Wolf Omega: Lykanos Chronicles 2

A week later, when the services were all done, and Maximo’s remains were on their way to France to be interred on the Roussade estate grounds, I called Richards to see me in private.

I had taken over my late husband’s office on the ground floor of the townhouse. It was a handsome study with dark oak shelves full of his favorite volumes and the modern Chippendale furniture he so loved.

I sat at his desk, dressed in black satin. I’d resolved to wear the color indefinitely, to let all who might notice that I was decidedly in mourning. I planned to stay this way, at least for the rest of their lives.

“Mistress?”

“Yes, please come in,” I answered and rose to come around the desk.

I gestured to the room’s small green damask sofa, beckoning him to sit. He only did so reluctantly at my expression of insistence and after I’d sat down first.

Henry arrived with a tray of tea and cookies, further upsetting Richards, who didn’t understand my purpose at orchestrating this irregularity. After I thanked Henry and the young man left the room, I reached for the small pot and filled Richard’s cup.

“Forgive me, Mistress. Is anything the matter?”

“Not at all,” I smiled a quick assurance. “I only wanted us to speak in private. Do you take sugar or lemon?”

“Please,” he said, taking the cup from my hands to do it himself, clearly upset that I would do such a thing for him.

“Very well then,” I conceded. “Before my husband passed, he’d been working with our attornies to settle preparations for my return to Washington. Among them was the matter of your retirement.”

“Mistress?” he asked with alarm.

“We’ll, you’re in your mid-fifties, if I may be indelicate. We wanted to prepare as far in advance as possible for the inevitability that you’d one day be unable to fulfill your present duties. After your exemplary service to this house, it was important to both of us that the matter is settled. To ease our minds and your own.”

A powerful wave of grateful sorrow came from his mind.

“That was most thoughtful of you and the Baron,” Richards said when he could.

“Good, then let me assure you now that we have established a pension in your name. It will continue to pay your salary from whichever date you decide to retire until your passing. Also, a sum of $25,000 has been placed in an account you will take ownership of on the same day. The lump-sum was my husband’s idea. He wanted for you to be able to purchase a suitable house for your retirement and still have enough left to travel comfortably once you’d left us if you so wished.”

Richards could not hide his astonishment, but nor could he find the words to respond.

“Of course, the sum will be yours to bequeath how you will, but know that the pension will continue to pay your benefactors for the remainder of their lives.”

“I’m overwhelmed, Mistress,” he eventually managed.

“I wonder if you wouldn’t like to begin your retirement at the end of this week.”

“Not at all,” he said, unable to keep his heavy brow from furrowing. “Mistress, I could not betray this house by leaving with so many years of capable service ahead of me.”

I set my saucer onto the tray, then reached to do the same for Richards. I took his hand in mine, a gesture he was clearly uncomfortable with, but I wanted him to understand my sincerity.

“Eight years ago, I asked you to do something for me that you didn’t want to do. Do you remember? I challenged you to help me raise a fatherless ten-year-old who you didn’t agree should be allowed in this house, much less be our burden.”

He averted his eyes and shook his head slightly as if to dismiss the idea.

“And then I left you and the baron alone here on the brink of war. Worse, I left you alone to fend for that same child, newly orphaned. And yet today, he stands in the next room as a healthy young man. He’s working this very moment, in full possession of your skills and ethics, even your dignity. You have met my challenge and exceeded every expectation I might have had of you.”

“No, Mistress. Your challenge was a gift to me, and I—.”

“Life is not guaranteed, Richards. Surely this week has shown us that tomorrow is promised to no one. Why not telegraph your sister in Virginia and tell her you mean to spend time with her next week? I expect she’d love for you to move to that area to be nearer her children. I know I’ll be safe here with Henry, thanks to you.”

I squeeze his hand tightly to draw his eyes back to see the tears he avoided.

“I won’t stop you from remaining, but it would have meant so very much to Maximilien to see you off at the end of your service. I can’t bear the thought that you might miss the opportunity, as he had the rest of his life taken from us prematurely. Won’t you please do this for me?”

A month later, as I had expected, Duccio walked into the townhouse, arriving with enough luggage to indicate his intention to stay indefinitely. I sensed great concern from Henry, but I bid him leave us.

“See that Mr. Van Duren’s things are placed in the guest room.”

“No, in a room upstairs,” Duccio corrected my request.

I nodded my acquiescence to Henry and sent him along to his duties.

Sitting down beside Duccio, I approached him with more calmness than I realized I was capable of.

“His body isn’t even cold yet, and you expect to live here as my lover?”

“I’ve been your lover for eight years,” he answered, selecting one of Maximo’s cigars and lighting it. “What is the point of living apart anymore?”

“There will be talk, of course.”

“What should it matter to us if there is talk? Do the people here even remember you?”

“There were dozens of people at the funeral; his colleagues and friends. They all know me well enough now.”

“He had friends? Human friends?” he asked with a dissatisfied side-eye. “I don’t sense other lycan in this city.”

I didn’t respond to his insinuation.

“What of Henry and Elizabeth? Are we to adjust every memory they have? Henry grew up in this house.”

“Then isn’t it about time you found a new butler, anyway? Or are you expecting he will not recognize how well you’re aging?”

Duccio looked at me again, and I knew he sensed my mind’s response to his suggestion. But I would not let him separate me from Henry. The boy was all I had left in the world to keep me grounded and sane.

“Very well, I will take care of Henry. You needn’t concern yourself,” I answered with a relaxed smile.

“Then we are agreed? We will go forth together?”

I took his hand and kissed it. I would play this game, however long it took to play out.

Early the next morning, I rose before the house awoke and crept up to Henry’s room on the top floor. I sensed he was asleep and let myself inside quietly.

I sat down on the end of his bed and stroked his arm gently, waiting for him to awaken.

“Mistress?” his eyes squinted in the dark pre-dawn light.

“Everything is all right,” I whispered and placed my finger to his lips. “I need to speak with you before the others wake.”

He attempted to sit up, but I stopped him gently until he relaxed his head back onto his pillow.

“Do you understand that Mr. Van Duren and myself are different from other people?”

Hearing my words, I struggled to believe what I meant to attempt.

“What do you mean, Mistress?”

Again, I placed my finger over his lips to insist that he must whisper to me.

“Do you remember what I looked like when you were a small child? Have I changed very much in all these years?”

“You’re a very handsome woman if that’s what you mean.”

“No, what I mean is, have you yet noticed how my face hasn’t aged? Do you see that we appear to be the same age, though I must certainly be far older than you?”

His mind wrestled with my question, becoming more and more alert as the puzzle woke him.

“The baron and I kept a secret from you and everyone else in our lives. We don’t age the way most men and women do. We are immortals. Do you know what that word means?”

He stared in wonderment at my statement, recognizing with his eyes what he’d never before seen or understood.

“You’re angels?”

I thought to correct him, but his assertion struck me as the perfect guise. Let him understand us in the way he already understands this world.

“Yes, my dear,” I said, reaching to push back his hair and caress his forehead. “We are angels, as is Mr. Van Duren.”

A disdain the color of deep plum came from Henry’s mind.

“Yes, I know you disapprove of him. Do you know how I know? It isn’t just that I can see your feelings in your eyes. I can also feel your thoughts in my mind. All angels can.”

He seemed to ponder the idea with great concern.

“Then he knows how Elizabeth and I feel about him?”

“He knows very well, though he doesn’t care much,” I smiled. “He doesn’t care about mortals much at all anymore.”

“Why is he here?”

“He has decided to live here with me now that my husband has left us.”

“Then, the master is not truly dead?”

I hadn’t played the logic of my lie out far enough in my mind, and his question struck a blow. I held to my composure as best I could.

“No, Henry, he’s not dead. Maximilien has returned to the Father in Heaven,” I assured him, and my answer flooded the young man with feelings of anguished joy.

I felt tears fighting me as that joy lifted him.

“I tell you all of this because Mr. Van Duren believes it’s time for you to leave us. People mustn’t learn the secret of our immortality, and we would normally separate ourselves from mortal acquaintances after so many years together. But you are different, dear. You are my beloved, and I don’t wish to be parted from you.”

“Then don’t send me away, Mistress. I don’t want to be parted from you again, either.”

I took his hand in mine and clasped it.

“I’ve promised Mr. Van Duren you will never become a challenge to him. This means that you must remain conscious of your thoughts around him. You must be agreeable when he speaks with you. When you feel bad about something he says or does, you must shield your emotions from him—from us both. The easiest way to do this is to concentrate on something else when those emotions arise. Do you understand what I mean?”

For several minutes, Henry and I experimented. I would say something provocative, and he would quickly try to think of something he liked. First, he thought of chocolate cake. Then he thought of puppies licking his face.

“Good, that’s right. It’s like becoming a man. When you scraped your knee as a boy, you ran to your mother to comfort you. But when you became older, did you run to Richards to cry when something upset you?”

“Of course not, Mistress.”

“No, you maintained your composure and withheld any such display. This is simply the next step.”

“I understand,” he said. “I know that I can do it.”

“Thank you, Henry. It’s important to me that you make sure to do it every time. Mr. Van Duren is a mighty angel. He has the ability to remove your memories, even to select specific ones and change them. He has the power to make you forget you ever knew me, or Mister Richards, or this house, or even your mother.”

The notion confounded Henry, and he scowled in disbelief.

“If he ever feels you are a challenge to him, he will do it at once. I don’t want that to happen to you. I love you, dearly, and I want you to be with me for all of your life. And the only way that can happen is for you to do as I’ve instructed—to carry on as if nothing is amiss in this house.”

Henry looked away as if to ponder all the mysteries I’d unloaded upon him.

“Will you do that for me?” I asked.