46. Lazarus
Lazarus
I did not miss the pageantry around this place. Nor did I miss the formality. While being a member of the Night Wraiths comes with order and an expectation to uphold it, there is nothing quite like the convergence of a meeting of the apostles.
The mutterings and whispers around the room at my entrance are expected.
I’ve changed a lot since I was last among these men.
But the same could be said about them. Apostles, twelve of them, sit in a semicircle.
Those with the most power or experience are meant to sit in the more central positions, but alphas who normally occupied those chairs now sit toward the edges.
Before them, the empty space, where a table would normally be, was supposed to demonstrate honesty and that there was no obscuring the truth.
An empty chair, in the exact center, is ornamented and different from the others. It’s the thirteenth chair. And I grit my teeth at the difference. It’s a change that goes against the fundamental belief that all alphas are to be equal.
Clement approaches, dusts off the seat, and then sits in it. I stand in the aisleway between the regular chairs where disciples are seated, watching.
“Asa returns,” Clement sneers as he gestures to me from toes to head and back again. Then, with an aggravated groan, he adds, “And he’s laid claim to our lost omega.”
Gasps and rumblings fill the room.
I don’t defend myself. I don’t correct him that I didn’t return, that I was brought back against my will.
“What do we do about this?”
I try to scrape my memory for the apostle’s name who posed the question. But it’s been too long since I last had to call any of these people by name, and I come up wanting.
One thing I do know is that Jerome sits in a chair at the end of the semicircle, and the vacant stare in his eyes as he looks at me rivals the dead. My mentor falling into such a hollow shell should elicit some emotion, but I can’t seem to find it.
I wonder where Isaac is, but I don’t take the time to look for him. He isn’t innocent in any of this either.
“One thing is for certain, Festus, we can’t put him into another pack.
We tried that. His . . . sexual preferences .
. .” a younger alpha, who looks as if he could have been born after I left, a few chairs down from Clement, sneers at me, “would taint anyone that we put him with. It’s distasteful.
It’s wrong. It goes against our teachings. ”
Agreements ring out among the apostles as they look me over with scrutiny. Some of them are so young they would have been children when I left. Yet, they seem to or pretend to know all about me.
“I’ll make it quite easy for your decision-making.” I cut them all off and make sure to keep the anger out of my voice, much like the early days when talking to the twins. “I will be leaving with the omega, Honey, and you won’t come looking for her again. She is mine.”
“That’s out of the question!” the first alpha to Clement’s left snaps. He starts to rise out of his chair before catching himself and remaining seated. “She is very beloved, and that should be made evident in her sire’s search for her. She belongs here.”
“The search that miraculously didn’t include the House of Apostles? Despite the fact that MP St. Pierre sits among the disciples now?” I toss my head back to where MP St. Pierre is sitting among the community alphas.
“That doesn’t concern you, Asa.” Clement tilts his nose up as he looks away from me.
“Clearly, it does. She is my mate.” I force back a growl, but I’m experiencing the grating slip of my patience being worn away.
I try to regain composure, knowing that the Night Wraiths will have followed Honey and me.
Whatever stopped the twins’ pursuit of us would not be the only attempt to chase after, rescue, or find Honey and me.
It is simply a matter of time. My mission is to delay, find answers, and if they truly have purchased black-market omegas, assure they can be safely rescued.
The same as it has been with the Night Wraiths since Iona went missing.
“If she has been claimed by Asa, then there is no point in keeping her,” Jerome says flatly.
He’s still looking through me. “She’s been knotted.
She is tainted. And if she was fixable, his shadow would heal her.
There are other ways to make a deal and keep our word.
We should cut our losses. Before it’s too late. ”
I suppress a growl. The dirty words they use to describe Honey as if she’s less than perfect stoke the coals of my anger.
“Unless you are planning to bring Asa back into the fold, then we keep him and the omega?” Festus circles back to the idea of me staying here.
Once, I would have dreamed of this, to be able to earn a place back into this world, into the fold. My stomach churns with the thought. Once, there was a time that they were my people, but my words are loud and convey my truth. “Absolutely not.”
“It was my thought that we would release Asa. So he could go with God.” Clement suggests my murder as if that is something House of Apostles stands for. “We should have done it the last time he was before us.”
The room goes hollow with silence. No one even shuffles in their chairs. I steadily wait in the void for someone willing to break the covenant with God. I draw slow breaths, waiting for anyone to dare agree, for someone to show me how far this sickness, this madness, goes within the faithful.
“Unless,” Clement muses with a look that only the devil could wear locked on me, “we cut his mark from the omega.”
My fist clenches. I struggle to keep my shadow beneath me. My shoulders gather in tightness, and I fight the snarl as it rises in my throat. Why am I playing by their rules? I’m not one of them, and I haven’t been for a long time.
I let my shadow free. It changes from the usual constrictor-shaped snake to that of a cobra. It moves forward with a jolt toward Clement before flaring its hood out and issuing a threatening strike. “I dare you to try.”
Clement shuffles back in his chair, his head pushed back away from my shadow in fear. Gasps and murmurs sound around the room, probably at the impropriety of my actions.
“This isn’t necessary, Asa.” Festus puts his hands out placatingly, but his words waver with a twinge of fear.
“Isn’t it? I’m not the Asa you once knew. I go by Lazarus now.” My serpent moves in his direction unbidden. “You’re threatening to kill me or to mortally wound my omega. What would you say is the right response?”
“He has a valid point.” Jerome sits back in his chair and kicks his legs out before him the way one would after a large meal or hard day’s work.
“We’re deciding how to deal with something that does not concern us.
The omega in question escaped. She chose to live another life rather than stay with our community and within our beliefs. ”
“You can’t do this.” MP St. Pierre stands up behind me and is practically shouting. “She’s my daughter. It’s my right to have her back. We need her.”
“You only need her because it is of some benefit to you. If you wanted her, you wouldn’t have left her here, with him.
” I don’t bother looking at MP St. Pierre while addressing him.
There is no need. He’s a pawn in Clement’s game.
How that came to be, I don’t know. But what I do know is that the devil is before me, and I’m not falling for his machinations.
“This is a discussion we should have in a chambered gathering. Lock him up for now.” Clement stands. “We’ll show you to some accommodations. Maybe some time to reflect will find you more reminded of our fundamental beliefs.”
“I wish to be housed with my omega.” I assume they’ll object, but gone are the days when I would stand on their judgment and their morals. Honey is mine, and I made her a promise that I fully intend to keep.
“Not until a decision is made.” Clement waves me off as he steps around my shadow.
I could wrap my shadow around him and strangle him, but I don’t have the faith in myself that I could bring the rest of the alphas in the room in line, and I am outnumbered.
I’m guided out by Clement, a handful of alphas following us. And when we step out into the late afternoon sun, I take the opportunity to observe my surroundings. The layout of the community is expected and usual, with the exception of a new building.
He walks me toward the unexpected building. “You’ll stay in here. It’s for our younger, unrulier disciples. Perhaps you’ll learn something from being here.”
All-spectrum lighting assaults my face as he opens the door. It’s designed for omegas and an irritant to alphas. Seeing as how they’ve corrupted the sanctity of quieting for omegas, this should not surprise me. There are two rooms, one to the left and right. Both doors are open.
“You can pick your room.” Clement laughs.
The door to the building closes behind me, and the telltale sound of a lock clicking into place comes a second after.
Slowly, I observe the building and each room.
But the more I examine, the more certain I am that I am truly alone — no video cameras in either room, nor in the hallway.
I try pulling my shadow up from the floor where it’s trained.
While all-spectrum light can be used to chain an alpha’s shadow to their body, the bulbs in this room are not strong enough, and although irritated, my shadow has plenty of strength.
Reaching into my cut, I pull out my phone.
It’s interesting they haven’t seemed to think to take it to cut me off from the outside world.
But I don’t look away from good fortune.
While I’m more partial to a phone call over a text message, it seems prudent to remain as quiet as possible in my scheming.
Several text messages have already been sent to me. None are from either of the twins but plenty from Revenant, Salem, and Techno.