In The Eye Of The Beholder

Chapter Four: The Danger of Dinner

Alysia pinched her arm, wincing to herself as the glass of sparkling water was placed in front of her and a waitress with a black vest and crisp white shirt snapped a satin napkin across her lap. When Iris had informed Alysia that a car would be picking her up two days after she had last seen Damien at the reading to meet with him, she had assumed it was going to be a professional meeting held maybe in his brothers old office to discuss her contract while continuing to work with him for at least the duration of his stay. Instead she was dressed in dark flare jeans and a forest green oversized sweater in one of the most expensive and fanciest restaurants in the city.

When the car had pulled smoothly up in front of the building and a valet opened the back door for her she was confused until she saw Damien standing at the entrance, dressed in a black suit, a navy blue shirt under with a blood red tie around his neck.

"Are we eating here?" Alysia asked in mild panic, her eyes widening as they met his, his head nodding up and down to confirm her worst fears. "I...well...I'm not really dressed for a place like this?" She couldn't explain even to herself why she said it like a question but her confusion and panic towards the situation began to skyrocket as Damien began to shrug off the jacket of his suit, handing it to the valet who still waited beside them. Next he tugged off his tie, undoing a few buttons at the column of his neck and folding his sleeves up to his elbow. He tussled his thick hair with a hand and then stuck them into his pockets as he stared at her.

"Can we eat now?" He asked her as though he was actually interested in whether or not that had appeased her or if he needed to find somewhere else for them to go.  She squeaked out a yes. 

Now here she was, sat across from his as his finger trailed across his bottom lip the same way his eyes were trailing across her face. The waitress came and went, Damien ordering everything in Italian after consulting Alysia on the choices and now they waited in silence for their meals.

"I am ready to discuss the rules you have in place for me as I remain on as the children's, well its mainly Sophia, that I stay on as their nanny for the remainder of your time here." She was hoping she didn't sound as weak as she felt in front of him, she didn't like the way his eyes darkened as she spoke.

"Why for the remainder? if you wish to stay on then you will move with us back east when we leave. Two weeks is enough time to settle your things, yes?" once again he spoke in statements posed as questions, his tone so final Alysia found herself nodding to his words until she shook herself.

"Two weeks? move back east?" She echoed back to him "I am sorry, Mr. Dellario. I wish with all my heart I could stay on when you leave and keep my job" she twisted her rings as she broke eye contact with him "But I have family obligations that keep me here."  she tried to explain.

"Then I will take care of the obligations and you will come with us?" He asked her as though he was serious and he won back her gaze as a man walked into the room with a folder that he handed to Damien and left with a short bow towards both of them that Alysia awkwardly bowed her seated body back to him, unsure how to respond or what exactly was happening.

Damien brought the glass of deep red wine in front of him to his full lips, the drink staining his bottom lip like blood until he brought the satin napkin in his own lap up to dab at them. "You had me quite convinced you were a human, Miss Rivera, I could not even sense power presence at your center" He stared at her, his gray eyes shrouded "I'm curious how you manage that."

Alysia felt every muscle in her body freeze and her eyes darted down to the file that was placed in front of him, his fingertips slowly opening and closing the flap as a harsh gulp forced its way down her throat.

He flicked his finger and the file opened, even from here Alysia could see a photo of herself with Amara just yesterday when she had visited to make a payment, her head hung and her fists clenched in her napkin. "You don't understand, Mr. Dellario" Alysia started her plea, she wasn't sure what they were with the family being old enough to be vampires, her eyes darting to the red liquid in the glass in front of him but the Dellario's being of the supernatural realm made more sense than Alysia had been willing to admit since she began her employ with them, she stupidly thought keeping her head down would allow her to skate by unnoticed.

"Alysia Rivera, born Alysia Birgitta of the Exalted Coven, daughter of the headmistress and granddaughter to the grand wizard." His lips read the words that settled like stones in Alysia's chest "Yes, I would agree that I don't understand what exactly Grand wizard Malachi's granddaughter is doing as my brothers nanny , Il mio simpatico puzzle, explain it to me." his voice held the darkest edge and his tense shoulders let Alysia know that the next words out of her mouth to him needed to be the truth or no matter what the reason he wanted to keep her around was, he would not be risking his family with a wildcard.

She released a shaky breath, her body sagging back into her highbacked chair as she tossed her napkin onto the table and ran a hand across her forehead, the type of stress that's been building for years settling into her bones with deep aches and tired limbs. 

"I was born Alysia Birgitta but I was never of the coven," she murmured but knew he could hear her as he tipped his head towards her to continue "When we are children we are raised away from the elders of the coven, typically together by one witch regardless of who our parents are. It's there a young witch or wizard would learn to cultivate, harness, and project their energies. During the first twelve years of their life their powers will begin to appear, typically the sooner a power begins to show in a child then the stronger they will be..."

"At what age did your powers present themselves?" He interrupted her, Alysia's haunted eyes flashing to his curious ones as memories floated around her like ghosts. 

"I was five" she whispered "I was playing down by the water in front of the mother witches house" a smile twitched on her lips for a moment "Mother was watching close by and my cousin Rachel was there, she was my Aunt Rosalina's only child and having presented her powers at seven she was rumored to be next in line for the next Grand Witch, surpassing even her mother as his successor." She licked her dry lips. "Mother warned me not to go to the water, she warned me but I did not listen to her, I wanted to touch the moon coming over the sky line, the waves were lapping at the shore and the wind was whipping the salt into my face..."She swallowed thickly "I thought I heard the moon calling to me." She whispered the shameful excuse she had once cried out to her Aunt as the woman wailed on the young girls body. 

"The moon?! the moon told you to kill my family?! you wretched cursed child!" 

The memory burned through her mind and the color drained from her already pale face.

"Then what happened?" His voice prompted her back into reality.

"I'm not sure" She cleared her throat and wiped the tears from her eyes before they could fall "I was a foolish child who didn't know what was best about anything, I imagined the moon was talking to me and when I...when I touched the water everything went black. When I woke up it was in our healers hut in the mountains. They told me I flooded the whole town, I killed almost a quarter of our coven, including my mother and cousin." The words choked her and she could not face him, she knew the disgust that would be painted on his face. "So the Grand Wizard and Coven Council locked my powers. It can only be unlocked through a true pairing but the coven stripped my mate senses so that I would be numb to his presence, I wouldn't know him if he was standing in front of me, its the best way to keep everyone safe." 

He was quiet for so long she finally looked up at him, nothing could have prepared her for the hurt and empathy in his silver eyes as they burned into her "You pay your aunt multiple substantial payments every week, often bordering on nearly two thousand dollars a week, why?" he asked her, his voice quiet, befitting the solemn air in the room.

She smoothed out her jeans on her lap and twisted her fingers together "My father is not a wizard, he is actually half pixie and he never married my mother but still loved her deeply, many years after she died he met a witch who promised him that she could cast a spell that would...give him another child with my mother even though she had died." 

"Blood magic" Damien hissed and cursed under his breath obviously knowing how dangerous blood magic was and that no matter how or why you used it, it always had a twisted price.

"That's how I have my sister, Amara" Alysia carried on explaining "My father didn't understand the price of blood magic and wasn't prepared for having a sickly child the spitting image of our mother, he took his own life before Amara was three. My aunt took Amara in on the condition that I worked and paid for Amara's treatments, I was thirteen and there wasn't much work at first but two or three jobs at a time normally fixed that, finally I found this job with your brother and I was able to really start making the payments like she was requesting, when I couldn't make a payment before than Amara gets too sick for me to visit. In a month and half Amara will be eighteen and she can go before the Grand Wizard to be placed in a coven that will help her and maybe even heal her and I will be out of debt to my aunt for helping Amara."

Silence punctuated Alysia's sentence, her ears began to pick up on the sounds outside their private room, his eyes stared at her as though he was trying to determine whether or not she was telling the truth and Alysia tried not to squirm in her seat. She had told him everything that he needed to know about her, the dark side of her that very few people knew and she wouldn't blame him if he no longer wanted her around his niece and nephew a second longer.

"A car will be by my brothers mansion at ten tomorrow morning to collect you and whatever items you need to take with you back easy, Alysia." Damien stood from the chair and decreed his words like a law as he made his way towards the exit, stopping just before he left to look back at her "You won't see me for the week Alysia, so don't get yourself into any trouble and wait for me, la mia regina ferita."