Chapter Six
S IX
When I wake up, my stomach’s roiling, and at first I mistake it for hunger. Waking peckish—even ravenous—isn’t new for me. When I do smell food, my stomach churns, telling me hunger isn’t the problem. My head hurts, and I feel ready to vomit.
I turn my head in to the pillow. Then I stop and sniff. It smells wrong, like when we’re on a holiday. The pillow cover is clean and smells of soap, but it’s not mine.
Did Lenora and I take a holiday? I remember talking about going away…
Struggling to focus, I sit up and scrub my hands over my face. When I exhale deeply, the stays of my corset fight back.
I went to bed corseted? I lift a hand to my hair, which has only partly come loose from its twist. Still groggy, I distractedly tug out the clip and run my fingers through my hair, loosening the pins.
“You look so much like your mother.”
I jump, my hands rising for a knockback. A man sits at the foot of my bed. He’s about forty, wearing a suit that’s less fashionable than Bishop’s but still tailored to fit his brawny body. What catches my eye, though, is his honey-colored hair and greenish-blue eyes.
The eyes that peer from my looking glass each day.
Everything that’s happened tumbles back, and my throat closes.
Is this my father?
No, he’s too young. An uncle perhaps?
“Your mother used to do that,” he says. “Unwind her hair at night.”
“Who are you?” I ask, and my voice comes rough, my throat aching from the chloroform.
“Silas Stockwell,” he says, rising. “Alpha of the Albion Pack. Your father.”
“You’re not old enough.”
His laugh rings out, surprisingly light for his size. “Well, that isn’t the first thing I imagined you saying to me. Werewolves age slowly. I’m nearly sixty.”
He kidnapped me. I want to gather my outrage and hurl it at him, but I can’t find it. I’m tired and confused, and all I can do is stare.
My father.
I’ve never had any relationship with those words. No father, no grandfather, no uncles. When other children spoke of theirs, I didn’t feel a sense of loss. How do you grieve for what you never had?
What I’d felt was curiosity. Sometimes having a father seemed a horrible thing, bruises and black eyes the only mark they left on their children’s lives. But other times, seeing children playing with their fathers, I’d wondered what it would be like to have one in my life.
It’d been purely theoretical speculation. Even if my father were alive, I never expected to meet him. My mother said she didn’t even remember his name.
Silas Stockwell. That’s his name.
Alpha of the Albion werewolf Pack.
And they never told me. My mother. My aunt.
They knew, and they concocted stories to cover up everything that had always felt wrong about me.
A well-honed sense of smell was from my perfumer father.
An enormous appetite? I was a big and healthy girl.
A restlessness, deep in my bones? I was independent and curious, that was all.
They could have explained the truth with a single word.
Werewolf.
And yet they didn’t.
Because I was tainted.
To them—to most supernaturals—I had monstrous blood. My mother had tried to prepare me, in case my true heritage ever came out, by telling me werewolves weren’t all vicious brutes. But my aunt had never been able to hide her distaste.
More than distaste.
Hatred.
My aunt hated werewolves.
And I was half werewolf.
Did she think if she never spoke of it, we could pretend it wasn’t true?
“Cordelia?” my father says. Then his eyes cloud. “May I call you that?”
I nod wordlessly.
He continues, “I understand you’re confused, maybe even angry, and I don’t blame you. When I dreamed of our first meeting, it wasn’t like this.”
The corners of his lips twitch in a semi-smile. “Bishop underestimated you, though I must admit I’m pleased that you didn’t just follow a stranger without explanation. That you fought back, with everything you had at hand, even a knife.” That smile blossoms. “You really are your mother’s daughter.”
My mother was never the fighter. Is he confusing her with Lenora?
He must see my reaction, because he settles back onto the bed.
“You can’t see your mother stabbing anyone?
You should have met her when she was your age.
I thought I was rescuing her from a dangerous half-demon, but she accused me of interfering.
Said she could have handled him… and she was right.
It took months to convince her to even speak to me again.
She had no time for men, certainly not a besotted werewolf.
She had her apothecary business and a young sister to care for.
But I was persistent, and eventually she let me love her and even—miracle of miracles—came to love me back. ”
“What happened?”
His smile turns wistful, almost pained. “You. Your mother and I both underestimated the danger of your existence. We were too deeply in love—with each other and with our new daughter. When the world showed us the danger, your mother decided to take you to the coast for a quiet life. She changed her life for you, and she never regretted it.”
“You saw her afterward?”
That pain sharpens. “Twice. We decided meeting was too hard for us and too unsafe for you.”
“Unsafe how? You said something about the danger of my existence?”
He meets my eyes. “You’re the daughter of a werewolf. That would always make you a target. But you’re also a witch, which makes you more valuable. And now Bishop says you’re a lycan. ” He shakes his head. “No wonder they came for you.”
“Who came for me?”
“I’m working to get those answers. The people who attacked your aunt’s house are supernatural mercenaries.
Such an operation requires a great deal of money.
My initial investigations tell me they were hired by a foreign Pack.
Likely from the Continent. There are two contenders and—” He shakes his head again. “I’ll figure out which one it was.”
“Why would a foreign Pack want me?”
He goes quiet, and my heart thuds.
“Tell me,” I say. “I always want the truth, no matter what.”
His mouth curves in a sad smile. “So much like your mother. All right. Your value to them is in your bloodline, your power. They want what you’d pass on to your children.”
I recoil. “They want me as a broodmare?”
“That’s why I didn’t want Bishop to tell you. My daughter reduced to a valuable womb—?” He snaps off the words as his voice rises with anger. “But that’s the ugly truth, Cordelia. Werewolves are always looking to strengthen their stock, to find women capable of bearing the strongest sons.”
“But—but witches only bear daughters.”
He lifts a finger. “That only applies if they have no other supernatural blood. You’re half werewolf, which means you can have sons, particularly if their father is also a werewolf. It’s been well documented.”
“So I’m a woman with a werewolf father and secondary traits that foreign packs believe would bolster their own werewolf blood. That plus the fact I’m a witch…”
“You’re a strong witch. From strong witch stock. A family known to fight when most witches hide.”
I bristle at the insult to others. As my mother always said, the fact that Levines have a reputation as dangerous foes is useful but not unique. But I understand what he means. Werewolves would value Levine blood because of our reputation.
I look him in the eye. “My aunt insisted on fleeing after Bishop found me. She knew who he was, who he works for, and it—you—frightened her.”
He rocks back, inhaling sharply. Then he shakes his head. “I was never Lenora’s enemy, but she couldn’t see that.”
“Explain.”
His face softens with amusement. “And there I see your aunt. Clever and forthright.” The smile fades.
“I presumed Lenora was fleeing because she had learned about the threat against you. But, yes, if she thought I sent Bishop to fetch you, she would leave. Your aunt and I… don’t get on.
” He rubs at his mouth. “Which might be the greatest understatement ever.”
I think of my aunt’s feelings about werewolves and shiver as I imagine how she’d have felt about my mother taking one as a lover, having a child with one.
“My aunt is not fond of werewolves.”
He gives a short laugh. “Another understatement. But there is more to it than that. I mentioned that I rescued your mother from a half-demon. He was involved—romantically—with your aunt. He was entangling himself with her to get to your mother. Your mother understood that. Lenora was young and in love, and to her, I was a savage brute who jumped to wrong conclusions and murdered her lover.”
“Murdered…”
He meets my eyes, his gaze steady. “You told me you want the truth. Always. Werewolves don’t chase away threats and give them the opportunity to slink back.”
I remember the town house. The screams.
Then I think of Henrietta, lying dead on the landing.
Only I’m the one who did that. Not Bishop or his cousin.
Did they kill the others? Probably. Do I judge them for that? No. I’m a Levine. If my aunt encounters a serious threat, she eliminates it permanently, and she’s prepared me to do the same.
I see Henrietta’s sightless eyes again. Was I prepared? No, I was not.
I shake that off and steer my thoughts back to what my father said about killing Lenora’s lover.
Lenora had been young and in love. She’d told herself that my father was wrong, my mother was wrong, that it was all a mistake, that a werewolf—a supernatural type she despised for their brutality—had overreacted.
I say slowly, “I understand why my aunt’s half-demon beau needed to be eliminated, and I also understand why Lenora would blame you.”
“Which she did, and she might have left it at that if I hadn’t then wooed and won your mother, inserting myself between them. I was in love, and I blustered in, ignoring the damage I caused.”
His thick fingers knead the bed coverlet. “I got your mother with child, which made her need to flee the city while Lenora stayed. It’s little wonder your aunt hates me.”
“You haven’t spoken to her since I came to London?”
“I tried, and she ran me off, saying if I ever contacted you, she would do to me what I’d done to her lover. I said that if she promised to do the same to anyone who touched you, I’d honor her wishes.”
He rolls up a sleeve to show a black scar across his thick forearm. “This was her answer, which I took to mean the question insulted her and you were safe under her protection.”
“But now you’ve decided to interfere with her guardianship?”
He exhales, and it’s a slow, pained sound.
“Your mother and I agreed not to tell you about your heritage—your werewolf blood—until you were older. It would be particularly important if you started to show secondary traits. But she never got the chance to tell you, and Lenora refused. I disagreed with that. Strongly.”
I wait, holding my breath. My father was right, and Lenora was wrong, but even thinking that feels disloyal.
He continues, “You needed to know about me, Cordelia. About your heritage. How else could you understand the threat? I told Lenora that I feared you’d become a target once you were of children-bearing age, but she wouldn’t believe me.
She thinks that’s just an excuse to insert myself into your life. ”
His voice softens. “I always trusted her to watch over you, Cordelia, to the best of her ability. But I’ve been keeping an eye and an ear out, in case the threat against you became a reality, and now it has, and she didn’t even know it was coming.”
He raises a hand. “I don’t mean to insult Lenora. If I thought we could work together, that would be my first choice. I still hope we can.”
“You’re not returning me to her, are you.”
He meets my gaze. “Not yet. I won’t lie. I have an idea of how to end the threat. I’ll be sure Lenora knows you’re safe, while praying she doesn’t kill my messenger. You’ll stay at our country estate while I deal with this.”
“Then I can go back to Lenora?”
“Of course. She can protect you against most threats, and from the way you fought today, you can protect yourself quite well. You just need a little more training.”
I want to argue, of course. To snap that I don’t know him, and I’m not going anywhere with him. But is that the sensible thing to do? I keep thinking of Audrey, who could have been killed because I refused to go with Bishop this morning, which had also seemed the sensible thing.
If these other packs get hold of me, I’d be forced into the kind of life that—as a witch—I was never supposed to live, under a man’s rule.
Yet to avoid that fate, I need to submit to it temporarily.
Accept my father’s rule. I hate to do that, and yet I see the logic in it.
This is his world. Let him handle this threat—or at least give him a chance to try.
“You mentioned training,” I say finally. “Can you help me with that?”
“Learning to protect yourself?” He smiles. “Nothing would make me happier. While I’m dealing with this threat, I’ll have Bishop teach you how to use your secondary powers.”
“Bishop?”
He frowns. “Is that a problem?”
“No, just…” I swallow and think of what my aunt said, calling Bishop ruthless.
Then I think of him in the attic, naked save for a cloth wrapped about his waist, and I have a feeling it would be much too easy to ignore my aunt’s warnings.
Or to accept them… and decide they only add delicious shadows to be explored.
I shake it off. “I would like to learn more about what I am.”
“Bishop then. It will be Bishop.”