Deviation: Altera Realm Trilogy Book 2 (50 page)

“What?” Gabe asked angrily as he stopped and looked at him. “I’m in a bit of a hurry.”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m pretty sure I already said that.”

“No, I mean where in the neutral territories?” Adam asked, stepping closer to him.

Gabe stared at him for a moment before answering. “Bolchin probably.”

Adam shook his head. “No, we should start in Colchin.”

“We?”

“I’m coming with you.”

“Not necessary.”

“Yes, it is. You’re not going to get anything with snark and attitude. People actually
like
me,” Adam said with a faint smile.

Gabe narrowed his eyes. “Fine. But Bolchin is our better bet.”

“Colchin. The Psyches are known to have healing medicines, and there are more of them in Colchin. Not to mention they’re way nicer there.”

“I agree,” Syney said. “When I had that curse, one of them gave me something to drink that took the physical pain away immediately.”

Adam looked at her and smiled.

“Fine,” Gabe spat. “But we need to leave now.”

Adam nodded and gave Syney a quick kiss. “Nothing stupid while I’m gone, OK?”

She nodded.

“And Reed?” Adam looked at the young man who sat quietly on the couch with his eyes closed. He knew Reed was awake even though he looked sound asleep. “She doesn’t leave your sight.”

“Got it,” Reed said, not moving.

Gabe glared at Adam as the two moved toward the door.
This isn’t my idea of fun either
, Adam thought, looking away from him. But this was about Noelle, not them. Once outside the room, they both took off at Vampire speed and didn’t slow down until they reached Colchin.

This little life came out of me
, Cass thought, as she looked down at her week-old son. He was beyond amazing as he looked around from his crib, his little pudgy hands waving in the air. Cass laughed and ran a finger down his cheek. This was her little boy, her and Wes’s little baby boy. She was a bit sad that he hadn’t inherited Wes’s amazing red eyes, but his brown eyes were just as beautiful.

Cass didn’t know it was possible to love someone as much as she loved her little Nyoka. Becca had helped with the name. It meant “snake” in the old language, she said. Cass wanted to name him something that had to do with Weston. This was his son as well, and it was important that he be a part of his life, even if he couldn’t actually be there with him. Her smile fell as the thought finally hit her. Ny was never going to meet his father. Maybe if the world were different, but it wasn’t, and it seemed as if the Realm would always be at war. There wasn’t even a way she could tell him he had a child. It was all so frustrating.

“How is the little man?”

Cass looked at Becca. “Getting cuter by the second.”

Becca laughed and peered into the crib. “I think you might be right.”

Cass stifled a yawn and sat down on the wooden rocking chair. “I just wish he slept a little more.”

Becca chuckled. “My mother always said you have to sleep when the baby sleeps.”

“Do you have children?”

She gave a sad smile. “No. I have two nieces, though, both of whom were born here.”

Cass looked at Ny again. She couldn’t imagine life without him.
Where did that uptight little girl go?
she wondered about herself. “Do you want children?”

Becca sat down on a chair by the crib. “I used to. I’m not sure anymore, although I think this little man may change my mind again.” She fingered the wooden bars of the crib.

The picture of Raine that Cass had found entered her mind again. She hadn’t brought it up since she’d discovered it, although she’d been temped to a few times. The thought of her relationship with Becca changing somehow had stopped her. There was no way Cass would have survived the last couple of months without her, and that meant almost as much to her as her own son. But something about this moment felt right to her, so she took a deep breath. “There’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about.”

Becca looked at her, her smile turning a little sad. “Took you long enough. I was sure you’d bring it up the moment you got here.”

“Excuse me?”

“You want to talk about Raine.”

Cass looked at her hands. “Yeah. I mean, you two knew each other. That much I know. But I…I don’t know.”

Becca was quiet for a while before taking an audible breath. “When we met, I was only seventeen. He was doing his seventh round of training.”

“Out here?” Cass asked, looking up.

She nodded. “Do you know much about guard training?”

Cass felt shame as she shook her head. As a royal princess, she should know these things, but she’d never cared to know them.

“There are ten rounds of training. I know, it sounds crazy, but it’s spread out over more than a hundred years and starts when they’re very little. Raine told me about some of the rounds. They had to survive by themselves out in the Realm for a month. Find a safe haven in the neutral territories. They also had to find three safe havens here, in the Human Realm. It’s very known to anyone from the Realm around here that this house is sanctuary for anyone who needs it. That reputation brought him here. I was surprised at first because no other Lycin had come knocking on the door. They preferred to find places that didn’t involve other people, especially others from the Realm who had chosen to live in the Human Realm. But Raine was smart. He knew that if he ever were stuck out here with his charge, he’d need help, not just shelter.”

Cass smiled. That sounded exactly like Raine. “So he just came and knocked on your door?”

Becca laughed and nodded. “And I invited him in for tea. He was so different back then. Most guards are before they’re named as Protectors. There’s no burden on them. I think he laughed more then.”

“How…how often did you see him?”

“He stayed for a while that time. And then a handful of times after you were born,” she paused as her eyes filled with tears. “The guards, including Protectors, are given leave as vacation. Raine would come here each time. During his second or third leave…that’s when he met Gabriel. The two were so weary of each other at first, but once Gabriel told him everything he knew about the war and the Ancient One, Raine asked how he could help; I think he did it for us. He already had tried to talk me into going to the Village. He told me he could get me to work as a handmaiden, your handmaiden actually. But I couldn’t do it. I was raised on horror stories of the Realm. There was no way I was going to leave here, and he knew that.”

“He helped Gabe for you then.”

Becca leaned forward and took Cass’s hand. “And you. He really did change after you were born. I actually got a little jealous to be honest.”

“Of me?” Cass scoffed.

“His face lit up when he talked about you, his little princess. And then you started growing up, and your silly girl stages made him laugh, and your adolescence made him want to quit. But through it all, he loved you so much. He wanted to help give you a Realm to be proud of, and he saw Gabriel as a way to do that.”

“And he died for it,” Cass said, wiping some falling tears.

Becca sat back and nodded.

“Sorry. I just blamed myself for so long. He encouraged me to do magic, and he died because of it.”

“He died for Altera, for peace.”

Cass sniffled and cleared her throat. “I miss him.”

“Me too.”

She looked back to the crib in front of her and pictured Raine playing with Nyoka. It would have been a nice sight to see. Her smile fell the second Ny’s gentle gurgling stopped. It was her constant reminder that her son was in front of her, and now it was gone. She flew up and out of her seat at the same moment Becca did. Ny constantly made noises, so not hearing them concerned both of them. But what Cass saw in the crib was even more disconcerting. She should have been prepared for this, but looking down at the little cub in front of her was almost overwhelming. Nyoka looked up at her with his big brown eyes and let out a high-pitched wail. She reached down and ran her fingers along the light-tan fur now covering his whole little body. A moment later his pink
tongue licked her hand before smacking his head into it. “What is he?” she asked, tears filling her eyes.

“He’s a lion,” Becca said, disbelief filling her voice.

“Why do you sound so surprised?” Cass asked. “We’ve been waiting for him to shift since he was born.”

She nodded. “I know. It’s just…lions are royalty.”

Cass looked down at him again. “Wes is a prince.”

“Gabe had me read up on Shifters when he dropped you off. Said it might come in handy. Lions were mentioned. There’s only one born every other generation—a direct line of succession. Wes’s father, King Lional, is a lion.”

“So?”

“Cass, this means Nyoka is the next Shifter king. It’s his destiny.”

She looked at Becca for a moment before looking back down at her little lion. This was huge and a bit scary. “Can they tell when he’s…Do they know about him?”

Becca nodded. “The current king starts to lose his teeth. He will be succeeded when they’re all gone.”

Cass frowned. The only way she saw of keeping Nyoka was if neither her nor Wes’s families knew of him. This worried her. “Can they track him?”

“I don’t think so.”

“But we can do a spell to hide him anyway, right?” She looked at Becca with pleading eyes.

“Of course. I’ll get started,” she said, hurrying out of the room.

Cass looked back down at her little boy. She had hopes of keeping him out of everyone’s sights until peace was reached in the Realm. But that was looking less likely. Moreover she had no idea how to care for a lion; she barely knew how to care for a child. She wrung her hands as Nyoka jumped in circles, chasing his short tail. All her certainty started to fall away, and worry invaded her mind. She needed help, and all she wanted was Wes. She was pretty sure she wasn’t going to get either.

When he closed his eyes, he could see her. But when he opened them, he was still in the stone cell his father had thrown him into the second he’d stepped back into Shifter territory. Wes shouldn’t have expected anything else. His people had been paranoid for centuries, and they weren’t going to look around his stint in Magic User custody, a fact he openly told them, even for him. His father knew Wes had been taken prisoner in the Village, and Shifter law demanded that the captive be put into holding until it was determined what he gave up in order to be let out alive. Being set free from prison in the Village wasn’t something that happened very often—he might actually have been the first—but the law was upheld, and every day a new soldier came in and interrogated him. Wes looked down at the burns on his arms. A few were starting to fade, but some were still red and black. Those were from the day before. Who would have thought the interrogation techniques in the Village were more humane than those of his people?

He hadn’t told them anything they wanted to know. Information about security at the Village and locations of royal families—that was all they wanted to know. Each interrogator laughed when he told them the truth about how Syney wanted to end the war and said they needed to work together in order to end the war peacefully. That wasn’t what they wanted to hear, but that was all he was giving.

Wes leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes again. They would come soon. It was always the same time and the same results, yet they still came, day after day. He opened his eyes as heavy footsteps echoed down the hall. Wes wondered what kind of torture they were planning for him tonight, not that it mattered much. The heavy wooden door opened as he stood and gave a good stretch. His cocky smile fell the moment his father stepped into the cell, slamming the door behind him. This was more than unusual. Lional hadn’t seen him since Wes had taken up residence in the cramped cell. Lional was a large, imposing man with broad shoulders and a thick mane of dirty blond hair.

“Father,” Wes said, trying to suppress his anger. This was his first sign that he might actually get out of here—no use ruining it with snarkiness.

Lional huffed and looked away, disgust filling his face.

Wes frowned and waited. There was obviously a reason for Lional being here.