and give you a half a day to wander the farm and ask any questions that you like of the residents. Let me talk to Charlotte first,” he added over his shoulder as he walked to the front door and knocked. “She can be… hostile.”

“I wonder why,” Aislen murmured under her breath.

“Ah, Mr. Gale,” a man with long, white hair and a silver beard opened the door and leaned against the frame. “It’s a pretty day, isn’t it?”

“I hear that there’s heavy rain coming,” Heath passed him a fifty dollar note. “How is she today, Simon?”

“She was happy,” Simon put the note into a jar on the table just inside the door. “Whether she stays that way when she sees you…” he shrugged. “Who’s this?” He nodded to Aislen.

“Aislen,” Heath held out his hand to her and drew her to his side when she took it. “Aislen, this is Simon Kershaw. Simon owns the farm.”

“Holds it temporarily, for the duration of my life,” Simon replied.

“Aislen’s new to town, or newly returned,” Heath told him. “I will show her around and make sure she follows the rules. Have a nice day, Simon.”

The man watched as Heath led Aislen away before retreating into the house again. “What are the rules?” She asked Heath as they rounded the corner of the building.

“Don’t step on the garden beds, treat everyone with respect, remember people come for healing and not everyone will want to talk – those that don’t wear a red ribbon around their wrist. Aislen…” He hesitated, his hand on her elbow. (Be careful. She’s just beginning to accept…) “Charlotte is fragile. She had a breakdown, and spent some time in care, before relocating to the farm. Simon keeps an eye on her mental health for me, and I try to stop by once a month, to make sure…”

“To make sure what?” She asked.

He sighed. “That she’s staying out of trouble.”

“What sort of trouble? Like spray painting my house sort of trouble?”

He grimaced. “After the loss of her son,” he said slowly, “Charlotte became convinced that the hospital had stolen her baby. That they had stolen him and sold him into an underground adoption ring. She tried several times to break into the hospital’s offices, determined to find proof that they had stolen and sold her son. She attempted to abduct one of the midwives and attacked a doctor. She went on hunger strikes, protested outside the hospital, tried to get reporters interested in her story… She was sectioned and spent six months in an institution receiving treatment, and developed an interest in gardening. I arranged for her accommodation here.”

Aislen stared at him. “You stole this woman’s child,” she said slowly. “And when she tried to find him, convinced everyone and probably her as well that she was mentally ill, so that she was committed.” He was as bad as Dr. James, she thought.

“Aislen,” he scanned the garden around them before putting his arm around her shoulders, drawing her tightly against him. “Watch what you say,” he said, his voice low. “I had nothing to do with that. It was arranged by the pack and was what was best for the child. He will grow up amongst his own kind, and with the support of the pack, knowing what he is and what it means to be a werewolf. It is better than him discovering at thirteen that he’s one of us and be taken away from his mother by strangers… It is better for him this way.”

“And her?” She demanded. “What about what is better for her?”

“She’s a mother, Aislen. If she knew, and if she could choose for herself, she would choose the best for her son.”

Aislen fought back her nausea. “You took the choice from her, and she knows, deep down, she knows that he is still alive, and she will never stop looking for him.”

“She has stopped,” Heath told her. (Please, don’t betray the secret.) “Aislen, you must keep this to yourself. If she were to even get the idea about where he is or why, her life will be in danger. She doesn’t deserve to die just because a fucking condom broke.”

Aislen’s breath sighed out. He was right about that. “I won’t say anything,” she said grudgingly. “I will keep your secret.”

“Thank you,” he was relieved, and pressed his lips to her forehead in gratitude. “This way,” he led her through the tidy rows of vegetables, nodding and smiling pleasantly to those they encountered on the way, composed on the outside, but unsettled within. There was a cute, little cottage towards which he led her, and Aislen saw a woman in faded jeans and a shirt sitting on a bench shelling peas.

She recognized the other sex toy within the woman she had grown into and saw in the other woman’s eyes that she knew precisely who Aislen was. Heath stopped a good two meters back from the porch. His hand on her elbow held Aislen in place. Charlotte did not like Heath to get too close to her – she had developed an aversion to the Triquetra and would barely tolerate his visits. He always came alone, to spare Cameron and Rhett, and to spare Charlotte, but his guilt and sense of responsibility made it necessary for him to see with his own eyes that she was alright.

“You’re early, Heath,” Charlotte said without stopping at her task. "You don't normally come until later in the month."

“Charlotte, this is--”

“I know who she is,” Charlotte interrupted him. “Went back to them, eh?” She said to Aislen. “Didn’t learn your lesson the first time?”

“Well, you know,” Aislen replied with a shrug, tugging away from Heath, and stepping forwards. She sat on the bench, reaching into the bowl of shelled peas, and popping one into her mouth. “Some of us are suckers for punishment.”

“Would be wise to go back to wherever you have been,” Charlotte advised. “Bad things happen to people around here, especially around those three.”

“Believe me, I know that,” Aislen agreed readily. “I won’t bore you with the story, so let’s just say, I have unfinished business here, and with them.”

“Hmm. So, what do you want, Heath?” Charlotte demanded. “Or is this about her?”

“Someone graffitied Aislen’s house, and tried to set it on fire,” Heath answered.

“And that brought you to me,” Charlotte lifted an eyebrow and smirked. “Because I’m supposedly crazy? Why would I set her house on fire? She didn’t steal my baby. Just because she’s stupid enough to get involved with you three again? There’s no accounting for some people’s taste.”

“True that,” Aislen stole another pea. “These are good. She didn’t do it,” she added to Heath, rising to her feet. “We’re sorry to disturb you,” she said to Charlotte as she stepped off the porch to where Heath waited.

“Did he tell you what happened to me?” Charlotte asked her.

“Yes, and I’m so very sorry,” Aislen replied with honesty.

“They think that I’m insane,” Charlotte swallowed hard, fighting back tears. “But I know. A mother knows. If he died, then why wasn’t I allowed to hold his body? To see him, just once? A mistake, they told me. He was sent to the mortuary and incinerated before I recovered from the birth. But I know. I know,” a tear slipped down her cheek.

“I’m sorry,” Aislen was fighting her own tears. “I am really sorry for it all. I wanted to speak to you five years ago, I wanted to run after you that day… But I wasn’t brave enough.”

“I wouldn’t have spoken to you,” Charlotte replied. “I was… angry with you. Like every other stupid girl in the school, I thought Heath was… Well,” she shrugged, “someone special, and for a brief moment, I thought that he saw something special in me. But he was just using me to make you jealous, and the moment that your fight was over, he didn’t want me anymore. It was too late by then,” she said sourly. “I’d stupidly let them take my virginity in the gazebo of the graveyard. I didn’t want to admit to myself that a man who felt something about me wouldn’t do that.”

Heath moved restlessly.

“You’d be surprised,” Aislen thought of Talen. “If he cared enough about you and thought that it would make you happy, then maybe he would.”

“Do you need anything, Charlotte?” Heath asked. “Clothes? Shoes? Something for your house?”

“No,” Charlotte looked away. “There is nothing that I need from you, Heath Gale.”

“Alright then,” he said with resignation. “We’ll leave you in peace.”

“It was nice to meet you Charlotte,” Aislen said to her.

“And you Aislen,” Charlotte replied. “If you wanted to come back sometime without the dead weight, I’ll make you a cup of tea.”

“I’d like that,” Aislen said. “Thank you.”