InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Child of Earth and Sea ❯ Chapter 2

AN: The Child of Earth and Sea is part of the Purity series and set in the current time line of Charity and Ben's story. Rumiko Takahashi owns Inuyasha and all recognizable characters from the anime, all characters from the Purity universe belong to Sueric, I have simply been granted the honor of taking them out to play for a little while. This series tells the story of Nessa Beaumonte, from the one-shot Heart of a Warrior, and has been written with the approval of, and in collaboration with the original author of the Purity Universe, Sueric.

The Child of Earth and Sea

A Purity Collaboration

By WhisperingWolf

Chapter 2

31 December, 2055

Flathead National Forest

Montana-Canada Border

Vanessa's brow furrowed as she turned her head, burrowing her face into Amaya's shoulder to escape the bitter wind that blew over her cheek. She squeezed her eyes closed tightly as she groaned softly, protesting her rise to consciousness, and felt her mother bounce her slightly in her arms as she whispered to her, shushing her quietly as she rubbed her back. She didn't understand why she was so cold now, her face scrunching up in displeasure and confusion as she turned her head, resting her cheek against her mother's shoulder and opened her eyes to look out at the world around her.

She had fallen asleep to the sound of her father's voice as he sang to her, to the red and gold ribbons of the sun rising up beyond the high window in a barn, while she lay in a bed made of hay and ferns. The warmth of the giant white sheepdog - her mother had called it a Great Pyrenees - had soothed her, as she'd fallen asleep with her face buried in the animal's fur. But now, she was high in a tree, wrapped securely in her mother's arms, and the safety she had felt when she'd fallen asleep was all but a memory now that she was awake.

The silence around her was deafening. Even the snow that fell from the branches above where they were perched in the tree held no sound. It was as if the forest itself understood the importance of them being unheard, unseen. Every single muscle in her body was coiled, tense, as though whatever was happening was riding on these next few moments, and she didn't know whether to be afraid or not. Vanessa blinked as she lifted her head from her mother's shoulder, biting her lip as she looked around at the snow and ice-covered branches. Something was wrong, that much was clear to her, but she wasn't sure exactly what it was.

`The bags . . . Mama's not carrying our bags and Papa's not singing anymore,' Vanessa thought as she turned in her mother's arms, looking back behind her as she searched for him.

She opened her mouth to call for him only to be silenced when Amaya covered her mouth with her hand, the constriction of her mother's youki around her own making it clear that she was to remain quiet. Vanessa nodded her understanding, turning back to look at her mother when the woman's hand dropped from her mouth, her arm wrapping back around her to tighten her hold. Vanessa's eyes widened as her breath stilled, caught somewhere between her throat and her lungs, her heart hammering wildly inside of her chest.

That was the difference, that was what had woken her and why she felt so nervous. She could feel her mother's youki tight around her own, shielding her, restraining her, but she couldn't feel her father's. She pressed closer to her mother, huddling against her as she cautiously looked around, scanning the branches above and below them for her father. Her brow furrowed a moment later when she spotted him in the tree across from them almost thirty feet away. He was crouched down low on the branch, his hands braced on the branch between his bent knees and in front of his feet, his head bowed as his gaze remained fixed on the ground below.

She didn't see the bags on him, or near him. He wasn't carrying anything. Vanessa hugged her knitted teddy bear tighter in her arms, the furrow between her brow growing deeper as she watched him. Everything about her father was tense, statuesque. His stillness scared her, but the fear she could feel from her mother made the shadows larger, turning the forest - a place she'd always felt safe in - to something dark and ugly. She blinked when her father looked up at them suddenly, his eyes fierce, glowing, and his jaw clenched as he offered her mother a single curt nod.

Vanessa didn't understand what his nod meant, but her mother did. In the same second that he nodded, Amaya clamped her hand down over Vanessa's mouth, ensuring her silence as she held her close and raced from tree to tree. Vanessa's eyes widened, tears burning behind her gaze as she watched her father fall from the tree he was in, landing silently in the snow, only to run in the opposite direction. She wanted to scream for her father, to yell for him to come with them, but any sound she made was muffled behind her mother's hand.

Only when they were far enough away, did Amaya stop, her punishing hold loosening as she released the fierce gag she had over Vanessa's mouth. The girl took in heavy breaths, the air misting in front of her face as she turned back to look in the direction from which they'd run. She could see the shadow of her father, his skin glowing in the dark as he ran, three other youkai chasing after him. The tears stinging her eyes fell, freezing to her cheeks and shimmering like so many crystals under the light of the half moon. She shook her head as she looked back up at her mother, too frightened to speak, as she wrapped her youki as tightly around herself as possible.

“Your father will find us,” Amaya whispered in her ear, the sharp edges of her mother's fear making Vanessa wince as Amaya's youki tightened around her in a stranglehold. “He's leading the ones hunting us away, but he will find us,” she promised, her voice trembling ever so slightly. “He always does.”

“The Tai Youkai came for us?” Vanessa whimpered, looking up at her mother with wide eyes and watching as the woman shook her head.

“No. These men are different,” she denied her. “These men want to capture us. To sell us. To harm us. Youkai aren't safe for us, my daughter. They want to take you away from your father and I and take me from him. You must always hide. It's only safe in the shadows.”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Bangor, Maine

4 January, 2056

Ammeline Jacobs looked down at the left side of her desk with a sigh, narrowing her eyes as she sat down in the chair behind her desk and set her bag on the floor. Sitting in the spot that had been cleared the day she had left for her long-overdue vacation with her mate, was a stack of files - thirty-six to be exact - with another, taller stack behind it. And another one to the right of that one. The stack in front had a red sticker bow on top of it, holding a folded note in place at its corner as though marking it as a gift.

`Hell of a gift,' her youkai-voice remarked dryly.

Ammeline released a deep sigh in agreement as she removed the sticky bow, tossing it into the trash can next to her desk before unfolding the note. Her eyes narrowed to slits as she stared at the rough handwriting - nearly cuneiform in design - and bit back a growl as she read the words a second time. The first stack of files, marked by the note, was expected to be completed by the end of the day. The two stacks behind them were expected by the end of the week.

`You know who wrote that note. There's only one person who's got writing that atrocious,' her youkai-voice pointed out. `You should return the favor.'

Ammeline frowned as she sat back in her chair for a moment. The amusement she felt from her youkai should have been warning enough, but still asked the question. `How?'

`Flaming bag of dog poo.'

The sip of coffee she'd taken caught in her throat, and Ammeline sputtered as she coughed and set down the paper cup before she dropped it. `What is wrong with you?' she shot back at her youkai only to be answered with laughter. `Freak.'

`One of us has to be,' her youkai-voice retorted with humor before sighing. `And here I was hoping for an easy day. You're going to need more coffee.'

`I'm going to need more something,' Ammeline agreed as she stared at the stacks of files with boredom and more than a little annoyance.

She still wasn't sure how she was expected to make it through all of the student files in the first stack within the next eight hours, it was impossible, she thought as she thumbed through each stack to count the files. Youkai stamina aside, there was only so much she could do at one time. Each file needed to have a full review done with student interviews conducted, as well as follow up with any and all teachers, and any social services personnel that may or may not be involved. Leaning back in her chair, she lifted one hand to cover her face and tipped her head back as she blew a heavy breath out between her fanned fingers.

`What's frustrating you more?' her youkai-voice asked. `That you had resolved all the cases on your desk before you left for that holiday vacation you and J.J. took, or that these three new stacks of case files appeared before you even got in this morning? How many are there anyway?'

`Thirty-six in the pile that needs to be done today. Seventy-three in the pile behind that one, and fifty in the pile beside that one,' Ammeline replied after a few long moments of silence, and tipped her head back up as she released the grip she had on her temples, letting her hand fall to her lap with a frustrated sigh. `I counted them twice just to make sure. No, the thing that pisses me off is that Margaret freaking Thames wants these -` she slapped her hand down on the first pile ` - all done by the end of the day, and these files?' she said as she lifted a handful from the top of the first stack before dropping them back down to the pile. `She's had them for at least a month, possibly more. She kept these - intentionally - until the last moment. That woman always has an agenda and what it is this time with - “ she looked at the tabs, focusing and the color dot used to mark the grade level, ` - second graders, I have no idea.'

`Amme,' her youkai said, the tone of the voice heavy with caution. `That name, buried somewhere in the middle, grab that one first. We've seen that name before.'

Ammeline frowned as she ran the index claw of her right hand down the tabs of the first stack, until she saw the name she was hoping to never see again in the stacks of at-risk students she was supplied with. Kathy Barker. Repeating the second grade and not because she couldn't understand the material, the girl was smart - damn smart - but she was absent too often to not be doomed to repeat the year. And the times she did come in to class? Jennifer Martin - the girl's teacher - had reported on more than one occasion that the girl had bruises on her arms, unwashed hair, and clothing that was unclean or too small or ripped beyond repair.

“Are you kidding me?” she asked as she stared at the open file in front of her. “She came in with a broken arm this time? What the hell happened to the child services investigation that was supposed to take place?” She flipped over two more pages as she looked for the report that should have been there but wasn't.

She didn't wait, didn't think as she reached for the cellphone sitting on her desk under the monitor of her computer. A text didn't seem quite right, and calling him about this didn't seem right, either but waiting until tonight when they were both home from work . . . She sighed heavily as she opened up her text messages.

`J.J. check into an eight-year-old girl for me, her name is Kathy Barker.'

She sent the text off with a sigh and closed the file before tucking it into the fawn brown vintage messenger style bag she carried back and forth between the office and home. A smile curled her lips up at one corner as her fingers lingered over the front pocket. J.J. had bought the bag for her three years ago, giving it to her on their anniversary. It reminded her of the bag her mother used to have, back when the woman had worked as an investigative journalist for a major newspaper.

She laughed as she shook her head, these days her mother was working as a private defense lawyer specializing in criminal law. She was due for a change up soon, almost twenty years in open court and no change in appearance, she couldn't stay much longer unless she faked aging. Ammeline's lips twitched as she recalled the last time her mother had tried to do that with makeup she'd gone from looking twenty-five to looking almost sixty overnight - and she still had the pictures to prove it. Her phone dinged as she straightened in her chair and she reached for the device, smiling when she saw her mate's reply.

`I'm having Sharon over at PD look into it for me. Training with the boys today, breaking in a new guy. They always start out thinking they're a hot shot.'

She smiled, laughing softly as she replied. `New human teammate?'

His reply was instant. `Worse. He's a cat. A damn housecat who thinks he was somehow chosen by the gods themselves to do this job. He and I are the only two of our kind on the team, and this idiot wanted to jump without a line.'

Ammeline sucked a sharp breath in through her teeth and shook her head. `Just remind him that Maine is the Zelig's home territory, and if he makes a scene, Paul Bunyan will come after him.'

Less than a minute later her phone rang with a video call from her mate. One tap and a few seconds later, J.J. appeared on her screen, his face split by a wide smile as he laughed.

“You gotta stop calling him that, Amme,” he told her as he shook his head. “One of these days, I'm going to run into him, and it'll be your fault if I end up calling that cub Paul Bunyan.”

Ammeline threw her head back as she laughed. “Yeah, but if he starts walking around leading a bull . . .”

J.J. shook his head, his eyes shining with mirth as he stared at her, the sound of cat calls behind him. “I gotta go, the boys are getting restless. And jealous!” he called back over his shoulder.

Ammeline laughed when Paul Clemmons appeared in view of the camera. “We just miss seeing you down here, is all. Damn giant keeps hogging you to himself.”

“Hey, Shorty,” she greeted the man. “Break in the new guy, teach him some manners, and then I'll have you boys over for a cookout.”

“Awww man,” he bemoaned, and looked at her mate. “We gotta teach him manners, too? All you said we had to do was house break him. Shi-i-i-i-i-i-t.”

She laughed as he smacked J.J.'s arm before moving out of line of the camera. Her mate looked back at her with a crooked grin, the length of his braid hanging down over his left shoulder. To everyone else, it appeared that he had shoulder length black hair perpetually secured at the nape of his neck with a leather band, but his concealment kept the humans from seeing just how long his hair actually was. Then again, with his cinnamon skin, high cheekbones, and dark eyes, the humans also believed him to be a rather tall Native American and not a polar bear youkai. The slate grey markings on his cheeks were hidden, too, the same marks she had spent hours tracing with her fingertips. The same double-slash marks wrapped around his hips, over the inside of his thighs, and one set directly over his heart - she loved tracing those marks with her tongue, and he never had seemed to mind.

“Yeah, I know that look,” he commented, and she smiled even as a blush rose to color her cheeks. “When I get home tonight, we need to talk.”

“That doesn't sound good,” she said, her brow furrowing. “Where's Ricky? Shouldn't he be there with you guys?”

“That's what we need to talk about,” he told her, sighing heavily as he shook his head. “Alvarez accepted a job as team leader.”

Ammeline frowned as she stared at him. “That doesn't sound so bad. It was expected, wasn't it? I mean, yeah, we were both surprised when they named you team leader over him, but you said Ethan had left some kind of note . . . ” she said slowly, her voice trailing off as she studied the seriousness in his expression.

“His Farewell letter. We all write one in case we don't come back. He left a letter to the Lieutenant, that's why I was named Team Captain and Ricky wasn't. Ethan left another letter to me with two other letters inside - one to Gwen and one to Dobby - but those he asked me to hang onto until they're each eighteen.” He shook his head slightly as he took in a breath. “Amme, the job Alvarez took . . . it's in L.A.,” he told her with a sigh.

Her mouth dropped open as her eyes widened, indignation rising to color her cheeks a ruddy hue. “Are you kidding me?” she returned fiercely, the edge of a growl roughening her words. “I'll set up a dinner with him and the kids at our house, he needs to be the one to tell Dobby and Gwen - “

“Amme -“

“ - they'll take it hard, I'm sure - “

“Ammeline - “

“ - I just have to find a way to get in touch with Gwen. I don't know if she's back at school yet. She really shouldn't be - “

“Ammeline!” She fell silent as she blinked at him. “Alvarez is gone. I came into work this morning and got the news. He left while we were in Utah. He left a note behind for me with Shorty.”

“Dobby and Gwen?” she asked with anger and disbelief, watching as he turned his head to look behind him before returning his attention to her.

“We'll talk tonight. I don't want to talk about this on the phone. Amme . . . those cubs . . . “

The look in his eyes, the concern furrowing his brow, it told her everything she needed to know. “We made Ethan that promise the night he told us about Patty being pregnant with Dobby. Do you remember?” she asked. “No matter what happens to him, we will be there, and we will fight for his pups, no matter what that means. If it means that we are there to take them out for a picnic or a baseball game or to go horseback riding once a week, we will do that. We fight for them, and maybe that means that in the end we adopt them legally - or we give them a safe place they know they can run to - but no matter what - “

“We fight,” he finished.

Ammeline nodded as she smiled sadly. “We fight,” she agreed. She glanced at the stack of files on her desk, turning the phone just enough for him to see them before turning it back to meet his gaze in the camera. “I doubt I'll be home before eight and I may be bringing some of these home with me.”

“Thai Flower?” he asked, naming one of the take-out places they frequented.

“Mmmm . . . “ She twisted her lips to the side as she narrowed her eyes. “I kind of want tacos.”

“Woman, are you going to make me cook?” he asked. He laughed when she responded with a wide smile. “All right. You sure are demanding,” he teased her.

“And you love me for it,” she teased back laughing when he did. Her smile fell away slowly as her eyes widened at the scene playing out behind her mate. “Ummm . . . J.J. . . . You need to handle that,” she said, watching as the dark blond cat youkai charged at Shorty with his shoulder down in order to throw him over his shoulder in a fireman's carry and stand tall, only to then spin in a slow bouncing circle. “That's not going to end well.”

“Son of a bi -“

Ammeline shook her head as she laughed when the call dropped, the text message conversation with J.J. reappearing on her screen. Closing out of the application, she rolled her eyes. That cat was either going to end up getting himself booted off the team or forcing J.J. into a dominance battle. She'd seen him do the same thing only once before with a human who simply wouldn't back down and kept challenging his authority. He had gotten fed up enough that he had grabbed the guy by the front of his shirt, lifted him up, and body slammed him to the ground. That man was Shorty, and he and J.J. had been thick as thieves ever since. Men, she thought as she shook her head and reached for her glasses, she would never understand them.

`Psst!'

Pale sky-blue eyes narrowed from behind the tint of amber lenses. `Did you just `psst' me?'

`Yes.'

`. . . Why?'

`Because. . . `

`. . . Because why?'

Rolling her eyes when her youkai remained silent, Ammeline reached up a slender pale hand to remove the delicate rectangular frames. The glasses she wore held a mild prescription for reading, but more importantly, the amber-tinted lenses were specifically engineered to eliminate the blue light from the computer screens she worked at most often. They really did come in handy as of late, she thought, especially since she was splitting her time between her counseling duties here at the school, as well as finishing her doctorate thesis work for both Developmental and Behavioral Psychology, and Education in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Maine.

She still wasn't sure if she wanted to continue on here at the school once her degrees were finished, or if she wanted to join a private practice somewhere. All she knew for certain was that she wanted to help kids, she thought as she slipped the glasses back on and turned her attention back to the computer screen in front of her. In truth, she didn't even need the education studies she'd taken, those had happened more out of her own curiosity than anything else.

For now, though, she thought as she opened the deep drawer on the bottom right side of her desk and withdrew the files from within the thick hanging folder, she had at least fifty more student files to go through from various teachers in order to finish the behavioral reports and college recommendation letters for the senior class that would be graduating this year. It was the only thing she had left over from the work she had before she had left for vacation, and all of those had to be completed before she could even think about getting started on the new stack for the second graders that were needed by the end of the day.

And as much as it would help to have another student counselor on staff, she was glad not to. After the two she had worked with almost five years ago, before they'd been laid off due to budget cuts, she had learned not to trust anyone in the school except for herself as far as the students were concerned.

`Psst!'

`Seriously?' Ammeline replied as she looked away from the desk in front of her that was becoming more crowded by the moment. `I have work to do.'

`She's lingering!' her youkai hissed at her.

`You're inside my head. Why in the hell are you whispering?'

`Because she's out there, and I, for one, do not like her.'

Ammeline sighed. The “she” in question was her boss - or at least one of them, anyway. Margaret Thames, Vice Principal of Student Affairs. The woman really wasn't needed, but she'd been hired on under the old principal before he'd retired last year, and Janet Fields, the new principal, hadn't seen a reason to let her go or change the woman's job. Not that she really did anything if it didn't directly benefit herself, she thought.

That woman was nothing if not a walking, talking agenda. Nearing sixty years old, the woman still dressed and acted as though she were in her twenties, dying her hair and adorning herself with makeup and accessories that were supposed to be the latest in the young adult fashions. It wouldn't have been an issue, if she were youkai, but she wasn't. Mrs. Thames was human, and a rather oblivious one at that. It made it easy enough to hide from her, at least. All she had to do was sit at her desk with the lamp off, the door and blinds closed, and more often than not, the woman didn't even bother to knock. What was that old saying? Be grateful for small favors? Something like that, she thought, and shook her head as she took in a deep steadying breath.

`You should introduce her to Patty. Pretty sure they'd be instant friends,' her youkai said ruefully.

`Ugh, no. That's the last thing that needs to happen.' Ammeline slouched down in her chair as she dropped her cheek to her fist. `You think I could get away with going home early?'

`Seven hours early? I doubt it,' her youkai returned, `If you turned off your lamp, you could pretend not to be here. It's not like they can sense you.'

Ammeline snorted at the advice of her youkai-voice, wondering just how easy it might be to get away with doing just that. Aside from herself, there was only one other youkai teacher on staff - a jackal - and he was in the physical education department. He was also the one person in the school who never bothered telling her about a student he suspected was being abused, instead choosing to slip her a note with a name on it and the simple promise that he'd taken care of it. The humans milling about in the hallway and offices outside didn't have the sharpened senses to tell if she was here by the thickness of her scent in the room, or the feel of her youki. All she really had to do was reach over to the small lamp sitting on the right corner of her desk and turn the light off. One. Little. Switch.

`Do it. You know you want to.'

`You're not helping,' Ammeline replied, narrowing her eyes as an errant lock of curly platinum-blonde hair fell over her eye.

`I'm helping plenty,' her youkai-voice denied her as she tucked the hair behind her ear. `Besides, it is training day, after all. We could go watch J.J. work out with the boys . . . watch him break in the new guy. That cat did look rather nice to watch even if he is a total idiot.'

`We're mated. Remember? To J.J. Handsome guy, polar-bear youkai,' she retorted dryly.

`Yeah yeah yeah. Mated doesn't mean we can't appreciate a little eye candy. It just means we can't go licking said eye candy. Besides, J.J.'s much tastier than any damn cat would be.'

`Pervert.'

`You know that even in this weather, he usually takes his shirt off. Polar bears do stay warmer in the cold.'

`Not. Helping!'

`I bet he's got sweat dripping down his chest right now. Tiny little drops rolling down over his - `

Ammeline couldn't suppress the sigh of relief that came as a result of the quick triple knock on her office door. The sound may have been timid, and a bit quiet, but it interrupted whatever her youkai-voice intended to say next and for that she was grateful. Shaking her head as she lifted her hands to cover her heated cheeks, blood pooling beneath her skin at the equal sense of embarrassment and arousal, she took in a deep breath only to release it in a heavy exhalation. Death by youkai-voice, she thought with a roll of her eyes and grinned at the sound her youkai's offended snort.

“Come in!” she called out when the knock sounded again, and sat back in her chair, her brows furrowing when the senior class student volunteer walked into her office. “Don't tell me - you've got more files for me?”

Tammy shook her head as she frowned, pushing her mousey brown hair behind her rounded ear as she stepped up to the desk. “Ms. Thames asked me to give you this for review,” she said as she handed the micro-USB flash drive to Ammeline. “She asked that you let her know as soon as you were done watching it.”

“Tammy,” Ammeline called to her, able to feel the discomfort in the girl's aura, and nodded to her office door. “Close the door and come sit down,” she instructed, her brow furrowing as she watched the teenager.

There was something about the flash drive that was clearly upsetting to her, but what that something was, she wasn't sure. It wasn't her imagination, she thought as she watched the girl pause with her hand on the door before finally pushing the heavy wood closed. The beat of her heart increased, and Ammeline could smell the rise of adrenaline. The girl wanted to leave, but there was something more . . . something that seemed to both anger and sadden her.

“Do you know something about what I'll find on here?” she asked once the girl returned to the desk and sat down in the visitor's chair on the right.

Tammy's shoulders moved as she drew in a deep breath, releasing it a moment later in a heavy exhalation. She ducked her head as she nodded, toying with the hair that hung down a few inches below her shoulders. Over and over, Tammy flicked and turned the lock of hair between her fingers, the natural curl at the end of her hair only helping to make the nervous hair-twirl happen that much faster.

“Tammy?”

“People are saying stuff!” she blurted out irritably, and Ammeline narrowed her eyes. “And not just the students, either, I've heard some of the teachers say things.”

Ammeline shook her head. “Say things about what? And to whom?”

Tammy shrugged. “To each other mostly, but some have said stuff directly to her, and it's not right!”

“Tammy, I can't help if I don't know what you're talking about,” she told the girl and listened to her sigh.

“I didn't watch that tape,” she said, nodding to the flash drive on the desk, “but I didn't have to. I was there to see it all happen. She told him to stop, warned him to stop running his mouth, but he wouldn't. And not one of the teachers tried to help, either. They didn't do anything, and no one could expect her to just let it go! That isn't fair! No one could just let something like that go.”

Ammeline shook her head as she reached across the desk, tapping her knuckles against the hard wood to get the girl's attention. “Tammy.” She waited for the girl to meet her gaze before she continued. “I still don't know what you're talking about.”

She watched as the girl's shoulders fell in a heavy silent sigh. It looked as though the student sitting in front of her had been defeated by whatever she had witnessed. Ammeline pulled her hand back as she leaned against the chair behind her, the furrow between her brows deepening as she narrowed her eyes. This was more than just the normal rumors that would spread around the halls, more than just someone stealing another girl's boyfriend, or so-and-so getting into a fight. Whatever this was had enough power behind it that Ammeline could even feel her youkai bracing for impact.

“They're saying terrible things,” Tammy began slowly, her quiet voice barely able to be heard and Ammeline was certain that if it wasn't for her youkai hearing, she'd never have heard it at all. “ . . .About Captain Dobson.” Ammeline pressed her lips into a thin line as she reminded herself to be patient, that the girl in front of her wasn't done yet. “The boy on that video - Jackson Pruitt - he kept saying that Captain Dobson was being careless, that his dad said that he had no business being up there anyway and that . . . and that . . . Captain Dobson . . . deserved to fall.”

Ammeline sucked in a sharp breath as she stared at Tammy through wide eyes. It took effort to bite back the growl building inside of her, the maternal rage she felt that was only a hair's breadth from coming out, whether she wanted it to or not. She had watched over Gwen enough as a baby and toddler that it was hard not to think of the girl as one of her own. Patricia Dobson hadn't even been halfway interested in her own daughter until Gwen was four and a half years old - old enough that the woman believed the child could take care of herself. Ammeline still believed that the only reason Patricia began showing any interest in her daughter at all was because the woman had seen her and Ammeline together in the park. To this day, Patricia still believed Ammeline had been having an affair with her husband, Ethan.

“. . . I just can't believe that he kept saying those things to her, that he was so - so - so - happy about it,” Tammy continued, shaking her head as she stood up, her hands fisted at her sides as she turned her back to Ammeline. “She just lost her dad and Jackson wouldn't shut up! He just kept going on and on and on and I very nearly popped him myself!” she declared as she whirled back around to face the woman behind the desk.

Ammeline stared in silence as she studied the girl. It couldn't be. “. . . Tammy, the girl you're talking about - the one Jackson Pruitt was taunting is - “

“Gwen Dobson,” the student confirmed with a nod. “She's in Mrs. Thames' office now. I don't even know why she's at school. She shouldn't be here. Hell, if it were my dad who died . . . “ She shook her head as she looked toward the window behind Ammeline before turning her eyes back to meet the counselor's gaze. “I don't even know how she's keeping it together right now. I know I wouldn't be.”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

The carpet in the room was new. There were no patches of threadbare areas, no tears or cuts, no stains from spilled coffee or tea or soda. Her brow furrowed as she turned her head, looked toward the door that was open only a few inches, just enough to allow the woman's words to carry outside the office. Gwen didn't care and wasn't sure she ever had to begin with. She was long past listening to her at all, and let her mind wander to the mundane, if only to keep her sanity.

They didn't match, she thought as she narrowed her eyes. There was a clear line in the carpet that cut across the middle of the partially open doorway. On one side - the side that was the main office - the carpet was ratty, short, threadbare, and that kind of blue that was made up of so many different shades as though whoever had invented it thought it would hide stains, or not get stained at all. What a lie that was. The stains were impossible to hide.

The carpet in Mrs. Thames' office? It stood taller than the other, she wasn't sure by how much, though. Maybe a quarter inch, maybe a half, but more to the point, it was plush and it was white. Gwen turned her gaze up, looked at the desks out in the main office. They were simple constructs of cheap metal, the kind that could be purchased at any office discount store for less than forty bucks. The one closest to her had a notable dent in the leg that looked as though it was one good kick away from breaking. Turning her head back to look at Mrs. Thames' desk, her somewhat bored gaze narrowing as she tightened her jaw.

Heavy thick wood, stained a reddish brown, decorative scrolls carved into the front. It was hand done, too. She knew the difference, having spent enough time with her father on his days off when he took to wood carving and building in their garage at home. He had taught her how to use the tools, sand and carve the wood, nail and glue pieces together, everything he did he had taught her to do. She couldn't remember a time when she hadn't worked with him, carving wood and building things from it. He had called the hobby “his chair”, telling her that working with his hands was something that allowed him to find his center again, especially after a bad day.

If she closed her eyes, she could smell the sawdust from the oak and pine, the scents of wood varnish and glue. Her fingers brushed against her palms as she felt the ghosts of the wood in her hands, the heaviness of the knife he'd taught her to whittle with. She stilled as the sound of her father's voice echoed in her mind only to fade away once more. The memories she held of him hurt so much that she wanted to scream at times, wanted to rage at the world and hit things, but those were emotions that she didn't get the luxury of expressing. Being here at school was her time away, her time to be Gwen Dobson the student.

But when she left and before she arrived, she was both big sister and mother. She was the one who would have to hold her brother when he woke up crying in the night, the one who would have to read to him until he fell asleep and remind him to put his toys away when he was done playing with them. And just as she knew that she was grateful to have something else to focus on when she was here at school, she knew that as soon as the last bell rang, her responsibilities would resume.

It was the little things that seemed to get to her the most. Things like knowing that when she left school today, she would have to stop by the market on the way home to pick up Cheerios and those little banana-flavored Gerber puff snacks her brother liked because he was almost out. And when she got home, she would have to collect her brother from Mrs. Danielsen next door, because there wasn't anyone at home to watch him.

The kindly old Norwegian woman who had lost her husband long before Gwen or her brother were ever born had become a surrogate grandmother to her. Mrs. Danielsen barely spoke English, but she'd been teaching Gwen to speak Norwegian since she was old enough to talk. It seemed like such a small thing, but it meant more to her than she could explain. There was an unmistakable pride Gwen felt in being able to converse and both read and write the language fluently. It allowed her a little leeway in being able to speak her mind without anyone really knowing what she was saying - aside from Mrs. Danielsen, that was.

“Miss Dobson!”

Gwen sighed as she turned her gaze back to the woman behind the desk and blinked at her in the following silence.

“Are you even listening to me?” Mrs. Thames demanded.

“No.” Gwen sat back in the chair and crossed her arms over her chest. “The moment you told me that I was being unfair to that . . . drittsekk,” she offered the Norwegian word knowing she would have been reprimanded for calling the boy a bastard in English, “was the moment I stopped listening to you.”

She watched the woman's complexion turn ruddy as her eyes widened. Mrs. Thames' lips pursed and trembled, before she stood and slammed her hands down on the desktop. “How dare you speak to me like that! You are a child! You - “

“A child? Really?” Gwen countered as she stared the woman down, feeling as much as disdain for her as she felt for her own mother. “I'm going to give you a description, and you tell me what I'm describing. This person regularly wakes up between midnight and three AM to comfort a crying toddler. Walks through the house with that same crying toddler until they've calmed down enough to sleep, and sometimes, that toddler doesn't calm before this person has to get up to go about their day. This same person has to clean the house, do the laundry, clean up after and take care of that toddler, cook the meals, do the dishes, sweep and mop the floors, even buy the occasional groceries. What would this person be?”

She watched Mrs. Thames scoff as she removed her narrow-lens wire-rimmed oval glasses, tossing them on the desk as she sat back down in her padded leather chair. Gwen arched her brow as she waited for her to reply, watching the woman tug at the cuffs of her pale-pink suit, a suit that looked as though it had been purchased at Forever21, or someplace similar. Mrs. Thames was closing in on sixty, a fact she loved to throw out with a comment of how good she looked for her age when she would stand next to some of the younger teachers who looked older than she did. Botox and hair dye - that's what Gwen had overheard one of the office ladies say. No one respected her, that much was clear to everyone, including the student body.

“An adult,” Mrs. Thames said after almost two full minutes of silence.

Gwen offered a curt nod before standing up as she lifted her school bag to her shoulder and walking toward the open door.

“Sit back down!”

“No,” Gwen denied, her hand on the doorknob. “According to your own words . . . I. Am. An adult,” she said stiffly. “That person I was describing is me.”

She didn't wait for the woman to say anything else as she left the office, adjusting her backpack on her left shoulder as she went. She shook her head when she heard Mrs. Thames' shrill yell behind her, the woman's pronouncement that her actions only added to the consequences that she was already facing. Gwen shook her head as she stopped, closing her eyes when she heard the sound of Mrs. Jacobs' voice calling out to her from down the hall in front of her, and turned to walk in the direction of the woman's office. Quite possibly the only person in the school that she could stand, aside from the redhead who worked in the library, the school counselor was the only one aside from her father and J.J. that she really trusted.

“Come in and close the door,” Ammeline instructed as Gwen neared her office door.

She'd always insisted that the students call her by her first name, but she'd never been able to, Gwen thought. It wasn't that she had any problem with calling her Ammeline but doing so made her feel . . . vulnerable. It didn't help that Ammeline and her husband were friends of her father's, or that they had known her since she was a newborn, Gwen thought. She couldn't count the number of times she had spent over at the Jacobs' house when her father and J.J. had been out on rescues together, or simply because Ammeline had wanted to go to the country fair or out to the stables and had taken her and Dobby along for the fun of it.

Everything felt so different now that her father was gone, and there were times that she found herself imagining - wishing - that Ammeline was her mother instead of the woman who avoided any and all contact with her, if at all possible. She'd done her best to close her mind off to those thoughts, though. The vulnerability she felt from that particular fantasy was suffocating.

“How do you always know?” Gwen asked, watching as the woman tucked her pale blonde hair behind her ear as she smiled.

“Call it intuition,” Ammeline replied with a smile. “Take a seat and just relax a minute.”

Gwen bit her bottom lip as she nodded, stepping further into the office as she closed the door quietly behind her. The sounds from the office outside were greatly muffled - almost muted - the separation offering her a temporary sanctuary. Closing her eyes as she breathed in, the warm scents of sandalwood and cedar filled her nose. A hint of smoke caught her attention and she turned her head as she opened her eyes, staring at the small misshapen clay dish sitting on the windowsill behind the desk.

“I didn't know you still had that,” Gwen said breathlessly as she fell to sit heavily on the couch.

Ammeline smiled as she pushed her chair back from desk and stood, moving around the desk to join Gwen on the couch. “Of course, I kept it,” she said softly. “You made it for me, didn't you?” she asked in return, and the girl sniffled as she nodded.

“I was three,” Gwen said as she laughed softly, staring at her hands as she swallowed thickly. “I didn't even know what I was doing with it, I just liked squishing the clay.”

Ammeline laughed in return as she nodded, reaching out to rest her hand over Gwen's shoulder. “Gwen, what are you doing here? Why are you at school?”

Gwen opened her mouth to respond, her brow furrowing as her mind grew silent, her words failing her. What was she supposed to say? That her mother had forbade her missing even one day at school, telling her that there was nothing for her to cry about and that she would “absolutely not” tolerate her being an embarrassment? Perhaps instead, she was meant to tell her that she was using school as a buffer, a useless distraction to keep her mind focused on something else so that the grief that seemed to be suffocating her every waking moment was held back just enough to let her breathe for a few minutes each day.

Gwen shook her head as she felt tears stinging behind her eyes and tingling in her nose. Tears filled her eyes, seeping out between her lashes as she gasped, trying to control her emotions only to find that her grief refused to be subjugated any longer. The bag that still hung from her shoulder, slipped down her arm to land with a heavy thump on the floor beside her foot, a choked whimper breaking from within her as she felt her body begin to tremble with the force of emotions that were too strong to be understood. She lifted her hands to cover her face, steepling her fingers over her nose and mouth as she felt Ammeline's arms close around her, pulling her closer to hold her tight as she whispered to her.

She hadn't cried since the day her father's team had come to her house to notify her of her father's death. She hadn't been able to feel anything at all since that day except for the incessant nothingness that surrounded her, choked her, robbing her of her sleep and her sanity. But now, as she sat here in Ammeline's office with the woman's arms wrapped around her, she felt herself break. Everything she thought she knew was shattering around her like glass, and she didn't know how to stay strong anymore.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Ammeline sighed as she wrapped her arms around Gwen, holding the girl close as she sobbed and trembled in her arms, her tears soaking through her blouse. She was beyond angry that Gwen was here at school at all, knowing that the girl had the option and the right to be out of school for at least another two weeks, since school holidays didn't count toward bereavement time - that particular school code had been changed almost forty years ago. She sighed, her breath ruffling Gwen's hair as she rubbed the girl's back with one hand and reached for the cellphone in her pants pocket with the other.

Tapping a few buttons on the screen as she lifted the phone in front of her face, she met her mate's gaze when his face appeared on the screen. “Hey,” she greeted him softly, watching as his gaze shifted slightly to the side. “Come get her?” she asked and watched as he nodded.

“I'll be down there in about twenty minutes,” he assured her, and she offered him bittersweet smile in return.

Ammeline released a heavy breath as she lowered the phone when the short video call ended, turning her attention to Gwen when the girl grew quiet. She watched as Gwen pulled back slowly, wiping her eyes as she looked at the floor, sniffling back her tears. She was nervous and scared and so many other things that shifted through her aura, coloring her scent, but grief remained the strongest.

“Is Dobby over at your neighbor's house?” Ammeline asked and watched as Gwen nodded in return. “Okay.” She reached out, catching the girl's chin with a crooked finger and turning her face to meet her gaze. “J.J.'s coming to pick you up, he'll stop by Mrs. Danielsen's house to pick up Dobby after, and then you two will be staying with us, at least for tonight. I'll call your mom and smooth - “

“Don't bother,” Gwen interrupted her with a derisive scoff. She shook her head as she released a heavy sigh. “She's in New York . . . I don't know where, exactly. She said she got a job and needed to take it now that Dad had run off.”

“Run. Off?” Ammeline asked dumbfounded, only barely suppressing the growl building low in her throat. “. . . Wait. New York?” She shook her head as she tried to wrap her mind around what she was hearing. “When did she leave?”

“Thursday,” Gwen responded with a shrug.

“Thursday?” she repeated. “It's Tuesday. When do you expect her home?” she asked, her anger burning hotter.

`Amme,' her youkai-voice cautioned her. `She can feel your anger. Stop scaring the pup.'

It took effort to force her rage back, to remind herself of the girl sitting next to her on the couch and the upset she was clearly feeling. Closing her eyes as she took in a deep breath, Ammeline nodded to herself as she rested her hand on Gwen's shoulder.

“You and Dobby will stay with us until your mother returns. Did she say anything before she left?” she asked.

Gwen's shoulders lifted slowly only to fall with a heavy sigh. “She just said that she was glad she had always worked to keep her looks and is hoping to get the campaign. She left me an envelope with cash in it to take care of Dobby.”

Ammeline clenched her jaw as she nodded and looked away. Patricia Dobson had never once been shy about saying that she had been a high-paid model in New York before getting married. She had never been billboard famous, but she'd done more than a few magazine spreads, often telling the story of what it felt like to be in the camera's eye. The only reason she had stopped modeling was because she had gotten pregnant - coincidentally, it was the same reason she gave for getting married and moving to Maine. Both were lies. She and J.J. had known Ethan before he'd ever met Patricia, and the couple had been married close to five years before the woman had gotten pregnant with Gwen.

In many ways, she hated the girl's mother. Patricia had become pregnant and given birth to the children she had only as a ploy to keep Ethan from divorcing her. And when she had become jealous and insane with the thought that Ammeline and Ethan had been having an affair, it was something she hadn't been shy about throwing in Ammeline's face, believing that Ammeline was unable to have children of her own. It was a truth that Ammeline had never repeated out loud - not to anyone, and certainly not to Gwen, even though she knew that the girl was well aware of it. Casting the thoughts aside, Ammeline offered Gwen a comforting smile as she rubbed her upper arms and nodded to the couch they sat on.

“Try to relax,” she told the girl. “Take a nap, if you like. I don't know what Mrs. Thames has planned as far as disciplinary action goes, but I watched the tape of that fight, and whether she likes it or not, you told Jackson Pruitt to stop, you warned him twice, and only after that did you strike him, and only once. It's still technically classified as fighting, but knowing her, she won't let it go with just a warning. She could decide on detention.”

“Or?” Gwen asked.

“Or,” Ammeline repeated and sighed. “She could suspend you from school for up to a week. I know - ” she said quickly, raising her hand to calm the girl's outrage before she could speak. “I know he provoked you, and I know you warned him, and I will argue that, but ultimately, the decision lies with her.” Gwen nodded silently as her gaze fell to the floor. “Okay,” Ammeline said as she stood from the couch. “I'm going to go meet with her, you stay here until J.J. comes.”

“Okay,” Gwen agreed as she reached for her bag. “I have homework.”

Ammeline pressed her lips together into a thin line as she held her hand over the handle of her office door. Of course, the girl would turn to her homework instead of taking her advice to just relax. Gwen Dobson had stopped being a child the minute she was thrust into the role of being a mother to her younger brother. Ammeline just hoped that one day, Gwen would learn how to smile again, and that someone would teach her what it meant to do something just for the fun of doing it.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

7 January, 2056

On the edges of the Banff National Park near Calgary

Dirt and dust covered the floor, broken pieces of what once had been a small table and two chairs scattered across the hardwood floor. Maybe it was used for chess, she thought as her eyes lingered on the shaped pieces of porcelain lying near the hearth. Her attention wavered, her gaze moving to the right as her eyes drifted across the floor and up to the covered circle in the wall. Shards of stained glass were scattered across the floor near the wall, the empty wrought iron frame of the window - that was still in place - had been boarded up long ago with a piece of plywood. The smell of old stone and soot, mildew and animals clung to this place, creating a strange sense of safety, as if the house itself had been hidden from the world.

The house had been built at least a century and a half ago, based on the design of it. The modest brick and stone Victorian had been abandoned at least fifty years ago, vines covering the walls outside, and birds' nest clogging the chimney. The trees surrounding the house - pines and willows and aspen - that she was certain had once been carefully maintained, were now overgrown, branches reaching out to one another and twisting together to hide the house from view. Nature was trying to hide it, to reclaim it, but still the house held together, standing proud in the overgrowth and acting as a safe harbor for she and her daughter.

Amaya closed her eyes as she scrubbed her hands down over her face, releasing a heavy tired sigh as she let her hands fall to her lap and sat back against the old brick wall behind her. Vanessa was sleeping on the floor beside her, the child curled into a ball with her arms wrapped around the knitted bear tucked against her chest. She should have at least brought the bag with the blankets in it but there hadn't been time, Amaya thought as she tipped her head back and looked up at the ceiling above her.

Seven days ago, Satoshi had told her to take their daughter and run north while he led those following them in the opposite direction. She didn't know if they had been sent by the gyrfalcon youkai who'd been hunting them the longest, or if they were just independent brokers - youkai following them with the sole intent of capturing and selling them to the highest bidder. The only thing she knew for certain was that she hadn't seen Satoshi since that night.

This wasn't the first time they'd been separated when they'd been forced to run, nor the first time it had happened since Vanessa was born. The standing agreement had always been that she would find a safe place - a cave or abandoned house or building or even a tree that provided ample shelter - and wait for him. He always found her, always came to her, every single time. Sometimes, they were separated for only a day or two, but sometimes - and she feared this would be one of those times - they would be apart for weeks.

Amaya looked down next to her when she heard Vanessa's soft groan, watching as her daughter pulled her knees in closer to her chest as she slept, tightening her arms around the bear she held. It wasn't hard to guess that the girl was cold, youkai blood aside, the winter here was brutal, and Vanessa didn't have the same tolerance to the cold that she did. Neither Satoshi nor Vanessa could handle the cold as much as she could, Amaya thought as she shrugged out of her knit sweater and laid the garment over her daughter like a blanket. Being Kujira made her far more resistant to the cold than they were, but even she had her limits, and she was quickly reaching it.

As cold as it was, though, she didn't dare light a fire. There was no telling who might see the light from it, or what debris could be blocking the chimney, that would only serve to clog the flu and cause the smoke to fill the house instead. Dragging a hand down over her face, Amaya leaned her head back against the wall behind her, closing her eyes as she gave into the exhaustion that weighed her down. Within moments, she was asleep, the last fleeting thought in her mind being the wishful hope of believing she could feel the edges of her mate's youki.

She was still asleep when the front door opened slowly almost half an hour later, the hinges squeaking softly with the movement. A man covered in snow and particles of ice slipped inside the house, bracing his weight against the door as he shut out the winter wind. He turned the tarnished deadbolt, locking it in place, and hoping that it would hold up against the storm building outside. This house was sturdy, he thought, the structure standing tall with all the walls and the roof still intact.

He turned around as he lifted the strap of the bag higher on his left shoulder, his lips turning up in a small grin when he caught sight of his family sleeping against the wall beneath the mantel. Releasing a soft sigh as he stepped closer to them, he quietly lowered the bags he carried to the floor and unzipped the one on the right, withdrawing the bear pelt from within. Smoothing out the pelt on the floor with the fur side up, he carefully reached out for his daughter, moving the sleeping girl to lie on top of it before covering her with the quilt her mother had stitched for her.

She groaned softly, moving just a bit, but didn't wake as she curled up in the makeshift bed. Satoshi braced his hands on the floor on either side of her as he leaned down to kiss her temple. “Sorry I'm late, Ness,” he whispered, braiding his youki around hers as he moved back.

Taking the giant quilt from the bottom of the bag, he laid it out on the floor next to Vanessa, standing slowly as he moved to where Amaya sat sleeping against the wall. His mate whimpered softly when he lifted her in his arms, her eyes fluttering though she never woke. He whispered to her as he carried her to the blanket, laying her down before stepping back to remove his snow-covered clothing, and laid down beside her as he felt her youki wrap around his.

He pulled the quilt over them both as he wrapped Amaya in his arms, kissing her temple as he pulled her back against his chest. His gaze softened, his lips curling up in a pouting smile when she turned in his arms, nuzzling her cheek against his chest as she pillowed her head on his shoulder. Satoshi kissed her brow as he smoothed his hand down over her hair when she whispered his name in her sleep and chuckled softly when Vanessa moved from her bed to crawl in between them, not once bothering to open her eyes. She whimpered when she was close enough to paw at the blanket. He smiled as he lifted the edge of the quilt to invite her closer, watching his daughter as she snuggled on top of him before falling back to sleep seconds later, as he lowered the blanket to cover her. He knew they would only be able to stay here another few days, a week if they were lucky, but for now, he was just happy to be back with his family. For just a few hours, he could lie down and rest, hold his family in his arms while he left the monsters chasing them to the darkness of his dreams.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

AN: Amaya's nickname of “May” that her mate and youkai-voice occasionally use is pronounced “My” as it is simply the middle of her name.