Chapter 26
Alec POV
"Are you ready?" I jumped up and down on the stoop and looked at Cleo as she tied her shoelaces in the first rays of the morning sun.
"Yes, just wait for a second," she finished her second shoe and punched me lightly on the arm, "Stop being so impatient."
"Catch me if you can," I shouted and started to sprint back through the garden and into the woods.
"Like you don't think I can!" she shouted back and followed me quickly. By the time I had reached the edge of trees she had already caught up with me, tapping me lightly on the shoulder before sprinting further into the forest.
~*~
I lent forward and felt the muscles in my calf stretch out. Cleo her right arm locked straight in the crook of her left elbow, as she stretched out her arm muscles and looked down at me.
"Good run?" her question almost sounded like a confirmation.
"Yeah," I breathed out as I relaxed my calf. "You're really getting better every day. It's amazing how quickly your abilities are developing."
"Oh, don't get started with all of that Steel super supernatural stuff," she rolled her eyes. I laughed back at her but in the midst of my laughter I thought I heard an odd sound mixed in with the wind.
"Why don't you go inside and put some coffee on and I might be persuaded to make breakfast," I suggested. Instinctively feeling that she needed to be removed from the situation. I hadn't even identified any danger yet, but something about my Basati instincts told me that she shouldn't be here for this.
Cleo smiled widely at me, "That's a deal." She bounded up the stairs to the back door. When I heard the door close behind her I turned around, pretending to stretch my calf muscle again I focused all my sense towards the direction of the noise. The scent hit me before I spotted a small piece of Wyhatt's finger that was not concealed by the leafy undergrowth surrounding the clusters of trees where they were crouched down. I sniffed the air slightly and could confirm that their beta, Tim, was with him too. So they are spying on her now? Is nothing beneath them? They might just be trying to keep her safe, even though I doubt that was their main motive. I released my leg from the stretch and shook it out, heading towards the back door and leaving the wolves to continue to hide in the bushes.
"Coffee's nearly done," Cleo shouted from upstairs when she heard me close the door. "I'm just going to have a quick shower, feel free to get started on that breakfast," she added merrily.
I turned towards the kitchen and started to prepare some sandwiches, pulling things out of the fridge at random. I didn't know what to do with this newfound knowledge. The wolves were following us. Were they following her, me or the both of us? And to what end? I knew that they have good powers of hearing but nothing like what the Basati does. They would have to be very clever not to get caught, but perhaps they hadn't thought that far. Perhaps they were following orders and Jackson hadn't thought that far? Until I knew more, I really didn't see what telling Cleo would do. She would only be more upset with Jackson and recently she had really seemed to be a bit happier.
"So what do you want to do today?" she said as she bounced into the kitchen and grabbed a sandwich and placed it on her plate.
"Since it's Saturday shouldn't you be at the mall shopping?" I teased.
"God, you know how much I love shopping..." she rolled her eyes at me.
"Okay then," I grinned back at her. "Want to go for a trek at the mountain nature reserve. We could bring lunch with us?"
She brightened up, "That sounds like a really good idea actually."
~*~
The steep incline pulled at my leg muscles but it only felt right, one of the benefits of being Basati was that we didn't really get out of breathe or felt tired as quickly as humans. I looked up at the vastness of the mountain and the trees clinging onto the slopes. I figured being out here was more peaceful than the town and with the wolves lurking around this might be a good way to shake them off for now. The heavy wind pushed its way into my face carrying with it all the scents of the forest. I felt the steepness of incline increase indicating that the small meadow, tucked away on the mountainside was not too far away. The grass was just as high as it had been the last time we had been here practicing. I took a moment to look at scenery whilst Cleo jumped into the meadow bouncing through the high grass with her backpack jostling up and down on her back as she went.
The checkered woolly blanket was pushing down the high grass and the wind was blowing across the meadow, making the high grass around us nod back and forth around us.
"Want some more juice?" Cleo handed me the cup with a smile. We had spent most of the day in content silence but I felt like I needed to talk to her about how she was getting on with everything. I knew that most of my Mentor duties was about teaching her to deal with her abilities but she had been through a pretty dramatic transformation so far and it couldn't be easy to deal with that.
"Thank you," I took the cup from her and downed a mouthful of it. She was half laying down, only propping up her body with her elbow as she looked over at me.
"So how are you feeling about everything?" I was trying to not be too nosey but at the same time she needed someone to talk to that knew about everything.
"It's all ups and downs really," she shrugged her shoulders. "It's been a bit of a rollercoaster."
"I know your transformation has not been the easiest. I know that everyone struggles to some amount when they first change. But you have had more to deal with than most."
"It's been hard. It's strange to think that even to the Basati I'm still considered weird. I mean, I'm being told that I'm this strange thing but even within the community of strange things I'm still the abnormality," a small sad smile crept across her lips.
"I know that your transformation is not considered normal," I could see that my statement upset her, so I carried on explaining myself, "but that makes you so special. You are one of the few that is even stronger, even better than the rest of us."
"Okay," she said, still slightly unconvinced, "I'll try to think of it like that."
"Please do," I confirmed warmly.
"So how are you handling everything else?" I wanted to ask her how she felt about Jackson but at the same time I didn't want to put her on the spot.
"I don't know. Everything got so complicated. I mean with Jackson...," she broke off and a thought passed across her face, "The wolves," she thought for a second longer, "Why do they know so little about the Hunters?"
I shrugged my shoulders, "Your guess is as good as mine on that one."
"Jackson keeps asking me about it and I can't tell if it's because he genuinely needs to know information about them or if it's only a reason for him to talk to me again."
"The wolves society works different from ours. They run in packs and share information with their pack members. Of course they have elders just like we do. But I don't know to what level they communicate with one another," I explained.
"So in which way do the Basati communicate then?" she looked genuinely interested.
"You know about Central. They are our main organisation, they keep records of all information and when we find something new we report it to them or in some cases we send in samples."
"Like my blood and Jacksons?" she added.
"Yes, we don't necessarily need all information we collect. But it's all analysed and tested, building the knowledge to our database."
"Ah," she said and stayed silent for a while as if she was processing this new piece of information.
A small pinecone from a nearby tree had found its way to the edge of our blanket, tangling itself into her hair. I held on to the strand of her hair and gently pulled the pinecone away from the ends of it.
"Thank you," she said quietly before turning over and looking up at the sky.
I looked back at her for a moment before following her example. My thoughts drifted from Cleo, to the wolves and back to Central, to the life I had left behind in Central. Now that I was here, of course I cared for Cleo and wanted her to go through the transformation as smoothly as possible. But taking on this mentoring position was not motivated by Cleo. I had my own reasons for wanting to be a Mentor.
Author's Note: So who's happy to see another chapter in Alec's POV? Let me know which your favorite part of this chapter was?
Song: Body Gold - Oh Wonder