Orion (28 page)

“They both knew each other a
long
time.  Before our parents married.   They talked about how our twin birth was pretold and that one of the twins would find their way into a prophecy that couldn’t be reversed or else, both would die blah, blah, blah.”  He swallowed slow and held his throat.  It hurt to talk.

“Dr.
Green,” he looked at Calum again for the second time, “knew about how his wife died to save you, his son, and that he would be marked by the stars.”  He looked at me.  “And father repeated the same, about you.”

I found out then I
’d been holding my breath for longer than I could because I let it go louder than I should have.   Why were we saying all this in front of the kidnappers?  “Szar, shut up. Not now.”  He didn’t listen.

“I heard the stories growing up
, Stace.  I knew it was inevitably true.  The other day he added that you were marked by a lover and a friend and some other crazy ass mumblings,” he paused and looked between us, “and that mom died because of you.  I've known for some time now this wasn't about me.  I'm the patsy ass tie between.”               

Szar
’s eyes narrowed into slits at my next admission, “But I didn’t come to save the world, you did?”  He is the heir, not me.  Calum jerked his head, his face showing every bit of realizing that I’d been holding back.  “Szar, I would change it if I could.  And you were born that day too.”             

Lee hadn
’t said a single word in any of this, but the car was still moving forward. 

Szar looked at
Calum narrowing his eyes, “So, are you marked, son of Dr. Green.”

Calum didn
’t miss a beat.  “Why don’t you ask her?”  The steam was rising in his chest.  The heat was burning through my hand as I freed it from where h'd grabbed it in a tight bind.

I nodded, red faced.  I looked towards his stomach and realized too late that meant I was looking to the top button of his
pants
. This was my brother watching. 

Calum didn
’t budge an inch to help me.

“I hope this means you haven
’t taken advantage of my sister, because if I find out you have, I’ll kill you before your Hunter ass can cross the car.”

“Szar, none of that. Not that it
’s your business anyway.  And no one has taken advantage of anyone except you right now.”

“Me? HOW?  Your the only girl here.”

“You are taking advantage of your brotherly rights to invade my personal space when I am here to save your sorry ASS from certain doom.  So if you’re done with the loathsome fatherly lecture, I’d like to hurry home to a fun filled court of never being allowed to talk to anyone, much less a dang boy.  You were as bad as him.  And if this whole prophecy thing is true, you’re off the hook from certain more doom, and my life was never my own in the first place.  I,
apparently,
never had a choice.”

Calum
’s hand shot back.

“Oh, I didn
’t mean that.  I didn’t mean I didn’t choose, I…I…oh!  Not in front of all these people!” I said through my teeth.  “I didn’t know about any prophecy when I showed up at the school and I certainly didn’t know anything about you Calum Green.  I assumed you didn’t either.” 

“No, I didn
’t,” he confirmed.

I continued my second monologue.  “I want to know everything you know about this Szar Hathown!  I
’m tired of wondering if I’m going to die in ten days or turn into some giant serpent Medusa or worse, watch someone I care about die.”  I inadvertently looked at Calum on the last four words.  I didn’t mean to, but it was out and Calum’s lips parted just slightly enough for me to know my terms of endearment however misjudged they may be.  It wasn’t like I’d said anything to him, but it was still “out of the bag” like I had.

It also didn
’t help that Lee took that precise moment to swerve at the same time I finished the sentence and saw Calum’s face.  Szar shifted around in the front seat giving me the back of his head.  I should have been glad, but he wasn’t finished yet, and neither was I.

“I think you have more to tell me or
am I mistaken?”  I shouldn’t have given him a choice.  But he continued anyway not in my direction.

“On the night of our birthday, yours too I hear,” he threw a finger in Calum
’s direction not looking at him, “Borgon here will have taken me to the school, cornered you and Hunter boy here, and would force you to make a choice between who you want to save.  One will die, one will live.  At least that’s what it will start as.  Various other parties, I never saw or heard other their names aloud, were said to kill all three of us.  Someone is orchestrating Borgon regardless.  And then, take all the courts in the same night.”

My body sank in the seat further.  It all sounded right.  “But how are the Vampire and Were courts involved?”  I was startled to see Szar glance at the Vamp boy expecting to see him awake and had heard everything, but he wasn
’t.

“And you should know...father sent you to the school for you to find your H
unter boy
.  Apparently, he fought the idea of it for years according to the conversation between the fathers, but he gave in and decided that the only way to save you was to have this Hunter as your…bodyguard,” he snorted at his ending.  “Anastacia, he only sheltered you and kept you from everyone because he knew what you were.”

“And what am I, OH wise one?”

“I’m not sure I should be the one to tell you,” his face was dark now with foreboding. 

“You will,” my teeth gritted.

“The daughter of Anat.”

What does that really mean?  And how is this climatic?  A dead goddess can
’t be my mother.  “Whatever.  And you would be her son too if there was any truth to it.”

“Ja!  I am.  But I
’m no woman.  The female offspring of the goddess Anat, not the son.  I was a mistake that wasn’t meant to happen.”  He looked as if he wanted to stab me with a fork.  What did I do?

“Don
’t say that!”

“Ja!  Truth hurts.  I
’ve hung there for weeks after hearing them wondering if father knew I was awake listening to him tell me I’m worth nothing and that you are the golden child.”

Time was up.  The car was stopped in front of the court gate office just beyond where the guards were stationed butted up to the concrete walls that surrounded our court like a fort.  I hadn
’t realized I was nose to nose with Szar until Lee opened my car door.

“Ludicrous, self-righteous idiot!”

“Good to know!  But that’s the good thing about being twins.   I already knew you felt that way about me.  Tell me something I don’t know?”

I huffed in Szar
’s face and stepped out.  Lee stopped me with a hand on my arm and whispered for only me to hear, “Hide your emotion before you go through those gates.”  I looked at my arm where he held me and back to his eyes giving him a silent reason to keep his hands to himself.  He let go and walked to the trunk.

Calum and Lee finished the end result of my “keep from killing the vamp thug” plan.  Szar really gave me crap about it, but I challenged his snarl with my own and he backed down.  Secure with all my knives in my own possession again, I adjusted my shirt and vest skillfully snaking my feet around from keeping my back turned to my ultimate plan.  Calum stood there watching my exposed side where my knives sli
d in pimpling my skin from the coldness.

“What all have you got in there?”  The slight form of a smile edged his lips. “Secrets are for sharing.”

I stepped up to him, tiptoed up to his ear like so, and whispered loud, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

He shivered.  I liked that.  Wouldn
’t you know it!  Lee and Szar stood there watching.

“Guess there
’s no doubt whose boat we’re all fishing on,"Lee said rudely.

Szar straightened, “That
’s my sister you piece of crap.”

Lee grunted, turned back to the car, and slammed the door behind him.

“Guess he never got over you either.  You’ve been busy!  Sure know how to catch ‘em sis.  Do you know how to bust their balls when they make a move you don’t want or do I need to demo it before you go?”  Szar’s eyed both boys.

I stormed off only after I made the mistake of thinking I needed to check their handiwork on the thugs.  I gagged and hid my face now holding my mouth.  Our two thugs were lying prostrate in the dirt, knocked out and untied with their weapons beside them.  They were to appear as if they we
re spying and were attacked.  I almost stripped them down to cause humiliation with their court but decided that it would look more like a set up.  I thought then I’d lost my mind.  Maybe I have. I had the strangest feeling I would regret not taking the Vamps elsewhere, but didn’t know why.  My stomach in knots still, I stood over the two dark haired broad shouldered men lying in front of me.    The knots and fluttering growing as I near the blue eyed vamp.  I was crouched down checking their pockets and found nothing when suddenly a picture came in my head.  Of me!  I was in the long red dress from the Val Ball given last year.  I remember standing on my own balcony window watching the party below after I’d made the right appearances.  I stepped off the top step and sat on the edge of the railing.  I was crying.  I remembered that.  I cried that night since coming back from a mission where two Vamps were killed before the party.  It was the first real dead person I’d ever seen.

“
Your idea,
princess,”
Lee grouched. 

I was pulled out of my vision.  It was like someone else
’s dream.  I shook my head back and forth realizing I was leaning on the Vamp.  His ass!  Whoa!

“Quit calling me that.  You didn
’t earn that right. And they’ll wake up and tell their Vamp lord all about it.  Great for them.  Heard he’s an asshole anyway.”

Soon!

I jerked my head around me expecting someone but saw no one but Lee.  “What is soon?”

He gave me a
what the heck
look so I walked away.

Calum followed me into the car and we arranged ourselves strategically.  I was in the front now with the back seat covered in blankets.  The guards would only believe a story connected to me and seeing Szar wou
ld raise suspicion.  My stomachache...gone.  And so was the Vampire.

I pulled up to the gate listening to the group of rank smelling men hiding in the back seat.  I giggled a small amount at the thought of growing up with no men in my life and suddenly, in a few weeks I had several, including my brother, sandwiched into the back of a car.  They grunted some more about having little room.

The guards believed my story about a short visit with my father and sent me in.  I had minutes before I would see his face and read his reaction.

We parked in the outdoor drive at the visitor entrance.  I jumped out and met the outside guard before he got close to the car to see in.  “I need to get something to my father quickly and out of sight.  Can I move the car to the inside garage?”  I smiled the needed blonde moment/devil may care smile to get the answer I wanted.

It worked and I jumped in the car.  Szar grunted and mumbled a muffled something like, “God, the female wiles we fall for.  Maybe women really do rule the earth.”

I smiled.

Once in, we went to work.  All four of us jumped out of the car.  Well, Borgon was dragged by Lee.

We were in the door and at my father
’s private chambers through the back entrance dodging the kitchen staff and only had one door left near the alarm panel to get through.  The one my mother and father supposedly used to sneak out of before we were born.   Of course that all stopped with us, but not because the romance died.  She did.

Our hand motioned speak was improving rapidly with all the sneak work so the movement through the palace was exceptionally fast. Szar was already a pro at it since I know how often he snuck out.

I realized just how well our little three man, now four, team worked in unison.  Which was really well when we weren’t arguing.  And I was the only female present.

I counted off on three fingers and opened the door and slipped in.  No one was there.  The plan!  I
’d appear first, let father see me, and then reveal the rest.

But…the plan changed.  All of us moved into my father
’s private den and waiting till he arrived.  We didn’t know it would be over half an hour.  He should have retired already by earlier years standards.  But that was then.

The doorknob sounded.  We all jumped up from a sitting position. 

He entered and stopped, searching each face and the rest of the room for anyone hidden. 

He put a finger to his mouth.  I
’d had the intellect to have everyone stay quiet as mice before he entered knowing the lack of cameras, but not sound alarms.  The sound of us standing would have been the first noise, and thankfully it coincided with him entering the room.

We were motionless.

Father walked to the desk, wrote on something, and held it down to me.