Chapter 47 - You have a brother?

EMMA

I roll face-down on the bed and lie on my stomach. I take the book in my hands with me and rest the binding on the bed sheets. The book is old and I let it fall open. “It says here that you can actually talk with your wolf.” I point a finger to the sentence on the page.

I picked up a book that I had lying around in my stack. It describes the workings of the connection between human and wolf.

Hadrian is sitting on the sofa working his way through a stack of documents. He has a frown on his face and he doesn’t look up. “I can.”

I rest my elbow on the bed and my head in my palm. “How does that even work? Do you hear his voice in your head?”

Hadrian looks up from the documents and lays his pen down. “Yes, and sometimes it can be very annoying.”

I purse my lips. “You know we humans call that schizophrenia.”

His eyes turn pitch-black. I used to be scared by it, but I’ve seen it so many times now. “Is your wolf talking to you now?”

His eyes swirl back to light amber. “Yes.”

I lean forward and cross my ankles in the air. “What does he say?”

“That you should stop asking questions,” Hadrian says and looks back at the documents.

I ponder his answer and something doesn’t add up. “You’re lying.”

Hadrian lifts his eyes and holds my stare. “How would you know?”

I shrug my shoulders, “I just do, call it intuition.” I nearly roll my eyes at my own answer. I don’t know how I know that he was lying, I just do.

His eyes flicker between black and amber again.

“What is he saying?”

Hadrian sighs. “That you should drink your tea, it’s getting cold.”

I look at the pot of tea beside the sofa. Paulina brought it fifteen minutes ago and neither of us has drunk any of it. I get up from the bed and pour myself a cup. The scent of jasmine wafts in the air.

I warm my chilly fingers to the hot porcelain and take a seat next to Hadrian on the sofa. “Does it hurt when you transform into a ferocious angry beast?”

Hadrian lifts a questioning eyebrow. “Usually it doesn’t”

“Usually?”

Hadrian sets the stack of documents aside and turns to face me. “Only when one of us is fighting it.”

There is still a distance between us and I eye the ten inches between our knees. “Do you like being a werewolf?”

"Yes, I do." His voice is sincere, but there is also apprehension.

I do wonder sometimes what it would be like. Now that I live here in a world full of werewolves. But I don’t want him to feel bad for me in any way. “What do you like most about it?”

A crooked smile pulls at his lips, “Running in the forest.” There is a youthful luster in his eyes. A hint of boyish delight. It swells the warmth in my chest.

Hadrian places his hand on my knee. “What do you miss the most about the human world?”

The swell in my chest constricts when I’m reminded of home. The ache is painful. I miss many things about my home.

“My brother,” I answer truthfully.

His eyes widen and a frown pulls at his brows. “You have a brother?”

I realize that we haven’t really talked much about our pasts. Only some of the hurtful traumas, but not the little things. Not the miscellaneous facts that make you understand a person and like them even more.

I smile when I think about my brother and another thought occurs to me. “Yeah, and I think you met him.”

I remember Lucas saying that he talked to Hadrian on the night of the choosing and warned him to stay away from me.

“The human with the scars?”

I shake my head. “No, that’s Justin.”

Hadrian’s features pull in a scowl “Is he your, what is it you call it? boyfriend?”

I blink “What? No."

How do you tell someone that dating and boys have never been on my mind before? Sure there was the crush here and there, but I could never make myself prioritize dating.

“I never had a boyfriend,” I confess.

Hadrian draws circles on my knee with his thumb as he visibly relaxes. “What about me?”

Sometimes I can see a little glimpse of insecurity shine through the hard muscular wall. He hides it well and I would never have guessed that sometimes he doubts himself like every other living being.

“I thought I was your mate,” I tell him.

Hadrian gives me an affirmative nod. He takes my cup of tea and pulls me closer. “What else do you miss? He places a hand over the back of the sofa and gives me my cup back. He places the other back on my knee. His warmth radiates from him and seeps into me.

I take a long sip of my tea and think about his question. “Fish and chips, the dogs. Oh and swimming, I love swimming.”

“You do?” Hadrian has a pensive look on his face. “I’ll take you swimming sometime.”

I appreciate the offer and his willingness to. “It’s too cold to swim here,” I tell him and there is sadness in my voice. The pond in the gardens is bigger than the average swimming pool, but the water is frigid.

“Then I’ll take you somewhere warmer.” Hadrian moves his hand and rests it on my hip bone. I noticed quite early that touch is very important to him. It seems to calm him down, but my body is heating up faster than ever. Especially when I think about this morning and my face flushes in what must be bright red.

Hadrian leans forward and he must notice my flush. “Will you be swimming naked?” He whispers.

My eyes widen and I gasp. I get up from the sofa and put some distance between us. He chuckles and I turn my gaze to the window and away from him.

The sun is descending in the late afternoon. The sky turns into an array of different colors of orange.

“I have to go,” Hadrian says. His voice is stern and pensive

I turn around and find him looking out the window as well. “Where are you going?”

He gets up from the sofa. “I want to check some things out in Septentrion.”

I startle. Septentrion is the place from the logbooks. It’s the place where Zeno used the poison. “Then take me with you.”

“I cannot do that.”

I want to put my foot down and make a spectacle about the fact that we were supposed to do this together.

Hadrian must see the hurt in my eyes. “Come here.”

He takes my hand and guides me to his office. He places me on the chair in front of his desk and pulls out a map from one of the drawers.

He unfolds the map on the wooden surface and straightens it out with his hand. The paper is still fairly new. The area on the map looks like a deformed circle. It is awkwardly divided into four parts and every part has its own name.

Hadrian points to the part on the higher side of the map.“Septentrion is the area near the north border. It takes hours to get there running at full speed.” Hadrian draws a line with his finger to the west area where a small circle is drawn. I look closer and realize that the circle is Sanguinem.

I push out my bottom lip when I realize what he’s trying to say. It’s far, very far. “Can we take the car?”

Hadrian places his hand behind my head and places a kiss on my temple. “I think it’s better not to draw any attention.”

I scoff as I look at the mountainous werewolf. He draws attention without even knowing it. Just his shoulders alone are huge. His bicep could fit my whole head.

“What if I show you my wolf instead?”

I perk up. He draws me in like he’s dangling a carrot in front of me. He uses my curiosity to his advantage and it’s working. “Okay.”

Hadrian places another kiss a little lower on my cheekbone. “Good girl.” He whispers in a low raspy voice.