In Reach?

Mira’s POV

After lunch I decided to go check out that gorgeous library. It’s not like I have ever been in an at-home library of a pack of wolves before. I’m just too curious to see what type of stuff they have. Are they all mythical related, or historical books? I’m quite worried that it will just have generic political stuff that most rich people tend to have. Personally, I think that is just a thing to make themselves feel smarter. I will be so pissed if they have those typical bestseller books, to just fill up shelf space. You can tell a lot about a person by their taste in books.

I walk in and the heavenly smell of oak pierces my nose, with a mix of grass and vanilla in the background. I’m smiling so brightly; I know that I probably look like the Cheshire cat. I know that smell, that means there are ‘very old’ books here.

I rush to the nearest shelf and glide my fingers across the spines of the books as I read their titles. There are all sorts of books here, mainly mythical and historical. A lot of the books are in other languages, such as French, Russian and ………even Greek. I may just try and learn a new language while I’m here.

I go to the spiral staircase. I want to have a look at the books on top as well.

It’s basically the same as downstairs, but these books look ’older’. Even the languages are more varied and seem almost ancient. Skimming through the shelves and admiring this work of art, something catches my attention. In the corner opposite the staircase, on the very bottom are a few very old books. The writing on the spines are familiar. I take a closer look and tilt my head to read, and see the words “Via Ad Deam” written in old English font. These are the very same words on my grandma’s books. They must have their own copy of these books. Theirs do look in a far better condition though.

Maybe this is it. I know it is a far stretch, but I have considered that the weird ritual I did must have backfired somehow and caused me to end up here. Maybe I can use these books to help me find my way back.

I sit down and take out one of the books from this ‘special’ collection. There are about five of them in total. My grandma only had three. I open it up and scan through the pages. It just looks like a bunch of words, no pictures, no colour. I pout my lips at the idea of having to read all of that. My grandma’s books didn’t look like this. They had colour and pictures to, ’illustrate’ I guess, what it was referring to.

Yeah, maybe her books were dummy proof, but it actually made reading the Latin way easier.

I take another book and scroll through it. And to my surprise, there are some pictures. Yay. Some of them look familiar. This must be one of the books I read. But this is not the one I’m looking for, the one with the ‘ritual’. I take the next one and scroll through. I can already see pictures and colours and I think this may just be it.

I set it down onto my lap and start carefully paging through. These pages look very fragile, I’m scared it will rip if I pull a little too hard. After a couple of minutes of just paging, I see what I’m looking for, well more precisely the picture I’m looking for. I remember the picture in the book I was looking at when doing the ritual, the first time. It was of a girl standing in front of the moon, reaching her bloodied hand out to it.

It is a strange picture, I know. But it was the name of the spell, ritual, whatever you want to call it, that caught my attention. It read, “Aperito”. And though my Latin skills are low, I know it has something to do with ‘opening up’ and ‘revelation’.

I wanted to know if it works. I had some questions about my life, well more like my destiny, and I thought this could help reveal some answers. I know it’s a foolish idea, but that was why I got over it when nothing happened afterwards, that night.

This book is literally the same as my grandma’s though. They don’t really spell things out. It just gives pictures and the Latin words next to them. It doesn’t really say if there is a specific way in handling them. And as far as I can tell, I had everything in here. Ugh! This is frustrating.

I’m sure there should be a Latin dictionary in here somewhere. But where? It might take a while to find where the dictionaries are stacked.

I put the books I have on my lap back and get started with my other mission.

Just as I get downstairs the door opens, and Cutie, or should I say Aiden, walks in. He has a smile on his face, “I thought I’d find you here.”

With a slight smile of my own, “Uhm, can I help you with something?” I don’t really know what to say, and I felt being quiet may just bruise this softy again.

“I just wanted to give you a check-up, and the Alpha wants to see you too.”

“Doesn’t he ever leave that office of his?”

Aiden seems happy that I responded once again to him.

“Okay…….” I’m standing there and he just looks at me confused. “What? You said you wanted to do a check-up. Well here I am.”

He chuckles and walks further into the room. “Well I thought I’d do the check-up in his office before he has his talk with you.”

I raise my brow at this. I don’t know what this ’doctor’ would be doing to do his check-up. But I don’t want it to be a show for Dimples.

“Yeah, thing is, I think it’s probably best if we do it here. I don’t want to become a show in his office. I’m sure he can wait a while. If not, he can meet me here. I’m sure he would like to get out of that office as well.”

Aiden just gives me a surprised look and starts laughing. He looks so adorable with his longish hair falling in his face like that. “You really are something.”

Then he just stands there, still with a smile on his face, but eyes focused on something else in the room. But I noticed his eyes glaze over, and that’s when I remember my lesson from today. The people here’s eyes do that when their wolves are pushing through. And sometimes it happens when they use the link to communicate. Aiden is probably talking, or should I say linking with Dimples. I don’t know what to call it.

He looks back at me and walks to me. “Have a seat on the couch.” He gestures to the couch by the window.

I sit and he kneels in front of me. He lifts his hand and brushes my hair out of my face, rubbing his thumb over my head bump. I actually forgot all about that bump on my head.

“Does it still hurt when I touch it?”

I shake my head.

He lowers his hand and gently brushes my hair over my shoulder looking at my neck. I think he’s looking for those handprints. He looks sad again. He then takes my hand in his and looks at the scar on my palm. It’s practically healed by now, leaving just a pink line behind. He runs his finger gently over it, as if scared it will open again. He really is a softy. He’ll make a great doctor.

He lowers his hands again and stops. I realize, he’s looking at my foot. He probably wants to lift it to check it. But why is he stopping? I look at him questioningly, and just lift my foot closer to him. That’s when I realize. I’m wearing a loose knee-length dress, with a bit of a high slit. My entire thigh is basically on display as the dress is falling open.

I try to cover what I can, but he’s being a gentleman, well……..a shy one. He’s focused on my foot but I can see a bit of a blush. I can’t help but watch him at work.

I think my staring at him is making him nervous, because that blush is growing a shade darker.

Aahh! I feel the sharp pain in my foot as he pushed it with a little too much force.

“Oh, I’m so sorry.” He looks up with a worrisome expression, rubbing gentle circles with his thumb on my ankle as it rests on his bent knee.

I just give a brief smile, to say it’s fine.

“You don’t talk much do you?” Aiden asks looking back at me.

“Not really. Why?” I notice now that he’s eye are a light blue, almost grey.

“It just, it makes me nervous.” He blushes a bit again.

I give a little chuckle at his childish antics. “Why do you need to be nervous, I’m the hostage here.”

He looks almost shocked at my statement and perhaps even at me laughing about it. But soon joins in with my chuckling.

In the background, we hear someone clearing their throat, and Aiden and I look up seeing Dimples and Noah at the door. Dimples looks almost angry and Noah has this mischievous smile on his face, it has me confused about my current situation.

Aiden looks back, puts my foot down and says, “Well, you look like you’re healing quite well. Your foot will be perfect in a day or two.” He gives a brief smile before he stands up an walks to the other two in the doorway.

The three of them are whispering about something, I can’t quite make out what. Aiden leaves, and the other two walk toward me still sitting on the couch. They sit down on the adjacent couch, and Dimples is staring daggers at me. It’s making me confused and just uncomfortable. I look down and see my very exposed leg from the dress still open. I quickly cover legs.

I hear a chuckle and look at Noah. “Is this the kind of game you play?” I look at him questioningly. “You try to corner us separately so you can seduce us.” He looks at me almost disgusted, which makes me give a disgusted look in return.

“Is this the reason you guys are here? Couldn’t go a day without trying to make my life hell?”

“You really are full of yourself aren’t you.” He retorts.

“Actually, that’s you.”

He widens his eyes wile laughing. “Don’t act like you know us. Or do you?” He says it like he’s accusing me of something.

“I just tell like I see it.”

“Enough!” Dimples chimes in. Finally. I was starting to think he was enjoying this. “We’ll get nowhere if you two bicker on like that.”

Dimples looks at Noah and then at me. “There are some things we still need to sort out, and we need to try and help each other as much as we can.”

There is a pause in the room, and I can see Noah starring daggers at me. I can only give him what someone like him deserves right now, my lack of acknowledgement of his existence. So, I will just have to put all my focus on Dimples in this sit-in. Not that it will be difficult.

“You said you don’t remember how you got here, well maybe we can get a better idea of how you got here or who has anything to do with this if we know more about you.”

I sit there thinking to myself, that I maybe, just maybe, know how I got here. But I’m not going to say it was some ritual spell. Yeah sure, they have the books for it, but until I’m sure about all this, I’m not going to breathe a word of that.

I just gently nod my head. “What do you want to know?”

“Where are you from? As in, where do you actually live?”

“I’m from Detroit.”

They both raise their brows to what I said, which is making me wonder if I even spoke the same language right now.

“What would a girl from Detroit be doing all the way out here?” Noah asks Dimples, as if he’s supposed to know.

“And where exactly is here?” Like, where am I really? I’m happy to know I’m still in the same realm, lol, but aren’t we supposed to be helping each other here?

They’re both quiet, and as if reading my mind Dimples releases a sigh and says, “This is the Blood Rose Pack.”

How poetic, but where is it? “And where is that exactly?”

“Not up for disclosure right now.” He looks at me like he’s not sure whether he should say what he wants to say next. “How much do you know about magic?”

Oh shit! He’s on to me. I purse my lips in a thin line not knowing where to start. “Well…..” They both look at me like they want to jump me for just speaking. Uhm okay. But they’re still sitting, so they’re probably waiting for me to continue. “I don’t know much. I’ve heard about some stuff.” I know I didn’t exactly hear about it, but it’s not like I’m going to say I practiced it. I wouldn’t exactly call myself a self-taught witch in the making. If anything, I just tried it out for fun. “I never really thought anything of it, but it’s not like I exactly thought that werewolves were real either, so who am I to say anything on the matter?”

“Do you know a woman called Dahlia?” Noah looks at Dimples as if he just spilled a secret.

Who? Is this someone they think I’m supposed to be a spy for? “Who? No, I don’t know a Dahlia. In fact, I don’t know many people. If you do want to know, I’m practically a wallflower. Not exactly the type of person to stand out. I like to mind my own business. I can literally count the number of people I know on one hand.” I raise my palm for emphasis.

“You know we will find out if you’re lying about any of this.” Noah just has to keep on playing instigator. Someone really needs to put a muzzle on him.

I can’t help but chuckle at the very accurate idiom. He looks at me and I just say, “If you go out looking, you will definitely find something. Just don’t get angry if it’s regarding something you never asked about.”

He almost seems a bit taken aback by my words; like he’s surprised by my use of words. What? He’s acting like he expected me to be dumb or something. The nerve of this guy. Are his expectations of me really that low?

“Just be warned, that the punishment for witchcraft is death” Noah says like he also wants to have the last say. But his statement though has me somewhat holding my breath. Death for witchcraft. What about accidental witchcraft? Or ignorant witchcraft? Shit! I need to keep my cool. I don’t even know if any of it worked. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just a bunch of hocus pocus, and even more so in inexperienced hands.

“What’s your full name?” Dimples likes to make his presence known with his subtlety.

“Mira Johnson, age 26, star sign Aquarius and blood type O negative.” I smirk at Noah, who seems to be surprised by me yet again. Mira - 2, Noah - 0.

Dimples smirks at my antics and looks impressed.

“Okay, we’ll have a look and see what we can find. But I guess we’re done for tonight. Let’s go to dinner.” Dimples gets up and waits for me to walk as he gestures with his hand. Noah gives me a confusing look and turns it to Dimples. What? Is common etiquette that much of a foreign concept to him? As the flirty type I would have thought he would know these things like the back of his hand. Isn’t that how his type snatch women as their catch for the day?