Abraxas's Kismet (Sentinels of Apollo Book 1)

Cerys

The revelations of the last couple of hours seemed surreal. I kept reminding myself it wasn’t a dream, and I’d really seen my ex-boyfriend turn into a crow and my current one turn into a wolf. And their friends claimed to be not only more crows but a host of other supernatural beings.

When Heron asked if I ever thought those books I read were real, he knew how much I loved those kinds. We’d often talked about them and what I was reading. I’d even told him how cool I thought it would be if they actually existed. Thinking about it, I was sorta upset that he hadn’t felt he could confide in me when we were together. I would’ve never revealed his secret.

Brax claimed he planned to tell me about himself, but what if the perfect time hadn’t presented itself? Would I have gone through life with him and not know? If he were capable of having children, they would have a chance at being like him. Would I have found out then? I needed to ask him.

I’d finished talking to Twyla. She seemed happy that we’d worked things out and told me to have fun and not do anything she wouldn’t. We both laughed because there wasn’t much she wouldn’t do. We’d finished dinner. Brax insisted on cooking, which I didn’t mind. We were outside on the patio. He was drinking a beer, and I had a glass of wine. Evening was coming, and the sky was painted with so many beautiful colors. It was still hot, but I didn’t mind. That’s when I asked him.

“Brax, I have a question.”

“Ask away.”

“You said you were searching for the right time to tell me about you. I wondered. What if it hadn’t happened? If you could have children, would I have found out only after we had a kid or two who was like you? That would’ve been a shocker.”

He sighed. “Cerys, I would’ve told you, and if we could have kids, it would’ve been well before we had any like me. You don’t know how much I wish we could have them, even if they had no shifting abilities.”

“Is it because of an injury or…” I stopped. I didn’t want to raise bad memories.

“Nothing like that. There’s a lot I still have to tell you about myself and other shifters. One of those is that we’re unable to have children unless we’re with another of our kind. That’s why I told you birth control wasn’t needed. We can have sex with a human without worrying about that. The same goes for sexually transmitted diseases that humans have to worry about. We don’t seem capable of catching or spreading them.”

The sexually transmitted thing was nice to hear, but disappointment flooded me. I knew that Brax was my forever love. The man I’d spend the rest of my life with. As such, I would’ve loved to have kids with him. I’d always seen myself as a mom. I swore if I had them, I’d be way better than my own. I’d model myself after Twyla. She had unlimited love to give. It was a dream that hurt to let go of, but it would hurt more not to have him. He scooted closer.

“Baby, I know that’s something you wanted, wasn’t it? Kids. I might not be able to give them to you in the traditional sense, but we can adopt them. There are plenty of kids looking for homes. I would love to see you pregnant, but it’s not meant to be, even though Nightstalker keeps insisting we get you pregnant with our pup.”

“Pup! I’d have a pup!” I shrieked.

The bastard fell back in his chair, laughing at me. I tried to stand, but he grabbed me and pulled me down on his lap, where he wrapped me in his arms so I couldn’t get away. I elbowed him in the stomach. The bastard didn’t have the decency to have a gut I could elbow.

“No, you wouldn’t have an actual pup. If we could have babies, they would be born human with the ability to transform into a pup if they inherited my genetics.”

“How do you know? You said humans can’t have your offspring.”

“Because even with our kind, we don’t birth cubs, pups, or anything else. They come out in human form.”

I settled, but then I thought of something else. “Brax, do you know why there are so many shifters in the world? Where did they come from? Are there more kinds that you guys didn’t tell us about today? How can you keep your existence a secret?”

“There are a variety of other shifters besides the ones we told you or there were. We’re scattered all over, and there are fewer of us each year. The ability to have children only with each other is one factor in our declining numbers. The natural progression of life, horrible accidents, and such depleted us. Others seem to just disappear. We tend to live in small pockets like in Needles or solitary families. As for how we came to be, yeah, we know, or we’ve been told how it happened. It’s complicated and unbelievable, even to us.”

I settled back to listen.

“There have always been myths about supernaturals. No one knows if supernaturals always existed, even then, or if they were just myths that became real in the fourteenth century. Either way, it was then that there was an explosion of us, and it’s all due to death.”

“Death?”

“Yeah, death or the Black Death, at least. You may recall from your history class that the world was hit with the plague in the thirteen hundreds, and they called it the Black Death. It was mainly a scourge from thirteen forty-seven to thirteen fifty-two. In those five years, the plague was responsible for killing approximately thirty million people. Thirty to fifty percent of Europe died.”

“I do recall it was a huge amount. But how do those deaths relate to supernaturals?”

“I’m getting to that. Many people don’t know that there’s more than one form of the plague. We always hear about bubonic, which you get from fleas who bite an infected rodent and then bite a human. There are two other types. Septicemic is from a flea bite or the bite of an infected animal. The third one is pneumonic, which is from contact with an infected animal and then passes through person-to-person contact.

“Thirty million might’ve died, but countless others got one of these forms of the plague, and they survived against all odds. Those who did were altered by it. They became more. They found they could change into a variety of different animals and beings. Can you imagine surviving and discovering you can change forms and do extraordinary things? It was frightening and exciting.”

“I expect it was, but you speak as if you know it was,” I said.

“I wasn’t alive then, but I’ve known people who were. That’s another thing. We don’t age the same way as regular humans.”

“Oookay, so what, you’re not really in your thirties but in your sixties?” I asked.

He shook his head. He had a concerned look. I gulped.

“How old are you, Brax?”

“Does it matter?”

“No, but I’d still like to know.”

He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he studied me. I was beginning to panic when he spoke. “I’m almost four hundred years old, Cerys. I was born in sixteen twenty-nine near Corfu, Greece. I was the one who immigrated to America, not an ancestor like I led you to believe.”

I gasped, sucking wine into my lungs. I began to cough hard and wheeze as I gasped to clear my lungs and get in some air. Brax yanked my glass out of my hand and slammed it down before pounding on my back.

“Breathe, baby. Shit!” he muttered.

I struggled for a good minute before I entirely cleared my airway and could get a complete inhale of oxygen into my lungs. Brax cuddled me close and rocked me in his arms.

“I’m sorry. I should’ve waited to tell you and not done it as you were drinking.”

“Maybe keep that in mind for when you tell me more. I know there has to be more you want to tell me. How about we hold off? I need to absorb what I already know,” I suggested.

He was quiet for a long time. “Is this all too much for you, astéri mou ? God, tell me this won’t drive us apart.”

I cupped his cheek and rubbed along his hairy jaw. I loved the feel of his whiskers against my skin. You’d expect his beard to feel coarse, but it was soft.

“Abraxas Christou, listen to me. Yes, I’m shocked and a little overwhelmed with everything I’ve learned. However, it isn’t going to make me run. I just need to absorb it in small increments and remember something.”

“What?”

“That I’ll have to take it easy on you when we have sex. You’re an old man, after all.” I smirked.

My words had the desired effect. He growled, which sent shivers of lust through me, and then Brax rose with me in his arms.

“I’ll show you an old man. Are you prepared to let me prove how wrong you are?”

I licked my lips. “Prove away.”