Chapter 25
Twenty-Five
Zephyr
I'd just gotten all the spell ingredients ready when Keoni came into the office the next day, and I smiled at him as he approached the desk.
"Ready?"
"Yep!" He had a cheerful smile on his face, but I could tell he was nervous, so I walked around the desk and pulled him into a hug.
He sighed as he tucked his head under my chin, his warm breath brushing against my skin.
"I feel strange," he mumbled, and I squeezed him closer. "Not scared, but a little anxious. He doesn't even know I exist. He might want nothing to do with me."
While it was a possibility, I didn't want to say that. I wanted Keoni to be loved by everyone, including the father he'd never known.
"Whatever happens, you'll always have me. And everyone who lives here," I assured him, and he pulled back to smile up at me.
"I know. That's the only reason I can do this."
Leaning up, he pressed a soft kiss on my lips before shuffling back. "So, how do we do this?"
"It's very similar to the last spell we did, just a different wording."
"And my blood instead of yours."
I nodded, and he clapped his hands together. "All right then. Let's get started."
I was working with a map of North America this time since centaurs weren't fond of water travel and Keoni's parents had met in the US.
I lit a match and dropped it into the bowl with all the ingredients and started murmuring the spell.
The smoke from the bowl wafted into the air, and I held my hand out for Keoni's.
Instead of his palm, I decided to prick his finger instead. Once a few drops of his blood had spilled onto the map, I grabbed the Band-Aid I'd set aside earlier and wrapped it around his finger as his blood started moving over the map.
Keoni smiled at his finger, and I turned my gaze to the map as the blood settled in the middle of a large patch of green called the Tongass National Forest.
"They went in completely opposite directions," Keoni murmured as he gazed at the blood marker. "My parents' herds, I mean."
I hummed as I found a map of the national forest—I had a lot of maps—and unfurled it on the desk, then whispered a direction for the blood marker. It smoothly moved from one map to the other, then started moving again.
"You'll come with me, right?"
"Of course," I answered instantly, walking over to Keoni's side. He leaned into me instantly, and I wrapped an arm around his waist, holding him close.
The blood marker stopped in the middle of the forest, close to a lake. The portal spell I would use would connect to this spell to take us to the right location, and all I needed to do now was make sure Keoni was ready.
"We can go whenever you like," I murmured against his temple, and he hummed.
"Will you help me with something first?"
"Of course."
I told Touya we'd be heading out for a while as we passed by his desk on the way to wherever Keoni wanted to go, and Keoni led me to the cabin he'd moved out of. The only thing still there was the cart he'd used to move around before.
"Will you help me strap it on?" he asked, and I shot him a puzzled look.
"Are the stockings out of magic?" I stepped closer to recharge them, wondering how they could've run out so soon, but Keoni shook his head.
"No, that's not it. I just—I want to know how he'll feel about me right out the gate. Does that make sense?"
I nodded, because if anyone could understand, it was me. Keoni didn't want to get along with his father only to get rejected when the man found out about his disability. He'd rather know before he developed a connection with the man.
"It does. I'll help."
Since we had to strap his back legs to his body first and I'd never done that for him before, it took a little time, but we worked it out.
It was strange to see Keoni attached to his cart again, and it was clear he wasn't very fond of it.
"This cart made it so I could walk around all these years, and I still don't like it very much. Is that wrong?"
"Before Draven made me this," I said as I raised my left arm, "I'd run through a bunch of prosthetics. Everything from a hook-hand to a plastic arm to a mechanical one. They were all helpful in their own ways, and I didn't like any of them."
Keoni smiled, then took my hand in his and ran the fingers of his other hand over my palm, then down my wrist to my forearm. "What about this one? Do you dislike it too?"
I had, in the beginning. When it'd still felt strange and other. But now...
"No. This arm is the closest thing I have to an actual arm. I can move it. I can feel it. It's muted, more like pressure than anything else, but I can still feel your touch."
"I know what you mean. I feel the same way about the stockings. You know, we should give Draven a gift of some kind. He's done so much for us, and he rarely asks for stuff."
"You're right. I have no idea what we could get him, though."
I knew Keoni was simply procrastinating by talking about this, but I didn't care. Keoni was the only one who could decide when he was ready, and I wasn't going to push him.
"What about supplies for his workshop? He's always running low on things," he suggested, and I hummed. I made sure to keep Draven's workshop stocked up, but he did burn out of materials fast with all his tinkering.
"Let's have him make a list and we'll get everything he needs."
"Perfect!" Keoni agreed, then took a deep breath. "Okay, let's go before I chicken out. Can you do the portal from here or do we have to go back to your office?"
"Here's okay."
Keoni nodded, and I opened the portal right in his living room, weaving it in a way that would only allow him and me to pass through. The last thing we needed was for a curious centaur to sneak into the Sanctuary.
Keoni
"Whoa!" I glanced around as we stepped through the portal, breathing in the crisp air full of the scent of fresh leaves and mud. Trees were everywhere. I lived in a place full of trees, and yet it looked like a children's park in comparison to the grandeur around us.
Cedars and hemlocks rose into the sky in every direction, the chirps and croaks of birds and other fauna ringing through the air like a strange melody.
A steady thud-thud-thud cut through the forest music, and I glanced up just as a centaur stepped through the trees.
I couldn't tell how old he was, though it was clear he was an adult. He had long blond hair and soft blue eyes, wore a loose tunic-style shirt, and had a bow and arrow in his hands, arrow nocked and aimed right at me.
Zephyr stepped closer to me, his right hand halfway raised, as if he was ready to knock away any arrow that came our way. He probably had a spell for that too.
Shit, I needed to speak before this good-looking centaur got into a fight with my mate.
"Um, hello! My name's Keoni. I'm looking for Tarquin."
The centaur blinked, and lowered his bow just enough that I could breathe.
"What do you want with him?" the centaur asked, his eyes flicking over me and lingering on the cart behind me.
I tried not to feel self-conscious as I straightened up and took a deep breath. "My mom's name was Lia, and Tarquin is my father."
The centaur blinked again, and his gaze lowered to the ground in front of him. He stuck the arrow back in the quiver strapped over his back, and hooked the bow into a belt at his waist. Only then did he look back up at me.
"Lia's gone?"
I nodded, and he visibly shuddered, like the news personally affected him.
Then he approached us, and before either Zeph or I could react, he pulled me into a hug.
I froze as I felt the strength of the arms surrounding me, as it clicked that this man looked an awful lot like me, and my hands trembled as I lifted my arms and slowly wrapped them around his middle.
"It's good to meet you, son," the centaur—my father—murmured against the top of my head, and I swallowed hard.
He pulled away after a moment, then glanced at Zephyr, who held his hand out for a handshake.
"Zephyr Morrigan. I'm Keoni's mate."
Tarquin's eyes lit up, and he gave Zephyr's hand an enthusiastic shake, which made Zeph smile for some reason.
"Come, come. Meet the herd. They'd adore you."
"Are you sure about that?" I asked, glancing over at my cart. He followed my gaze, then gave me a puzzled look.
"Of course. Why wouldn't they?"
Huh. I had no reply for that, so Zephyr and I just trailed after Tarquin.
"So the baby-face thing is in your genes, huh?" Zephyr teased in a low voice, and I glanced over at him. He wasn't wrong. Tarquin did look quite young. Hell, we looked more like brothers than father and son. Did that mean I would always look like a teenager?
"The stars told me I'd meet someone precious to me soon, but I never imagined it would be a child of mine," Tarquin said as he glanced back at us, his eyes bright and sparkling with joy.
He clearly didn't mind my cart, even when we had to stop because the wheel got stuck in the mud.
Zephyr's magic unstuck it quickly, but Tarquin didn't even get annoyed. It was strange.
"Were you hoping for your mate?" I asked, and he shrugged.
"Maybe. But this is so much better. I wish I'd known about you. I would've found you sooner. Why didn't the stars tell me about you?" The last part was mostly mumbled to himself, but I heard it anyway. I'd wondered the same, but maybe things happened the way they did for a reason.
Zephyr was always meant to find me. I was always meant to fall for him.
It was all part of Fate's plan to lead us where we were today.
While I would've loved to be raised by my dad—who was clearly just as accepting as my mom—I wouldn't change the life I had now.
The people at the Sanctuary were my family, and I was glad to have them in my life.
"Everyone!" Tarquin called as he led us into a clearing at the edge of a sparkling lake. I quickly counted twelve centaurs, all adults, scattered around the lakebed, and they all turned at his call, their eyes flicking from him to us.
"Chief! Who are they?" A man with a red braid hanging all the way down his back and sharp green eyes asked as he approached us, his gait a little off.
I glanced down at his hooves, and blinked when I realized one of his front legs was gone beneath the knee.
Instead, someone had fashioned a prosthetic out of wood.
Hmm... if these people accepted me, maybe I could ask Draven to make something better for this guy.
I doubted the wood lasted long in this atmosphere.
"Oz, this is Keoni, my son, and his mate, Zephyr," Tarquin introduced as it clicked that my father was the chief of this herd. I was the chief's son.
"Your son?" more than a few voices exclaimed, and the centaurs shuffled closer, abandoning whatever they'd been doing.
"He does look a lot like him," a woman with graying hair and dark brown eyes murmured as her gaze flicked between me and Tarquin.
Then she stepped closer, and held a hand out to me.
When I took it, she held mine with both of hers, shaking it and then pressing a kiss on the back of my hand.
"It's good to meet you, Keoni. I'm Opal, your great-aunt. The chief is my sister's son."
I'd expected to find one new family member, and instead I had two? And they both seemed like nice people, and no one in the herd had acted weird about my cart or my apparent disability. Maybe it was because of Oz? Or maybe they were just less traditional than my mom's herd had been.
Either way, I was glad I'd decided to find my father.