The Waking (The Upturned Hourglass) (29 page)

“Nice to meet you, Isaac,” Valie whispered and, with a sick, biting wit uttered another, single word, “
Dad
.”

“You’re nothing like him, you know,” Jack immediately reassured. Valie was suddenly conscious of just how close the
werewolf-boy was to her.

“How can you be so sure?”

“I know him, Valie. And I’m beginning to know you, too.”

Valie rolled her eyes, surprising the well-meaning Jack.
“Really? You
know
him, Jack? Does that mean that you
knew
he was going to try to kill me? Or that I even
existed
? Because, from where I stand, no one knows anything about this situation except him.” Valie waved the picture in front of Jack to indicate the image of her father before thrusting the photograph into his hands. The boy placed it on the mantelpiece and stood by the fireplace with his hands in his pockets as Valie took a seat on the couch.

“You didn’t answer my original question, you know,” she said. “Why are there no pictures of you?”

“I wasn’t around when Shane’s obsession with photography began. Missed a lot of photo-ops.”

“You weren’t around? I thought you’ve been with Isaac for years?”

“I was with our clan for a long time and then, I guess you could say, I took a break for a couple of years and joined the Lycanthrope Guard, became a soldier for the Council. It was a good gig, though I learned more about the Occult than even I wanted to know. . . .The tattoo on my shoulder is a symbol of the Guard—it’s the alchemical symbol for silver. The Vampyres used to brand it on Lycanthropes in their service. It now serves as a reminder of our past as well as a representation of ourselves as servants of both Fate and the moon.”

“If your life in the Guard was so good, why did you return to Isaac?”

“I was needed here,” Jack replied simply.

Valie glanced at the lithe boy and realized just how much she did
not
know about him. She was drowning in the Occult and Jack was her life-vest, a life-vest that had dropped from the sky without warning and the girl was just now questioning how it had appeared.

“So, if we aren’t keeping secrets from each other any longer,” she began. “Will you answer a personal question for me?”

The boy hesitated only a moment, and then answered honestly, “Anything.”

Valie’s eyes narrowed at his response. “How were
you
turned into a werewolf?”

Jack’s features became expressionless; all playfulness vanished.

His answer was matter-of-fact, “Isaac selected me and I was . . . initiated . . . when I was twelve. I joined his pack soon after.”

“Right . . . okay, but is that all there is to it? You’re bitten and changed into a wolf. But what’s the process; when does it take effect? Does it hurt? How does it work?” The girl hesitated before adding, “Do you still
feel
like a human being?”

Jack held up a silencing hand. “That’s many more than one question, sweets.”

Valie frowned. “You said no secrets.”

Jack watched her, without speaking. She had no idea what she was asking, but she still deserved to know. . . .

Finally, he sighed.

“So I did. But can we please stick to one topic at a time?”

“Fine. Is the werewolf bite painful or is there something else to it? I’ve heard stories from Luci about Vampyres having the ability to drug their victims so it’s . . . . I don’t know . . . . a
pleasant
experience.  I don’t suppose that works for werewolves?”

Jack laughed without humor in his voice. “No. Unfortunately, it does
not
work that way for Lycanthropes. Humans often experience a euphoric sensation when bitten by a Vampyre, but no one knows why and it affects each individual differently. Werewolf bites are not that way. They feel. . .well, like you’re being bitten by a huge wolf. They are painful and leave a distinct scar.”

“Where’s your scar?” Valie asked, but she immediately wished she could take it back. It seemed, even to her, like an incredibly personal question.

Jack smiled, sensing her discomfort. “On my shoulder.” He pointed to his left shoulder.

“Isaac bit you on your tattoo?”

“No. My mom thought twelve was a little young for a tattoo. It surrounds the bite marks.”

Valie shifted awkwardly, embarrassed. “So what was your life like before you were bitten?  Do you have family?”

“I did.”

Valie waited for more, but nothing more was offered.

“Any siblings?”

“One sister.”

“Older or younger?”

“Younger.”

Valie nodded, though she was becoming frustrated with Jack’s obvious reticence to share with her.

“I’m assuming
, you lived with your parents and your sister, then?”

“My father walked out on us when I was eight.”

Valie glanced down at the ground. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” Jack shrugged, trying to appear indifferent, although Valie could see the tension in the boy’s shoulders.

“That must have been hard.”

Jack’s eyes hardened dramatically—that portal to his soul snapping shut with a bang. “Yes. Of course,” he replied formally.

Valie scowled and exhaled sharply.

“What?” Jack asked innocently.

Valie’s frustration was obvious. “You know everything about me, Jack.
Everything.
Is it really so much to ask that I know a little about you? I know absolutely nothing about you, except that you’re some gorgeous werewolf trying to save my life. That’s not a whole lot to go on when you’re entrusting your life to someone! You know about my life, about my parents, my grandfather. Hell! You’ve seen me crying, bleeding, screaming, shouting,
drowning
. Now, I’ve conceded that my life
does
need saving, but how can I trust you to do that when you won’t tell me a damn thing about yourself!”

Valie took a much needed breath, her steam blown.

“You really think I’m gorgeous?” Jack grinned.

Valie rolled her eyes. “I’m not stupid. Of course you are, but that’s not the point.”

His smile faded.

“I’m answering your questions,” he said, composedly.
“What more do you want from me?”

“I want to know who you
are
—who Noah and Shane are—so I can follow my gut and trust you without reservation. I want you to give me
real
answers instead of treating this conversation like an interrogation. I . . . I want
you
to trust
me
. Please.”

Jack’s deep eyes went from a blank stare to a shrewd gaze, as he, in turn, searched Valie’s face. The girl’s heart pounded in her chest. Her passionate appeal had the adrenaline flowing through her blood; she knew her skin was hot and
flushed, the palms of her hands moist. She prayed for him to speak.

“What would you like to know?” Jack finally asked, but with remaining aloofness. His brow was still furrowed broodingly.

Valie exhaled the breath she’d been holding inside of her. “Anything you’re willing to tell me.”

“I’m not really
willing
to tell you anything, so you might try narrowing it down.”  Jack’s voice was gruff and the full force of how hard this was for him hit home in Valie’s heart. Of course, he didn’t like being vulnerable, but he especially didn’t like being vulnerable to Valie which didn’t help her building tension.

Defensively, Jack continued to stare at her, while she considered her next question carefully. He was steadily withdrawing from her, she could feel it.

“Tell me about your family.” Assuming that was too general, Valie went on. “What was your sister’s name? How much older were you than she? What was your father like? And your mother? How did life change when your dad left?”

He took a deep breath, “That’s a lot to ask, sweets….”

Valie waited.

He sighed with resignation.
“Very well.”

“My sister, Emily, was only three years younger than me, but extremely intelligent and very precocious. We were very close. She knew my mind as I knew hers. If it hadn’t been for the difference in our ages, people would have thought us twins. I was her protective older brother who would do anything to keep her safe. She was my impetuous, fun-loving, little sister who loved life and was bold and brash about everything. She had quite an attitude, just like our father, John Haden. We were basically always together. We even slept in the same room on
bad nights. My father took to drinking after he lost his job when I was seven—he was a mean drunk. He tended to throw things and smashed everything up.  He never hit my mother, but she was scared of him. She was relieved after he left us, though she tried not to show it. 

“We moved when I was ten. Mom had a hard time keeping things together after our father left. She became overwhelmed and depressed. I helped out as best a ten-year-old could. I tried to take care of Emily; walking her to school, making her breakfast and lunch in the mornings. Mom always had dinner on the table, though I could never figure out how. With the cost of the apartment and our living expenses, I don’t know how her minimum wage paycheck even covered food, but somehow she did. She was a good mother despite her weaknesses. She tried her best to keep our broken family together.  It wasn’t enough, but the effort was there.”

Jack stopped and got lost in his own thoughts.

“What happened after Isaac found you?”

His features hardened like ice. Nothing in Jack’s face held an ounce of emotion. Valie shivered as if an arctic chill had blown through the room.

“Jack?”

He stared out the window, and continued his recitation as if she were not there. However, Valie could see the remaining darkness in his eyes. His voice was severe, as if this disclosure of the past brought with it a frightening surge of furor he had to contain.

“I was twelve. I was bitten. I ran home, my shoulder bleeding,
my whole arm useless. Mom had the late shift that night, so Emily was home alone. I can still remember her screaming at the sight of me, as I stumbled to the bathroom. She helped me into the shower to wash off the blood. When I told her what had happened, she cried and called our mother. Mom arrived soon after, calm, seeming more prepared than any person should be. She took me to the emergency room, but by the time I got there, the wound had healed itself, except for four silvery scars; two puncture wounds on either side of the shoulder. Mom thought I’d pulled a prank. I tried to show her the remains of the wound, but she’d berated me saying if I ever did anything like that again she would send me away to a boarding school that one of my older cousins attended.

“You see, my mother thought I was a trouble-maker and a growing bad influence on my sister.  Which, admittedly, I was, but I never lied to either of them, even though she thought I did. Occasionally I omitted the truth, but I never lied. I lied to her, then, though. I told her what she wanted to hear, that it had been a prank, and that I wouldn’t do it again.

“The next night happened to be a full moon and I changed. I was in my room studying and a horrendous headache came on so suddenly I thought I’d been struck. I called for Emily, who ran into the room, Mother close behind. They watched, horrified, as I writhed. They tried to comfort me but my senses seemed to burn with new appreciation for intensity of feeling. An agonizing crawling sensation spread across every inch of my skin. It began to stretch, to transform. Hair burst out from fallow pores. My teeth erupted in unbearable pain as new teeth pushed them out of the way, most out completely. My face suddenly felt like it was being broken, battered by multiple fists as it changed. My nails extended as my hands shrunk to five-toed paws. Within minutes I was no longer human. I was wolf.

“I stared at the blood-spattered bed clothes and my screaming family with new sight. Emily and my mother were huddled in a corner, gripping each other as if they were in their last moments, as if they were facing Death himself. Some survival instinct told me to leave, to run and keep from being seen by anyone else. I crouched and jumped out the three story window to land unharmed. A small part of me registered the soaring feeling that came with such exhilaration, but I didn’t have to time to enjoy it.

“My racing mind was strange to me. New thoughts, new reactions flooded my thought-process. I was the me I’d always known, but I was new. I was not as I had been before. Without thinking, I ran to the forest twenty miles east of town, an instinct, a draw pulling me toward the open woods. It was there that Isaac found me.

“He told me about what I had become, about how he’d
been Fated to choose those who would serve the Lycan cause faithfully and help to extend the newly-growing, glorious bloodline. He told me to follow him. He told me there was no hope of going back, back to my mother, back to Emily. But at the mention of my sister, I stubbornly backed away from him. He was human-looking at the time. I knew I was different, improved. I believed I could outrun him. I took to the woods in hopes of losing him and headed back to town.