“What the hell am I supposed to do then? You think this is easier on me? All my life, I have always thought my father was a saint. I thought that he was the best thing life gave to me. You have to understand that he is my father, there is no other way that I could have possibly seen him. There was just no other way. When I found out who he was, it broke my world more than it did to yours. This was someone that I believed in, someone I fought my brother for when he said demeaning things about him! This was someone I put all of my faith and trust in. Yes, my sad story is not supposed to move you but do you think it is my fault? You are so unbelievable and it just hurts because I thought that you of all people would understand it. You would see that it is not my fault and neither is it my brother’s fault but no. You are blinded by your own personal hate, you are blinded by your rage and it is so sad that you are” she said to me.“First you tell me your sob story and then you think you ca
“That is bullshit and I think you know that already because Cathy is right at the center of all of this! This is her father we are talking about. The circle of violence started from her family so she is just as involved in this as her brother is and if you can work with her brother then there is nothing stopping you from working with her too. If you can still talk to her brother after everything that happened with Arielle, then you can still talk to her too” Bennie said to him.Alexander looked at him and sighed. He knew that Bennie has a very valid point and he rubbed his forehead. The bus started to move and he looked out the window. He saw Carson and Cathy get into their car and he looked away. He pulled out his phone and decided to drop her a text but he didn’t know what to say so he sighed and tossed the phone away. He hoped that she would be willing to talk to him after the way he acted earlier today. All Alexander could do was stare at his phone. When the bus stopped at his jun
“I can’t answer all of your questions because you have to leave now. If Carlos senses that you were here, he would hunt you down and he would kill you and I can’t let that happen. You can’t die without fulfilling your destiny. If you do, the world would be just like that house, nothing but ashes. It would be a waste land and your own people would not survive it. It would not be able to inhabit anything living again so I can’t risk you staying here longer but I can grant you one wish. What do you want?” she asked him. “I want to be able to come back and get answers to my questions. I need all the answers I can get!” he said to her. “I was hoping that you wouldn’t ask that. I thought you would be ask to get your sleep back, your sanity, your peace of mind” she said to him. “I guess you can say that somethings are more important than others” he said to her. “I would try my best to keep shielding you every time you come but there would be sometimes where I wouldn’t be able to do that a
“The second time?” Arielle asked him.“It doesn’t matter. We need to go to school. The last thing we are doing is going late to school. Mom would freak out if she finds out that we were late to school” Alexander said to her.“No, I want to hear it. We can be late to school for all I care. This is way more important than whatever the school has to offer us. Besides, we already missed the bus. We might as well take out time or stay home. Nobody really cares” his sister said to him.“Miss school? Mom would kill me” Alexander said to her.“She loves you way too much to even hit you. All she would do is let me off this stupid punishment before you but you already seem unaffected by the entire thing so it shouldn’t be a big deal for you” she said to him.“No. We can talk about this when we get back but for now, we need to find a way to get to school. We would get a cab to take us to school and if they ask why we are late, you would tell them that your brother was coming down with a flu” he
“So what do you plan on doing about that because he is definitely going to be at the phasing ceremony. There is no way he is not going to find out and if I don’t phase, I would draw a lot of attention to myself. That is the last thing I or my family need” Alexander said to him.“You would be transforming. I would keep my father here until the entire transformation is over. Cathy and I decided to act sick and make him stay here. When my father can’t attend to something, he sends his general. This is a bracelet that I had someone make for me. Nobody would be able to see that you are a burning flame wolf except for those with the knowledge already so be careful about who you tell that you are a burning flame wolf” Carson said as he handed him the bracelet.“I don’t understand. Why are you doing this for me? Why are you being so nice to me even though you are aware that I hate your family?” Alexander asked him.“You don’t hate my family. You hate my father and that is okay. I hate him too
“Confronting her wouldn’t get it solved either. Look, she has the upper hand here. The last thing we want is you getting expelled for rude behavior. Mom would totally kill you even though she loves you. Besides, we need to get home before mom freaks out because she is looking for us. The last thing we need is to get in any more trouble before the next full moon” she said to him. He nodded at her and they headed for the bus. She was silent through out the ride to the house. When they got back into the house, they could smell the aroma of their mother’s food. She was cooking lunch already. Alexander wondered how late they were if she was cooking lunch already. He stepped into the house and he could feel the presence of another person. He walked into the living room and a smile appeared across his face.“Dad” he yelled out before walking to him and giving him a hug.Arielle ran down from the stairs that she was already midway on. She ran to the living room and she jumped on her father.
“Yeah, two days and some hours. What are you going to do now? I mean, what is going to happen to you?” she asked him.“I don’t know but I am hoping that mom would have some answers for me” Alexander said to his sister.“How can you still call her your mom? She literally lied to you!” Arielle said to him.“Arielle, until I hear her side in all of this and get the answers that I seek, she is still my mom. Whether she gave birth to me or not, she has looked after me since I was a kid. That is what a mom does. So her not birthing me is not going to change the fact that she has been my mom right from the very beginning and she is always going to be my mom” Alexander said to her.She scoffed and she shook her head. There was no way she was going to put up with all of this. One thing she hated was lies and secrets and it was starting to look like their entire family was built on them. She shook her head and she headed out of his room.“Ari?” he called her.“What?” she responded.“Tell me if
“How do you know this woman? Where did you meet her?” his mother asked him.“She has been in my dreams. I have been having these dreams where she comes and she stares into my soul. The dreams, there is a burning house there. Hold on. Let me see if I can make a sketch of it” he said as he grabbed the notepad and started to draw in it. It took a couple of minutes and that seemed to be like forever but he was done soon enough and when he was done, he handed it over to her and she looked at him. She shook her head. There was no possible way that could be possible. This woman was dead. She was known to be the last burning flame wolf and there was no way Alexander knew her because he was barely a month old when she had died. She didn’t know what to think or how to feel. All she knew was that he was the last burning flame wolf. The woman in the picture was the last female burning flame wolf. If she was right about everything, the woman in the drawing was his mother, his real mother. “Mom
“You look like you had fun” Lois said, turning to look at them.“We took a while, I’m sorry. We just got really distracted with the shopping and time flew past. You already got dinner” Alexander said as he entered with their dinner packs and dropped it on the center table.“Well, at least we have something for the road now” Arielle said as she headed up the stairs.“Someone set your parents house on fire” Bennie said to him immediately he heard the door close.“I guess news do travel fast in the valley” Alexander said to him.“You know already?” Lois asked him.“Yes, Arielle and I started the fire. We did it” Alexander said, dropping on the sofa and taking a slice of the pizza in front of him.“I thought we were supposed to be keeping a low profile! How is that a low profile in any way?” Bennie asked him.“Arielle needed to do it and she did it. Also, according to what you just said, nobody knows who did it. That is the point. We would be out of here in less than ten hours. What do we
Alexander waited until she was in the house before he drove off. He and Arielle headed for their house first. When they got there, he noticed that she sat still, not making any attempt to leave the car. He touched her hand and she looked at him. She had tears in her eyes and Alexander sighed. He didn’t know what to tell her to make her feel better. How could she feel better? The last time that she was in the house was when her mom was being killed. He nodded at her and cleared his throat.“You really don’t have to do this. We can’ always do this another day” Alexander said to her.“There is no other day. We have to do this now. I need to see the condition of the place. I need to know how much damage the did to the memories left in the house. I need to see if mom and dad still have anything in the house, something can take along with me to remind me of their sacrifice” she said to him.“I don’t think you would ever forget it but there are a lot of things in the house. I am sure that yo
That was one of the few times that Cathy had ever spoken up to her father. Carlos had always seen her as the quiet one in the bunch. He never imagined that she was capable of the things that she spoke off and even now, Carlos still found it unbelievable. She walked into her brother’s room and sat on his bed. She wanted to tell him about her endeavors with their father but she changed her mind. Sometimes, the best way to protect somebody was to keep them in the dark. She knew that her father was going to come for her when the time was right and she wanted her brother as far away from her father as possible. Carson might hate his father but one thing was sure. He had his father anger and his father’s determination. The only difference was that Carson had his mom to build his foundation so he had the opportunity to learn how to channel is anger to the right things. Carson stood for what was right and he fought for what he believed in. She looked at him one more time. She was determined t
“What do you want me to do?” Cathy asked him. “Delay her. Just give Alexander a couple of minutes” Carson said to her. “No! I already did what I needed to do. Meet me by midnight and we can talk about what happens from there. Deny that I was ever here to your aunt and your father. I have to go” Alexander said as he closed his eyes. Carson was blind but he could tell that Alexander had left. He felt another magic and he knew that it was his aunt. The front door opened and he could sense the disappointment in the room as she walked in and walked towards the window, looking out of the window. “Did you not learn the courtesy of knocking before you enter a room that doesn’t belong to you?” Carson asked her rudely. “Who was here?” she asked him. “My sister. I don’t think she is that small. You can’t miss her. Besides, she is still here. What do you mean by who was here?” Carson asked her. “Someone else was here. There is the lingering energy of a different presence. My magic is pickin
She nodded at him and took a deep breath. She might not have been in her house but she knew that she was the same person, no matter the location and if anybody came for her or her brother, she was going to do what was necessary for the both of them. She wasn’t sure if she was supposed to be watching over Bennie though. Bennie was old enough to take care of himself and she would rather be out in the middle of the night with her brother than here, playing baby sitter but Alexander called the shots and she was not going to argue with that. She turned away and headed back to the room.“When do you want us to make contact with Carson and his brother?” Lois asked him.“Can we do it now? I want to make sure that they have enough time to do whatever it is that they need to do. Carson is blind and there might be some sort of delay with his own movement. This would put most of the work load on Cathy. If we can give them an early notice, that woile be helpful” Alexander said to her.“I would get
“I don’t think it would kill me to test that theory” he said to her. “No, it wouldn’t but we would not be testing that theory without magic for back up. So, until we can get Lois on board with this new agenda of yours, nobody is stabbing anybody in the chest just to prove a theory” Bennie said, his eyes still closed and his back turned to them. “Sorry” Arielle said with a laugh. “Whatever” he said back. “So how is your real mom like?” Arielle asked her brother. “Dead. She is cold. She definitely doesn’t give me the information that I need. She tells me what she thinks I need to know and leaves me to find out the rest for myself. Sometimes it is a good thing, sometimes it is a bad thing. I just go with whatever flow is there and get the job done. I know she wants me to do something but I don’t know what it is. When the time is right, I would probably find out too” he said to her. “Does she know where mom is?” Arielle asked her. “I don’t know. I didn’t ask her. I have never asked
He dropped on the bed where his sister slept. He touched her hair softly and she curled to his touch. He could tell that she felt safe, something that none of them had felt in a very long time. He didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. They had arrived at the Southern Crest Valley around six in the morning and now, they were comfortably tucked in Bennie’s house. Everybody was sound asleep, everybody but him. He couldn’t bring himself to sleep. This was the fifth day and he still had two days left before he went for Carson and Cathy but he knew that two days was a lot of time. They could be ready to move tonight but he didn’t want them doing that. He wondered what his grandfather’s reaction would be when he walked into the house with everybody else. The surprise on his face, the questions in his eyes. Well, they had nowhere else to go and it was his fault that they were in this mess so it was only reasonable that he took up the responsibility to keep them safe. He stood u
“Do you think that we would be making a mistake if we go with him?” Cathy asked her brother. “We have always wanted to leave here. Don’t grow cold feet now. We had plans to run away even before Alexander showed up. If we don’t leave now, we would never get the chance to do so again. We need to move as fast as possible now that we have someone that is willing to help us move” Carson said to her. “What if father comes after us? What if he catches up with us and he kills us off the same way he did with mom? We may not be living our best lives here but at least we are alive. Isn’t that what is important? I know that we had plans, too many of them but right now, this looks like a dangerous gamble. Dad is a monster. Who knows what he would do when he finds out that we are missing? Maybe this is where we ought to be” Cathy said to her brother. “Here? What the hell do you mean by that? If you want to stay here with your father then be my guest! I wouldn’t be doing that with you. I am leavi
“Alexander? Did you hear me? Matilda is closing in on us. We don’t know if she has alerted Carlos and they could be on their way here now. We need to get out of here. I would do a cleansing spell so that she wouldn’t be able to find traces of clues that we were even here. The last thing we want is Carlos knowing that you are back in town” Lois went on and on, telling him how it was important that they made plans to leave but Alexander wasn’t listening to her. His mind was far away from her. All he could do was stare at the person that stood in front of him. He hadn’t seen her in years and now she was here. Something was wrong. His mind went to his grandfather but there was no way in the world that anybody could find his grandfather. He had stayed hidden for years and away from everybody else, only seeing whoever he wanted to see. There was no way that he could be in danger now. There was no danger to be in! Alexander screamed at himself. Maybe she was just here because she needed to