We ended up digging a thirty foot deep pit, layering the bottom and walls with concrete, then hastily constructing a removable roof covered in faux grass to keep it hidden. It being a Blackhawk and all. James and I then hid our small arsenals in the hidden (and soundprooofed) rooms we had constructed throughout the mansion. After all of that was done, I went to corner Damon about the mindspeaking and weapon hoards. And I also needed to find out what the hell “Inmia mea, sufletul meu, totul pentru mine” meant in Romanian. (or I was pretty sure it was Romanian, anyways.) I hauled myself up the stairs past Angel, who was moaning dramatically to Alex about how much she missed Kayla. I shut the door to my room, took my cell phone out of my Cargo pants pocket, and texted Damon. I said “Get your big dumb Warlock ass up to my room now. You have a lot of explaining to do.” A few minutes later, the devil himself was knocking on my door. “Come in!” I shouted, trying not to sound too pissed. He had the nerve to smile at me as he walked in. “I suppose you want to know why I’ve ammased an army.” “Among other things.” I replied tersely. He sat on the edge of the bed next to me. I waited for him to begin. Several minutes later, he still had yet to begin. “Do you want me to start first?” I asked him, trying to coax him into spitting it out. “No, no, I’m just trying to figure out where exactly to begin. There is a lot that I need to tell you, Carmen. I owe you a complete, no-holds-barred explanation. Alright. Here it is.” I waited patiently for him to begin. “Carmen, I’ve never told you this before, but I’m head-over-heels in love with you.” “Whoa. Hold on a sec there. You’re in love with me? ME?” He winced. “Yep. Now, may I continue on please?” I nodded, not entirely trusting my voice to hold steady. “There is something rare that is going on, something which allows me to speak in your mind and your mind alone. I suspect that you, being a werewolf, will understand the term I am about to use.” I had a pretty decent idea of where he was going with this. In retrospect, there’s only one thing it could have possibly been. But bloody hell if i didn’t hope he wasn’t taking this where I thought he would take this. “Mate. Carmen, you are my Mate.” As he pronounced those fatal words, I could feel in my heart that he was right. I took a moment to absorb it, trying to hide my shock. He grinned broadly. “Wolf Girl, don’t even try to hide your emotions from me. I feel them as my own. Now, to continue on, as my Mate, there are a few things that you need to know. I am the son of the King of the Romanian Werewolves and the Queen of the Warlocks.” I watched his Sky Blue eyes for the telltale sign of lying. If it was there, I never saw it. I broke in hastily, wanting something clarified. “Wait. Just. One. Freaking. Moment. You mean to tell me that you are the Prince of the Romanian Werewolves, as well as the Prince of the Warlocks?” “Yes.” “Wow. Jackass, I didn’t know you were a freaking Werewolf, which means your magick was somehow hiding the scent, which officially means that I underestimated you.” “Whoa. Did you actually just ADMIT to making a mistake?!” I slapped him jokingly on the arm. “Yes, you complete and total Jackwagon, I just admitted that I underestimated you. Now, get over it and get back to the story before I feel the need to turn your furry behind into a nicely sized rug on my floor.” “Okay, okay. No need to get testy.” He paused just long enough to flash a grin at me. “Well, anyways... My parents are getting old enough that they want to pass the seat of power on to me. And to you. They want us to rule as a mated pair, Carmen.” This was just too freaking weird, and only getting weirder by the minute. “I can see why they’d want you to have a Mate for this, but why the weapons? Why the secrecy? Why wait untill now to tell me? You’ve known me for the better part of the last five years. Surely you must have realized before...” I broke off, feeling utter confusion over the whole matter. Damon, with his angular features, black hair, and blue eyes, had caught my attention before, but I had always classified the relationship under the “close work buddies” file in my mind, nothing more. “I waited until now because I didn’t want to force you into anything Inmia mea (my heart). The weapons are because until the Mating Rites are completed, every male Werewolf within a hundred miles is going to be pursuing his interest in you, and I doubt that any one of them could possibly have your best interests at heart.” “And you do, Damon?” “Yes.” He seemed to like the one word, one syllable answers. This was causing me to halfway expect that he would one day answer: “You Jane, Me Tarzan” and beat his fists against his chest. He burst out laughing, aparantly having picked up on that stray thought. “Would you get out of my head, please, Tarzan?” “Alright Jane.” A third voice broke in. James. “I see we have a case of Thelma and Louise going on here.” “Clearly. The question is which one of us is Thelma-” “And which one is Louise?” Damon completed helpfully. Just then, I heard what sounded like a barroom brawl going on in the kitchen. “Shit. Sounds like we’ve got a catfight to break up.” James and Damon tried, but failed, to hide a laugh at my play-on-words. Then we heard someone being thrown through a window and streaked downstairs. Maggie was holding an intruder by the throat, and was surrounded by at least ten more. All of our defensive instincts kicked in at once as we saw Alex and Angel cowering behind Maggie. Then Angel did one of the bravest (and possibly stupidest) things an eight year old could do. She ran up to one of the guys, said “Get out of my home, you cretin” and promptly kicked him in the legs. Like I said. Beat it out of you. I flashed into wolf form, and like a strike of lightning, I was between Angel and the attacker. I called out in the form of a howl for my packmates to wake up and get their sleepy asses downstairs. One by one, we pushed the attackers back. “Get out and stay out you flea-bitten furry bastards!” I shouted after the last one left, tail between his legs. I know that I should have stuck to the simpler more cleshea “Get out and stay out”, but what the hey, they were on my territory, threatening my pack. I had every right to give them a taste of the hurricane they they had just stirred up. In fact, as Beta, it was my job to throw the occasional jab and take care of intruders. James wanted me to take over the pack eventually, and as a matter of fact, the ceremony of becoming Alpha was next week. I was going to be a bossy, overprotective furball until then, and probably for some time after. James looked at me. “Mind explaining what that was about?” “It’s kind a long story.” “I have time. Need I remind you, I am still the Alpha of this pack. I need to know what’s endangering it, and you Thelma and Louise, are both clearly somehow involved.” “And you would know this how, exactly?” “When have you not been at the center of all our problems?” Ok. Point taken. All right furball, how you wanna handle this? I directed the thought at Damon. Tell him everything, please. He responded. Will do, Fido. I shot back smugly. He had no response for that one. I could see James picking up on this bit of chitchat, and putting two and two together. “Wait a second. Carmen, are you and Damon a-” He was so mortified that he couldn’t complete the sentence. I filled in helpfully. “We’re a mated pair, James, deal with it. I only found out a few minutes ago myself.” And so I repeated everything from the start. I was shocked when his only response was “Congrats, sis. I’m happy for you. Not many wolves find their mates quite so soon. Some have to wait for decades or even centuries before finding their true mate. I just hope that you’re happy with this.” “I am.” “Then you both have my blessing.” “Since when are you a Dad?” I asked James sarcastically. “Since you two became a classic example of Thelma and Louise.” Good retort. I had no response for it. Other than this. “Wiseass.” “It would have been worse if you called me a Dumbass, so I’m okay with being called a Wiseass.” “Poor dumb Schmuck.” I muttered to James, who pretended not to have heard me. With that, we called it a night. Damon crawled into bed next to me, ad he had taken to doing. The difference was that tonight he actually had the nerve to kiss the top of my head and mutter “Good night, Inmia mia.” “Watch it, Fido, I may kick you out yet.” With that, I was asleep. Normally, I sleep pretty much dreamlessly, but tonight was different, somehow. I dreamed that somehow, something went wrong and the Mating Rites were delayed, that I failed at being an Alpha. Some of the images that I saw in my sleep that night were too horrible for words to describe. I saw flashbacks of every person I had ever killed, heard them asking me if it was truly worth it. I woke up being shaken by the shoulders, drenched in sweat. It was Damon who was shaking me awake. “It was just nightmares, inmia mia, go back to sleep, and this time may sleep come easily for you.” He stayed up with me for the rest of the night, just holding me in his lap and humming untill I eventually was able to sleep again. In retrospect, that was really incredibly sweet of him.
