Riley's Curse, A Moon's Glow Prequel (15 page)

Joe's scent along with his footsteps woke me
from sleep. I hadn't even realized I had drifted off again. I was
just so tired. It was difficult to keep my eyes open. When he
stepped into the room, carrying a tray laden with more water,
bread, and a large bowl of soup, the scent of chicken and
vegetables almost made me drool. He placed the tray on my lap and
handed me a spoon. I dove in straight away, and I moaned in
appreciation when I swallowed. I couldn't remember being so
famished.

"So, Nathaniel, do you know where a werewolf
can find some work around here?" Joe asked, his Irish brogue
getting thicker the more he spoke.

"Why," I took a break between bites to say.
"Are you staying?"

"Yes, Ireland has nothing left for me.
Charlotte found me there a few months ago and mentioned you. Told
me she killed the one you loved and accidentally turned you. I felt
some responsibility because I had sent her away just before you met
her. I wasn't able to live the way she did anymore and I told her I
never wanted to see her again. If I hadn't done that she wouldn't
have ruined your life."

Guilt and self loathing were two emotions I
was extremely familiar with. It made me feel even more of a bond
with this Irishman. "It's not your fault. I've learned that you
cannot blame yourself for other people's actions."

He nodded, his grey eyes filled with emotion,
and then he shook his head, and grinned. "Enough of that, I need a
job."

"Well, I may be able to help you with that."
As he was speaking, an idea formed in my mind. With my new goal to
open Riley House and help run it, I wouldn't be able to do my
previous job, unless I trained a replacement. And hadn't I thought
it was the perfect job for a werewolf? I stared at him; a smile
grew on my face.

"What?" he asked, looking a little bit
worried?

Present Day

One crisp fall afternoon I was just arriving
home after my run when I heard my phone ringing.

“Hello?” I asked after I took my cell phone
from my pocket.

“Nathaniel?”

“Yes.”

“It’s Will.” Will was my great, great, great
nephew.

“How are you?” I opened my fridge to take a
water bottle out, the door slammed behind me as I walked into the
living room.

“I’m good, but I could use your help with the
business, and the charity you started here isn’t doing so well. Do
you think you could possibly move back home?”

I had been living back at the updated cabin
in Baycrest, helping out at the store and setting up my charity
here. I was considering moving on since I had been here for five
years. People would soon start to notice that I hadn’t aged.

“Sure, I guess I could move home. Is it
bad?”

“Nothing you can’t handle,” he said with a
chuckle. Will was one of my favorite nephews, and the most like my
brother, his namesake.

“What about your children?” I asked, sitting
down on the sofa and leaning the phone on my shoulder so I could
use both hands to twist the lid off of the bottle.

“I think Lauren is ready. Nathan will learn
when he’s old enough.” It warmed my heart to hear the name, he was
named after me.

“There isn’t a problem, is there Will?”

The line was silent for a moment and then I
heard his soft laughter. “Well no, but you’re not supposed to stay
longer than five years anyway, and Phillip and I have been fighting
over you. He wants you to go there next.” Philip, a descendant of
Mary’s, lived in Rockview. I lived there about fifteen years ago
and that usually wasn’t enough time: I could still be
recognized.

“I can’t go there, it hasn’t been that long.
I’ll talk to Richard tomorrow about my leaving. He’s got everything
under control here anyway. And I’ll see you in about a week.”

“Great, I’ll have your cottage ready for
you.”

“Thank you Will. And I have missed you.”

He sighed. “Me too. What’s it like to have
your family members fight over you?”

“Annoying,” I grumbled.

He laughed. “See you next week.”

I tried so hard to keep a distance from my
extended family. But they would not let me. Rowan was ever present
in my mind. He was a threat to me and my loved ones. That was
proven when he killed my father and then Sadie. I have not
forgotten my quest to find and kill him, and with Joe's, and Mile's
help we have been searching. But after all this time, we still have
found nothing.

I did what I had sought out to do. I found
where Sadie's family had laid her to rest, and filled the empty urn
with her actual remains. After that, I found Miles and told him
what happened. We grieved together, having been the only friends
she had. He made me a promise to help find the man who killed
her.

Joe proved to be a good choice as my
replacement. Although I still opened the occasional store, my focus
has been on the charity. And I did it in the memory of Sadie
Clark.

A week later, I was sitting on the leather
sofa in William’s office inside the mansion that had once been a
quarter of its size, as well as my childhood home. “School?” I
asked disgusted, sure I’d heard wrong.

I had wrapped up business with Richard,
making sure that Riley House would be taken care of. I appointed
Richards’s youngest son, Edmund, to run it. He was just as
interested as I was in helping people in need.

I packed up the cabin that I had fixed up by
adding on to it years ago, and prepared to move home. I never lived
in the mansion with the family. My father had a small cottage built
for me down by the lake. It wasn’t visible from the road, that way
no one else would know I was in town. But now that Will was talking
about me enrolling in school, the thought of returning to the cabin
in Baycrest crept into my mind.

“Yes, you look like a teenager. If we enroll
you in school, you can stay longer,” he explained, leaning back in
his leather chair.

I stood up and paced in front of him. “I’ve
worked with other families before and never attended school.”

“Which also raised questions. How many times
was there trouble among non-family members because you didn’t have
to abide by the high school diploma rule?” He set his coffee down
on his desk, spilling the brown liquid onto his papers. While he
wiped up the mess, I considered his words. It was true that some
employees were angry with the managers for hiring me when it was
against policy to hire people full time that hadn’t finished high
school.

“Fine, I’ll go. As long as you tell Lauren
not to acknowledge me. I won’t put her at risk. And I will change
my name so no one knows we're related. You know what happened to my
father, and Sadie.”

“Okay. I’ll tell her, but if I do, I’ll have
to tell her everything,” he said tossing his gob of wet tissues
into the garbage beside his desk.

“I think she’s ready. She’s known him for a
while now. She can be trusted with the secret,” Carolyn, Will’s
wife said. She was sitting on the couch and had been silent up
until now. They had visited me last year and I instantly liked
their daughter.

I stared at both of them not sure if this was
a step I was ready to take on, but when they nodded, I backed down.
After all it was their decision.

The next day I enrolled at Everest High
School. It was the biggest school I had ever seen. There were
hundreds of kids, with lots of loud voices and strong aromas for my
heightened senses. I instantly regretted my decision to listen to
Will.

About an hour into the day, I was sitting in
my first class, feeling bored as I listened to a man who was
prattling on about the second world war, with facts that were
actually wrong. I almost corrected him, when I caught a scent. And
I recognized it instantly. It was something I had hoped would never
happen. It was a part of my nature that I avoided at all cost.

I tried to ignore the scent, and the nagging
feeling for me to follow it. I struggled for hours, but by midday
the wolf inside me seemed to take over, and I followed it.

I sniffed hard, following the smell down a
long corridor. The hall was packed with teenagers. Between the musk
cologne, and fruit lip-gloss it was surprising that I had no
problem catching the scent I was looking for.

It was wafting out of a closed door with the
word cafeteria written in bold letters. I paused outside, hoping I
could make myself turn around, forgetting what the smell meant. But
as soon as the door swung open, the scent overtook me, and I could
no more resist following it, than I could resist breathing. I
walked, as if in a trance to the back of the room, oblivious to
what was going on around me.

Six students lounged around a table. Three
boys and three girls all dressed in the school colors of burgundy
and gold. Five sets of eyes turned to me as I stood behind a young
woman with strawberry blonde hair. I could only see the back of her
as she listened to a tall boy with ink-black hair relating a tale
of a boring football play. The girl next to her with long chestnut
hair and dangling silver earrings elbowed her in the arm. I stood
still, unable to move.

She slowly turned around, and stared at me
with bright green eyes. I took in her face: the freckles that
dotted her small buttoned nose and cheekbones, her slightly rosy
cheeks. Her full pale pink lips started to turn upward into a smile
that I would remember forever.

I finally regained my wits, bolting out of
the cafeteria, and out the door of the school. I walked fast trying
not to draw attention to myself; needing to put as much distance
between me and the girl I knew I had to stay away from. The girl
that I later learned was named Megan Banks.

###

A sneak peak of
Riley’s
Secret,
A
Moon’s Glow Novel.
Available now at Smashwords

Present Day

The young man
stood in the open meadow under the full moons glow. His clothes
were folded neatly on an oversized tree stump. He knew what would
happen when the moon shone freely, but tonight the reluctant
monster welcomed the change. Normally, he avoided the call of his
wild side at all costs. However, every excruciating pain, pull and
tearing of his limbs was worth it, because it would bring him
closer to her.

When the
transformation was complete, all signs of the young man had
disappeared, only a majestic wolf remained. He tipped his head up
to face the moon, and let out a chilling howl, that stopped
suddenly as one thought entered the wolfs mind. It was his only one
as he raced through the woodland, jumping over brush, under growth,
and over-turned logs. He revelled in the speed and strength he felt
in his limbs, allowing himself to enjoy the run. He scented a
rabbit, a squirrel and even a deer, but he was not concerned with
food at the moment, that would come later. His need was over
powering, taking away all other thoughts.

His paws
thundered over the well worn trail, this was not the first night he
had taken the journey. The trail was miles long, but with his
obsessed mind, he made it to his destination in no time. Finally he
broke from the trees, and emerged onto a well manicured lawn. He
wasn't concerned at being discovered. His mind was too far gone to
be cautious.

The grey stone
mansion stood above him towering on the crest of a hill. He raced
up to it, his paws digging into the abundant grass, taking his
usual position, next to a cedar bush. The smell of the flowers from
the garden whirled around him momentarily mixing with the only
scent that mattered. Once he caught it, he followed it to the glass
patio door. Cream
colored
curtains were parted in the center, and he
peered through, knowing what he would see. His heart raced with
anticipation.

There she was
lying in her bed, her pale blue duvet pulled up to her neck, her
fiery locks cascading over the soft feathery pillow. The wolf
yearned to touch the silky strands, knowing it would feel so soft
in his hands, but the man inside knew it could never happen.

I remember the
first time I realized I didn’t belong in my family. The three of us
were in the back of our limo, stopped at a stop sign, when my
father noticed a family of four standing at a bus stop. “What’s
wrong with those people? How can they subject their children to
public transportation?” he asked, his voice a mix of disgust and
his usual arrogance. “It’s dirty and crowded.”

My mother
nodded in agreement, her head bobbing up and down like the little
bobble-head dogs you see on the dashboard of cars.

“Maybe they
can’t afford a car, Dad, did you ever think of that?” I answered,
feeling shocked and embarrassed by my father’s words.

“Maybe they
should get a job, Megan. Did you ever think of that?” It was the
first time, but not the last, that his voice was filled with
irritation when he spoke to me.

I didn’t
respond to his absurd words; I was stunned silent—and I was
ten.

I’m no longer
shocked when either of my parents says or does something cold and
insensitive. It’s who they are, and I’ve long since accepted
that.

When people
tell me I look like my mother, I know they mean it as a compliment,
but that’s not how I take it. While she is beautiful, with long,
flowing platinum hair, pale blue eyes, and smooth, flawless skin,
the saying
beauty is only skin deep
definitely applies to
her. My hair is more of a strawberry-blond, a lot darker than my
mother’s, and my eyes are green. It might not be a big deal to
anybody else, but to me, it’s a visible difference between us,
showing that I am nothing like her.