Catalyst (Forevermore, Book Two) Page 3

  “Eila? It’s me, Madison ... if you can hear me ... please blink or nod your head or something,” I said, practically begging though it seemed sort of silly.

  Nothing.

  “Mom,” I said, hoping that the familiarity of the title would catch her attention, but still, she didn’t reply.

  “She’s in shock, Madison,” Jason said, having finally come down the hallway and stood beside me. “Let me see if I can get her attention ... ”

  He knelt down in front of Eila, opened his mouth to speak, and before a single word could come out, her hand swept across his face. Jason recoiled and swore, putting a hand over the reddening mark on his cheek. “I deserve that,” he muttered and straightened up.

  Eila looked at me then, her eyes watering, then turned back toward Jason. “Don’t let her leave me. Please, please, don’t let my daughter leave me.”

  “Maybe now you can understand a fragment of what Alex was going through,” Mitchell said, surprising all of us. I hadn’t even heard him come back in.

  Eila looked as if she had been the one slapped across the face. She went to reply, but my uncle was already stalking down the hallway to retrieve Willow. He returned moments later, the white cat tucked under his arm, and strode out of the house in a furious stride. It was almost humorous, but I couldn’t find it in me to laugh.

  I stood up and put an arm around Eila, feeling the warmth of her tears against my shoulder as it brushed across her face. “I don’t hate you, if that’s what you were thinking. I want you in my life, and I wish that things had turned out differently ... and maybe someday we’ll all get through this and things can go back to normal. Or at least as close to normal as they possibly can.”

  “It’s too late,” she said in a hoarse tone, “I screwed everything up, and now everything is over.”

  Jason pulled me away gently and gave me a look that I took to mean ‘It’s time to go,’ and gave Eila one final glance before he picked up his own bag of stuff and headed to the front door. No one said anything, but I could hear the sound of Eila’s sobs even through the closed door as I walked down the familiar sidewalk. The sound seemed to trigger my own tears, regardless how hard I fought it. She had been my mom for sixteen years … she would always be my mom. I just hoped she understood that I had to do this. I had a purpose that was bigger than living out a nine-to-five life. Briefly, I was tempted to go back in and melt into her arms – to comfort one another, but I knew it wouldn’t be any use. She didn’t seem like she wanted to be comforted, and neither did I.

  Mitchell dropped me off at Haven and helped me take everything to my room while Jason remained in the car. Something about the place made him uncomfortable, and I wasn’t going to force him into going in when he wasn’t ready to. Hopefully someday he would learn to accept me for what I was. Willow immediately crawled underneath my bed and hissed. She hadn’t enjoyed the car ride, which was no surprise. She hadn’t been in a vehicle since she was taken to the vet and spayed – not too long after Uncle Mitch had given her to me. I was lucky that I made it through the ordeal unscathed, having had Willow in my lap during the drive ‘home’. My uncle lugged a bag of cat food into the room and set it against the mini fridge. I plopped my book bag softly on top of my mattress and set the makeup bag on my dresser. The duffel bag was placed beside the edge of my bed, where I saw a small white paw whip out and swipe at the zipper.

  “Thanks for bringing me back,” I said with a subtle frown. “It wasn’t easy being there.”

  Mitchell pulled me into a hug and squeezed tightly until I gasped for air. “You’ll all make it through this, slowly but surely. I remember when your Gran and Grandpa divorced, it was really hard on Jason and me ... but after a while, it almost felt normal … like they were never really meant to be together like that.”

  It didn’t even feel like Gran and Grandpa weren’t my grandparents, though they technically had no blood relation to me at all; I wondered if they knew that. “It just seems so sudden ... and so unreal.”

  “I know exactly what you mean. With your Gran and Grandpa, it didn’t even seem possible. They acted like they were the happiest couple on the planet, but it turned out it was all just that — an act. They didn’t want Jason and me to realize how unhappy they really were. Somewhere along the way, they figured out that life wasn’t worth spending with someone you couldn’t be happy with, especially not for someone else’s sake. Your dad … Jason … I don’t think he was ever a hundred percent with being with Eila, and I think she knew that all along too … a little, at least.”

  “Yeah …” I said and pulled away from him. “It’s just weird. Why wait this long? Why wait until my real mom came into the picture?”

  “They did it to protect you, just like your Gran and Grandpa did for us. They were more concerned over your happiness than their own. Now maybe they’ll go their own ways and find out what — and who — makes them happy. Who knows, they might just find that they were in the right place all along .. in their own time.”

  “I already know what makes Eila happy. Her bakery.”

  Mitchell nodded. “And I know what makes Jason happy,” he said with a grimace.

  “My mom,” I said knowingly.

  Once more, he nodded. “That’s always been the case ... I just don’t want him to get hurt over it again. I don’t think those two were ever meant to be, either.”

  “Yeah …”

  But nor do I want him to try to get with her, now that I know my real dad is alive.

  I wasn’t sure what else to say; it was weird having my uncle speak to me so bluntly about all these things. I was so used to him treating me like his little baby niece, even though I was way past that stage.

  He patted me on the shoulder and kissed me lightly on the cheek. “Let me know if you need anything, okay?”

  “Yeah, sure,” I said and walked with him to the door. “Have fun with Jason.”

  “Oh, definitely,” he said with an amused grin. “It’ll be like when we were around your age and lived together.”

  “You lived together when you were my age?”

  “Yep. After your Gran and Grandpa divorced, we lived together in your mom’s old house that’d been left to her by her mom while she was living with Salem.”

  “Wow ...” I said blankly, trying to imagine what that must have been like — two teenage boys living alone together under one roof. “I never knew.”

  “Now you do. I’ll see you later.”

  “Bye,” I said and locked the door behind him.

  After I had everything unpacked and in its place, I filled the cat’s dishes and tried to lure her to the litter box, then crawled into bed. Willow eventually eased out of her hiding place and joined me on the mattress after noisily crunching on her food. It was nice having her warm fluffy body beside me again. My mom came into the room two hours later, trying to be quiet and not wake me, but she failed when she knocked over the water dish and yelped.

  “M-mom?” I said quietly, sitting upright and blinking into the darkness.

  She flipped on the light switch and looked apologetically in my direction. “I didn’t mean to wake you,” she whispered. “Let me clean this up and you can go back to sleep.”

  With a groggy nod, I fell back against my pillow and drew my covers up over my head. The sound of my mom opening the bathroom door to get a towel, wiping up the mess, and refilling the water dish kept me awake for the next five minutes. Once silence had settled in the room again, I managed to fall back asleep. My dreams were filled with dark shadows that whispered in screeching voices in languages that I couldn’t understand. Bright red eyes sparked into existence, illuminating the faces of each shadowy figure and one clearly said my name.

  I sat up in a startled jolt, my heart pounding in my chest. Daylight streamed through the windows and Willow was nowhere to be seen. I heard scraping coming from the bathroom and assumed that’s where the cat had gone off to. Mom was curled up on her bed, facing the wall. With a strangled gasp of surp
rise, I saw that the framed picture was no longer hanging up and instead was lying face down on her nightstand. Quietly, I stepped down from my bed, went over to the nightstand and picked it up. There were crumpled up tissues beside it, and I imagined my mom sitting up in the darkness last night, crying relentlessly ... if only she knew the truth.

  Temptation overwhelmed me then. It would have been so easy to wake her up and tell her that Salem was alive and that we could save him, just her and me. Hannah wouldn’t have to know. Then again, what could we possibly do? A mortal and an untrained witch against hordes of vampires was suicide. I frowned, placed the frame back on the nightstand, and stepped away from her bed. It hurt knowing that my aunt was right and that keeping this information from my mom was the best for now. She could go to Romania, she could go to whatever fortress Cassius and Silas lived in, and she could demand to see her husband, but in the end they would only wind up killing her or holding her prisoner with him.

  When Willow came padding silently from the bathroom, I collected some clean clothes from my dresser and went to take a shower. I’d hoped the warm water would help clear my thoughts, but if anything, it only caused my mind to wander more and intensify them. The red-eyed creatures from my dream appeared more than once when I shut my eyes to rinse out the shampoo, and I wondered if there was more behind it than just a dream as Hannah seemed to have hinted at.

  Chapter Four

  I found my way to Noah’s room, where I’d hoped to find Mathias since he wasn’t in his own and the boys were practically brothers. The door was cracked open enough that I could hear the two of them discussing the night I had been attacked by James and the rest of the Nefastus group. I cringed at the memory and knocked on the door. Mathias looked temporarily surprised, and then grinned at my presence. He jumped down from Noah’s bed, and shut the door quietly behind me once I was inside. I scanned the vicinity, having never been in this room before. It was cluttered, to say the least. If Eila had thought Jason was a slob, she needed to see this room. Clothing was strewn all over the floor and hanging off of the back of a computer chair, there was an overflowing garbage can in the kitchen area, and the sink was stacked with unwashed dishes. On the walls surrounding Noah’s bed were movie posters and pictures of scantily clad women. I shook my head and glowered at him.

  “Hey, Madison,” Noah said, ignoring my expression. “If you wanted to sneak into my room to be alone with me, you really should’ve waited until night time.”

  “Very funny,” I said with a grimace.

  He grinned. “How’re you liking it here so far?”

  With a shrug, I said, “I like it so far. I just can’t wait to meet more of the members.”

  “Lydia’s somewhere in the building, but you likely won’t have any luck getting her to open up to you,” Mathias said and sat back down on Noah’s mattress.

  “I have had no trouble getting her to open up to me.” Noah winked and we both glared at him.

  “You might run into some of the other members that are hanging around, though. I know that Castus Bowman and Castus Chance returned yesterday from a trip to California.”

  “What were they doing in California?” I asked curiously.

  “Top-secret witch stuff,” Noah answered, smirking when he saw the look of disbelief on my face. “Not really. They were going on a short vacation together … getting away from the chilly Denver weather, I guess.”

  “They’re a couple,” Mathias said, answering my unasked question.

  “So couples do exist here in Haven,” I said, “not just sleeping around.”

  Mathias blinked in surprise. “No one here sleeps around — oh, you mean Noah. Don’t be fooled by any of the nonsense that drips out of his mouth. He’s full of it.”

  “Hey! She doesn’t need to know that!”

  With a laugh, I pushed the dirty clothing off the computer chair and sat down. “Tell me more about them. Castus Chance and Castus Bowman, I mean.”

  “Elijah Chance is one of the most amazing witches I’ve ever met, I mean as far as abilities go,” Noah said with a hint of excitement. “He can literally break a bone in his body and heal it without need of a doctor. Hell, he could have his leg sawed off and it would grow back.”

  I looked to Mathias for confirmation, and he nodded. “Castus Chance holds the gift of regenerative healing, meaning he can rebuild torn limbs or heal wounds — strictly on his own body. Some of the other witches have given him the nickname Starfish, because they, too, can regrow lost limbs. There are consequences, however ... he tends to believe that he’s immortal, but he’s not. For instance, if he was stabbed through the heart, he wouldn’t have enough energy or time to heal himself before he died. He disregards Artemis’s warnings, as well as Forrest’s.”

  “Forrest?” I asked, certain I’d never heard of the name before.

  “Castus Bowman,” Noah said. “Elijah’s boyfriend.”

  “Oh ... oh!” I said and caught them both looking at me. “I just — I assumed ...”

  Mathias grinned. “It’s hard to know the difference between a male and female witch by their Clan name. Elijah’s sister is also here, but she’s not been initiated as a member yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “She hasn’t shown any signs of being a witch,” Noah answered with a disinterested shrug. “She’s like ... what? Fourteen? Elijah came here when he was ten, so their parents are pretty surprised that she doesn’t have a gift yet. It’s different for every witch, though.”

  “Her name’s Eden, and if she does turn out to be a witch and join us, she’ll also go by Castus Chance ... so I imagine it will be rather confusing for us all. I would be greatly surprised if she didn’t have a gift, however,” Mathias explained.

  “Why’s that?”

  “Both of her parents are witches, therefore it’s assumed that any offspring of theirs would also be a witch.”

  I nodded and thought of my father briefly. “What can Forrest do?”

  “He’s even cooler than Elijah,” Noah said, contradicting his prior statement about how amazing Castus Chance’s gift was, then looked thoughtful, “well, maybe not. It’s a tough choice.”

  “You’re doing a good job of making me feel less and less important,” I said with a mock frown.

  “Hey, you already know how rare your type of power is, so get over it,” Noah said teasingly. “Forrest can make copies of objects.”

  “Any object?”

  He shook his head. “There are size restrictions. I think he said once that it couldn’t be anything larger than a car wheel or something. I don’t remember exactly. He mostly uses it to make replicas of weapons and armor for the Clan.”

  “Weapons and armor ... for what?”

  “In case there is ever a war,” Mathias answered.

  “There’s also Iris … I mean Castus Abbot,” Noah said, seemingly unaffected by the idea of a potential war. “She’s a Telekinetic.”

  “She can move things with her mind, right?” I said. “I’ve seen that sort of stuff on TV. Is she the only other girl, besides Lydia and Eden?”

  “She’s one of the few that has stayed over the years. Most of the witches come and go as they please, while others stay until adulthood or they feel fully capable of controlling their abilities.”

  “The only other witch that’s been around long enough to be worth mentioning would be Castus de Quincey.”

  “What can he do?” I asked, growing more and more interested and fascinated by the idea of all of these magical gifts I’d always believed were only in books and movies.

  “He can see the past by touching any object.”

  While I wondered what each of these witches was like, Noah began filling me in on a story about Elijah. He’d returned once to Haven with his arm mangled and twisted in a way that anyone else would have never recovered from, and how nauseating and yet fascinating it had been watching him rebuild the arm to its former self. It had taken almost a week for him to recover from the exhaustion of so muc
h energy loss, which is another reason why Artemis and Forrest try their hardest to stop him from getting into trouble.

  “He doesn’t believe in playing it safe. He’d walk straight into oncoming traffic without giving it a second thought if it meant getting somewhere quicker,” Mathias said and shook his head.

  “That’s crazy,” I said with a gasp. “Wouldn’t he die?”

  “He very well could. But again, he’s determined that he is immortal. I don’t look forward to the day when he finally discovers that’s far from true.”

  “Would Eden have a gift like his?” I asked, trying to get the image of Elijah’s twisted arm out of my head.

  “She’d probably be a healer of some sort, yeah,” Noah answered and leaned back against his pillow. “It usually runs in the family, and both their parents have healing type abilities.”

  “What about Artemis?” I asked. “What kind of healing does he have?”

  “He can heal minor wounds and if he exerts himself to his energy’s limit he can do more, but nothing anywhere near what Elijah can do. Of course, Artemis can heal others, while Elijah’s gift is strictly useful only to himself. Artemis can’t save a life or regrow another person’s limbs for them, but he can mend broken bones and such.”

  “And Castus de Quincey ... his gift sounds incredible. I can’t imagine what it would be like to actually see the past through touching something. I mean, I can see the future ... but the past?”

  Both boys stared at me awkwardly.

  “I know, it’s nothing as ‘cool’ as ripping your arm off and having it grow back, but I think it sounds fascinating,” I said and sat up. “Do either of you know if he’s around?”