Chapter 224

#Chapter 224 – the Alpha and the Luna Victor pulls his face away from me for a moment, still holding him close against him, looking down at me intently. A low growl builds in his chest.

And I want him, too, desperately. Want to tear his dirty shirt from his body and throw it to the forest floor – want –

“Where,” I hear myself ask, my mother’s instincts kicking in despite myself. “Where are the boys?” I wonder aloud, looking around.

I see Victor blink, suddenly, looking around and remembering them as well. He opens his mouth to call for them but I put a hand on his chest. “No,” I murmur. “Let them. This is…this is a good place. They’ll be safe. Can’t you feel it?”

He considers for a moment before responding. “Yes,” he whispers, and then laughs a little. “We’re starting to sound like the boys, frankly, but…yes. I can feel it. This is a good place.”

Victor sighs, then, gathering me close against him. “Evelyn,” he begins, “I’m so sorry –“

“No,” I interrupt, shaking my head and raising a hand to his cheek. “No, Victor, you don’t have to –“

“Please,” he begs, looking at me with such an earnest expression. “I want you to know, Evie – how clear it all is to me now.”

I nod, understanding, letting him know without words that I know precisely what he means. That I feel exactly the same. We sit there for a moment, marveling at each other, and in this instant I love him with such an intensity that I can barely breathe.

But it’s not the kind of lack of breath that I felt earlier, like the other days we’ve been in the woods…

I frown, suddenly, realizing something.

“What?” Victor asks, laughing a little. “I’m about to confess my undying love for you, and you’re frowning?”

“No,” I say, looking up at him, considering. “Victor, how do you feel right now?”

He stops and thinks about it for a moment, looking down at himself. “I feel…okay, I think?” He responds, not really able to put it into words.

“But you were running, all day,” I insist. “And Alvin and I must have walked hours in that fog to get here…”

“Fog?” Victor asks, his face twisting in confusion, but I shush him and continue to think.

“I think,” I say quietly, looking back up at him. “I think the forest gave us a little more strength. One last push, maybe, to keep us going.”

“What do you think it means?” he asks.

I shrug, staring up into his beautiful green eyes. “I don’t know,” I sigh. “Maybe that we’re…close. Or something.”

“Good,” he murmurs, bringing his face close to mine and nudging my nose with his own. Such a wolfish gesture, I think, laughing a little at it. “I want to be close to the end of this. So that we can go back home, start our life.”

“Me too,” I reply, stroking his face with my hand. “I think you should keep this stubble, though,” I murmur, running my thumb over three days’ worth of un-shaved cheek. “It’s nice.”

He laughs at me, leaning into the pressure of my hand. “Whatever you want.” Then he considers me for a moment. “I ran all day with Ian,” he says quietly. “But what did you do?”

I laugh and then throw my hands over my head, stretching in his arms, remembering all the glorious food. “Ate!” I cry, laughing more. “We ate and ate and ate, until we were bursting.”

Victor frowns at me. “Ate? Ate what? We left everything back at camp –“

“Come on,” I urge, standing up from his lap and grabbing his hand, pulling him to his feet. “I’ll show you –“

Confused but curious, Victor follows me up the steps towards the little house. “Is this…safe?” he asks, his voice cautious. “This place looks like it could fall down at any moment…”

“It’s safer than it looks,” I respond, giving him a wink over my shoulder and tugging him by the hand through the door. “Wait till you see all the pastries –“

I gasp though, surprised and delighted, when I see that the table inside has changed. Instead of the breakfast spread it presented earlier, the table now presents a simple but sumptuous dinner.

“Oh!” I cry out. “Oh look, it gave you everything you like!”

“What?” Victor asks, baffled and moving forward towards the table, which is now covered in a variety of savory, filling dishes. Meat pies, and a roast, swimming in gravy – peas, and beans, and small stuffed hen. Victor in particular studies a plate loaded with roasted potatoes covered with salt and rosemary.

“How did…who made all this?”

“I don’t know,” I say, shrugging and then mimicking the twin’s little pinging gestures in the air. “The magic brought it.”

“Amazing,” he says, shaking his head.

“Eat!” I say, giving him a little nudge. “You’ve got to be starving.”

“Is it,” he asks, glancing at me. “Is it safe?”

I shrug again. “Who knows. But hey, there’s a pretty good chance we’re going to die out here anyway.

So, if the forest says eat…” I spread my hand, letting him finish the sentence for himself.

“Then we eat,” he murmurs, picking up a plate waiting at the corner of the table and filling it to his heart’s content. Then, we both move to the fire, me perching on the arm of the recliner so that I can sit as close to Victor as possible while he fills his belly.

“What do you think is next?” Victor asks between bites, looking up at me as he does.

“Trial by combat,” I say casually, rolling my eyes a little. “Catching a magic hen. Solving a troll’s riddles three.”

Victor laughs lightly, a sound deep in his chest as continues to work through his food. “We’ll have to bring the boys along for that one,” he murmurs. “They’ll be better at quizzes than you and I.”

“I know,” I say, frowning towards the door. “Why do you think that is, Victor?” I ask, suddenly curious.

“Why do I think what is?” he replies passively, paying more attention to his food than to me in this moment. He was hungrier than he thought he was.

“Why’re they’re so smart,” I respond, frowning towards the door. “Intelligence is usually genetic, but they’re way smarter than you and me. How do you think they got that way?”

“Speak for yourself,” he murmurs and I turn to swat him on the head, which makes him laugh.

“Seriously, Victor!” I insist, laughing a little myself. “If we had more, do you think they’d be really clever too? Like, are we doomed to always have kids we can’t keep up with intellectually?”

“More?” he asks, quirking an eyebrow and ignoring my real question. “How many more?”

“Oh,” I say, wrinkling my nose and pretending to think harder than I really am. “Like, maybe six? Eight?

Should we go for an even dozen?”

He laughs, putting his plate down on the floor and pulling me into his lap. “Two dozen, if you want them,” he murmurs, holding me close to him and running a warm hand down my back, stopping only when he cups my ass in his broad hand. “As many as you want. Should we get started now?”

I laugh, wriggling in his arms, glancing towards the door. “Victor, stop,” I insist, but secretly hoping he doesn’t. “The boys could come in at any minute –“

But suddenly, a flash of light fills the room, coming from the window next to the fireplace. We both freeze, looking towards it, and then jump as the air is suddenly filled with tiny golden lights.

I gasp, looking around at them, moving through the air like little dust motes, or fireflies, or…

“Magic,” Victor murmurs, marveling at them. “Can you…can you see them, Evie?”

“I can,” I confirm, my voice just as breathless with awe as his is. “Oh my god. It’s beautiful.”

As we watch, the golden motes begin to move with more direction, gathering themselves together and then moving with purpose towards the door. Then they being to stream out of it, despite the fact that the door itself is closed –

As we watch, uncomprehending, trying to figure it out, the door flies open –

I jump again in Victor’s arms, but he just tenses below me, solid and ready.

“Mama?” Alvin’s eager voice rings out as he steps through the door. “Papa?”

“What is it, Alvin?” Victor asks, tense, as the boys both come into the cottage.

“Something’s happening,” Ian says, looking at the magic as it flows out of the cabin and off into the night. “I think…I think it wants you to follow it.”

Victor and I stare at the boys, and then at each other. And in his face I see my own knowledge reflected there.

The boys are right.

It’s time to go.