Chapter Sixteen #2
“That’s what’s worrying me,” Ziggy said.
“Have you ever been in love, Ziggy?”
“No.”
Ziggy gave too quick an answer. There was more to Ziggy, Kartog was sure.
Kartog replied, “Love makes us stronger because you have even more to fight for.”
“What if she goes with Brogan to her home planet Earth and leaves us without someone to protect the portals?”
“It won’t come to that, I’m sure,” Kartog said.
“Have you heard of this place Earth, Kartog?”
“Yes, but not where to find it. It’s spoken about in the ancient library on Danus. They ruled there in the ancient past.”
Ziggy sighed. “It would be much safer to get them away now.”
“According to Abnobian comms, they won’t arrive till tomorrow. Give Camber and Brogan this one night. They might never get another one for a long, long time.”
Ziggy nodded. “We both know our roles, then?”
“We do. Is everything prepared for a quick exit?” Kartog said.
“Yes, I’ve been preparing since I first contacted you.”
“Good luck, then,” Kartog said.
“We’ll need it. I better go and talk to them. Make sure you tell the Abnobians that everything was done to help you.”
“Of course. Goodbye, Ziggy.”
“Till we meet again, Kartog.”
Brogan watched Camber eat with a smile. She was really enjoying the meal and looked light-hearted and happy.
Camber had the biggest salad with some very thin slices of meat, with a spicy dressing on top. She let Brogan taste it. It was nice, but she preferred her rare steak.
“Oh, this is just delicious,” Camber said. “I normally eat ration packs.”
“I’m glad you like it.”
Camber lifted up her drink and took a sip.
“I’m not used to fancy food either, although Paris, the city I live in, is world renowned for high quality, delicious food. Parisians make a great rare steak,” Brogan said.
Camber liked to hear about Brogan’s life back on her world. Maybe it was the time to ask.
“So, earlier you said you’d tell me about your pack and why you left it. Would you tell me about it now?”
Brogan put down her knife and fork and took a drink. She nodded. “Oh yes. I thought I was getting away with that one.”
Camber could tell talking was not something Brogan enjoyed doing. It was good she felt comfortable enough to do it with her.
“It can’t be that bad, surely?”
“No, not bad, just…it’s complicated. I have to start from somewhere, I suppose.”
Brogan twisted the stem of her wine glass nervously.
“I have a really loving family. Me and my older brother had the best childhood. Our ma was the Alpha.”
“Ma?” Camber asked.
“It’s what we call our mothers in Ireland,” Brogan said.
“Okay, got you.”
“My ma was the Alpha, until she stepped down for my brother. She was getting to be older and wanted to spend more time with my da, and the grandcubs.”
“You brother has kids?”
“Yeah, two boys and two girls. He married the perfect wolf. I adore her, everyone does,” Brogan said.
“So your brother’s older?”
“Yes, he was always going to be the next Alpha.”
From what little Camber knew about wolf packs, there were rarely two dominants in one family. “Two dominants. Is that usual in a family?” Camber asked.
“It doesn’t happen very often. Normally nature doesn’t put two dominants in the same family, it causes too much friction.”
“And you are very dominant,” Camber said.
“Am I?”
Camber saw in her mind’s eye that Brogan’s fur puffed up in pride at that comment.
“Uh…yes.”
“Well, yes, when we were children, we were always fighting for the upper hand. I love my brother, I love all of my family. As we grew up and he began to be trained by my ma, and his duties started to increase, and it was clear his best friend was going to be his second, I felt kind of out of place. A dominant wolf needs a job.”
“Yeah,” Camber said, “I can’t imagine you with nothing to do. You’d go crazy.”
“I couldn’t find that in my pack, or at least I thought I couldn’t. There was a lot of tension between me and my brother, and my ma. I felt I had to find my own path,” Brogan said.
“Is that when you left?”
“Yeah, I’d been working on my art for years, so I told my family that I was leaving to study art and open my own business, as a tracker and private investigator. They were sad to see me leave but knew that I wasn’t happy.”
“Did the distance help?” Camber asked.
“Yes, but it increased the sadness. Every wolf longs to be with their pack, but I was also yearning for my place. I couldn’t work out what it was.”
Maybe it was here with me? Camber thought.
“You know, it’s weird. I’ve never talked to anyone about this before.”
Camber reached over and put her hand on top of Brogan’s. “It’s good to get your emotions out. I know it can be difficult for a dominant wolf to do.”
“It’s part of our make-up,” Brogan said. “We can’t show any weakness to an adversary. If we do, the pack could be at risk. That’s why I found art so helpful. No one could tell it was my way of controlling emotion.”
Camber ran her thumb up and down the back of Brogan’s hand. “I’m not here to judge you, or make you feel any less of a wolf for that. Tell me what happened next.”
“I was doing well, selling my art, and also growing my tracking business. I bought a loft apartment which doubled as a studio for my art. I let customers come to view there. Married women with rich spouses—”
“Oh, it was like that, was it?” Camber said with a smile.
“Not all the time. But I did have a sex life that made me feel even lonelier afterwards. I think I was looking for what my brother and my parents had.”
It was more than Camber had. She could have never trusted anyone, made herself so vulnerable. In the end, Brogan’s varied sex life and her non sex life left them in the same position—lonely and longing for their person.
Brogan said, “I eventually met this one girl. We were dating. I was trying my hardest to make it feel different from brief affairs with women. At the time, it was my brother’s thirtieth birthday, and the pack were planning a big party.
I was getting a lot of pressure to come home.
I don’t blame my family. My ma and da wanted to see me, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
But I felt going home, I’d be on my own again. No mate. I felt like a failure.”
Brogan took Camber’s hand between her two and gazed down at them, as if trying to gain Camber’s strength and courage to tell the story.
“Don’t feel awkward, Wolfy. It’s just me. The woman that caught you with silver cuffs,” Camber joked.
“A wolf isn’t supposed to be thirty-two and not mated. Just another part of wolf culture I’d failed at.”
“Thirty-two isn’t old for being single,” Camber said.
“It is in wolf society. So I decided to take Gayle, my girlfriend of a few months, with me. You know, I actually tried to convince myself I loved her. But deep down I knew it was just to make my pack believe it. It was a disaster.”
“What happened?” Camber asked.
“She was rude to my family. My brother and ma came to me, so angry, she’d insulted his wife, the Mater.
I knew they were right, but my pride was hurt, and I denied it.
Took Gayle’s side over my own family. The worst mistake of my life.
We packed our bags and left. I was estranged from my pack then. ”
“Did you stay with her after that?”
Brogan laughed. “No. Within a few weeks of being back in Paris, I went around to her flat to talk about our relationship. I found her in bed with one of my vampire friends, Byron.”
“The vampires that only take blood by consent?”
“Yeah. What hurt wasn’t that it was over with Gayle—I knew it wasn’t love and thought we should probably end it. But with my friend? That’s what hurt. I left and didn’t speak to Byron until years later, we she asked me for help in their quest to stop Balor, the guy that threw me here.”
Camber smiled. “To me.”
Brogan smiled right back. Her wolf senses were going crazy right now, and her stomach was tumbling around.
I want this woman so badly.
Just then, their waitress came around to take their plates. “How was your food?”
“Beautiful, thank you,” Camber said.
“Yeah, it was great. Thanks.”
“Wonderful, I’ll be back around with the dessert menu shortly.”
The waitress’s interruption broke the feeling that they were all alone.
“I think that’s enough talking about feelings for the next five years,” Brogan said.
Camber laughed. “Thank you for talking to me. It means a lot that you trust me enough to talk to me.”
Brogan took her hand again. “Of course I trust you. You are the only one I’ve felt safe to tell this story to.”
There was a silence, and it hung heavy with feelings and their need for each other. Camber didn’t know what to say, so she was happy when Brogan said, “Do you want to skip dessert and go to the gambling hall? Ziggy gave us chips, so we can lose all of it and not be worried about it.”
“Sounds perfect,” Camber said.
Margot and Jhosa were sitting on the floor of their ship while Thane kept an eye on the controls.
Jhosa had put the ship on autopilot, so there wasn’t much for Thane to do, except watch out for anomalies.
Morrigan sat on the chair next to Margot and Jhosa. “Are all your weapons ready?” Morrigan asked.
“Aye,” Margot said, “we’ve got a rucksack with guns, one a rapid pulse gun, and some handheld bombs. Do you want anything, Morrigan?”
“Just a handgun. I think my powers will be most helpful when trying to outmanoeuvre the enemy—posing as a Drazani guard or Cardo and sending them the wrong way, or posing as Kartog.”
They’d been given information by Ziggy that Kartog, the Goddess Ninti’s escheal, was on the moon.
“Kartog is a formidable warrior,” Jhosa said.
“Indeed she is,” Margot said. “Cardo can be dealt with. He is a vampire, but a bounty hunter all the same. It’ll be the Drazani guard and Kartog who would be the most difficult to deal with.”