Chapter 7
Alec POV
I walked down the stairs, following the scent of coffee and scrambled eggs. As I turned the corner to the kitchen my eyes locked in on Rose's back, she stood by the stove and the ends of her black hair was gently curled as it was still damp from her morning shower. I walked over and wrapped an arm around her waist.
"Good morning," I caught a whiff of her strawberry shampoo.
She sidestepped deliberately out of my embrace with the excuse of getting some fresh thyme from the pot that she had placed on the window seal. After carefully snipping off a few stems she turned back to me.
"Morning," her look told me that she disapproved.
I stared back at her, struggling to understand her disapproval. She had been so distant ever since we moved here. She didn't seem to mind the way things had been between us when we were both working at Central. Why should things be different now? I knew it was fruitless to discuss the topic with her, so I dropped it.
"So what's your plans for today?" her tone was soft, as if she realised what was going on in my head. She was pulling the thyme into small pieces and strewing them onto of the scrambled eggs.
"I don't really know," I poured us some coffee and handed her one of the cups.
"You should really spend more time with Cleo," her voice had suddenly turned short.
Before I could comment on it, she had continued, "We need to move on with the bonding ceremony as soon as possible. You need to have that in place to fully be able to mentor her."
I started to get annoyed, she always told me how much the bonding ceremony would change me but she never told me how it would affect me. I had never been through one before but she had done it with a number of mentees. She seemed determined that it would change things between her and I, I couldn't see the logic in this.
"I understand that I need to step up and be more of a mentor and not leave you to do everything. But I thought you didn't like the thought of me and Cleo going trough the bonding ceremony."
Rose clenched her teeth, it was a very slight movement and if I hadn't been intimately familiar with the features of her face, I would never have picked up on it.
"Yes, I'm not thrilled about it. But you have been assigned as her mentor and the ceremony is not optional. You'll need it. Especially now more than ever..."
"What do you mean?"
"The ceremony is a link, it will strengthen and protect you both as you help her understand her abilities. You might need it more than what you think."
"Really?" I found it hard to understand how standing in a circle in the woods and chanting some ancient words would be able to protect us.
"Really. Plus there is so many other factors that we need to consider. I need to tell Central that Cleo is Steel, as soon as I do they will call me in to deliver the labs but also to go through all the research and procedures and that can take a while."
"So I would be alone here?" I didn't like the thought of Rose leaving me behind and going to Central but I knew that was she was saying was right, as soon as Central knew they would call her back for a while.
"You wouldn't be alone here. You will have Cleo and you'll also have to deal with her wolf boyfriend."
I raised my eyebrows, I had seen the wolves in the woods but Rose had clearly put a few more pieces of the puzzle together. I felt a heaviness across my chest as I considered how this could complicate things.
~*~
I was rushing down the corridor to the stupid history lecture. I had spent far too much time with Rose this morning, trying to cheer her up and keep her mind off the fact that I soon would go through a bonding ceremony with Cleo. It wasn't the easiest task to make her happy because as soon as I cheered her up I would have to go and spend time with Cleo. But if I didn't do my job as a mentor she would be unhappy about that too. I felt trapped, whatever I did it didn't feel like anything could give her any lasting happiness. I brushed those thoughts out of my mind and started looking at the room numbers of the lecture halls, I had clearly rushed down the wrong corridor of the campus. I turned the corner and found that I was not as lost as I had first thought. Cleo was rushing down the corridor from the opposite end. We both reached the door at the same time, the mascara has slightly smudged underneath one of her blue eyes and her checks were flushed from running.
"So you're late for the lecture too?"
"I overslept," she pushed out between her panting and holding her hand to her side, "and now I've got a stich from running."
I gave her a small smile, "You could have used your abilities and that wouldn't have happened."
She looked quizzical.
"I mean, you might still have overslept but you wouldn't get a stich from running."
"Oh."
"I'll show you some time."
She nodded and opened the door.
The tiny European history lecturer looked like he was a piece of red dynamite and our late entrance was the spark that set the fuse off. He sat off in a tirade about time keeping and respect. A small rain of spittle spraying from his mouth on each hard consonant.
"...and to round it off, you two," he waved his chubby finger in our direction, "will be responsible for painting the European history themed mural at the end of the corridor by the lecturers' lounge."
He smacked a small batch of paper cards in my hand, "Here's your excuse notes, so that you can spend some time in the library researching seeing as you seem to have so little interest in attending lectures."
He stomped back to his usual position at the front of the class. Cleo and I slid quietly into two seats close to the front. As I handed her some of the excuse notes, I could see her looking at that brown haired guy. Was his name, Jackson? He gave her an empathetic smile and she smiled back, giving her shoulders a small shrug. I looked back to Jackson, he was now throwing me an angry glance. His eyes remained controlled but I could sense that he was not happy about the situation.
~*~
We followed the stream of students out to the courtyard after the lecture. She naturally slowed down her pace close to a little apple tree.
"So I guess we have a project to work on together now," as I spoke I studied her face, I could tell that she was cautious around me.
But then again, I had been taking the backseat approach and I had let Rose establish the first contact. I had to step up, if I was going to be a good mentor to her.
"Yes, it looks like it," her voice was neutral but there was a touch of caution to it.
"So I can teach you if you like?"
Her eyes looked more interested, but still that note of caution lingered, "Teach me what?"
"How to use your abilities, for example your strength and speed without having to fully shift," I kept my voice low and stepped closer to her when I spoke. I didn't need any unwanted ears listening in to our conversation.
"Could you? That would actually be a useful way of using this new thing..."
"Still not used to the whole idea of being Basati?" I smiled at her. I remembered how unwilling I had been, when I had first been thrown into this world myself.
"Not really."
"Don't worry. Give it some time and it won't feel so strange."
"Okay. I'll try. Well... See you later." She shot me a small smiled and walked off.
I smiled to myself. I just need to take this step by step, a little bit of progress each day. I looked over the courtyard and saw Cleo giving Jackson a hug. He was shooting me a look over her shoulder. He broke the hug and shifted his arm so it was draped across her shoulder. He said something to his friends, that tall and lanky blond haired guy and a big muscular black guy. They both laughed at what he said and their little group started walking off. I watched them as they left, considering how much more complicated it was to try to mentor a girl with a wolf boyfriend.
~*~
I was rushing towards campus, another morning and yet another late arrival. I must admit I found it really hard to motivate myself to care about history. But I was Cleo's mentor, which meant that wherever she went I went during my time as her mentor, even if that meant going to history lecture yet again. I groaned and started for the marble steps leading up to the main entrance, it was completely deserted, as I was way past the start of the morning lectures as normal. As I was approaching I could sense that something was going to happen, there was a slight movement through the ground that told me that someone was standing at the side of the big marble steps. As I approached they walked out from behind one of the giant marbled handrails, it was that tall blond guy and the big muscular black guy that hang around with Jackson.
"So, you're the guy that's been hanging around with Cleo?" the blond haired one said.
"I just want you to know that she's with Jackson. So you're going to step away from her. She has friends and she has a boyfriend. She doesn't need you," he continued.
I couldn't help but reply, "Did she say that or did Jackson?"
Something twitched behind the blond haired guy's eyes but he kept his composure, "Just consider yourself warned."
"Well, that was the tamest warning I have ever experienced," I knew I was provoking them now.
But I could tell from their smell that they were both wolves and I wasn't going to let two wolves tell me what I could and couldn't do.
"This should be a proper warning," said the muscular one.
I could see him clench his fist before he had even started moving his arm. His fist flew through the air and I gently side stepped, letting his fist crash into the massive block of marble next to me. His cry of pain echoed around the walls of the building. I caught a glimpse of the look of surprise in the blonde one's eyes before I turned on my heels and walked into the building. The wolves didn't bother me, as I knew that they wouldn't pose any great threat to me. But it did make the dynamic of being Cleo's mentor more difficult.
~*~
I was completely done with this day. I ducked into the men's restroom closest to the entrance of the university. It had been a lot of pointless lectures and had been completely uneventful apart from the wolves' little scene this morning.
I zipped up my trousers and walked over the sink. I let the water run over my hands before lathering them with soap. I rinsed and quickly used one of the paper towels, ready to grab my backpack and go home to ignore my assignment and try to cheer Rose up instead. As the paper towel fell to land in the waste bin, I heard the sound of the door opening. I turned around and stood face to face with Jackson. His brown hair looked messy and his facial features made him look young, almost childish but his blue eyes were piercing and I could sense that he was doing everything he could to control his wolf instincts. I took a gentle breath and inhaled, the scent told me that he was the alpha. This situation just got another layer of complicated thrown on top of it.
"So, I see that you have gotten to know Cleo," his words were sharp and pointed.
"Yes, we are neighbours and we're in the same class. It's only natural."
I could see him clench his fists again, this was not the response that he wanted to hear.
"I don't trust you. Moving into town and spending so much time with her already. You haven't been the least bit interested in getting to know anyone else. That goes for the both of you!"
He must be referring to Rose. I could see that his wolf instincts were on high alert, he was trying to protect his pack and by extension that also included Cleo. Whatever I did, he would see it as a threat.
"Well, I'm friends with Cleo now. So you're going to learn to deal with it."
"I'm not going to learn to deal with it. You're going to stay away from her. I don't trust you. What is it that you don't get about that?" his voice was raising progressively.
I was going to have to go with a different tactic here. I don't know how much Cleo had told him about what she was going through. But if he didn't know, he wasn't going to confront her about it from finding out in this conversation because then he would have to admit to trying to scare me away. Like that would work.
"Look, we're the same. Cleo and I."
Jackson showed a flicker of recognition. He must know something, but maybe not the full picture.
"She's going through a transformation. She's Basati and so am I."
"What's that supposed to mean?" he was still angry but his voice had calmed slightly.
"You find out if she chooses to tell you."
"Of course she will tell me!" he was angrier again now.
I disliked the tone in his voice, so blatantly feeling that he had the right to know what was going on in her life.
"I have something that you can never give her and I won't go away until she tells me too," with those words I walked past him and out of the bathroom.
I walked calmly down the corridor but Jackson didn't follow me. My mind was spinning, it might not have been the wisest move but he needed to know that I wasn't going anywhere. I wasn't going to fail my first mission as a mentor just because my mentee happened to have an over-protective wolf boyfriend who struggled with keeping his wolf instincts in check.
Author's Note: Thank you so much for reading! Please vote if you liked this chapter that would certainly make my day.
What did you think of the showdown between the wolves and Alec? Do you think Jackson has the right to be suspicious of Alec and Rose or do you think Jackson should back off?
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