Broken Mate, Unbroken Bond

CHAPTER 6 - ASH

When I stepped back into the living room, having ended the mind communication between myself and Dominic, I found Dee on the sofa. She was slouched over a little, her jaw and fists clenched.

“Are you okay?” I asked, quickly moving to her side. She looked even paler now, though there was a clear sheen of sweat developing on her hairline and brow. “Dee?”

“There’s another,” she muttered. When she said nothing else, I strode toward the window and pulled open the curtain again. Sure enough, there was another person out there, standing next to the dark-skinned young woman. They clasped hands and their mouths began to move in unison. I glanced back toward Dee and did not like what I saw.

Dominic. Stop.

We’re getting in, Aislinn.

The seductive quality was gone from his voice, replaced by the authoritative force.

Dee’s breathing was coming in short, breathy bursts. Her eyes were still far away, unseeing, but a soft, keening noise was coming from her chest. It was growing in volume.

What are they doing to her?

She is fighting them.

You do know if anything happens to her I will blame you.

I didn’t care that they were “my kind” or whatever it was he’d said. I didn’t care either in that moment that I’d been robbed of something integral. All I cared about was that the woman who had raised me, the one person in this world who loved me the most, was suffering.

Dee’s body began to tremble. I turned away from the window and once again rushed to her side, reaching for her hand. “That’s enough!” I said through gritted teeth. I’d abide by this no longer.

THAT’S ENOUGH!

My own voice echoed in my mind, just as it pushed outward, loud and clear and no doubt reaching the powerful ears of the creatures outside.

“I’m coming out!”

My aunt slid down the cushions of the sofa as the force of her seizure doubled. I tried to still her; I reached out in an attempt to settle her flailing limbs, but nothing had an effect. After agonising seconds passed with me watching helplessly, she stopped moving so suddenly that I almost fell on top of her. I scrambled backward, then in a panic reached for her neck, fingers searching for a pulse. Just as I found a weak thread, I heard the sound of the front door crashing open, followed almost immediately by the back door.

I threw myself upright, arms wide and my back to my aunt’s unconscious form, trying to protect her. My hair swished from left to right as I tried to keep both entrances into the room in my sights. Soon, the sitting room was overrun with huge bodies. And I roared.

The noise that burst from my chest was not something I recognised, nor something I would ever have associated with myself. But it was mine.

My hands were held up, palms out, and my weight was shifting very slightly from one foot to the other as I scanned the room, automatically counting the people within it, weighing them up. They had all stopped dead in their tracks, each in various stages of entry into the living room. Every one of them stared at me, expressions ranging from surprise to confusion. Dominic was the first one to step closer.

“NO.”

It felt like a force coming from me; my voice. Like all of my pent up anger and upset were blasting out behind that one word, strengthening it, making it dangerous. The others were looking from me to Dominic Mac Nessa, who for a moment looked uncertain - a look that surely was unfamiliar to him.

He held up his hands. “Let us help. I swear to you that’s the only reason we’re here.”

“Help!?” I spat, my ire only for him in that moment. “She’s unconscious. How is that helping!?” From somewhere behind him, a smaller figure moved. The dark-skinned woman I recognised from outside, the one who had challenged Dee in some way I had zero understanding of, stepped forward. I stared at her and my lips quirked in a snarl.

“I am sorry,” she said, her voice soft, her accent melodious with so many different influences, “I was under the impression that this woman was holding you against your will. Harming you in some way.”

The woman gestured toward my Aunt, who was still motionless but for the slight rise and fall of her chest. “That does not seem to be the case.” She looked toward Dominic, her eyes hardening. The man who had been holding her hand before out in the garden also moved forward, lending his silent support. I looked at the two of them, noting some similarities. Siblings perhaps, or cousins. Whatever the relation, the two of them together in the room had a tangible impact on the atmosphere. Something deep and disconcerting disturbed the very air between us all. This was magic. I felt like I was feeling it for the first time, and yet there was a familiarity to it.

“That woman is holding her. Aislinn had no idea of who she was, of what was being done to her.” Dominic’s hand movements became emphatic, his hands slicing through the air as he gesticulated. “Can’t you sense that, Orisa? That she’s being blocked somehow from her own true nature?”

Orisa turned to look at me once more, the silver beads in her braids clicking together with the movement. Her eyes narrowed as she studied me for a moment. “I can sense her true nature, it’s clear as day, wolf.” She took a step closer to the sofa and immediately I stiffened. Orisa held out a hand herself in an attempt to placate. “This woman has some power,” she said of Dee, “But she was overwhelmed by my magic, together with my brother’s. We can help her, but we will need the rest of our circle, and the expertise of our healer.”

Uncertainty flooded through me. My instincts had been to protect Dee, protect them from this pack and these witches that they seemed to be using for their own ends, yet there was an authenticity to Orisa. The young woman before me exuded a quiet calm, and I found myself wanting to believe her. In truth, I was in way over my head. I had no idea what most of these things meant, and no clue how to help Dee.

“You can bring them here,” I eventually responded, though I wasn’t entirely sure even myself if that was a question or an order.

Orisa shook her head. “I’m afraid after the show we’re putting on right now, it would be too risky to expose the rest of my people.”

“She’s right, several of the neighbours are stirring,” Colin, the sneering companion I’d met the previous day said from the back doorway, his head c****d to one side.

“There is another peering over the top of the back garden wall,” Dante added.

“Mrs. Reilly,” I automatically responded. “The Curtain-Twitcher.”

Mrs. Reilly was a very nosy, very old widower, who, in place of a TV, spent her day watching the real world soaps outside her window. Dee often made an extra dinner for her, and always had time to listen to her complaints over a cup of tea. I swallowed down my tears, as I looked down at my Aunt.

“We can take her to the Estate.” Dominic, his voice now much softer, was speaking to me. “She’ll be safe there, Aislinn. You’ll be safe there. I can give Orisa and her people whatever they need in order to help your Aunt.”

My anger, which had been steadily dissipating since these wolves had blown the doors of my house in, returned again.

“No further harm will come to her under our protection. You have my word.”