A Path of Oak and Ash (27 page)

"If they did, they wouldn't still be canvassing this place." Aodhan reasoned. Quin and Conall continued to bicker as they carried the unconscious Matthew down the stairs, handling his large weight with ease.

"Which means, we have to find Liz." Carrick chimed in.

"She is dead." Aodhan looked at him quizzically.

"But we can talk to her, like we tried with my mom?"

His dark locks fluttered about as Aodhan shook his head no. "Too dangerous, look what happened last time."

"But-"

Quin returned from dropping Matt off out front looking agitated "Can we discuss this somewhere else? Company just pulled up." Quin hissed. "At least four, human not fell. Well-armed."

"We'll stay and hold them off." Conall offered.

"No." Aodhan and Quin barked in unison.

"We'll be flayed alive by the elder's if we get in an all-out brawl in broad daylight in a human city."  Quin tacked on.

"There's a back exit to the alley, this way." Carrick spoke as he dashed down the hallway.  There was a steel door to the metal fire escape ladder on the back of the building outside.  Starless and Millie were waiting impatiently beneath the ladder, he wasn’t surprised they had been able to keep up with the cab.

"Where are we headed?" Aodhan asked as his feet hit the concrete.  He had to rush to keep up, the rest of them were already running down the alley.

After they had put two blocks between them and his old home Carrick decided he was done weighing the pro's and con's in his mind.  They were low on options. He needed to know.  Two birds with one stone and all that.   

"One more place I want to see." Carrick called over his shoulder banking a hard left at the next intersection towards the wealthy neighborhood.

37

“No one is home." Bethany whispered quietly, more to herself than the two men flanking her. There were no cars in the drive outside the brownstone, no lights on in the windows. Although, the large rose bushes on both sides of the front door had been recently watered and weeded.

"Your mother and brother are in California, visiting your aunt." Aurelian explained.  Bethany was slightly saddened by that, she loved visiting Aunt Josephine in Carmel. Laying in the sand, basking in the sun at Point Lobos to the calls of sea lions and the gulls. Building castles, grilling out with her father...

She closed her eyes momentarily, forcing all of those memories into the past, focusing on the now. The last thing anyone needed was her turning into a blubbering wreck in the driveway. Still she found it odd that those distant childhood memories cut her more deeply than standing in front of her own front door. No. Not her door. Elizabeth's door. She was Bethany and Bethany was strong.

"It feels like I have never left and yet, never been." Beth turned to Aurelian. "Sounds quite silly does it not?"

"On the contrary, it’s the most sense you've made all day."

The front door popped open without anyone laying a finger on the keypad. "Shall we?" Erik offered with a sly smile. She was beginning to wonder if there was anything this Erik could
not
do. The three of them had flown from Latin America to New York via private charter. No one had requested a passport stateside, only a limousine awaited their arrival. Driven by a cheerful man who referred to Erik as Mr. Jones-although she doubted that was his last name-they had made it to her home in record time while sipping champagne of all things. There was money, old money, in what these people did.

The entryway was as she had remembered it, the small occasional table covered with roses under the chandelier, the wide staircase with its cherry steps and wainscoting along the wall.

"Stay here for a moment." Erik ordered her as he headed left towards her father's study, Aurelian went right through the formal living room towards the kitchen. Impatient, Bethany grew restless staring into her mother's hallway mirror.

Slowly she meandered into the formal living room, running her hand over the back of the white leather sofa. She had never been allowed in this room growing up. This was the adult room, where her father entertained clients and partners. Being the traditionalist that he was, the no children allowed rule had been severely enforced in this space. Her brother had once been grounded two weeks for simply touching one of the sculptures displayed on the console table. Mom had gone on and on about the cost of the item, not that it was anything new. She was always flinging money around. In fact, her mother had spent over seven thousand dollars on this white couch, another two on the coffee table and who knows how much to the designer who picked it all out and set it every so expertly in front of the large bay window.

On impulse she walked around and sat on the cold leather, even put her dirty shoes on the walnut coffee table between the serving tray decorated with candles and candies and the wire horse sculpture that sat atop a stack of New Yorkers.

A sad smirk crept across Bethany's face. All those years she had eyed this room in wonder, never daring to disturb it for fear of her parent's wrath. How many countless times had she eyed this very spot, wondering what it would be like to sit with the adults and sip tea or brandy in the evenings? Now that she had broken the cardinal rule, the very concept of it seemed lackluster and borderline absurd. Nothing but a dismal view from the most uncomfortable couch she had ever had the pleasure of planting her butt upon.

The familiar sound of the front door opening snapped her to her feet at a run. Not towards Erik or Aurelian, but the door in a primal misplaced urge. "Mom?"

Rounding the corner she came face to chest with four of the most handsome yet scary looking men she'd ever seen in her life, literally running into the man in front of the group. Taking a step back, the newcomers pine forest scent hung in her nose. She looked up into the hooded eyes of a man who's dark hair matched his clothing, trying to decide whether to scream or say hello. In spite of his fierce gaze and hard jaw, there was a slight blush to his cheeks triggered by her touch.

"Liz?" That voice...

She scanned their faces, landing on the brilliant oceanic blue eyes of... "Rick?"

He smiled, that was all it took.

Eyes watering she ran at him, brushing past the man in black, wrapping her arms around him in a tight hug. Wow he was...no longer the lanky guy that had taken her to homecoming. His frame had doubled in size, thick muscles roped over his arms, legs and even his neck had thickened. His alabaster skin now carried the dark summer color typical of lifeguards. Dark short hair now fell over his shoulders, small strands braided with no particular rhyme or reason. His face held no boyish charm, he was a man plain and simple with a strong jaw and angled cheekbones. Surrounded in his cedar scent, she felt a strange weight lifted from her chest.

"Carrick, actually. Carrick Slaine." He mumbled into her hair.

"Bethany, actually. Bethany Blair." The smile on her face felt natural for the first time in forever. "I thought I'd never see you again."

"Bethany dear...who are you talking t..? Oh my." Aurelian's eyes widened, scanning the group. She quickly dropped her hands from Rick, moving to stand behind Aurelian. Which in honesty made little sense. She'd known Richard a lot longer than she had her short statured savior. Still he had become somewhat of a human security blanket. "Hail friends, what brings you so far from Dre'ien?"

"Who are..." Rick..er...Carrick started to ask, he trailed off soon as Erik came into view at the other end of the hallway. The look exchanged between them was born of surprise yet grew into mutual anger. As though their flesh was conceived of magnets, the pair moved away from the group and yet closer together. Their words angry whispers.

"Why are you here?"

"I could ask you the same."

"Do you they know each other Aurelian?" Her question hung momentarily against their unintended awkward eavesdropping. Surprisingly, she seemed to be the only one bothered by it. The redhead had taken the top magazine off her mother's forbidden coffee table, flipping through pictures with an odd look of glee on his face. The blond had moved past the formal living room into the kitchen. The two remaining men remaining took up watch; the one in black by the front windows, the one in green she assumed by the sliding door off the kitchen out of her line of sight.

Aurelian nodded. "Family resemblance is often striking, wouldn't you agree Quin?" The one in black turned towards her and Aurelian, his oddly hued eyes softening for a moment when they fell upon her. She looked down, brushing her now dark hair out of her face.

"I have no family." The one he called Quin said quietly, words that brought a fresh tinge of grief to her. Oh how she knew what that was like, to loose everyone she cared for. Behind them Erik and Carrick were still in the midst of a quickly escalating argument. Their voices no longer attempting angry whispers, but full on shouting.

"I told you to stay in Dre'ien!"

"What are you doing with Liz? Did you kidnap her too?"

"Of all the scapegrace..."

She couldn't listen to it anymore. Aurelian had excused himself, moving to stand between the two shouting men.  Clearly he was trying to diffuse whatever it was they were about to come to blows about. She wondered if this was the father Aurelian had been referring to, although that didn't seem right. If he had been Carrick's father, wouldn't he have introduced himself as such?

Since everyone seemed occupied, Beth turned the corner out of the formal living room toward the stairs. Taking the rich cherry wood two at a time-as she often did- she was on the second floor landing in the blink of an eye.
Eyes forward
, she warned herself. This beige hallway was home to every family portrait and fondly framed vacation memory her family had. Disney World, Hawaii, San Diego, London...all those wonderful carefree days felt like someone else's life. Her room was the second door on the left, the brightly colored sign she had painted in first grade that read 'Elizabeth's Room' had been taken down. Odd. Perhaps her mother had given it to her grandmother or something.  She turned the knob and her heart sank.

Her beautiful iron canopy bed had been partially disassembled, the bed linens changed into the spare whites. Her pictures, trophies and dolls had been packed into cardboard boxes piled in the corner of the room. Her mother's beautiful cursive writing marked them as 'Storage' on the side. Not Elizabeth's. Not my daughters. Just Storage.

Beth fell to her knees on what used to be her plush chevron rug. It too was gone. Just like her it had been replaced. Designer ivory twill dug into her knees, not that she minded. The pain did little to distract from the one in her chest.

"What are you doing?"

Beth whirled around to find Quin standing in her doorway; face unreadable, arms crossed.

"Ah I'm sorry, I..." She wiped her eyes, unable to think of anything to say. Through the floor she heard the shouting escalate, something was tipped over with a crash. Someone laughed.

"It isn't safe to wonder out of sight." His tone was very fatherly, although he didn't look more than a year or two older than she was. "Come back down with the others."

"Okay, just give me a minute." She muttered, tucking her hair behind her ears. He nodded, turning to leave.

"This used to be my room." He paused at her words. "I'm dead. To them, I mean. Murdered and buried not long ago and this...this used to be my room." She sighed. "I guess I never thought my family could just box me up like this. File me away as a memory so quickly."

"Those we are born to do not always fit us. Take solace in your real family, the one you keep in your heart." She was surprised to hear such beautiful words out of one so dark.

"Quin, is it?"

He turned around, his steel eyes seemed to shimmer against the small rays of light that caught his face. "Yes."

She flipped up the rug. "Come here, help me with this board." It hadn't been nailed down in ages, her father had added the screws eight years ago to stop the squeaking. Addressing what he referred to as 'builder incompetence'. What her father-and everyone else for that matter-didn't know is that she had used this revealed hollow under the floorboards to stash all of her secrets.

"I can't get it, my nails are all ruined." Beth hissed, clawing at the wooden floor anyway. This had been so much easier pre-captivity, she'd lost anything that resembled feminine hands through torture. Even though the bones were mending and the scabs were about ready to come off, her digits didn't operate with the upper class grace they used to. Not that she really cared, returning from the brink of death puts bad manicures in perspective.

"Here, allow me." His voice seemed to have dropped an octave as he approached. Crouching down next to the broken board, it dawned on her this was the first time she had ever really had a boy in her room. Her Dad had been a stickler about that kind of thing, any company was to be kept in the living areas in plain sight far from any beds or closed doors. Sure she'd try to sneak off a few times when she was a sophomore but her bother had always ratted her out, forcing her to use the showing him where the bathroom was excuse. Beth realized in a way this didn't even violate her Dad's rule, as clearly this room was no longer hers.

Removing a handmade necklace from his thick neck, he used the animal fang that had been tied onto the leather to turn the screw.

She blushed. "Thank you." He smiled, two rows of perfectly straight brilliant white teeth. He was far less scary when he smiled, hell he even had dimples.

As Beth reached to pull up the board, Quin's massive hand's shot out and grabbed hers. "What happened to your hands?" He asked, rolling them over in intense examination.

She pulled away from his soft touch, clearing her throat. "I was...tortured." Looking away she focused on popping up the wood, it came free with the same ease it always had. Underneath lay a navy blue knapsack, just where she left it. With a smile, Beth tugged it free of its hiding spot.

"Why?"

"For this." Loosening the top, she carefully pulled out the small leather bound book. The gold piping on the strange symbol on the cover seemed to shimmer when it caught the sunlight.

Quin gasped, his eyes filled with reverence as he looked upon the object in her hand. "The Leabhar Fìrinn. Never in my life did I believe I would lay eyes upon it." Quin's steel gaze flicked to her. "How did you get this?"

She opened her mouth to respond. "Bethany darling, are you up here?" Aurelian's voice cut off her story, scrambling to her feet she took a step back from Quin. Aurelian's silhouette was in her doorway just a moment later. The sarcastic smirk that typically decorated his face faded instantly. Eyes wide, Aurelian approached with the same solemn awe that Quin displayed. "I thought it was a myth. All these years, the whispers in the trees, complexities in our web, and lo the truth hidden in the palm of the seat all along." Aurelian smirked. "Clever bastard."