Unleash The Moon (The Preternaturals Book 6) (3 page)

He got himself together, and then Elise was nothing
but bone and ash. Sydney ran down the hall to a supply closet and
returned with a broom. But Jacob was too much of an emotional wreck
to do anything, so Sydney swept Elise’s remains under the bed. It
wouldn’t be long until someone needed her for something or
discovered her missing.

“
I thought you didn’t love her?”
Sydney said.

There was hope in his eyes as if her question had
been fueled by jealousy instead of mere curiosity.

“
I don’t. But that link… it does
something to you. I don’t think these are my real feelings. They
aren’t very deep. They just scratch the surface.”

If this display was just scratching the surface of
Jacob’s feelings, there might be issues there. Because it seemed
pretty intense and epic to Sydney.

Jacob wiped his face with the back of his sleeve.
“I’m fine now. There’s nothing anymore. It was just the claim
breaking.”

She was skeptical, but his face seemed to have
cleared of the mild hypnotism. Suddenly an awful thought occurred
to her. “Oh God, do you think my mom doesn’t love my dad? That it’s
just the claim?”

Jacob touched her arm. “No, Syd.
It’s not like that, I promise. I never wanted to be around Elise
when she was alive. I didn’t even like her. It was just the effect
of the bond breaking. Your parents aren’t like that. Charlee loves
him. The claim can’t create those feelings she has all the time,
all it can do is create that brief surge of loss when the claim
breaks. It’s not even grief. Grief is deeper. It was just this
brief panic and… I don’t know… loss for the sake of loss. But I’m
fine now. If it was your mom, trust me, she would
not
be fine in
five minutes.”

Sydney wasn’t sure if Jacob just said it to make her
feel better about what could be her mother’s unremitting Stockholm
syndrome. But it was true that Jacob hadn’t ever followed Elise
around like a lost puppy. He avoided her whenever he could,
preferring to spend his time with Sydney, unlike her parents who
were nearly inseparable. And just a bit icky with their public
affection.

“
Let’s go,” Jacob said, having
turned an emotional one-eighty in the course of a few
minutes.

“
You aren’t coming with me. You’re
too vulnerable now.”

“
You need someone to watch out for
you and feed you.”

Sydney shook her head and retreated several steps.
“No. I might kill you. I don’t have the greatest track record with
that. Now that Elise is gone, you can die. I can’t… I can’t.”

“
You won’t kill me, Syd. I have
faith in you. It’ll be fine.”

But Sydney knew it wouldn’t be fine. She might be
able to control herself, but even so, she couldn’t feed from him
every day without him growing weak and sick. And there might not be
enough out there for him to eat to help him stay strong.

“
I’m eating wildlife.” She pushed
past him.

“
I’m still coming with you,” he
said. “I’m dead anyway if I stay. You know the king will get into
my mind. He’ll kill me for letting you go.”

Jacob could easily stop her. He might be only human,
but he was strong for a human, and Sydney was… well Sydney.
Thankfully Jacob’s loyalty was with her, not her dad. Even so, she
knew she had no choice but to bring him. No matter how loyal he was
to her, Anthony would get inside his mind the moment they realized
she was gone.

She sighed. “Fine.”

He grinned. “Awesome. Let me just pack a bag real
quick.”

Sydney waited in the hall while Jacob packed. She
didn’t want to stand in Elise’s room thinking about how he’d just
killed a vampire without hesitation. Sure, they both had hated the
bitch, but Sydney had never been faced before with the obvious
moral gray Jacob had developed in all his time with vampires.
Surely he must harbor some disturbing impulse toward revenge for
being stolen from his family. And here he was, running off into the
wilderness with the king’s daughter.

Could she trust him? Maybe she should drain him the
first chance she got, for her own safety.

A few minutes later he joined her, an excited, happy
look on his face like they were going on a fun road trip instead of
running into God only knew what was out there. “Ready?” he
said.

“
Yeah. No, wait.” She went back to
her room and took a sheet of paper and pen from her desk. She stood
there, trying to come up with something that didn’t sound stupid.
This would kill her parents, but she was a fucking adult! Wasn’t it
normal for adults to move away from their parents and start their
own lives?

If the old movies she’d had to sit through
repeatedly were any indication, it was normal.

After a few more minutes thought she scrawled what
could possibly be the lamest running away letter ever penned:

Dear Mom and Dad,

I’m sorry I left. I know you’ll try to come after
me. Don’t. Please just let me go. I can’t be a locked-up princess
anymore. What kind of life is that for me? I don’t know how you
guys stand it, but some day you’ll want to be free, too. And in
some small way, now you are.

Love, Syd

Sydney felt the glow come to her eyes and her fangs
pop out as she growled staring at the letter. She sounded like she
was fifteen. She
had
to get out of here before she regressed
back to toddler. She folded the paper and left it on the desk and
followed Jacob down the hall. The blue LED lights clicked on as
they approached and clicked off as they receded.

They climbed the steep stairs and went down a couple
of other hallways. She heard her mother laughing at something
stupid her father said and almost lost her nerve. But her life
might be measured in centuries, and eternity here wasn’t an
option.

“Syd, you okay?” Jacob whispered.

“Fine. Let’s go.”

Jacob led her out a back door on the main level,
away from the sounds of the deer being dressed and prepared in the
large kitchen. A lot of that meat would be stored for winter.

The two of them stood outside under the bright moon
with the mild near-summer breeze blowing over them. Thousands of
stars were visible, all twinkling and unassuming. This was the same
view she’d had on the roof more or less. But down here, outside the
protection of the compound, it felt different. More wild. More
free.

With each step they took farther from the big metal
building, Sydney’s guilt grew. She’d get Jacob killed, and herself
as well. But she kept walking, and he kept walking.

“I know where there’s a car. We can travel more
safely that way than on foot,” Jacob said.

Sydney had never ridden in a car—that she could
remember, anyway. She was sure at some point in her babyhood before
the world had changed that she must have, but it was too long
ago.

“What will we do when the sun rises?”

“We’ll find a place. There are a lot of abandoned
houses now from when the people moved into the cities. Some of them
have basements. We’ll be fine. We just need to get on the
road.”

“Jacob, why are you helping me?” He seemed too
eager. What if he was leading her to danger? Could she trust him
when she fell dead for the day unprotected? He’d put the stake back
into his boot after killing Elise, as if he might need it later.
For her?

“You know how I feel about you,” he said. “You know
I’d do anything for you.”

His hand was warm in hers as he took it and led her
off to the car that would take them far from everything that had
ever been safe.

Chapter Two

Noah paced in the glass magic-reinforced cage. It
was a hundred square feet, not nearly enough room for a wolf. The
door slid open and raw meat was shoved in. He felt the glow come to
his eyes, and he shifted. Raw meat was better in wolf form.

He shouldn’t shift. Any time he did, they just took
more blood to use in their magic. The meat was drugged to sedate
him so he wouldn’t struggle or hurt them when they brought out the
needle. But sometimes oblivion was a good thing. It allowed him to
dream about the good times when he was a pup.

He ripped into the meat, barely tasting the drugs.
Whatever it was, it didn’t seem to have long term effects on his
strength or health. Maybe it wasn’t a drug. Maybe it was a potion.
It had an herbal flavor.

When the plate was clean, Noah drifted to the
corner, the lethargy overtaking him. And he did dream.

He was seven or eight, right before he’d been taken.
He’d been born in his fur and had only had a human form for about
three years by that point. He still felt gangly and awkward as a
human. It felt unnatural after spending so long living on four
legs. It was as if the wolf was him and the human was what he
shapeshifted into. Instead of the reverse.

He played under the sun with his den mates. The war
was going on. It had been going on forever. But the hive and the
surrounding forests and fields had been well-protected by a witch
called Tam and a sorcerer named Dayne, along with a few others of
their kind.

They were the only magical beings that reminded Noah
that not all the magic users were bad. They weren’t all on the
human side in the war.

Noah laid in the sun stretching his arms way out so
he could be more tan like his dad. “Hey Mom, where’s Sydney? Why
can’t she ever come out and play with me?” He didn’t understand why
Sydney didn’t go in the sun like he did. The sun was great.

“She can’t, honey,” Jane said. “She has an allergy.
You can see her when the sun goes down.”

“Great!” He ran to the stream to watch his den mates
to see if they could catch a fish right out of the water with fangs
and paws.

Syd was his best friend. He was going to protect her
and take care of her forever.

His dad had seemed skeptical of that but wouldn’t
tell him why except that, “The king would never allow it.”

Well, he wasn’t Noah’s king, so screw that. Sydney
was too awesome to have that big angry vampire for a dad,
anyway.

A black cat came out of nowhere and pounced on him,
then ran back into the woods. Aunt Greta. One of these days he or
one of the others might accidentally hurt her. But the werecat was
fast! So maybe not. His dad chuckled from under a nearby tree.

Moments later, Greta emerged from the forest in some
jeans and a T-shirt. She had clothes stashed in the woods all over
the place. None of the wolves cared about being naked, but Aunt
Greta was different. His mom called her
reserved
.

“Hey Jane,” she said, “Anthony’s being all crazy
again. Let’s go kidnap Charlee for some girl time while he’s
asleep. She needs to get out of that compound before she loses her
mind.”

His mom stood and stretched then bent to kiss his
dad. “I’m game.”

“Be careful,” Cole said. Like he needed to say that
to Noah’s bad ass demon mom. Nobody could hurt Jane. She could make
herself where she was like a ghost, and you couldn’t even touch
her. And she had this scary demon form that sometimes Noah saw when
he didn’t clean his cave. And she could shift into anything. She
could become a bird and fly away. She was his hero.

“Careful is my middle name, babe,” she said. Before
she left with Aunt Greta she turned back to Noah. “
You
be
careful. Stay safe.”

Noah rolled his eyes at his mother. “Mom, I am the
most powerful of all the werewolves that ever lived. I mean look at
these muscles!” He held his arms up. They looked like regular kid
arms and not the superpowered child he seemed to believe he
was.

“Yeah, you are!” his dad said, chuckling.

Jane just shook her head, a wry grin on her face.
“Just be careful.”

Noah jolted out of the dream, finding himself back
in the sterile glass room. He whimpered and put his nose between
his paws. He should have listened to his mother, and he still
blamed himself for it. He’d only been a pup, but he still should
have listened. He’d been old enough to listen. Even if he couldn’t
manage it as listening to his parents, he should have listened to
them as the pack alphas. No one else his age had gotten free passes
like that. The alpha’s word was law to the pack.

It wasn’t long after that he’d been taken. He’d been
playing chicken with the protected areas versus the unprotected
areas with his friends. He’d jumped outside the protections at just
the wrong moment and been taken by some magic users.

And he’d been here ever since.

Noah stretched and stood. Even more than being kept
a prisoner, he hated that his blood might be used for magic to hurt
more preternaturals. From what he could see, the humans had
protected themselves well in tightly-controlled fortress cities.
Now they were being aggressive because they could.

New clothes had been neatly folded and placed in the
center of his cell. He shifted back to his human form and stretched
again, then he ambled to the center of the room. He winked at the
camera high in the wall over his cell. It was a holographic square
patch that blended well into the glass, but he could still see it.
Noah wasn’t sure if humans could detect it, but his vision was more
enhanced than that. He could see the iridescent ripple that proved
it wasn’t the same as the surrounding glass. He wasn’t sure if it
was technology or magic. Over the past decade the two had blurred
together until one was indistinguishable from the other.

He dressed, then sat and waited. It felt like hours
passed, but it was probably less than half of one when a cheery
robotic feminine voice in the ceiling said: “Number 5856, Please
prepare to exit your cell for daily exercise.”

“Noah,” he whispered under his breath.