Chapter 14 - Answers Pending

COVYN

“Spencer….” Ellion began cautiously, moving around the counter to Daley. “What did you bring home?”

Perhaps it was only me and Spencer that found the smile beautiful and honest.

“Evadiene, what are you?” Daley asked, she was still curious even as her mate grew cautious.

I watched Evadiene’s mouth work, but not a single thing she wanted to say was permitted. Her brows grew tightly together and she let a shaking breath leave between her lips.

“Don’t want to tell us? Or, more likely, can’t say?” Daley asked.

“No,…”Evadiene’s eyes went wide and then she darted to the stove.

Truthfully, I should have said something when I smelt it burning but this conversation was rather important and no one else seemed to noticed. Even still, her concern for the burning food seemed to only be an excuse to get that one word out against her restrictions.

I watched her, as did the others, as she darted at a regular human speed to the stove and reached for the pan, burning her fingers on the handle and dropping it onto the stone floor.

“Fauck!” She groaned, holding her hand against the other and gritting her teeth together. “Fuck, Goddess just kill me already.”

Spencer came up behind her and guided her to the sink, running the cool water over the hand. Slowly her breathing returned to normal, and I rounded the counter to help clean up, grabbing the hot pan off the floor and turning off the stove top. The lid had mostly stayed in place even as it hit the floor, containing most of the egg and leaving very little to clean up, but Sequoia helped in eating what fell anyway.

Daley was grinning to herself slightly in spite of everything and muttered, “you must be very rare if you can’t say it.”

Spencer shot her a glare as he continued to hold Evadiene’s hand under the water, but she was trying to pull it away now. I knew Ellion enough to know he was still on the fence between protecting Daley, curiosity, and not seeing the threat when she appeared very much human.

“What do you mean darling?” Ellion asked, putting himself protectively beside her anyway.

“There is always power in names, even the word ‘wolven’ has power to those who never or rarely hear it. But creatures who are truly rare, whose names are almost never said are bound by different rules,” Daley informed, eyes tracing over Evadiene carefully.

Spencer picked her up, bringing her over to the bar and sat her in Sequoia’s spot to check her hand over again. There was a bold handle imprint over her palm and across her fingers and he started to lick the wound.

“Ambrose,” she wined, “that tickles.”

——

Ambrose

“Then don’t grab hot pans Angel ,” I returned, kissing her hand and then pressing a rolled cold cloth in her grip. “Is Daley right Eva? Are you a rare magical creature?”

She turned to face him more directly and smiled softly, nodding her head just once. I smiled as well, brushing the hair back from her face to tuck it behind her ear, and as I did the pink darken from the roots to recolour her hair into a dark brown. Small gasps came from the others in the room but her eyes didn’t leave mine.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked lightly and her smile wavered.

“I can’t,” she choked out, nearly literally choked like the words were impossible to say.

“Daley dear, do you know what she is?” Ellion asked, moving to stand beside her now that Evadiene was so close to his mate.

She shook her head. “Not much to go on, and there are so many that we have likely never come across let’s alone even ever heard of in our life time.”

“But you can change your hair colour?” Ellion asked, his tone between a scoff and disbelief. “Why?”

Evadiene smiled. “Like a defence mechanism, to blend in or hide, change my appearance slightly if being followed.”

“How far does that go?” Ellion asked and she moved her shoulders back and forth in thought, considering.

“I can make my hair almost any colour, and my skin can change within the ability of my own melanin. I can go from a summer to a winter pretty easily, but the ability wasn’t intended for me like this.”

The Alpha stood on the other side of the counter in between Daley and Evadiene, and spoke before anyone else asked her to elaborate. “You said bound by other rules, what do you mean?” He asked Daley and she seemed both excited to share and nervous that it was him to ask.

She shrugged. “It’s different for everyone I think. I haven’t read that book in a very long time. I don’t even know if the librarian keeps borrowed records that far back. I’ve used up several cards worth of books since moving here and she refuses to go digital…”

“You have a library?” Evadiene asked excitedly, sitting forward and pulling away from me slightly.

She squeezed my hand and I realized she had distractedly squeezed both hands when I heard her wringing the water from the cloth onto the floor. I could feel her excitement and wished I had been the one to tell her about the library. Daley just nodded like she was surprised she didn’t know.

“Can you describe it? What does it look like?” Evadiene asked, leaning so far forward she was nearly off the stool.

“The library?” Daley asked but at whatever expression Evadiene made she laughed, “oh the book. It’s quite large, with a red cover that looks like it came from an old cotton curtain… the metal on it was… brass maybe? And the writing on the cover was in black stitch.”

The Alpha was chuckling on the other side of the sink now. “Do you want to find that book?” He asked.

Daley quirked her eyebrows. “Well obviously, it could be very helpful … oh.”

Evadiene leapt off the stool and started walking down the hall with me on her heels. She went right to the Alpha’s office and I was about to pull her hand from the door when he appeared beside me and said it was fine. She cut through there into the library and stopped.

Every set of eyes was on her when those doors opened but she turned around, looking through us to the hall we’d come from.

“Sequoia.” She called softly and I hadn’t even thought to checkif she was following.

The cat jumped up on her shoulder and they started walking down the different isles. She would stop randomly and pull a book off a shelf, or have Sequoia climb a shelf she couldn’t reach and knock something down. Daley and Spencer sat on the couches for a short time, but the Alpha and I followed her up and down each one.By the end she had gathered enough books for each of us to be holding a stack.

“This is weird,” she muttered, looking at them all.

“What’s weird, you picked them all,” I laughed, trying to lighten her mood which had gotten very cloudy.

“Usually people need the books I find and come to me for them. Three books would have been a lot.” I could tell she was feeling down, and embarrassed.

“It’s likely because the Alpha is with us,” I assured and he startled at me. “People aren’t likely to approach her with you right there, they don’t want to bother you, or risk interrupting.”

He nodded. “I should have gone when Ellion and Daley left.”

“Daley left?” Evadiene looked down at the stacks again and sighed. “She will find it.”

Evadiene then went to a big table and started laying out all the books we had. When they were all spread out the Alpha whistled loudly and shouted that some requested and previously lost books had been found and to check if you had been looking for something..

We returned to the kitchen to eat, asking our librarian to save the books that were left for us. I split off a portion of my omelet for Evadiene to replace the one she burnt, and I was surprised when the Alpha stayed with us to eat. I checked on Evadiene’s hand again when we were done, the skin was blistered and sore looking, and decided it was time to see the pack doctor.

She had tried to argue, but, oddly enough, the Alpha had backed me up about it and took it upon himself to call ahead to the doctor. After that, she felt obligated to go and I led the way down the halls to the clinic.

“You must be Miss Evadiene,” Doctor Tina walked over to us as we entered, eyeing the cat Evadiene had curled in her arms. “The Alpha told me to expect your arrival, and to call him back if you didn’t show up,” she giggled. “Is there anything about your physiology that I should know about?”