Chapter Twenty-Two

Every red flag and alarm that could possibly go up, does. I feel like the floor has been ripped out from underneath me, my vision zeroes in on the three men that has just walked into the room and my breathing becomes erratic and labored. I feel as if the air in the room has just been completely sucked out. I can see Fenirick saying something, but the only sound that I am hearing is garbled and from far away, I can’t understand what he is saying and I start to feel myself backing away, while little black spots start to dance in front of me. I shake my head to clear the dots and open my ears only to walk into something hard.

I look around me to see what I walked into and notice that I backed myself into a wall as darkness starts to surround me, making it harder to concentrate on my breathing and keeping myself calm. I see the younger of the two men reach out to me and all rational thought goes out the window as my training kicks in, I punch him in the nose making him stagger backwards holding his face in his hands, I spin around and book it out of the house and into the woods trying to find a hiding spot. The trees fly by me in a blur of green, as I stumble through the wooded forest, I come to a clearing in the middle of the wooded area where I look around and find a dark cave that is nestled into the side of a dirt mound that is surrounded by bushes and is nearly impossible to spot by the naked eye. I crawl through the bushes into the cave and calm my erratic breathing, I hear shouting and footsteps coming towards my hiding spot, taking a shaky breath I cover my mouth with my hand and scoot further back from the entrance.

“Falencia?” I hear Addam call.

I almost go out to meet him, but when I inch a little towards the mouth of the cave, I can see him standing next to the boy who cornered Freyja, Cherie and me at the mall. I hear him ask a question that I wasn’t expecting. “Do you think she’s going to be alright?”

“I honestly don’t know, I think this whole thing could have been avoided, had you and your dad just been patient and let us introduce you instead of you both trying to introduce yourselves the way that you did.” Addam replies.

I start to feel as if my head is going to explode and whimper slightly from the intense pain that wracks its way through my skull, I try to fight off the pain when I hear the snap of a branch, which makes me back even further into the cave. I hold my head as white-hot pain shoots through my skull, making me wish for nothing but relief from the pain. I hear another snap of a branch, only this time it comes from a little further away everything in the woods becomes eerily still until I hear a loud CCCRRRAAACCCKK then the shriek of someone as the thud of something heavy falls onto the ground.

“What the hell was that?!” I hear someone exclaim.

“If I’m not mistaken, that’s my niece’s powers manifesting. It shouldn’t be manifesting this early, I think we may have acted a bit rashly Fenirick. I should have listened to you and let you introduce us.” I hear the same gruff voice from the apartment say.

I start to inch my way out of the cave still feeling the headache at the back of my skull, as I reach the entrance of the cave I feel the cool breeze of the wind come through the branches of the bushes that have hidden me away so neatly. “I don’t disagree, but what is done is done, there is nothing that we can do about it. I just hope we find her before she either hurts herself or the rogues that we’ve been having problems with find her. I have no doubt in my mind that she can make them sorry for meeting her, but I’d rather not have to have her deal with that on top of everything else that she’s already dealing with.” I hear Fenirick say.

I pull myself through the branches of the bushes into the clearing just as the cave collapses at my feet. I look back in complete shock. As I realize it wasn’t an actual cave, it was a hidey-hole that was built from wooden planks and dirt I let out a breath releasing the anxiety and rear that I had been holding on to. “Thank the Goddess you’re ok!” I hear a voice say from above me.

I look up to find Addam standing over me “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset or worry anyone. Everything was closing in on me and I allowed my fear to override my rationality.” I say as he helps me up off the ground.

“I’m sorry my dear, we are the reason for your fear and we weren’t thinking about how you might react to us, instead we just put our wants above your needs. That’s not what family is supposed to do, and I hope you can forgive us.” The man who came to the apartment says looking at me sheepishly.

I look at Fenirick with a panicked look. “They’re not here to hurt you in anyway, they’re here to keep the rest of your family from actually finding you.” Fenirick explains. “Why don’t we go back to the house, Alaxander has made a delicious feast for tonight, we can use one of the conference rooms to have a private conversation over dinner. Then if you’re feeling up to it, you can go ahead with Addam and the others to the dance.”

I look at the men who have stated that they’re family then to Fenirick and nod “ok.” As we walk back through the forest towards the house a thought occurs to me “who got hit by the branch?”

“That would have been me.” I look over at Justin who is raising his hand which has minor cuts and scrapes on it. “Don’t worry, you didn’t hurt me too bad! Plus I heal fairly quickly thanks to wolf genes. You scared me more than anything.” He says smiling.

I rub my temples as the headache starts to come back a little more forcefully “I think I may need some headache medicine if you have any.” I tell Fenirick.

“Your mother used to get really bad headaches when her powers first started manifesting. Is it right at the base of your skull and radiating upwards towards your temples?” The gruff guy asks.

I nod slightly “yeah, it’s really painful too.”

He stops in the middle of where we’re walking and puts his hands up in a surrender type of way “Do you mind if I help?” he asks.

Even though I am extremely wary of him I give him the nod of approval, figuring that if he tries anything, he won’t get very far considering we’re surrounded by werewolves, who would do anything for me. He places one of his hands at the back of my skull and the other on my left temple, I feel a slight warmth spread through my head and burn away the pain that was spreading its way through my head and my headache goes away fairly quickly. I look at him and notice that his eyes are closed as he takes the pain in my head away.

“Thank you, my head feels so much better!” I exclaim.

“No problem, Demons get a bad rep because of the bad that more than most of our species does, but there are a few of us who aren’t into spreading evil, hurt, and mayhem.” He explains.

We reach the packhouse and are ushered into a soundproof conference room “We will talk and eat in here. There is so much that you need to be made aware of,” Fenirick says to me as the door shuts behind me, and we all take our seats around the conference table where there is an array of food decorating the middle of it.

“Please, fill up your plates and lets eat.” Fenirick says as he sits in his spot and starts to fill his plate.

Now that we’ve all got our food, I’d like to introduce you all to Torsten Moorn, Falencia’s uncle from her mother’s side, and his son Ryker Moorn. They are here to help us keep Falencia hidden and untraceable from the rest of her family that is hunting her down.”