“Just let me know what happens before you go.” Rika called out as they left. Lily was more than happy to agree. If Gabe could fix her car, she’d give Rika whatever she wanted.
It was a short distance to the car, and she saw it from an outsider’s perspective. A collection of rust spots and dents duct-taped together, it was a wonder that it had even brought her this far. Gabe whistled when they stopped in front of it.
He was silent, though, as they lifted the hood. He shone his flashlight, did some mechanic-y things, and after a few tense minutes he looked at Lily.
It was the same look as when the doctor delivered her mother’s prognosis.
* * *
Simon sat on the massive leather sofa in the living room, frustration boiling up inside him and leaving a sour taste in his mouth. It had been a full day since the kidnapping attempt, and they still didn’t have a clue who was behind it, and if The Dark Warlord was behind it, or just a couple of random lunatics. He tapped his sternum repeatedly, as he did when he was under stress. He’d been doing that a lot since theWaryeorswoke up six months ago.
It wasn’t actually his sternum that he was tapping, but nobody except Miller knew that underneath his shirt he wore a gold medallion. It was really Miller’s influence that he wore “jewelry” hidden away, as Miller believed that the only acceptable man-jewels were the ones between his legs.
ID tags weren’t jewelry, but even those were discreetly worn by Miller under his clothes.
Jewelry or not, tapping it helped him whenever he was stressed out, or exasperated as he was right now.
With Miller out of the room, the volume was cranked up to eleven and some old-school industrial was blasting. Music for mosh pits, which wasn’t helping. Since Barric and Merek were thwarted in their attempt for action earlier, they were spoiling for a fight. There was a lot of testosterone, or whatever theseWaryeorshad, being let loose on each other. Col and Barric were at each other’s throats, sometimes literally if they shifted into their wolves, and Aylwyn was riling everyone up, with Merek taking the bait.
Over the last 24 hours, Tybalt had already forcibly shifted several of theWaryeorsback into human form—for which Simon was thankful.
As theVixar,Tybalt alone had the ability to do that, and in fact that was the deciding factor that proved he was the Alpha, much to Barric’s resentment.
Minutes earlier, Miller had walked outside with Tybalt, suggesting that the boys work things out amongst themselves, leaving Simon alone in the house with four agitatedWaryeors, each of whom could benchpress one of him on each massive arm without breaking a sweat.
As if he needed more help feeling inadequate.
Miller had done his best to get Simon into shape, but he was definitely the “before” picture in the muscle-building ads. He already didn’t have game, but around these action figures come to life, women looked right through him. Except for the ones that zeroed in on him because they weren’t after what was in his pants but in his bank account.
In addition to the hefty trust that was left behind by his parents, Simon had made his own fortune as a cyber tech savant. The boys called it techno-wizardry, but then again, they also considered the microwave magic, and the washing machine a conjuring of the ocean into a box.
Simon had to smile at that, even as the boys were turning his leather couches and recliners into the equivalent of a bouncy house. An ottoman went flying, probably a response to Aylwyn’s latest wisecrack. The wise-acre wolf seemed to have the perfect instinct for finding his fellow shifters tender spots, and poking them.
Aylwyn’s long blond hair streamed as he easily dodged it. It thudded on the floor, lying sideways. Sighing, Simon walked over to set it upright again.
He did feel protective of them, and not just because of the fact that it was his duty. He fiercely wished he knew more about his sacred duty, which had been passed down through dozens of generations – but there was no one left alive to tell him.
His parents had been slaughtered—there really wasn’t any other word for it—along with others who were like them. The lands that they occupied, the very Medieval Faire itself, were all part of a secret legacy that was set up to watch over theseWaryeors, who up to six months ago. Before that, the five men existed for him only as closed sarcophagi in a converted mine shaft – and some vague memories of what his parents had told him.
They just thought they’d have more time. They should have lived to raise him to adulthood, and taught him and the other children everything they needed to know - them and the other families who called themselves the Diviners. Instead, they’d been cut down with brutal efficiency, leaving one cowering little boy – Simon - behind. The secret survivor.
He didn’t even know there were supposed to be seven of them, until they finally learned enough English to communicate that. The missing sarcophagi with theirWaryeorcontents was one of the remaining puzzles he was trying to solve with bits and bytes and little else. They had told him that they were selected for this centuries-long sleep, because they were the strongest and the best from their respective armies and tribes.
Simon, a natural cynic, was disinclined to believe them at first, because what else would they say? They had survived because they were the best at hiding? That they pushed aside the women and children as they made their way to the lifeboats, with Celine Dion singing in the background?
But then he saw them as they jockeyed to find their place in the group, much like wolves in the wild. There wasn’t a single shred of cowardice among them. Quite the opposite. He was afraid they would kill each other with all the dynamic snapping of jaws and slashes of claws.
And then he’d witnessed their surprise, when it was the quiet one with the pretty boy face who was able to force them all back into human form by sheer will alone.
That was proof that he was the Alpha, orVixarof this group. Further proof was that although they were all strong, and grew even stronger with the waxing of the Moon, it was Tybalt whose strength multiplied exponentially when the Moon was at its fullest. Col was the archetypal soldier, falling in line with the established hierarchy as he was trained from birth to do. That made him the natural second.
Miller had confirmed the elite skills of each of theWaryeors, having spent time training them and getting to know them as intimately as any military boot camp instructor would. He also knew of their profound sadness, that they had to sacrifice the glory of death in battle alongside theirBredhrenin order to voluntarily be enspelled by a sorceress they called The Fair One, Aurelia. And then to wake up in an unfamiliar world and take up arms against The Dark Warlord, with only a socially awkward keyboard jockey as their champion.
No wonder they had got all that pent up steam. And when they weren’t fighting, there was—
“Wenching!”
Merek’s yell instantly changed the energy of the room from violence to…something that Simon wasn’t a natural at.
“Yes, wenching!” Barric’s lusty deep voice echoed the plan.
“I’m always down for the shorties.” Aylwyn was also the one who was “down with” current vernacular, which only made Simon feel more like a social underachiever. A man who’d just woken up from a thousand year nap had more game than Simon.
When they’d awakened, Simon and Miller’s plan was to integrate them into the Medieval Faire, which Simon had founded himself years ago in preparation for their arrival. He’d created the Medieval Faire so that the five men wouldn’t stand out….as much, and replicate what would help them comfortably transition into modern life. So far their exposure to other people aside from Simon and Miller had been at Ye Olde Taverne, located at the Faire, and the occasional trip to The Alehouse in town, which had its fair share of Medieval Faire attendees and costumed employees.
Even Col was enthusiastic about the “Wenching”, which surprised Simon. Col was the most like Miller, in that it was always duty first, distractions and time-wasters relegated to the To Be Avoided column. To Col, “Wenching” was definitely a distraction at best, a time-waster at worst, and in either case To Be Avoided.
But Col had been acting oddly lately. It was even obvious to Simon. At least “Wenching” was less potentially destructive to Simon’s home and movie-screen-size flatscreen than Fighting, so even he had to agree.
“Wenching it is!”
