Page 67 of Secrets and Ruin

“You kept an important secret from me about my son, one that only came about because he was with you, and you don’t know how to do anything with a modicum of care. Forgive me if I don’t think you’re the best person for him right now.”

You have no idea what secrets your son has me keeping from you, Niko. And for that, I am sorry. There’s one I really do wish you could have, but they aren’t my secrets to give you.

“I thought you wanted a world where werecats and werewolves could finally live together peacefully, more unified than we have ever been,” I said, finally pulling away and straightening to stare down my brother.

“I don’t do it at the risk of my loved ones.”

“If none of them wanted to be part of the risk, they can leave my territory any time. Dirk has certainly been reminded of that. I don’t keep him chained in my home, locked under Heath’s orders. Sometimes, good things, the right things, need to have some risk,” I countered. “You’re just angry with me right now because you want someone to be angry with.” I thought about it for only a second before I said something else. I couldn’t take it back, but I said it anyway. “And you don’t like that Dirk has found a life worth living while he’s been with me.”

“Damn it,” Niko snarled, stomping to the open kitchen. “I knew you reminded me of her, but I never thought…”

“What?” I asked, demanding to know what he was mad about now.

Grabbing a bottle off a shelf, he pulled out the cork and took a swig, not replying for a moment. He glared at me and took another drink.

“You remind me of Liza sometimes.” Niko put the bottle on the counter, slowly spinning it around. “But where she was sweet and kind, you are a baseball bat with nails. She would say the same things, but the way she went about embodying them was on the other end of the spectrum.”

“Ah.” I didn’t know what to say to that. I’d been told she and I couldn’t be more different. I’d been told I wasn’t anyone’s attempt at replacing her. I’d been told she was sweet and innocent. I never thought anyone would say she and I were similar. No one talked about her, not nearly enough. It was a wound that was only recently cleaned and could start healing. Davor showed me how rotten and infected it had gotten and how healing could finally repair the damage.

“Yeah, it bothers me, but it’s not a bad thing.” Niko took another drink. “She was, and still is, my favorite sibling…from both families I’ve been part of, she’s my favorite.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, walking closer. “I would love to talk about this more, but I need to know what our next step is with the werewolf out there hunting us down. You’re his target. How did you get away? Did you injure him?”

Niko shoved the cork into the bottle and put it back on the shelf behind him.

“I was able to push him off, but between getting all of you out of that and him deciding to retreat, thanks to his injuries, there was no way of killing him. Rainer has always been a damn good fighter. He wants to kill me, and thanks to that, he won’t be so risky as to get himself killed for nothing. Even though I was stronger as a werecat than he was as a werewolf, he gave me hell during the War. It almost doesn’t surprise me that he’s the one that survived.”

“And he made a deal to kill you,” I pointed out. “With the Wild Hunt itself.”

“Yeah.” Niko stared at his hands on the counter.

“Now is the time you tell me everything that’s going on,” I said, leaning on the counter opposite of him.

“The Black Forest Pack had deep ties with the fae. I don’t know when it started. I was too young for that education. I would have learned the deeper secretive history when I was about to be a man. I don’t know if there was a bargain struck, or perhaps the werewolves originally decided it was a good place to stay, only to discover the fae, but the pack was very…isolated. My biological father, he would say we weren’t like other packs. This was our world. The rest of it didn’t matter. He hated the War and didn’t like how other packs kept asking us for help, not caring about what we dealt with in this place. It was a strong pack, but it was strong to deal with this place, not werecats.

“Instead of hosting other Alphas, we hosted fae political leaders, keeping peace treaties with them to keep their own in the deepest parts of the forest. The Wild Hunt is something that encompasses all fae. It’s shown up all over the world, and the legends around it are different everywhere. For example, there are legends about Odin, the Norse god, leading it, so…” Niko shrugged. “I’ve never encountered it before. I do know anyone can be a victim if they aren’t careful.”

“And? You and Rainer?”

Niko growled softly.

“Rainer was my eldest brother, and when he was becoming what we now call a teenager, he was invited to private meetings with my father. He saw other packs ask us for help more than I did. Then the pack was attacked and destroyed. We didn’t talk about what happened afterward. I was angry and believed I hated him. My brother was fighting for the werewolves who’d killed our parents and destroyed our home. He hated me in return because I was a werecat and, therefore, the enemy. It was a youthful hate that didn’t have the maturity to listen to the other side or even recognize it.”

“So, you fought and thought you killed him.”

“We fought here, actually,” Niko said softly, putting his elbows on the counter. “In this forest, running between the ruins of our family home and the homes of those we considered friends. Fae watched us as we clashed, staying out of the turmoil because they knew the War was exposing more than just the moon cursed to humanity. Even the most feral of fae don’t want humans to know where they live and hunt. They need the secrecy to continue killing the way they do.”

“Is that why they’re avoiding us now? I noticed not many fae have tried to bother us since we got here.”

“Probably. The fae here are…a bit stunted. Everything happens all at once to them, and they ignore the passage of time in the human world. They want to continue living as they did a thousand years ago, free of interference.”

“And you killed your brother in this place, or so you thought. With the fae watching and his rage to come back and kill you, too strong an emotion for some of them to resist.”

“I have no doubt whatever my brother was feeling after I left him to finish dying out here was enough to call the Wild Hunt to him. That much need for revenge, that much hate. That would do it, I bet. Among other things, I bet that would do it.”

“They gave him a deal worthy of an immortal supernatural—all the time in the world and some fae power.”

“Yeah, and I get why they would. Claiming a soul like that for their menagerie? He would be better than any fae hound. He would be able to do things some of the fae can’t. They played the long game with him, even when they probably didn’t need to.”

---