Mated To An Enemy

Ashleigh stared with eyes wide. She read the sentence again and again.

[The werewolves and the fae are one and the same.]

What did this mean?

[The werewolves and the fae are one and the same.]

The only thing that she could think of, the only meaning that would be proven through scientific testing, with factual results to question and ponder…

It wasn’t possible.

Ashleigh set the journal down on the table. She stood, keeping her eyes on it as though it would move or attack her at any moment.

She swallowed and then moved away from the couch, pacing the room back and forth.

“It’s not possible….” She whispered aloud. “No… there’s some mistake….”

Looking back at the journal, she wondered if she should go back and read the pages leading to that entry. Maybe there was a better explanation. Perhaps it meant something else.

She licked her lips and pulled out her phone, dialing the contact immediately.

“Hello?”

“Come to my room, now. We need to talk.”

***

Clara approached the room with caution.

She had never been personally scared of Ashleigh, they were friends, and Ashleigh had only ever shown her kindness. But her voice, the urgency. Clara wondered if she had done something to upset the incredibly powerful and generally feared Luna.

She swallowed her nerves and raised her hand to knock on the door, but it swung open before she had the chance.

“Oh! Hi! I was just about to– Whoa!” Clara shouted as Ashleigh grabbed her hand and yanked her unceremoniously into the room, closing the door behind her.

“What is this?” Ashleigh demanded, pointing toward the sitting area.

“Uhm… a couch?”

Ashleigh sighed, walking past Clara to stand beside the coffee table and then pointed down to the journal sitting where she had left it.

“OH!” Clara quickly replied, hurrying over. “You finally read it? How far? What entry did you get to? Did you read IT?”

Ashleigh clenched her jaw.

“It’s not true… it can’t be, right?” she said.

“You did read IT….” Clara said quietly as she bit her lower lip.

Clara took a deep breath and tried to find the words she wanted to say. She had rushed to get this journal into Ashleigh’s hands, but the truth was, she didn’t exactly know what to do with the information afterward.

“Honestly… I don’t know,” Clara replied. “Alpha Cain wasn’t specific about the tests he ran or where he got his samples from.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, yea, there are all kinds of genetic bits and bobbles within us that we haven’t identified yet, but in order to compare ours to that of the fae, we would need samples from them too.”

“Then there’s no way he could know this?” Ashleigh asked with a bit of hope.

“I didn’t say that,” Clara sighed. “I’m saying I can’t confirm or deny it. Because I don’t have any way of running the test to check the results.”

“But how could he have even run a test, to begin with? As far as I know, before the attack on Winter, there hadn’t been any fae reported for centuries.”

“Well, that’s not entirely true,” Clara said. “There have been reports randomly throughout history. But most were checked out, and nothing was found. But you read the journal. So you should know that already.”

“Well, I read some, but then I skipped forward when I saw your sticky tab,” Ashleigh replied.

Clara sighed.

“Never skip ahead; if you do, go back and read the material!”

Ashleigh rolled her eyes and crossed her arms.

“The last full entry I read was about Gorn inviting Cain back to finish studying in the fae mound. Then I skimmed a few entries about what he was studying from the chamber,” she said, thinking over what she remembered. “Oh, there was something that sounded interesting. Cain seemed to be feeling suspicious that Gorn was hiding something. That was when I found your sticky note. So, what did I miss?”

Clara pursed her lips and raised her eyebrow.

“What did you miss?” she asked sarcastically. “Well, let’s see. You missed Gorn kicking Cain back out of the fae mound after Cain tried taking samples of the tree.

“Then there was a two-year silence, he made a few entries about his thoughts and theories on what the power could be, but it didn’t lead anywhere.

“Then Gorn brought Tomas in without any scientific knowledge or know-how. Of course, that was when there were reports of active fae in between the territories, so he used that excuse to–”

“What?” Ashleigh asked with surprise and confusion. “What are you talking about? Something like that I would have heard about.”

Clara shook her head.

“Nope, because according to the journal, your dad refused to believe it and didn’t want to investigate.”

“Bullshit!” Ashleigh growled, as did the others that whispered in her mind. “My dad made many mistakes, but he never would have ignored a threat from the fae!”

“I’m not saying he did!” Clara cried back, raising her hands in the air submissively as she saw faint white light around Ashleigh’s eyes. “That was what Cain was told. And he didn’t believe it either, but he was too curious and concerned to worry about it.”

“So, did he find them?” Ashleigh asked, attempting to reign in her anger.

“Not exactly,” Clara continued. “Gorn and Tomas volunteered to hunt the fae, and Cain was asked to research. Gorn wanted him to dig into the history books and investigate the mounds for any others that might contain that power source. That is when things started to feel really hinky for Cain.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, up until that point, Gorn hadn’t really directed Cain to do anything specific besides asking, ‘hey, there’s this buzzing in my backyard. Can you figure out what it is?’. But suddenly, he wanted Cain to track the power, to find ways to use it or capture it.”

“That doesn’t seem good,” Ashleigh said, taking a seat on the couch.

“Not at all,” Clara said. “Cain was working with them, but he never quite trusted them, especially when the Spring Luna attacked him at the entrance to the cave.”

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