chapter 4
Selene started to move toward the house but then paused, slightly puzzled. She shaded her eyes with her hands and scrutinized the layout of the home more closely. Where was the front door? There was something next to the garage, but it looked more like an entrance to a side room. There was also a set of double doors up on the second story porch, next to some stairs that wound down around the side. The driveway also looked as if it continued on and around to the back of the house, so Selene assumed there’d be an entrance there as well.
Finally, she decided to try the double doors on the second floor. She made her way up the stairs, took a deep breath, and then knocked.
She didn’t have long to wait. The door was opened by a young, petite woman with striking eyes.
“Hi, Ellie,” Selene said quietly. She was surprised at how nervous she was about Ellie’s reaction to seeing her again.
After a brief, stunned silence, Ellie broke into a huge smile. “Oh my gosh! Lucy said she felt someone coming. I was hoping it would be you!”
“Oh… I…” Ellie’s reaction was not what Selene had anticipated, and she glanced over her shoulder in case Ellie was talking to someone else. But she was the only person in sight, so Ellie must be talking about her. “I… thank you,” she said, bewildered.
Ellie’s smile widened. “I have so many questions for you. And I’m not known for patience.” She wrinkled her nose. “But I knew that you probably needed some time to figure stuff out. Besides, Alex and Griffin would probably kill me for trying to find you because you’re Vyusher. My only consolation was that Adelaide saw some kind of relationship between you and our family – not that she’ll say what – and I figured you’d probably come to us one day. When you were ready.”
Selene blinked at this unexpected outburst. “I see.”
“Will you come in?” Ellie opened the door wider and stepped to the side.
“Thanks,” Selene replied.
The inside of the house was as quaint as the outside. The double doors led directly into the main living area of the house. Large windows let in the light, making the rooms look bright and airy.
Ellie led Selene to a couch. “Please, make yourself comfortable. May I get you a glass of water?”
“Sure… thank you.” Selene gracefully sat down and crossed one dainty ankle over the other. She placed her purse on the table beside her and carefully folded her hands in her lap while she waited for Ellie to return.
“Alex is at work, and Griffin and the others aren’t here at the moment,” Ellie called from the kitchen. She returned with the water and handed Selene a glass, then sat on the other end of the couch. “So we have some time to get some things straight between us.”
Selene nodded. She noticed that Ellie was studying her intently and tried not to smile. She knew that people found her hard to read. Years of practice around her brother, she guessed. She knew that she sometimes came off as unemotional, when, in fact, the opposite was true.
“I came as a courtesy to let you know that I would be attending school at CSU starting this fall,” Selene said.
Ellie only nodded, her expression unsurprised. “I appreciate the gesture, but I do think we deserve some answers.”
Selene didn’t so much as bat an eyelash; she’d anticipated a request along these lines. “You have every right to an explanation. I’ll try to answer your questions as much as I am able.”
Selene swallowed. Here we go. Ellie and her family were not going to like what she had to tell them. And as soon as they got the explanation they were looking for, they’d turn their backs on her. She’d hoped, perhaps in vain, that she might find friendship with this family.
Ellie sat back for a second, clearly organizing her questions in her head. “You and Gideon were related, right?”
“Yes, he was my twin brother.”
Ellie tipped her head. “Did both your parents have multiple powers?”
“Two powers each,” Selene confirmed.
Ellie frowned. “Were twins common among the Vyusher?”
“Well, not really. But then, my mother once told me that twins occur when there are more than three or four powers to pass on. Something to do with one person not being able to handle more.”
“That explains a lot,” Ellie muttered under her breath. “We get that with the Svatura too, I guess. So your parents had more than one each?”
“I inherited three and Gideon only one.” Selene noticed that she was clenching her hands in her lap and tried to relax. She took another deep breath. “My father was able to influence people to do what he wanted. It was a subtle skill and didn’t always work. He couldn’t force people to do something against their will or to go against who they truly were. He was a gentle man… a good man.” Emotion choked her voice.
“But Gideon inherited something a little stronger?” Ellie guessed.
Selene nodded. “Yes. Gideon’s power was the ability to make anyone in the pack do whatever he wanted without their knowledge or consent. It appeared to work best on wolves – something about the linked pack mind. I assume it’s why he spent decades recruiting wolves into the family, as he tried to do with you. He destroyed anyone else with powers, anyone he couldn’t control.”
“I’ve touched you,” Ellie said, “so I know that your biggest strength is the ability to turn off anyone’s power if they’re using it near you. Is that how Gideon defeated my clan all those years ago?”
“It’s one of the ways,” Selene confirmed regretfully. “Of course, he was forcing his will on all the Vyusher, and so he had access to many different powers during an attack. We were born in 1832, so I was relatively young when we fought your family…. I was still developing the skill, so it wasn’t as effective as it is now.”
“Wait a minute…” Ellie wrinkled her brow in confusion. “You said four powers. Is morphing into a wolf one of them?”
“No, actually everyone in the pack does that. I’m so used it, I forget to count it. I guess with that there are five powers between the two of us.” Selene took a sip of water.
“Okay…” Ellie tapped her teeth with her fingernail. “You can visit people in their dreams as well, right? I didn’t have enough time to explore what you do with it. Was it you who came to me in that dream and helped me find the Jenners and Pierces?”
Selene leaned back and re-crossed her feet. “It was me. Not even Gideon discovered that I had that power. You are very good at what you do.”
“Why did you send me that dream?”
“To protect you and to fight my brother,” Selene replied. At Ellie’s confused frown, she explained, “I’d been hiding you from Gideon for decades. He’d been looking for you since the night he attacked your family and you’d morphed into a wolf before his eyes. I knew you had no chance against him as long as it was just you and Griffin. So I tried to give you reinforcements the only way I could.”
“Wait a second, back up.” Ellie held up a hand. “You protected us?”
Selene gave a small smile. “My third ability, I can… hide… for lack of a better word, Svatura from our tracker. I can’t physically hide them; it’s more that I shield the existence of a powerful being.”
“Were you hiding us from Gideon?” Ellie asked.
Selene shook her head. “Sheila— she’s one of our more talented wolves and can find anyone with powers on the planet. It’s not the person that she locates— it’s the power itself. However, she does better honing in on them if they’re in large groups. And I did better hiding them in small groups. That combination created just enough of a loophole in Gideon’s system, and I took advantage of it when I could.”
“We figured out that someone was keeping Gideon from finding us. But we thought maybe Griffin was doing it. Something with his shield maybe,” Ellie said. She absently reached for the candy in a bowl on the coffee table and popped one into her mouth.
“Did you never wonder why you never discovered that aspect of his power?” Selene asked.
Ellie shrugged. “I’m still developing my own ability. I just assumed it was a gap or that he was unconsciously blocking me from seeing it. Wait. So why wasn’t I able to see that gift when I touched you?” Ellie asked. Usually if she touched people, she had instant access to their abilities to their full extent.
Selene grimaced. “For that reason, actually. After decades of hiding my other two abilities from Gideon and Sheila, it’s a very well developed skill. And a bit of a habit.”
Ellie accepted this information with barely a blink. “And how were you protecting us, exactly?”
“Initially, I kept you and your brother away from Gideon. But then I discovered he was about to target the Jenners and Pierces and that they would need your help to defeat him.” Selene broke off and took another sip of her water. Was it getting hot in here?
Ellie narrowed her violet eyes. “There’s something else, isn’t there?”
Selene sighed and set down her glass. “Together, your families were my best hope of ending Gideon’s control over my clan. I have so much to apologize to you for, I don’t even know where to begin,” she admitted sadly. “I put you in danger after hiding you all those years. But it was my only option. Or at least, the only way I could see.”
Ellie sat in silence for a while, thinking. “Were you a part of what happened to my original family?” she finally asked.
Selene closed her eyes as her heart plummeted. This was the one question she’d dreaded the most.
“Yes,” she confessed. “I wasn’t as skilled with my powers back then. I could only stop one person’s powers at a time, not many people’s powers as I can now. Gideon would determine whom I should stop, and then force me to do it. He never fought himself. Just coordinated and controlled all of the rest of us. I never… we… none of us ever had a choice.”
She didn’t tell Ellie that she was the only one of the pack under Gideon’s control who’d actually been aware of his manipulations. Everyone else accepted Gideon’s thoughts and directives as being of their own volition. But not Selene. She knew she was being forced. And the pain of living with that awareness, of knowing the evil they were doing and her part in it, however unwillingly… that was something Selene wouldn’t make anyone else live with. Not if she could help it.
She looked directly into Ellie’s eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
“She’s telling the truth,” Lila’s voice sounded from the back of the room.
Selene glanced over to see a tall girl with honey blonde hair standing by the kitchen.
“Sorry about eavesdropping,” Lila added.
“You’re not really sorry, are you?” Ellie asked, a small smile playing at her lips. She patted the space between her and Selene on the couch.
“Not really.” Lila grinned, unrepentant, and moved to join them. She turned to Ellie and took her hand, letting Ellie take over her power. “Watch. The truth in her words is obvious, but it’s also in her emotions.” She turned to Selene. “Say it again. The end of it.”
Selene repeated her story and her apology, willing to do or say anything if it helped. When she stopped, tears were silently slipping down all three of the girls’ cheeks.
Ellie hopped up, moved around the coffee table, and wrapped her arms around Selene in a tight embrace. “I forgive you,” she whispered.
“What is she doing here?!”
The bitter rage in Griffin’s voice startled them. Selene’s heart sank into her stomach even as it was trying to jump out of her throat.
Ellie left one comforting hand on Selene’s arm as she turned to her brother. “She’s not dangerous, Griffin.”
Composed, and with all her walls back up, Selene met his gaze. No one watching her— especially Griffin—would ever guess her true feelings at that moment.
“You don’t know that.” He glared at Selene and moved to stand directly in front of the three.
“I do,” Ellie replied stubbornly, her chin tilting up. “Look…” She reached for his hand, but Griffin jerked out of her grasp.
“Anything you’re seeing about her could easily be a lie,” he insisted. “Her family killed ours. And she was part of that.” Griffin shifted his intense glare from Selene to his sister. Selene could tell they were using their powers to speak to each other telepathically.
After a few minutes of tense silence, Ellie sighed and shook her head. She turned to Selene and opened her mouth to speak, but Selene stopped her by placing a gentle hand on her arm.
“I think I can see how things are, Ellie,” she said softly, taking care not to look at Griffin. With her free hand, she patted the hand Ellie still had on her arm. “I don’t want to cause any trouble in your family. I’ll go now.” Selene dropped her shield just for Ellie, saying into her mind, “Griffin can’t hear me. I’ll let you tell him about where I’m attending college. He needs some time to cool down first. And you don’t have to worry… If I see any of you on campus, I’ll walk the other way.”
Ellie shook her head vehemently, but Selene couldn’t hear her thoughts since she’d already put her guards back up.
With a small nod at Lila, Selene picked up her purse and walked out the door.