Out of the Dark (10 page)

"You said you are a healer?" Jen asked.

"Yes, I am. But I am not only a healer."

"Your eyes glow," Jen's words were soft as she pieced the puzzle together, "Mother of pearl
;
you're a dormant aren't you?"

Rachel's mouth took on a slight curve as she smiled at Jen's odd words. "Yes, I am a dormant. I'm the last one born in 5 centuries, both gypsy healer and dormant Canis lupis."

"Why are you living here all alone without a pack?"

"Try to relax
.
T
his could take a while," Rachel sat back in her chair and crossed one leg over the other. She looked off at nothing unparticular gathering her thoughts and
trying to decide
where she should begin her story.

"Gavril, my mate was a mighty Alpha three centuries ago to the Western Romanian Pack,"

"Western Romanian?" Jen interrupted.

Rachel cocked her head, a very wolf like gesture.

Jen raised her hands in surrender, "Sorry, got it. No interrupting, hold all applause until the end of the show."

Rachel shook her head, "You are very strange."

"You have no idea," Jen muttered under her breath but kept her attention on Rachel, waiting for her to go on.

"For centuries the Romanian packs were divided. Eastern and Western. Both were ruled by powerful Alpha's who were surprisingly agreeable most of the time. They had a shaky alliance that turned into a friendship over the years. My great-grandmother was the gypsy healer to the Western pack. Eastern pack did not have a healer and because of the friendship between the Alphas, the
Eastern
Alpha would allow my great-grandmother to go and attend their wolves when needed. She wound up having an affair with a werewolf, although now I believe she was actually his mate. Through that pairing a daughter was conceived and so on and so forth until I was born. At first
,
I thought
that
I was
just
a fourth generation healer and dormant
. 
Gavril
was the pack historian.  He had no reason to know otherwise, so that is how he recorded me. 
But after the werewolf wars, and my mother's death, it became apparent that I was the only healer left. That was when
I was finally told who I really was
.
  S
he
had
finally
decided that
it was time to remind the wolves of
their
history."

"She who?" Jen asked.

"We will get to her soon enough." 

Rachel paused
momentarily and
Jen took advantage of the silence, "Okay back up a sec Charlie Brown, what do you mean they think your great-grandmother had a mate? Wasn't she human?"

Rachel nodded, "She was human," before Jen could interrupt Rachel held up a finger stopping her, "But more importantly, she was a gypsy healer." She didn't elaborate but just let that sink in.

Jen's mouth fell open
.
E
ven though it hurt horrifically
,
she propped herself up on her side gingerly, "Bloody hell, you can't be saying what I think you are saying. But you are, aren't you? Gypsy healers can mate with Canis lupis."

"Not 'can'," Rachel clarified, "will."

"Will?" Jen's eyebrows rose at the declaration.

"Gypsy healers are always the mate to a Canis lupis."

"Then why aren't their more dormants?"

"It is very difficult for werewolves to procreate
, there is a reason for this but we won't get into that right now
.
I
t's even rare
r
with healers and a wolf. A child born of a healer and a wolf only comes every four or five centuries. I was the last known gypsy healer/dormant."

"Okay
,
so how can there be gypsy healers that aren't dormants then?" Jen challenged.

"How was the mate of the Romanian Canis lupis prince conceived and not full wolf?"

"Touche'," Jen conceded, "So there are
gypsies
who have chosen to be with humans
?
"

"When they could not find their mate, or their mate died before they were bonded. Then yes
,
some chose a life with a human and would wind up bearing children from that union," Rachel explained.

"Okay, I'm with you. Hit me with some more," Jen laid back down, her lips flattening in a tight line as she eased onto her back.

"Since my mother was a healer, I grew up around werewolves but most of my friends were from a village a couple of miles
away
from the pack den. My mother kept me, for the most part, away from the males for as long as she could
. 
I believe she was worried that I would find a mate at too young an age. When I hit puberty
,
I began to exhibit unusual physical attributes that were getting difficult to conceal from the humans. My eyes, for instance, took on a slight glow
.  W
hen I would feel strong emotions, they would glow just like a full blood Canis lupis. I had to be careful and learn to control my emotions. Although my mother wanted to keep me from the males, I had to learn
the skills of
being a healer. As I continued to get older I started going with her to see her patients. I would see Gavril from time to time and began to feel a pull towards him. When I mentioned it to my mother she told me that it wasn't time. I didn't really understand what she meant until later.

"One day
,
I was with one of my friends from the village and she saw my eyes glow
—
really glow. You have to remember
that
this was a time when the mere mention of witchcraft would get
you hung, or burned. Anything out of the ordinary was looked upon as suspicious. She promised not to tell anyone, but naturally
,
her fear overcame her loyalty to me. After she told her mother what she had seen, her mother
convinced
her to bring me to their village. I trusted her
;
she told me she had something to show me. And because I trusted her
,
I followed her to my death."

Jen's breath caught as she heard the raw emotion in Rachel's voice. She saw her eyes glowing but also the steely determination written on the healer
’
s face.

"What did they do to you?" Jen asked gently.

"They tried to burn me at the stake," she answered matter of fact like.

"What?" Jen's mouth dropped open and her eyes
,
wide as saucers
,
revealed the indignation she felt at Rachel's revelation.

"I say
tried
because as they were
about to light
the fire
,
he
came. Like an angry, wild
,
magnificent storm. He tore through the crowd that had come to watch me burn to death. I thought he would kill every person there. And the ones who chose to stay, he did slaughter."

Jen listened, captivated by Rachel's words as she imagined Gavril coming for her, saving her. Surely Decebel would do the same. While Rachel had been talking she had continued to seek out Decebel's mind but he was blocking her. She could still feel him, but there were no words or images or emotions. She didn't know what was going on with him, but
deep down Jen
knew
that
something was majorly wrong with her wolf.

"It was in that time of intense emotion,
” Rachel continued.
“A
nd dire need
,
that I heard his voice in my head. He saved me
.
A
nd when he took me back to the pack, he claimed me. My mother
told me that she had long suspected that the Alpha would be my mate
. Gavril was
thoroughly
confused as to
how
I
could have
been in his pack
for so long without there being any mating signs.  Our bond only solidified after
I was nearly killed.

My mother explained that sometimes
,
with dormants, 
mating signs will only be revealed after
a major cataclysmic event
.  These traumatic events sometimes
bring out the wolf in the dormant so that she can bond with her mate. The more diluted the blood, the more intense the cataclysmic event will need to be."

Jen rolled her eyes, "Yeah, I got front row seats to that show."

Rachel once again looked at Jen in confusion, "What does that mean?"

"You know how I told you
that
I
also
have a mate?"

"Yes
.
"

"Well there were no mating signs until I was nearly killed. Nothing. There were only two reasons that we were convinced
that we were mates
. The first, my blood tests came back as inhuman, and the second, the
indescribable
pull
that we feel towards each other
."

Rachel smiled at her, understanding etched in her face. "It took that crisis for your wolf to surface. Hard to believe,
I know
, but you
do
have Canis lupis blood, which means
that
you hold a wolf
inside
as well. It's just tucked way down deep. What mating sign appeared?"

"We can hear each other's thoughts." Jen's smile lit up the room as she remembered hearing Decebel's voice in her mind for the first time, "I don't think I've ever wanted anything so much than to hear his voice in my head." A single tear escaped Jen's eye and made a path down her
clean, soft cheek
. She wanted to hear it again. Needed to hear it. But he wouldn't let her in.

Jen wiped the tear away and looked up into Rachel's softly glowing eyes, "So then what happened, after he claimed you?"