Bloodmark (16 page)

12

Promises

I yearned for Grey’s touch and wanted so much more
. I loved the way he smelled, the mischievous look in his eyes, the little smile that played at his lips. I couldn’t stop kissing him. I had permission to date Grey, but I was certain Mund would be furious that I ran off. But Mund couldn’t contain our love, and it was my life.

Grey drove us deep into the forest down a dirt path worn by his tire tread. He parked in front of a giant old oak tree. It was maimed and misshapen, but to me the old oak was perfect. It was one with the river, fed by it as well as threatened by its power. A beautiful relationship they had taken many years to create, the little details humans never saw. Grey was different. He saw them too.

“My mom used to bring me here. We’d climb up high as we could and hide for hours,” he said.

“It’s beautiful.”

“I don’t know why I keep returning here, but I feel like I’m closer to her,” he said, running his fingers over the gnarled bark.

“Care for a climb?” I asked.

He leapt up onto a branch, farther than a human should be able to jump. I noticed it, but chose to ignore it and carelessly leapt up after him. We climbed up high into the tree. He stopped on a worn branch, and we both lay down, looking up into the sky, with our legs intertwined. Grey was different today—quieter but yet protective and aggressive around Mund.

“Grey, what did you and your father fight about?” I asked.

“He came home angry, and then he found your shoes in my room,” he said. “So he took out his frustration on me. I’m not supposed to bring anyone to the house.”

My face burned bright red. I hoped his father wouldn’t tell Baran. I was already in enough trouble for letting Grey in the house, much less spending the night at his house unsupervised. I wish everyone would just trust us to make the right decisions instead of always assuming the worst.

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t mind being in trouble, for you.”

I leaned in to kiss his lips, rubbing mine lightly over his, tempting him to move. He leaned in, but we lost our balance and fell toward the ground. He wrapped his arms protectively around me and tried to grab the passing branches. His hand was being ripped up by the rough bark. I should have been protecting him—he could die from a fall like this.

His hand locked on to a branch twenty-five feet from the ground. His shoulder cracked as it popped out of the joint, but he didn’t cry out in pain. His other arm was wrapped around my waist, and my legs were wrapped around his waist as well. Adrenaline raged through my veins, and I felt myself becoming a part of him. Every part of me wanted more of him.

“Let. Go. Of. My. Sister. . . .” Mund said below us.

“Mund?” I said. I hadn’t realized anyone else was out here. He was a great tracker and unusually quiet, but I was shocked that he found us so quickly.

“Ash, get yourself out of that tree immediately.”

Before I could respond, Grey let go of the branch, dropping us down to the ground with ease. He set me back on my feet, placing a hand on each side of my face, kissing me on the forehead, heating my entire body.

Mund cleared his throat.

“Bye, Grey. See you tomorrow at school,” I said.

I could feel the anger rippling off Mund, and I could smell his fear. I grabbed Mund’s arm, pulling him back down the dirt path. He wouldn’t turn around or take his eyes off Grey. What kind of man-issue was this? Was he threatened? Grey was human, what threat could he pose against Mund, of all creatures? But Mund was more territorial and defensive than I had ever seen him before.

“I’ll be there,” Grey called after me.

The tension between them was unbearable. In the blink of an eye, Mund shoved Grey into the tree with his forearm at Grey’s throat, nearly crushing him. My brother had lost his mind. My lust was replaced by panic.

“I don’t trust you,” Mund said, pushing harder into Grey’s throat. Grey stared back at him, unfazed. “Stay away from my sister.”

“That’s up to her,” Grey said.

“Mund, this isn’t funny,” I said.

“Did you not hear me?” Mund asked.

“Oh, I heard you,” Grey said.

“Mund, come on. Let him go. Mund, please!” I cried, pulling at his arm, but he was stronger than me. Mund released his grip on Grey and took a step back. “Grey, are you okay?” I said, checking for injuries, but Grey stilled my hands and kissed my palm. “It’s okay, love. He was just looking out for you.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked.

“Sure thing.”

I didn’t delay getting Mund out of there. I pushed him all the way to the parking lot as he growled. It was dangerous to be that close to an angry werewolf, but I didn’t care about myself—I just wanted them to both be safe. Thankfully, Grey hadn’t tried to fight back. I would figure out what was going on later, then I would kill them both myself.

Once Mund had me on his motorcycle, he ripped through town to add as much distance as he could between me and Grey. Baran looked furious, pacing on the front porch as we pulled in the drive. Mund followed me up the stairs, blocking my exit. I had no choice but to walk toward Baran. He opened the door, but I was afraid to go in. On the porch, they couldn’t kill me, but inside I was a goner. My feet disobeyed my brain and led me in to my execution.

My palms were sweaty with fear, but I was equally mad. “Mund, what the bloody hell was that about? You had no right to behave like that. If Mother would have seen you . . .” I shook my head in disgust.

“Mund, what is this all about?” Baran said.

Mund’s hands shook as he spoke. “I don’t know how, but their souls are binding.”

“He’s human,” Baran said.

“It’s impossible, I know—a werewolf can’t bind with a human, but they are.”

“You must be mistaken,” Baran said.

“It’s not complete yet, but we have to keep them apart. If she binds with him, eventually he will die and she’ll be alone for eternity. No wolf will marry her after her soul is bound to another. Especially a human.”

They talked as if I weren’t even in the room. As if they were deciding the fate of a prized cow for breeding. I could bind with whomever I chose. I loved Grey, and I knew our souls connected. He would age and leave this earth, but a short time with him was worth a lifetime alone.

“There’s something about that kid, Baran. He smells human. But he moves like an animal. I saw him drop eighty-plus feet from a tree with her in his arms, like nothing. He grated his hands on the bark, but when he landed, his hands weren’t bleeding. There was no damage to his skin. And you should have seen the look in his eyes when he kissed her. He was challenging me.”

I looked at my clothes; there should have been blood all over me, but there wasn’t a drop. Mund was right, there was something different about Grey, but it didn’t change the way I felt about him. So what if he was some kind of creature from children’s stories? So was I . . . except I didn’t know what kind of creature Grey was yet.

Baran sat down on the edge of the sofa. “I’ve seen it too. He does things no human can do. The question is, what is he and what do we do about it?”

“Do about what?” I said.

They continued as though I hadn’t said anything.

“The real question is, which parent did he get it from?” Mund asked.

“Yes, that is the real problem,” Baran said. “He could have any number of strengths from her, but without the proper supervision, he could be a threat.”

“What are you two idiots babbling about?” I said.

I slapped my hands over my mouth. I shouldn’t have said that. They glared at me.

“Ashling . . .” Mund said. He was clearly disappointed.

“Don’t you dare scold me, Redmund Boru! I’m not a child. I deserve to know what the bloody hell you’re talking about and why you behaved so poorly today. He’s my friend. You had no right to attack him. I trusted you.”

They both looked astonished. I was already in trouble, but this time, I was getting my answers. I steadied myself for a fight.

“Ashling, there are things you don’t know and can’t understand about Grey and his mother. That I don’t even fully understand yet,” Baran said.

“Well, maybe I’d understand if you would just tell me what was going on.”

“Ashling, it doesn’t concern you right now,” Baran said.

“Doesn’t concern me? Are you stark raving mad? This is my
life
you’re discussing. My happiness. My forever! This does very well concern me.”

Baran gave me a dirty look, but I didn’t care anymore.

“My life.”

“May as well tell her, Baran. She’s too stubborn to let it go,” Mund said. “You haven’t seen her angry yet. Trust me. It isn’t pretty.”

“Can she keep it secret?” Baran asked.

Mund nodded.

“Very well. Grey’s mother, Brenna . . . was my sister.”

He waited for it to sink in. I kept my face as calm and plain as I could, but I’m sure my eyes revealed my confusion.
Grey’s mother was Baran’s sister
, I repeated over and over to myself, but it just didn’t make any sense.

“She was the only other survivor of the attack in Scotland. During the attack, she was raped. She was only eighteen years old. I tried to protect her, but there were too many. Your father and his packs saved our lives. But it was too late—Brenna was pregnant with Willem.

“Knowing the right her attacker had by our laws, that he could claim both her and the child, Brenna hid in the United States while I raised Willem. We saw Brenna from time to time, but I lost touch with her for about two decades. When I finally found her in York Harbor, I was too late—she was already dead.”

Baran continued, “I found her in her human form—dead in the river, decapitated, and all the blood was drained from her body. It was the worst thing I’ve ever endured. She’d fallen in love with a human, Robert Donavan, and I found two-year-old Grey hiding up in a tree. He had her eyes and her mischievous smile. I stayed here in York Harbor to keep an eye on him. I think it is what Brenna would have wanted. I was afraid he’d become a werewolf and have no one to trust, but puberty came and went, and he never changed. He has extraordinary strength, precision, and speed, even advanced healing like a wolf, but he never shifted.”

The weight of his story bore down on me, and my confusion was thick.

“If you loved her and stayed to protect him, why are you so afraid of me being with him?” I asked.

“Because we don’t know what he is. And frankly, he doesn’t know what he is. Maybe I just haven’t let myself see it. I’ve studied his life; his father locks himself up in that house for days at a time. I’ve seen Robert’s violence, speed, and strength. It’s inhuman too, though he’s not a wolf. So if Grey is more like his father than his mother, he could be dangerous.

He could be a Bloodsucker.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

“Everything,” Mund said.

“Grey’s not going to hurt me,” I said.

“Ashling, you have to be careful. He’s as strong as I am, but he’s not a werewolf, and he may not even be human. He might be some sort of hybrid. What if he hurts you?” Mund asked. “I could never live with myself if something ever happened to you.”

“But he won’t. You said it yourself. Our souls are binding. We love each other. He can’t hurt me.”

I thought we had already had this fight, and I thought I had won, but here we were again. Except this time, I understood what they were talking about. I understood Robert was strange—I thought so too. He made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. But Grey was different . . . he was nothing like his father.

“Ashling, do you even understand how dangerous it is for you on a normal day, much less when you choose your friends so carelessly?” Baran asked. There was an icy spike at the end of his words. It was meant to cut me, but what Baran and Mund didn’t realize was the massive amounts of time I had already spent pondering my life with Grey and what his mortality meant for me. I already knew that one day I would be destined to live without him.

“Yes. Adomnan hunts me, and I’m supposed to unite everyone.”

“Without you to unite us, we remain a lost civilization, and the humans will have no future,” Mund said. “If you risk your life so carelessly, you endanger us all. Protecting you isn’t just about you; it’s about protecting our family and protecting the humans. We are all servants to Old Mother, even you. You are one of her wolves.”

“I’m not trying to kill myself. I love him. That’s never going to change. I understand your fear for my well-being, but you need to understand my fear of living without him. I know he’s not a werewolf, nor is he human. I am not threatened by him, and neither should you be. You both agreed to let me make my own choices. So let me. I will respect your wishes and let you know when and where I’ll be. But I expect you to trust me too.”

I felt a sense of satisfaction in saying what I did. It made me feel good. I finally stood up for myself, for what I believed in, and it felt right.

I had the right to love. And I had the right to fight for it.

“Agreed,” Baran said.

“Fine,” Mund said. “But we have one more subject to discuss.”

What else could there possibly be left to batter to death? It was like kicking a dead horse. It was already dead, what was he trying to prove? I would get to be with Grey. There was nothing left to discuss.

“What’s that?” I asked.

Baran said, “You shouldn’t have sex until your souls are bound to one another and you’ve been branded. It’s tradition. Mating will bind you with his soul for eternity. Which you might think is what you want now, but your soul will be bound to that other life. If you don’t choose wisely, you risk losing yourself.”

“What do you mean, losing myself?” I asked.

“The humans go from one mate to another, leaving pieces of themselves behind. Until there is nothing left. You only have only one chance,” Mund said.

“Ashling, it is important you understand this. By mating with him, your soul will be matched with his for eternity, and even after he dies and you move on, your soul will never be free of his,” Baran said. There was a deep sadness in his eyes. I couldn’t explain it, but just speaking those words broke him somehow.