Page 45 of Alpha's Magic

“I’m sure it could be again, with just a little work.”

He shook his head, and I heard how stupid that sounded in my own head. Why would he be interested in that? Or to even set foot inside it again? This was where his family was murdered, and where the witch cast an evil spell on him that almost ruined him. No wonder he was trembling ever so slightly.

We made it to the manor house just as the storm that had been threatening finally hit in earnest. I banged on the doors and listened for some sound within, but there was nothing.

“Stay here,” I told Leo. “I’m going to look for an open window.”

He nodded, his eyes wide. “Can I go with you?”

“Stay here where it’s dry. You’ll be fine, and I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

I tried the closest windows on the ground floor and the ones not out of reach. All of them were tightly locked. Finally, I came back around to the porch to find Leo huddled on the front step, shivering from the wind and damp. “No luck,” I told him. “But there’s a good barn nearby. We’ll head over there for shelter.”

We got back on the horse and rode over to the small barn nearby on the property. I led the mare inside and helped Leo down. Then after I unsaddled her and used an old blanket I found in one of the stalls to wipe her down, I got her settled with some hay I found in the loft and then went back to check on Leo, who was sitting in another one of the empty stalls on a pile of straw. It was probably warmer inside the stall and out of the drafts, so I cleared an area and started a fire for us inside it and fell down beside Leo.

“Not as comfortable as I would have liked, but at least it’s dry and out of that cold wind.”

“It’s fine,” he said quietly. “Better than that house.”

“Yes, I can only imagine how bad your memories must be of the place.” I hugged him, and then got back up to find the food I’d bought at the market. Once I had him warm and dry and fed, I thought he’d go to sleep pretty soon, and that would be for the best. It would give him a chance to process being back here again and help restore him. I wondered if he might have played in or around this barn as a child, or if his father had taken him riding from these same stables.

After he ate, he sat wide-eyed beside me, snuggled up close for warmth and made no move to lie down to sleep, so I began to question him as gently as I could. I had a lot of questions, actually, because so much of his story didn’t add up. Harrison had been skeptical of it as well.

I started with the thing that had always bothered me the most.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Yes,” he said softly. “Anything.”

“You said Rozamond made a potion to give to your father that was supposed to turn him into a monster, right?”

“A beast. Yes.”

“But when you saw him about to drink it, you said you rushed forward and drank it yourself instead. Is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“But why did you do that? Why not just knock it from your father’s hand?”

“What?”

“Help me understand why you drank that potion instead of throwing it to the floor.”

He pulled sharply away. “To save my father!” he shouted. “Why are you asking me this?”

“No need for shouting, Leo,” I said, making my voice stern, and he dropped his gaze and tried to pull away from me. I wouldn’t let him.

“No. Answer my question. Why did you drink the potion? Why not just knock it from his hand?”

“I don’t know!”

“Why are you getting so loud? You do know the answer, and we’re going to sit here until you tell me.” I kissed his cheek tenderly. “You can tell me anything, Leo.”

He burst into tears, and I held him in my arms and waited him out. I thought the tears were a clever ruse on his part to get out of talking about it and probably one he’d used for years with Grimora. I decided to wait him out. When he finally subsided, I pulled him over into my lap.

“Would you like to know what I think?” I asked him.

He dropped his head and didn’t answer, so I kept going. “I think you didn’t really know what that potion would do to you. Isn’t that the truth?”

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