The Lady of the Valley

TLotV Chapter 39

39.

A package sat on Astrid's doorstep. Derek knew as soon as he saw it that his chances of getting a hot shower and some sleep fled like a feral cat in the night. Astrid tore the brown paper open and her face scrunched up.

"It's the hunter's report on Sarris."

He smothered his own groan. Of course it was. He turned the key in the lock and felt the lick of Astrid's wards on his skin. "I'll start coffee."

"Let's not." She followed him in, discarding her jacket and shoes. "Can we just get in jammies and read it in bed? I kinda just need to pretend the rest of the world doesn't exist for a bit."

He kissed her forehead. "That sounds like an amazing idea.You are so smart."

"I don't have to be Ari to see the grimace on your face."

"Would you think less of me if I admitted I'm overwhelmed?"

"Not a bit," she answered. "Fae make my head hurt."

Derek changed into a pair of black sweat pants and grinned when he spotted Astrid peeking at him over the papers they'd been left. He flexed. "See anything interesting?"

"Very," she said. "But also...'A devastating fire raged through the three story brick building at 341 South Maple. Police later documented finding six total bodies, two of which were identified as William 'Ike' McCully and Alexander Drauts, who went by the stage name Jared Drake, member of the band. Four bodies remain unidentified, though they are assumed to be'--"

"That sounds familiar."

"It is. It's the same story from the file your sister gave us." Astrid said. "Not just the same story, I think it's the exact same words."

Derek slipped out to the living room desk and snatched one of the print copies of the file. When he came back into the room Astrid took it from him and pulled a highlighter from her bedside table. Both files quickly turned blue. They weren't exactly the same, but there was a lot of overlap.

"How, exactly, do the hunters and the vampires have the same file?"

"Not exactly the same. Look," Astrid pointed. "The hunters have been trying to figure out what Sarris is. They made a list and eliminated some. Vampire was crossed off in 1975."

"Who are these hunters?" Derek asked.

Astrid shrugged. "I know my dad used to work with them. They operate as a family. They don't go after everything supernatural, obviously, because they are allowed to live here."

Something in her voice bothered him. He could almost see her closing down, like a flower blooming in reverse. He reached out and touched her, sliding his arm around her and pulling her closer.

"Hey, it's okay. You don't have to tell me. I'm just trying to figure all this out like you."

Her hands smashed the papers down into her lap. Her face twisted in frustration. "I don't even know that much. My dad tried to keep me out of it. He hid a whole lot from me. He pretends to be this, this normal person. Almost like, if he convinces me he can convince himself too. So sometimes I just can't question stuff. When I do...I'm not just asking him, I'm questioning his reality."

The pain in her voice killed him. She did this thing where she was a kick ass warrior princess outside, but occasionally she let a little of the churning turmoil peek through. He got it. He felt like a storm himself most days, barely contained and not sure which way the emotional winds would blow him. That was it. It was okay that he didn't know things. But some of her pain came from how much had been hidden from her.

He squeezed her a little harder. "You don't have to tell me anything. It's okay."

Astrid took a deep breath. "I didn't know my dad was an addict until I was eleven. I knew something was off. My life wasn't like Ari's. My dad didn't do the same things, like cook and clean, or go to work. Dance on Saturday mornings while he made pancakes for everyone. It was like I had two different dads and I wasn't sure which one I was going to get when I came home from school, or woke up in the morning. Now it makes sense. But to a kid, it doesn't.

"There's a lot I don't like to talk about because I don't want to see that look on people's faces when they realize how not-right things were. Then that one that follows when they pity me.

"I knew we were different than other people. But for a long time I thought it was a good different. My dad always told me the truth about my mom. I thought we were different because of who she was. People couldn't accept that. But then one day I come home and Tannis and Rick were waiting for me and my dad was gone. I'd never met them before, but they were so kind and they knew all about us. They had pictures of them and my dad, decades earlier. They sat me down and made tea and explained that my dad had made the choice to go into rehab.

"They had apparently met my dad first when he was a teenager. They were on a hunt for something preying on street people. They ended up saving my dad. He didn't have a family of his own, so they took him in, got him clean. He was a good study. Hunting gave him purpose. It meant a lot to him. They said they allowed it because he deserved redemption from his past.

"Honestly, I can't believe they never looked into his past." She waved the papers. She was right. These people were very thorough. They wouldn't have taken a random kid into their fold. "But they never told me anything about that. And I never really asked."

Derek winced. "Maybe they wanted you to see your father as who he was then, and not the druggie street kid they found him as."

Astrid bared her teeth. "Sometimes I feel like everyone is just lying to me. They're just as bad as he is with all their secrets. So even though they looked out for me, I kept my distance from them. I don't want to be one of them.

"Anyway, they'd checked in on us and found out how bad things had gotten. He kept himself together for the family, but he couldn't do it for me. He'd lost his job and hadn't told anyone. We were two weeks into our thirty day eviction. I didn't even know, any of it. I remember thinking he kept bringing home hot dogs because I said I liked him. But they were easiest to steal from the corner grocery.

"They arranged for me to stay with Ari while my dad got his shit together. It took him four months to contact me again, even though he knew where I was, right there, right down the street from where he'd left me. He never quite came back.

"The hunters bought this lot. And helped fund my dad building this house, and others. He likes building houses. It's the best he's ever done at a job. He'd let me help and he'd talk about how we were going to live here. It was almost normal. But then it was done, and it was like all his hopes and dreams bled out of him. He didn't relapse, but he didn't move in, and I didn't move back in with him.

"He forbade me from getting involved with the hunters, even though they helped him so much. He still lectures me, often, about living a normal life and staying away from magic. But magic is half of who I am."

Derek had a queasy feeling he knew where this was going.

"I grew up. Ari, and her family, they were the ones who were always there for me. They didn't shame my curiosity about magic. They tried to help me as much as they could, even though their magic and mine is very different. They gave me space to explore who I was. And my dad, he pulled further and further away.

"I have to pretend none of this exists around him. I have to pretend I'm not me around him. Sometimes I go to visit and he won't even look at me. It kills us both because we know we're lying."

Derek squeezed her to him. She said the hunters hadn't hurt her, but they'd known secrets and kept them over helping her. They'd known she was a kid and struggling and had helped themselves, and her faf over her. It didn't answer why his sister's file and theirs were so similar. But he knew which side of the fence they were on in his book.