Authors: Dean Murray
"Brindi is
with me. I'm sorry, I don't mean to rub your face in her addiction,
but I couldn't just leave her, not for that long. She…well,
something happened while I was fighting the vampires who almost
killed us all and she's taken a step backwards when it comes to her
control. She's asleep right now, but I would have taken your call
even if she'd been awake. I don't want to be cruel to her, but I'm
not going to pretend like I'm not interested in you. She's just going
to have to deal with things the way they stand."
I kind of felt
like I should be angry, like I should throw a fit about the fact that
he was bringing Brindi, but somehow it didn't matter. Alec had
answered my call and he'd trusted me to know what I could withstand
and not called Isaac when I'd asked him not to. It wasn't like having
someone you could call when you thought you might have overdosed on
something was a prerequisite for a healthy relationship, but I did
appreciate the fact that Alec was treating me like an adult.
Maybe it was
the fact that we'd both already been through so much despite not
being eighteen yet. I felt like that kind of stuff earned me the
right to make some potentially stupid decisions if that was what I
needed to do and it was nice to know that he agreed with me.
"I think
I'm okay now, Alec. Thank you for being there for me."
"You're
welcome. What are you going to do now?"
"I need to
make contact with my mom and sister, so I guess I'll try to fall
asleep."
There was a
pause as Alec carefully weighed his words.
"Are you
feeling tired?"
"No,
actually I'm not, which is a pretty big problem. I need to go to
sleep soon or I could miss my opportunity altogether. I…I'm
not really sure what to do."
Alec could
apparently hear the panic rising in my voice. He spoke quickly in an
attempt to calm me back down.
"You still
have time, Adri. Where's your best guess as to where they are holding
your family?"
"Minnesota
or possibly somewhere nearby."
"Okay,
that's great. That means that they are only, what, one hour ahead of
you? Even if you don't fall asleep for three or four more hours it
still isn't the end of the world. Your mom and sister will still be
asleep and you'll still be able to talk to them. I know you're
worried and stressed out right now, but things aren't so bad that you
need to take another sleeping pill."
"You're
right. How did I not see that?"
"Donovan—he's
our butler, but he's really more than that—used to tell me that
people make bad decisions and struggle to communicate when they are
sick, in pain, or feeling stressed. Right now you're a combination of
all three of those. Given everything else that's happening, it's not
surprising that you're going out of your head a little right now.
It's completely understandable."
"Really?
Somehow I'm having a hard time seeing you make that mistake."
"Trust me,
I've made plenty of mistakes and for a lot of them I didn't have
anywhere near as good an excuse as you do right now, but that's
another story. Do you want me to let you go to sleep now or would you
rather I stay on the phone with you?"
"I think
I'd like you to stay on the phone with me."
As I levered
myself off of the floor and into my bed I wondered if I was making a
mistake. Taking care of my family was still the most important thing,
the one thing that nothing else could be allowed to supersede. Looked
at in that light, staying on the phone was a betrayal of them.
I should be
hanging up so I could lie there in the dark and try to sleep, but I
was fairly certain that even if I did that I wouldn't be able to
sleep. Besides, I was having a hard time believing that I was really
through the woods with regards to whatever it was that my second dose
of sleeping pills had done to me. It seemed impossible that I could
have snapped back so quickly.
I'd actually
been worried that I might die. You couldn't go from that kind of pain
and weakness to feeling fine at the drop of a hat like I had. Talking
to Alec meant that I'd have a safety net if my body went back into
some kind of withdrawal shock. Besides, being on the phone was
comforting in a way that I couldn't explain.
We barely knew
each other. I didn't even have as much history with Alec as I had
with Taggart, but the idea of us together still felt so right that I
had a hard time thinking rationally about him most of the time.
Alec's yawn was
so prodigious that I heard it despite his effort to cover it up.
"Okay, I'd like that." He yawned again before I managed to
get a response in.
"Are you
sure? You suddenly sound super tired."
"No…I
mean yes. I want to talk to you, and I should be fine for hours
still. I don't know, I'm just all of a sudden way more tired than I
should be. It's probably still just the after-effects of the fight
with the vampires."
"Were you
hurt really badly?"
Alec took so
long to respond that I almost started worrying that he'd fallen
asleep at the wheel. "No, I was hardly even scratched, this was
something else, but I need you not to tell anyone about it, not even
Taggart or Isaac."
"I'll keep
it quiet if that's what you want, Alec."
"I think I
manifested my power finally. The vampires we ran into completely
outclassed us. The oldest one was a mentalist and he was strong
enough to freeze us all in our tracks."
I couldn't help
the gasp that made it past my lips. "I didn't even know that was
possible."
"To be
honest, neither did I. We ran into a vampire a few weeks ago who was
able to take one person at a time over and force them to attack
whomever he wanted, but this was exponentially more powerful than
that."
"So what
happened next?"
"I don't
know exactly how to explain it, but it was like something opened up
inside of me, a rift of some kind that wanted to consume everything
around me—only it couldn't because it was part of me and it
couldn't break free like it wanted to. About then the mentalist lost
control over me and I killed him."
"That
sounds a lot like what Taggart says that werewolves do."
"Yeah, I
think you're right. I've turned into the hybrid equivalent of a
werewolf, which is good in that it saved all of our lives, but bad in
that it means I'm a failure."
There was such
quiet resignation in his voice that I wished he were there with me so
that I could wrap my arms around him.
"How can
that possibly make you a failure?"
"Because
it means that I'm just another weapon. I'm no better than Brandon or
Puppeteer. Everyone has been waiting for the last decade and a half
to see what form my power would take, but it was only recently that I
found out the other half of the story. My father's gift is the
ability to heal incredibly quickly, but that's not all. He has…for
lack of a better term let's call it a secondary ability. He increases
the population growth rate of the shape shifters around him. Most
shape shifters are doing really well if they can manage to have one
child every twenty or thirty years."
"So
rarely?"
"Yeah. We
live so much longer than humans that it isn't as bad as it sounds. A
pair of shape shifters could conceivably have nine or ten children,
but the truth is that most of us don't survive long enough to have
more than two or three. Between the dominance fights inside of our
own packs, the infighting between packs, the wars between us and the
jaguars, and the vampires, most of us don't make it nearly as long as
we otherwise would."
"So your
dad's ability changes that equation?"
"Yeah, the
Sanctuary pack has seen a population explosion the likes of which
nobody has ever seen before. Some women are having children as
frequently as every two to three years."
"That's
incredible, Alec."
"Yeah. It
basically means that the Sanctuary pack is growing faster than the
next ten biggest packs combined. For the first time in centuries our
species has a chance of outgrowing the losses we're experiencing. My
dad's gift is a game-changer, one that has the potential to make
everything better for our entire race. Mallory said that my gift when
it finally manifested would be stronger than Kaleb's, but there was
never any guarantee of what form it would take. I know that my
friends and the rest of the resistance need another weapon right now,
but I was hoping for something that would serve double duty somehow,
something that would help keep us all alive at the same time that it
made a bigger difference for everyone."
"I'm sorry
that things didn't work out like you wanted them to, Alec, but I
think you're selling yourself short. If you can stop a vampire who is
thousands of years old, then you can stop a lot of other threats that
nobody else can deal with and that could make a massive difference.
You can bring this war to a close more quickly than anyone is
expecting and that will mean a lot of lives saved. It doesn't matter
how many babies your dad's power helps bring into the world if he
just sends them all into a meat grinder so he can take over yet
another pack. There are two sides to that population equation and
you're only focusing on one of them."
"You know,
you're right. I've been looking at this all wrong. I've been
comparing myself to Brandon and Puppeteer, but I don't have to be a
destroyer like them, I can be a preserver. How did you get to be so
smart, Adri Paige?"
"I don't
know, but I was just thinking the same thing about you, Alec Graves."
We talked for
twenty more minutes before I nodded off and during the course of that
conversation I realized something very important. Talking to Alec
didn't have to be a betrayal of my family. He made me something more
than I was by myself, something better, something stronger.
Alec Graves fit
together with me in ways that I didn't fully understand, but we
definitely belonged together. He was everything I'd ever wanted, even
despite all of the craziness with Brindi, and I wasn't going to stop
fighting for him as long as it was within my power to do so.
Now I just had
to hope and pray that I would get the chance to get to know him
better. I was falling in love with Alec and I'd realized that it
didn't always have to be an either-or choice between him and my
family, but if none of the plans that Taggart, Isaac and I had just
spent the last day and a half putting together worked, then I was
still going to turn myself over to the vampires and just hope beyond
hope that they would really let my parents and sister go in return.
Adriana Paige
Marauder's Gas Station
Central Wyoming
Once I was
asleep it only took me a couple of minutes to pull myself into my
mom's dream. She was sitting on a bench in a familiar-looking park
with her legs pulled up under her chin.
It was the only
time I could remember her looking vulnerable. Usually she was so sure
of herself—she almost looked like a different person here. I
started towards her, planning on giving her a hug, but even the
initial rush of emotion at seeing her after so long wasn't strong
enough for me to carry through with something like that.
I slowed down,
intending on stopping several feet away from her, but she heard me
approaching and spun around. "Adri, is that really you? Cindi
told us that you were able to visit people's dreams, but I'd almost
lost hope that you would come find us."
She jumped to
her feet and wrapped her arms around me, squeezing hard enough that I
nearly couldn't breathe. I shook my head at her in astonishment.
"Didn't
Dad tell you that I visited him last night?"
"No, they
are keeping all three of us separated. I haven't seen your dad in
almost two days. Have you called the police yet?"
"The cops
already know you're missing, Mom. There's no need for me to call
them."
"That's
crazy. When people get kidnapped, you call the police."
"Okay,
Mom, let's say that I call the police. What should I tell them?"
"I don't
know, Adri. They drove us away from home, so we're probably still
somewhere in Minnesota. I mean, we were only on the road for a couple
of hours."
"Great,
I'll just call and tell them that you were taken away in a yellow
truck and you're somewhere within two hours' drive of home."
"Exactly."
"At which
point they'll ask me how I know that and I'll tell them that my mom
and dad told me that bit of information in a dream I had last night
and they'll either hang up on me or they'll take me in for
questioning as a suspect in your disappearance."
That shut her
up, which was a relief. It was funny how time and distance could make
you forget that someone made you want to rip your hair out, but as
soon as you were back around them all of those feelings of
frustration just came roaring right back.
"You don't
need to be so snippy about things, Adri."
"I'm
sorry, Mom. You're right, I should have handled things better than
that. I need to pull Cindi here into the dream with us—I'll
need some quiet so I can concentrate, but once I'm done I'll be able
to answer both of your questions at the same time."
"Oh, that
would be wonderful. I've been so worried about her!"
Part of me
wanted to ask if she'd been at all worried about me while I'd been
gone, but I figuratively sat on all of those feelings of resentment.
Now wasn't the time or place to get into some kind of yelling match
with my mom.
Actually, I
wasn't sure that there would ever be a time and place to address all
of the baggage I was still carrying around, but now definitely wasn't
that time. I gritted my teeth and forced myself to concentrate on the
task at hand.