Chapter 8 #2
Calia stared at him, her mouth barely ajar as she slowly lowered her half-empty cup to her lap. “So, no one here in your tower knows who you really are?”
He shook his head. “I am the cursed one. The beastly Wraith of the dark tower to the north, who has become the punishment of the clans.”
“Punishment of the clans?”
“My housekeeper, Mynlis Nalwes, my steward, Tanpip Berreg, and all those serving beneath them are fulfilling their life sentences here. Their clans exiled them and sentenced them either to serve here or die.”
“What did they do to deserve that?”
“Most of them did nothing other than anger the wrong person. The Ninth Realm is not the kingdom it once was.” His heart ached with heaviness over all that had been lost or callously tossed aside.
It pained him to share that Talon and Tanner did not rule justly.
“It would seem my sons have not received the guidance necessary to make them wise overseers of the clans.”
“And of course, the curse prevented you from having any input.” She set aside her tea once again. “Have you even spoken to them?”
“No.” He pushed up from the chair and went to the cabinet.
This conversation called for whisky. “The royal court allows the Wraith admittance but once a year, and I am kept at a distance from my sons. Bansys is not a fool.” Without turning, he drained the glass and poured himself another, then returned to his seat.
“That is the curse I have lived with for the past three hundred years.” He prayed she would keep his suffering in mind when he told her the only way he could be rid of it.
“And there is naught but one way to break it.”
“How?”
“Win the heart of an otherworldly woman who refuses to love.”
She stared at him, blinking ever so slowly as if struggling to rise from the depths of slumber. “And that would be me.” She flinched as though suffering renewed pain.
“Aye, lass. That would be ye.”
“Why me?” The tremor in her voice twisted his soul as she raked her fingers through her hair, combing it back from her face. “Why?”
“Because we are fated mates, and that bond is the only possibility for either of us to learn to love someone other than our children. Much like yerself, I swore I would never risk my heart. I believed love to be a silly fairy tale for younglings.” Unable to decipher the shadows in her eyes, he gave a despondent shrug.
“Mairwen and her ilk felt it their calling to find the other half of my soul since I was once also the Ninth Realm’s leader of the Defenders of the Blessed Highland Veil.
They have searched for ye ever since the curse took hold of me.
’Tis important for the balance of what was, what is, and what will be, that no realm or reality falls.
That is another reason they swore to help me.
The Ninth Realm needs us. My sons are failing as rulers. ”
She slowly shook her head. “I don’t know what to say.
” She rose from the chair, wrapping the blanket around her like a cloak.
Making her way to the hearth, she stared down at the flames, then hissed with what sounded like a bitter laugh full of disbelief.
“I’ve allowed myself to become a pawn in another stupid game.
One of the main reasons I moved to Scotland to become a hermit, more or less, was to put an end to that.
” She shook her head. “Why does this keep happening? It’s happened all my life. ”
“Ye are not a pawn, lass.” He knew it might seem that way, but he prayed she realized he would never force her to do anything she didn’t wish to do. “We could find happiness here, ye and I.”
She turned to him, her eyes narrowing. “Of course you would say that. This is where you belong, and you want your old life back.”
He tossed all caution to the wind and joined her in front of the fire, bracing himself, knowing this couldn’t possibly go well, yet there was no other way. It would have to be addressed at some point. “Ye belong here too. This is where yer wolf once lived.”
Her already cutting glare hardened. “If you’re referring to Otto, he came from a shelter in Tennessee. In fact, he was born there. They had pictures to prove it.”
“I am not referring to yer Otto.” He widened his stance, uncertain how the alpha female within her would react when Calia finally discovered the truth that the pale one had taken such great pains to hide.
“That inner voice ye sometimes hear is yer wolf. Here, she was known as the pale one, the protector of the lost, revered as one of the most powerful alpha females in the history of the Ninth Realm.”
Calia edged farther away from him, eyeing him as if he were about to attack her. “Why would you say such a thing about an inner voice? Everybody has an inner voice. It’s called intuition or gut instinct.”
“My wolf heard yer inner voice. She is royalty of the purest bloodline. When she speaks, he hears her.” He wouldn’t add that another reason his wolf could hear the pale alpha was because the two of them were fated mates, just like Calia and himself.
“It’s intuition,” she said, biting out the words. “Your wolf is mistaken.”
“The pale one just told her ye speak the truth,” Dubh said, “and she is not pleased that ye upset Calia. She meant to tell her in her own good time.”
“Then why did yer intuition just tell ye that I speak the truth?” Mathison asked Calia.
She bared her teeth and growled so convincingly that he expected her to shift. “Get out of my head and stay out. You have no right there.”
“’Tis only my wolf able to hear yers. I swear I canna listen to yer thoughts, nor would I ever do so even if I could.
” When Mairwen did that to him, he found it intrusive and infuriating.
Never would he do such a thing to Calia.
“Yer headaches are further proof that ye belong here. When a shifter has difficulties, or canna take the form of their spirit animal, it often causes them pain such as yers.”
She dropped to the floor in front of the fire and held her head, huddling deep into the blanket and rocking in place.
Mathison hated himself for doing this to her.
He had pushed her too far. Unable to hold himself back any longer, he scooped her up into his arms, settled with her in the wingback chair, and held her.
“I can’t do this anymore,” she said with a muffled sob as she curled into a tighter ball of misery. “I can’t.”
“I am here, and here I shall stay. Ye are not alone, lass. Never will ye ever be alone ever again.” He wouldn’t tell her it would be all right, because at this moment, she couldn’t see it, and honestly, neither could he.
The road ahead would be treacherous at best for both of them.
But he could assure her he would always remain at her side.
He held her closer, stroking her hair and shushing her as though she were a frightened bairn. Such an enormous change would shake anyone clear to their bones.
She shuddered with harder sobs, keeping her face buried in the blanket and clutching her head, oblivious to his holding her. “I can’t do this anymore. I always tried to be strong. Stand my ground, but I can’t anymore. I’ve been backed into a corner since I was born.”
“Ye’re not alone anymore,” he crooned softly. “I shall always fight beside ye.”
“I have no one but Otto—and now, even he’s deserted me.” It was as if she hadn’t heard him, or still wasn’t ready to accept that he’d never desert her.
“Otto is a pup that is easily distracted by all the unfamiliar smells of Wraith Tower. I promise ye, he has not forgotten ye.” Mathison tossed caution to the wind once again.
“Tell me why ye feel ye’ve been backed into a corner since ye were born?
” To help her, he needed to know more of her history.
Still shuddering with hiccuping sobs, she shook her head.
“According to the caseworkers, I was abandoned at the hospital when I was born, and then passed back and forth from family to family. People who thought they wanted to adopt an infant kept returning me to the state home because I somehow failed to fit in with their families. At least, that was what my file said—so I grew up in the foster system, moving from house to house until I was old enough to be out on my own.” She pushed herself up and glared at him.
“How can a baby that’s just days old not fit in with a family?
One file even said they thought I was demon-possessed.
They took me to their church for an exorcism that failed. ”
Mathison suspected it was her shifter abilities that had frightened the mortals and made them reject her. Shifter offspring didn’t usually assume the forms of their animal spirits, but their magic often made itself known in other ways. “They nay understood ye, not like ye needed to be understood.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Ye are more powerful than ye could ever know. As a child, a babe even, if ye wished for something, ye would more than likely cause it to come to ye.” He slid his hand along her jawline, cupping her cheek in his palm and reveling in the warm, sweet softness of her skin.
“Do ye remember none of that? None of yer abilities?”
She pulled away and slid off his lap, disappointing him immensely. “I remember always being the odd one out, but never knowing why.” She returned to the hearth and sat on the rug in front of the fire. “There is nothing special about me.”