As Darkness Falls by Riley Storm

Chapter Fifty

“You what?” I gasped. “How?”

“It’s a long story,” Thomas Wetter said, addressing the group as a whole. “A story which I’m ashamed to say I played a large part in.”

“I’m sure you didn’t do so because you thought it was a great idea at the time,” I pointed out.

My father shrugged. “At the start, I did. But at the start of it all, Lars was a very different man than he is now. I thought all he wanted was to find Shuldar. To prove to the other pack leaders that our histories are true, and not just made up as so many believe.”

“That’ll be hard for them to say now,” I said, hooking a thumb at Vir. “Being that he is a god and all.”

“How can you know this?” my dad asked.

“Um, long story short, I sort of accidentally dragged him here from the Direen,” I said, grimacing.

My dad stared. “You went to the Direen?”

“Several times, actually. None of them on purpose, oddly enough. But, Dad, we’ll bring you up to speed later. First, Lars. Evil Plan. Go.”

“Right, right,” Thomas said, shaking his head. “We wanted to find Shuldar. Lars bankrolled me for years. During one trip or another, I forget now, I ran across Aaron and his team. I hired them to help out.”

I bit my lip hard at that. Not because it surprised me, but because I knew my dad was lying. There was a lot more to that story than he was telling. I could see it in his eyes. But he didn’t want to discuss it, and so I kept my mouth shut, letting him continue.

“We hunted for Shuldar for years. Slowly, we grew closer and closer. I started to find hints that we were in the right area. Bits and pieces of shifter history that seemed to indicate Shuldar was a real place. But we could never find the city itself.”

“That’s cause it’s underground,” I muttered.

My father smiled. “You have been busy.”

“A little,” I said, shrugging, trying to keep my cool. His story was fascinating, but my mind kept wandering to something more personal. A question I needed answered. A question I’d been wanting to ask for too long.

“On my last dig, I found a book,” he continued, the rest of us listening closely, while in the background, the lavender purple dome continued to shimmer, a reminder of just what sort of power we were up against.

“What book?” Vir asked sharply.

“The Book of Terrano,” my father said heavily, naming the shifter god of rites.

“The book of rituals,” I whispered, staring at Vir. “That’s why Lars had us tied to the altars in Shuldar. He did know how to do something.”

“Lars did what?” my mother yelped.

“Uh, yeah. Long story. I found Shuldar by accident while trying to escape Johnathan, who I was Soulbound to, and uh, yeah. It didn’t go so well.”

My mother blinked slowly. “My daughter. You don’t do things small, do you?”

I compressed my lips into a flat line. Her words sounded sweet and genuine. But the truth was, I didn’t know. The old doubts were returning, infesting my mind, and I began to wonder about the truth of everything.

“I tried not to give him the book,” my dad said. “After I called him from Kellar to tell him I’d found it, he went insane. Basically slobbering at the mouth, ordering me to return at once, as fast as possible with the book. That I wasn’t to stop for anyone or anything. I’d never seen him so intense. It scared me.”

“What did you do?” I asked.

“At first, I told him I wasn’t going to give him the book, of course. The change was so abrupt, so outlandish, that I knew giving him the book was the wrong thing. I read it through, wondering what could possibly be so important to him. It was just a book. None of it was real. Or so I thought.”

We all smiled at that, though most of the smiles contained little in the way of true humor. It wasn’t funny.

“Then, he threatened my wife,” my dad growled. “Said that if I didn’t give him the book, he would kill her. I was too stunned. I had no idea he’d go to such depths, just for a book. I read it front to back, all of the rites. I told myself that even if somehow they could be done, the only relic Lars had was the Idol of Amunlea. That without a second one to pair it with, there was nothing he could do. And since I knew he didn’t have those, I gave him the book for Alex’s life. I’m sorry.”

I watched my dad put his arm around his mate’s shoulders, pulling her in tight. “Sounds familiar,” I said wryly. “Giving Lars something because you think he doesn’t have the other things he needs. Who would do such a thing?”

A faint smile crossed my dad’s lips.

“There’s no need to apologize, Dad,” I said. “Trust me. But you said you know what he’s up to. What more can you tell us?”

“Well, now that I know the ancient gods are real and exist, and so does the magic, I figure he has to be going after one of the rites. That must be his goal.”

“But which one?” I asked.

“If I were Lars, insane and power-hungry, I’d go for the biggest of them all,” my dad said.

Beside me, Vir hissed in shock.

“What? What is it?” I asked, looking at the shifter god. “What’s he going to do?”

“He’s going to use the Ritual of Vir,” my dad said, staring at the shifter god.

“What’s that?” I asked, not familiar with that one.

“He’s going to do what Amunlea did to me,” Vir said quietly.

“Huh?”

“He’s going to turn himself into a god,” my father said.

“Oh.” I licked my lips, turning my attention to the purple dome. “Well, fuck.”

“Dani, if he does that, then he will become a god on Earth,” Vir said uncomfortably. “When Amunlea raised me, she did so in the Direen. That is where my powers are greatest. But if Lars does that here in Seguin…”

“Then Earth is where he will be strongest,” I finished, connecting the dots. “You had to leave much of your powers in the Direen when you come to Earth.”

“Lars will be under no such restrictions,” Vir explained. “He will be beyond anything. He will be able to bring down the barrier and release Irr and his power onto Earth as well. We must stop him.”

“And I gave him everything he needed,” I whispered. “This is all my fault.”

Everyone started to protest at once, to tell me how it wasn’t my fault. I held up a hand, silencing them. “We’re not going to argue over this. It’s pointless. Vir, how long do we have?”

“Until what?”

“Until he can become a god,” I said.

Vir looked at the sky, where the clouds had thickened, covering the moon from sight.

“The next Wild Moon,” he said.

Oh, great.

“We have two weeks to save the world then,” I said with a shrug. “Everyone in the truck. Let’s get back to Kellar and confer with Aaron. Maybe he knows of something or someone who can stop this from happening.”

Vir looked ready to protest, but I shook my head. “Johnathan needs care and rest. We need sleep and food so that we can come at this with fresh minds. There’s nothing we can do tonight unless you can get us past that barrier.”

“No,” Vir said. “I’m sorry.”

“Aren’t we all,” I said grumpily. “Now, in the truck. With the rest of them.”

Vir turned and went, leaving me alone with my parents, both of whom looked like they wanted to sweep me up into their arms but were holding back.

“You know that I have questions,” I said, looking at them, making an assumption as to why they were keeping their distance.

My father sighed. “We figured.”

I nodded, chewing my lower lip some more.

“Ask whatever you want to ask,” my dad said, speaking for both of them.

My mother looked to be on the verge of tears.

“W-Why?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice even. “Why did you lie to me?”

There was a long pause.

“Because,” my mother said, her voice quavering but not breaking. She looked at me, not flinching away. “At first, we were going to wait until you were old enough to understand. To know what it meant. But, Dani, you were so young when we took you in.”

“How old?” I asked. “I don’t have any memories before you.”

“Four months,” my father said.

“We raised you as our own,” my mother said. “And after a couple of years, you were ours. Maybe not by birth, but you were our daughter all the same. We loved you like you were ours, and eventually, it just stopped mattering.”

“It matters to me,” I said quietly. “What about my birth parents?”

My dad shrugged. “Lars came to me one day. I was one of his top lieutenants, and it was just after he’d ascended to the pack Alpha from his father. He said he had something for me to do. And that turned out to be you.”

“Lars gave me to you?” I groaned.

“He was different back then, Dani,” my dad said. “He was a good man. A good leader. He wasn’t always evil. Something has twisted him. Turned him from the man he used to be.”

“Right,” I said. “Because good men just suddenly have babies they need others to care for, with no explanation whatsoever of what happened to their parents.”

“He was our Alpha, Dani,” my father said. “You don’t question them. You know how it is.”

I didn’t reply, because what was I going to say? That they should have disobeyed the Alpha and said no? That they should have rejected me and gone on some sort of quest to find out who my parents were and what happened to them? In hindsight, that was great, but at the time, I could believe that they were willing to do as their Alpha commanded. It wasn’t that abnormal in the shifter world.

But it left me with questions. About who my parents were. What had Lars done to them?

“We’re sorry we never told you the truth,” my mother said. “But to us, you are our daughter. You still are. We certainly love you like one. And always will. Even if you can’t forgive us.”

Part of me was angry and wanted to lash out. To tell them that I would never forgive them for lying to me my entire life. And I almost did.

But I stopped myself. There was nothing good that would come of that. Since they had disappeared, the one thing I’d always been happy about was that the night of my Soulshift, when I’d found out I was adopted, was that I’d not burnt any bridges. All I’d done after they’d confirmed it was run out of the house.

I never said anything I couldn’t take back, and I wasn’t about to do the same now. Given that we were about to go up against a shifter with powerful magic and try to stop him from turning himself into a god, it seemed likely that not everyone would come back.

I didn’t want any of us to go out being mad at one another.

“You guys did a pretty good job of showing me you loved me,” I said. “You were great parents, truthfully. I wish you had told me, and it’s going to take me some time to get over that, to adjust to it, but I want you both to know that I don’t hate you for it.”

“We love you, Dani,” my mother whispered. “And we’ll be ready whenever you are.”

I found myself smiling, a great weight lifted from my chest. Yes, I was adopted. Yes, they had lied to me about it my entire life.

But they truly loved me. They hadn’t been faking it, and that was something to be grateful for.

“I love you guys, too,” I said. “Now come on, get in the truck. We have places to go and a lot to get you caught up on.”

“You’ve been busy, by the sounds of it,” Thomas said as we headed back to the truck.

“You have no idea,” I said, pausing only slightly before adding, “Dad.”

The smile I got back was worth every ounce of pain I’d gone through to get to this point.

Now, if I could just figure out a way to stop the apocalypse from coming so I could enjoy having them back in my life.