The Alpha's Surrogate Mate

Wayne

Croaks and subtle howls trail the echoing jingles of Temple bells as I sit on the chilly ground, under the canopy of shady trees in Lucerne’s wintry Garden.

I hug my knees to my chest and stare up at the dull, starless sky, a large furry coat draping over my shoulders with charge to shield me from the hands of an arctic night, though it does not perform its best since I am still shivering beneath its thickness.

Is it the wee hours? I never know. Yet, I am certain about the Goosebumps that creep upon my skin when a dark, sharp-eyed feline leaps, out of nowhere, into the space before me.

I stiffen and stare wide-eyed at the animal for closely twelve seconds, my mind registering what is about to transpire in the next tick. It hisses, and then growls, tail lashing as pupils dilate in preparation for its ensuing attack.

I dare not move even when the Cat’s fiery eyes burn on my figure, and I give no further reaction despite the fact that I may not escape this fiery furry thing uninjured. Yet, when it hops from its position, posing to land on me, a single deafening shriek rips out of my mouth, echoing in the strident night as I whack the air, my feet stomping the innocent ground. It takes me a few more frenzy seconds to realize what an illusion really is.

For nearly ten days, I have been in virtual hell when I am to deal with dreams that hold cruel artifice. The last one had a masked caramel-skinned maiden in form fitting jumpsuit standing closely in front and muttering words that seemed irrelevant.

‘Bear this warning or come with me,’ her low, potent, and accentuated voice reverberated as she stretched her right hand to me, and I slowly shook my head, my brows puckering at the strange feeling I had about me.

When she took her hand down, my gaze settled on her exposed eyes—a pair of upturned, flaring orbs and gray irises that gave me the feeling of staring into the eyes of a reborn mythical being. Her aura left me stiff to my bones. It was cold and intoxicating, slowly choking the very life out through my lungs.

‘You mayn’t hold the capacity to impede fate, yet you never want to be the end of loved ones,’ she rumbled before I sensed her strong grip on my left shoulder. Sharp ache spread through my guts when I felt a cold blade pierce my flesh, and I jerked, the maiden earning a throaty gasp as she let me descend to my knees.

‘You even dare not to evade a woman, talk more of a man as you are. It just proves how deep weakness has sunk in your vessels but you fail to realize.’ She forced those words through gritting teeth, golden loops flashing around her steely irises as she gradually moved backwards.

In the next blink, my sealing eyes saw the woman no more. She had disappeared from my sight and then it felt like I encountered no one at all. Even when I looked down at my panging stomach, there was no blade or sign of a wound in the least. Yet, I had woken with a twinge that morning, just the same as I awake with perspiration pooling over my forehead now.

I sense a presence and my eyes turn toward the entrance to see Damien leaning against the closed door, his hands folded across his stomach as he watches me with an uncertain expression.

Often, I imagine that an audacious Damien has more height than a furious one. The fellow is either of these two sides from time to time. Yet now, he looks tall, lean and maintaining hard facial features—a look fit for an impulsive Vampire. His silver, shoulder-length hair stays swept in a neat ponytail, his muscular figure entirely buried within a floor-favoring, ultramarine robe.

He pushes himself from the door, his hands still crossed as he saunters toward the shelf at the foot of my bed, perching on the study table beside it. “Can’t sleep?” He mumbles after a moment of calm, his voice deep and indifferent, and his accent dull.

I shove the duvet aside and sit up, my feet sliding down the bed to touch the porcelain floor. I feel my mane brush to the side of my face. Tousled damp strands nearly block my sight and I pull at them, deep in thought.

Even as it seems as an illusion, I can still feel the prickles from the Cat’s clawing on my flesh, my lungs sore and my heart pounding heavily from the swift moment of fright.

Damien draws my attention with a cough. He has a wonky smile as his gaze steadies on me. This is his usual expression when the words that would pass his lips turn out as thorns to my eardrums, and I hope that they will stay sealed. “I can’t help but relish your look of vulnerability,” he states as he shifts his weight to a leg.

He seems to hate me, maybe for my weak flaws. One minute he poses to care, but his next action often makes me feel dreadful. I have no way of defending myself either. I am never the talking type, and I surely know better than to engage him in a fight. Still, I always have Lucerne, the firstborn of our father. He is the kind sort of person, the only one who shields me from the talons of my Vampire brother.

“Do you ever sleep?” I ask, albeit I know the answer.

I look from him to the door across me when he huffs. “Vampires rarely do, obviously, or does your dumb skull not record that?” His voice is calm, his gaze sharp, but I would be more relieved if he did not quickly replace his punitive stance with a wolfish grin. One of the odd things he knows better to do.

I heave a second sigh before taking a handful of hair from my face and pushing them to my back. When I later realize that I have Damien’s inherently hollow eyes casually staring at me, I trap his gaze, watching as his lips slowly twitch to a side. “What is it this time?” He suddenly switches soft, although his countenance holds otherwise.

“It was a cat.” I look down at my unnoticed shaking hands as I add, “A black one.”

“No girl?” Damien knows that the nightmares I had were about a cloaked, strange maiden that keeps threatening and proving how feeble I am, and yes, this is the only nightmare that evades her. Damien chortles when I tell him.

“Either she turned into a cat or it belongs to her. She may be a witch after all, though she seems to find interest in you. Who wouldn’t want an obviously attractive demon?” He mumbles insouciantly as he feeds his eyes on the riveting view of my bare torso, missing the part where those two creatures never cross without a fight, if she is the former.

“I mean, unlike the rest of us, you are the dreamboat—the Adonis who catches the attention of all the maidens in Coral Shore.” He may be jealous as well, seeing that he tends to mention this even when it has nothing to do with a situation.

“And as if that is not enough for being prominent, you are also the target of some invincible being in a Castle of four Royals.” Damien puts solid emphasis on ‘target’ and ‘four Royals’, and I roll my eyes, noting his tone of sarcasm.

Mother taught us, when we were very young, to transform, exhibit our prowess as well as control them. Lucerne is pure Demon so he changed easily, and everyone knows that Damien is a Vampire right from the moment he was born. As for me, I am best regarded as a human for three whole decades.

Damien expects me to possess the ability to track a dream to its origin and find out the cause. This is a gift blessed to Demons yet it eludes me, something that rarely happens. Another cannot even help because it is a man-for-himself ability.

When the Vampire strides across my front to the ceiling-to-floor window, my gaze follows him. His fingers find their way around the knobs and he pulls the two glasses rearwards, letting cold air ooze into the room.

“A beautiful dawn and a reveling moment,” he inhales cold breath, still holding the windows. When he turns to my direction with a smile, our eyes meet. His is a pair of glistening cobalt orbs, and mine is dull amber; they do not match.

“What if you realize that you are a Vampire at the end, Wayne?” Damien says between an infectious snicker, and I understand that he sulks often for the demise of his kind but he is plainly pulling my legs. As he looks away, he sniffs a number of times that I am forced to look around my room. “There is someone here,” He suddenly rasps, his fingers tightening on the knobs.

My balcony faces the Copse that situates behind the Castle, so we can definitely hear the harsh ruffling that comes from the trees, a loud thud following. Damien crosses the sill to the balcony, and I rush behind him before we both look down at the thicket. He must have seen something down there because he suddenly grips my bicep and pulls me down the balcony along with him. While he lands just fine, I rather lose my balance, ending up with a sprained ankle.

“She is gone,” he murmurs, his grip still holding me as mine seizes his shoulder to save my hurting foot from pressure. I blink at the direction he stares at, and I indeed saw nothing. It does not even look like there was someone around in the first place, or is it just my poor senses?

“There was a cloaked girl,” Damien reads my thought. “She has a full cluster of honey hair, and her speed is extreme. She vanished through a portal.” It is a very rare occasion for Damien to look defeated but he does now.

As I think of it, I realize that his description of the woman has some sort of similarity with the one in my dreams, except that I could not see her hair color since she had them hooded to the extent that I barely saw her eyes.

“She could be a witch,” I utter, pushing the last thought behind my mind while Damien gradually moves his gaze from where he stared at, now looking at me.

“I know they can hideously use potions and invocations to do their deeds, but they aren’t that fast, are they?” Damien has a scowl in his countenance and his displeasure infects the veins of his neck.

While I remain silent, I contemplate if he is right or wrong. He definitely makes a point, but we cannot push aside the fact that no other creature in Northland is capable of conjuring Portals aside from the Witches and the Demons.