The Elemental Luna's Awakening

Chapter 5 - Sarcasm and Coffee

Seth

I snuck into Julia's house while she was outside with her granddaughter, hiding in one of the two bedrooms like an intruder.

I laid down on the bed, listening to the conversation that her and Rhiannon were having. I deliberately chose the spare bedroom to hang out in. Knowing Julia, she probably had some magic trap set up in her room and Lucius, my wolf, would have been turned into a bubbly, obedient Labrador upon entry.

"Or worse, some type of a doodle!" Lucius snipped in my head with disgust. I chuckled at his comment.

It was difficult to contain our growls when I heard about the issues that Rhiannon was having in life. That's not how it was supposed to be for her. She was supposed to be well cared for. Protected. Hidden.

But now was not the proper time to reveal myself to her. Not completely. So I had to keep my mouth shut, as well as my wolf's. Which was a difficult task on both ends.

She smelled like sandalwood and magnolias, earthy and spiritual, and being so close while having to stay away made Lucius whine in my head like a love-sick puppy. After the stunt he pulled this afternoon, I wasn't in the mood to listen to his bullshit.

"Mate!" he annoyingly kept repeating in my head, his impulse control riding a fine line.

"Yeah, no sh.it, Sherlock! We knew this!" I snapped at him in annoyance.

He snorted in frustration. "We must claim her. Mark her. We NEED her! We've been waiting for her for so long. She's in our territory now. Why are you waiting?! She's mere feet away."

He was right. She is our mate and we needed her. Most werewolves get their wolf at around 13 years of age. We spend a few years getting to know each other. Then, once we reach 18, we can find our mate. That is, if we're lucky to be close enough to pick up on each other's scent and feel the pull of the mate bond.

But Rhiannon is different. We're different. Lucius and I have known that she was our mate since we first saw her as pups, but we have really been feeling the pull since we turned 18. Some days, it's enough to drive us well past our breaking point.

For almost 5 years, we've watched her come and go the few times she's visited Julia. We were able to feel what she was feeling, even from a distance. The hurt, anger, stress, anxiety, and the pain. Not as strongly as we should, but it's there.

When her emotions started getting more extreme, we would run out and check on her, just to make sure she was OK and staying out of her sight. She was as clueless about us as the humans around her, though we could tell she would pick up on our scent. Seeing her relax when the wind blows our scent her way made us both happy.

But things needed to stay secretive that way. She needed to be kept in the dark to protect her, or so I'd been told. It's what my parents and Julia had drilled into my head when I was younger.

"We can't claim her now, and you know it! Will you just let me handle this?" I snapped at my impatient, horny mutt.

"She's special, you know that! That's why she's OURS. She's been ours since the moment she arrived here."

I sighed. "Yeah, I know ."

"SO TAKE HER!" he growled in my head.

My patience was wearing thin. "You DO realize that she's not of age yet, right? Add in she knows absolutely nothing of our kind. She doesn't even know she has a wolf. Do you want to scare the sh.it out of her so badly that she never wants to come back?! Because that's what you'll do!"

Lucius let out another growl "NO." He huffed out and finally went to the back of my mind. Just in time for me to hear the slurred words of my mate.

"Sh.it, Julia and her damned tea!" I hurried out to the kitchen, and as Rhiannon's head started dropping towards the table I managed to catch it with my hand before they collided. I turned my head and glared at Julia.

"Don't you look at me in that tone, I won't be having any of it!" She snapped at me as her eyes dared me to say something.

I rolled my eyes at her. Which in turn made her scoff.

"Don't just stand there holding her head. Pick her up and take her to the bedroom you just came out of." Julia lifted a hand from her coffee cup to point a finger at me. "And if you don't keep that mongrel of yours in check, so help me Lycaon, I'll castrate you where you stand!" Her stormy grey eyes were drilling holes into my crystal blue ones.

I gulped and Lucius whimpered. "Yes ma'am". I nodded my head, knowing she was serious, gently picked up Rhiannon, and took her to the spare bedroom.

"6'6" and you're afraid of a little old lady." Lucius chastised me from in my head.

"If I'm not mistaken, you whined like a pup nipped by its mother." I mocked him in return.

"Shut up." was his only reply before he went quiet again. Hypocrite.

I gently laid Rhiannon down on the bed and slid her boots and socks off. As tempting as it was to take her clothes off for her, I left them on and pulled the blanket up over her. It wasn't my place to take her clothes off. Not yet. And not for the first time when she's completely oblivious.

I did kiss her forehead though."Sleep soundly, my beautiful love. For your world will drastically start to change once you wake up." I whispered to her before leaving her room.

I walked back to the kitchen, got myself a cup of coffee, and sat down where Rhiannon was sitting a few moments ago.

Julia had a smirk on her face."What's the matter, pup? Don't you trust me to get your coffee for you?" Her eyes were lit with humor.

I chuckled at the old coot. "Thanks, but no thanks Julia. I can get my own. So, how long will she be out for?" I asked, not knowing what she put in her tea.

Julia put a finger to her chin, slowly rubbing it with her eyebrows furrowed as if she was deep in thought. "Oh, jeesh. She had two cups. I don't expect her to wake up until tomorrow night at the earliest."

"What?!?" Lucius and I asked in unison. "Why'd you give her so much? She could have gotten hurt, you know."

"Mmm hmm." Julia took a sip of her coffee. "Pup, I knew you were here the entire time and that you wouldn't let anything happen to her. It seemed like the first cup didn't do anything. It must have been slow acting because of her nerves." She suddenly glared at me. "Besides, this is partially your fault and you know it." She looked at the coffee in her hands, then back up at me with an eyebrow raised. "You need to keep that mongrel of yours under better control." She scolded both Lucius and I, and he whimpered in the back of my mind, knowing this was fully his fault.

Amar had been lying by the fireplace the entire time, despite no fire being lit. He raised his head to look at me, almost seconding what his ward had just said. "Would you like to add to that?" I asked the grey dog. He roo'd at me before laying his head back down, still watching me. "Smart ass." I grumbled under my breath.

I signed in frustration. "Yeah, I know. I was coming here to check on you and have a chat. That's when Lucius picked up her scent and took control." I shook my head. "I can usually control him better than that, but he's growing impatient and restless." I shrugged my shoulders.

"Let me see." Julia said, nodding at my shoulder.

I rolled my eyes. "There's nothing there besides a faint bruise. It'll be gone right directly." I tried to drop the subject, embarrassed by the entire thing.

"Oh, I don't care about your wound. I want to see what type of aim my granddaughter has." Julia was wearing a huge grin.

I snorted at her comment, but unbuttoned my shirt and moved it off from my left shoulder to show her a barely visible bruise. As soon as she started laughing, I quickly buttoned it back up.

I pressed my lips together to form a tight line, but then quickly smiled. "She has good aim." I was impressed. At least she could defend herself. That's a start.

Julia covered her mouth to try to hide her Cheshire cat grin, but gave up and lowered it back to her now empty coffee cup. "Look at that. Big bad wolf has finally met his match, huh?"

"Funny. I'm happy that the entire situation is one big joke to you. Whatever happened to Grandmas being sweet, kind, little old ladies? Clearly, whomever started that rumor never met you." I said in a sarcastic tone, teasingly, then finishing what coffee I had left.

Julia stood and took the cups to the kitchen sink. "When you've been around as long as I have, you're allowed to break the mold."

I softly chuckled at my old friend before I took on a serious expression. "Speaking of. You know they're aware of her, right? They're going to try to get her for themselves. We need her here. Not only for her safety, but ours as well."

Julia sighed. "I know, boy. Believe me, I know. I had hoped to have more time. To slowly start bringing her around so that once she turned 18, all this .... " she waved her hands in a circular motion " ..... would be normal to her. But it looks like we're going to have to try to get her to see the real world sooner than intended, somehow without scaring her off."

I nodded my head. "She won't be able to go back to that school. I'll ask mom about homeschooling her so she at least has some sense of normalcy."

"That's actually a good idea. Now, go back to the pack and I'll reach out when she starts to wake up. If we don't go about this in a sensitive matter ....." Julia paused.

I finished her thoughts out loud. "We're dead if they get their hands on her."