Chapter 17
ZAK
“Have you been out this way before?” Evander asks as we pass through Titirangi’s small township.
“Not really, nah,” I answer quietly, briefly glancing out the window.
The restaurants and bars are still open, and light spills out onto the street, as do customers heading home.
I focus back on Rose. She’s still sleeping, still breathing, and I keep finding myself staring at the rise and fall of her chest and the pink of her cheeks.
She’s here. She’s alive.
“It’s not the place I’d expect someone to say they have a holiday home,” I add after a moment.
“I’ve known a few people in the TV industry who live out this way, but it seems to be more of a lifestyle thing, not just a weekend destination.
” The little that I know of Titirangi can be summed up by hippie vibes and native bush, and I have no idea if I’ve even got that right.
“Yeah, it definitely is,” Evander agrees.
“Particularly for humans. Ellie and I already have a similar setting on Motuwai; like Waiheke and Titirangi, there’s a lot of artists, creatives, and artisan food places.
We supply quite a few of the local restaurants here, which is how I ended up seeing the house for sale. ”
“Of course, the wine.”
Evander nods. “It’s a convenient enough place for Ellie and I when we have business in Town, in terms of proximity to the city while still being away from everything.
Ellie — and likely Rose — has an affinity with plants and nature, and she’s not a city girl.
She’s still out there digging huge holes and planting decent sized things every day even though she’s supposed to be taking it easy. ”
“Is she…” I actually don’t know what I’m asking. Is she unwell?
“She’s pregnant. Sixteen weeks today.”
Holy shit. I hadn’t realised, but thinking about it now, the dress she wore the other night had been pretty loose around the waist.
Lylia, the fae-were hybrid woman, has been quiet up until this point, but gasps loudly. “Congratulations! We didn’t know!”
“Yeah, that was deliberate on my part,” Evander says dryly, and I don’t miss the way he glances at the woman. I think they’re related, though I’m not sure how. “I don’t need the Maheras coven treating my wife like an experiment.”
“I wouldn’t let them,” Lylia replies, and there’s something dark and ancient in her voice that wasn’t there a moment ago. It’s easy to forget that she’s hundreds of years old. Evander makes a non-committal sound, and Lylia replies with, “I’m serious about this.”
“You’re second in command in the coven, aren’t you? You’re not even hiding the fae from them anymore. Do they know all the other identities you took over the years? I remember when you — Bethyl — ‘died.’ Mom mourned you for years. You know how fucked up that is?”
“You know, you were so polite a few years ago when I was here to save your mate’s life. Now I see the real personality; you do take after your father.”
I have no idea what they’re talking about, but it sounds messy.
Evander says, “I’ve mourned my sister for the past twelve years.
I know what grief feels like. That you did that to my mother and everyone else…
you’d think there’d be a better way.” The car falls silent.
We drive for a good five minutes before Lylia finally speaks again.
“There hasn’t been, and I wasn’t given options. You know, you were going to have to contact me about the pregnancy, anyway. The child will need their own ward.”
“I know.” There’s a growl in Evander’s voice that I haven’t heard before.
“You don’t trust me.”
“How can I?” he asks.
“Because I’m loyal to House Maheras, not any individual within it. I serve the House. My goal is always the preservation and longevity of it.”
“Well I don’t; I’m a shifter alpha first in the eyes of my mother’s family, that’s been made very clear. I don’t want anything to do with the First.”
“Sometimes, we don’t get a choice in these matters, Evander.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“I think you should ask your mother. Ask her what she’s seen, because the current High Witch is slowly dying, and someone will need to take her place.”
I really don’t think I should be hearing this conversation.
Evander shakes his head, and when his gold eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror I want to shrink away.
I may be physically bigger than him, but he’s got that alpha vibe about him that is intimidating as fuck.
“Sorry, Zak,” he says, his face softening.
“You don’t need to hear me arguing with my many-times-great-aunt. ”
“I was wondering if you two were related.”
“Most of them in the main coven are my relations,” Lylia says.
“I never had my own, but my half-brothers all did, and it’s a joy to know their descendants.
Genetics are always a funny thing; sometimes a child is born that looks just like someone else who lived hundreds of years earlier, and it’s like stepping back through time, watching them grow. ”
“And you’re not in contact with the people who did this to Rose?
” I ask, meaning her other people, the fae.
I know how glamour works — we all lived with it and our fake human bodies pre-Unravelling — but I’ve become so used to everyone wandering around in their true forms over the past few years that it’s weird to think about how Lylia is both ancient and actually the fae woman I met earlier this evening, not the twenty-something year old wolf sitting in front of me now.
After all, the universal glamour aged everyone faster, by human life spans, not whatever fae sorcery she’s got going on.
“No. I’m not a fan of the Unseelie, to put it mildly,” she answers. “I suspected, though I didn’t know for certain, that these fae had a Third Realm.”
“Is that what it was? What we saw?”
“Yes, without a doubt. Who knows how many changelings they’ve got trapped down there.”
The thought makes me sick. “Are you gonna save them?”
“I’m just one person,” Lylia answers. “What you’re talking about is a war. That would take a lot of cooperation between the Houses of the First, and other groups, too.”
“Like shifters?” I ask, watching the way she looks at Evander.
“Possibly.”
“My wife and I have a child on the way. We’re not interested in war. We make wine and grow flowers. We’re not warriors. And we’re not skilled in magic.”
Lylia’s “Hmmm,” is so sarcastic that the following silence feels physically painful.
I’m half-expecting Rose to wake when we arrive — it’s fucking cold tonight, and it’s a shock to the system as soon as Evander opens the car door for me — but she remains fast asleep, barely stirring as I climb out of the vehicle with her in my arms, gravel crunching loudly beneath my feet.
A morepork calls from somewhere in the trees, and a moment later the soft hoots of its mate ring out in reply, though it’s way too dark for me to see the shape of the little owls from here.
“Ellie was the same after we had to have the ward put around her,” Evander says quietly. “Which is what Lylia will do for Rose tomorrow. Once she was out, she slept for twelve hours straight, and nothing was going to wake her. The magic takes it out of them.”
“Yeah, she’s been through a lot.”
Evander shakes his head in disbelief, his eyes on Rose’s sleeping face. “That’s an understatement. Let’s get inside the house. I’ll show you the guest bedroom, and then we can talk about next steps.”
The house in question is fancy as fuck, in that ‘designed by an exclusive architect’ kind of way.
It’s more glass than anything else, at least on the lower level — a long rectangular box that stretches back into the native bush, with the wooden upper level stacked on top of it like a lego block.
The warm light from inside it appears to glow like a beacon in the dark, and some of the biggest moths I’ve ever seen flit around the massive floor-to-ceiling windows, their wings flashing in the dark.
While Lylia walks ahead, her boots loud on the wide wooden staircase that leads up to the front door, Evander steps to the side, his phone held to his ear.
He gestures for me to go ahead, so I leave him there in the dark, the words “Hey, baby,” spoken quietly telling me all I need to know.
He’s calling his wife, which makes complete sense.
I’d want to touch base with her too if I were in his shoes.
At first I thought the place was empty, but as I approach the door, Zara of all people appears from a room down the back, her face splitting into a grin the moment I step inside.
“So,” she whispers loudly, “when you said you’d met someone, you sure as hell met someone, eh?
How the hell did you even start getting involved with a ghost?
!” She must see something in my expression — exhaustion, the come down from all the fear and terror of not only this night, but also the weeks and weeks of not knowing if I could save Rose — because her face softens, and she steps forward, rubbing my arm.
“You two have been through a hell of a lot. Come on; I’ve made up a bed for the both of you upstairs.
Finn and I are gonna be staying down the hall.
We’re the enforcers on duty here tonight, one of us will be awake at all times. ”
Most people would probably be pissed that their ex had been the one Evander scheduled to be on call, but after everything, it’s nice to see a familiar face. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that I can trust Zara with my life — and with Rose’s.
“How’s married life treating you?” I ask as I follow her up the stairs. They creak under my weight. “Fuck, aren’t you guys supposed to be on your honeymoon?”
“We don’t leave ’til next week. You’ve got good timing, that’s for sure. How bloody lucky that you came to my wedding and met my new alpha and Rose’s sister.”