Anna could feel it as soon as she opened the door to her and Charles' cozy cabin, the groceries wrapped in her arms. The television could be heard from the den where Charles, Samuel, Bran and Asil all watched a press release. She sensed the negativity even before the words on the television reached her werewolf ears.
"They are monsters! As we see in the court case of Les Heuter, the werewolves are dangerous and will only hurt those around them!"
Hearing the words herself spoiled the mood that she had been hoping to keep as she entered the house from her trip into town. Without thinking, she began to pull out some lunch from the freezer that she could heat up and serve to the men seated and conversing in her sitting room.
As of late, the news tide had taken a hammering blow at their hope for peaceful co-existence. She knew Heuter was probably a large trigger to finally get the crazies to get their words out into the public. There had always been the crazies, she knew, but now that the world knew that the supernatural creatures in their fairy tales were indeed real, they suddenly wanted to hear anything they thought would reassure them that the bog bad wolves would not barge in their houses and eat their children.
Of course, asking the wolves themselves seemed completely out of the question apparently.
Anna growled softly as she shoved the pan into the oven, trying to hold back her irritation at the futility of politics. Everyone just wanted to hear something that would make themselves feel better. Something that allowed them to go to sleep that night thinking that they were completely safe- that was what the world wanted, not the truth. Not the truth that Anna had found out herself- that monsters were all over the world and came in every species whether it be werewolf, human or fae.
She shook her head then, unpacking the groceries and putting them away as a new voice began speaking on the television in the living room. It was a female voice she actually recognized.
Pausing in her process of putting away the groceries, Anna shifted to a spot where she could see the television from her position in the kitchen. Her ears had been right.
A small, delicate and beautiful woman was standing at the center podium on the television. Her mist gray eyes were focused with careful intensity on the camera and her soft blond hair framed her tanned face before it fell over her shoulders and onward. She was a vision as always, but Syndie Houst was not known only by her beauty when one thought of her. The sizable scar of puffed skin on her skin was what every persons' eyes were drawn to when she came up now. Her wonderful music that could come from her fingers on any instrument were thought of as only second.
Her husband Gage Houst stood behind her with his slightly taller than six foot height. His hair was instead the soft color of chestnut and his eyes the color of a clear and light blue. His pale hand rested on the shoulder of his young wife as she spoke.
Anna hadn't realized she had shifted closer until Bran spoke and she found herself leaning against the couch that Charles was seated on.
"Do you know them, Anna?" Bran asked, his voice pleasant although Anna knew better. Her father-in-law could hide many things from her but she had known him for too long to not be able to read him in that moment. Bran was frustrated.
"No," Anna spoke, thinking of what to say to help the situation. "But I know of her- and her husband. They're both crazy talented musicians. Sydnie is a world ranked concert violinist and her husband is a music producer to many classic artists, like Yo Yo Ma." She saw the names already on the screen and was happy she didn't to quite explain everything. So, what else did she know, about them... She smiled then as she remembered her father had always joked with her that if she kept reading to much into the gossip that she'd get thrown into it.
"They're technically separated," Anna spoke, smiling at the memory,though maybe not the ironic accuracy her father always possessed. "But their paperwork was never processed because of what happened to their son a few years ago." She'd barely finished speaking when Asil spoke up, all of them now turning their attentions away from the screen and its words.
"And what happened to him?" Asil asked, his eyebrows risen and Anna wondered if none of the males in the room had heard of the world-renown disappearance of Grey Houst.
"Grey Houst?" Anna asked, looking around at the males around her in surprise. Nothing. Absolutely no recognition. She continued, wondering how to proceed. "Syndie's son was abducted from their home about three or four years ago, I think." Anna said. "It caused a huge explosion in the press...?"
Bran seemed to confused at her bewilderment. "Scandals happen all over the world," he spoke, trying to understand her confusion. "We have problems of our own to deal with. We must take care of our own first."
"Yes" Anna nodded, but her finger tapped her lip, telling him there was still something he was missing. "But, do you know what she told the police when she talked about how he was taken?" She asked, sounding nervous and he shook his head.
"Umm," Anna answered, looking unsure. She then turned toward the television and the woman speaking. "Maybe she'll explain it better."
Bran turned back to the screen- and actually looked at the young woman on the podium.
"Her scar," Samuel spoke, his voice awed. Bran nodded.
"A werewolf made it." Charles growled, the entire room then quieted to listen to the beautiful woman on the screen.
"Four years ago," Sydnie spoke, her voice hoarse. "My home was invaded as I and my son slept. I ran to his room and gathered him into my arms as his door was forced open by beasts."
Anna saw Charles straighten in his chair and bit her lip, waiting for the rest.
"The beasts attacked us. And then, instead of simply letting us die, they took my son from my bloody arms and dragged him out of the door." A short, hiccup of a sob left Sydnie's throat as she trembled, her story shaking her. Her husband began to pull her into his arms, offering comfort, but she shook her head, determined to not fall. Anna respected the woman and the strength she was forcing herself to have for her missing son.
She continued and Anna felt the awed silence fill every soul watching the woman. "They took my barely twelve-year old son, my baby, and left me to die in his room. It was only by the grace of God that my husband had wanted to surprise us and arrive home early from a business trip the next morning and took me to the hospital. I survived by grace." A pause, in which a powerful tremble ripped through the woman's body, her hands clutching at the ends of the podium as she spoke the next words. Those words were soft and wet- at first.
"But my son... My sweet baby boy." Anna saw Gage beside her place his hands over his eyes and couldn't help how her heart hurt for the grieving father as well. "They took him. Werewolves. They took my innocent Grey. My poor baby." The words were cries now, each word filled with anguish and pain as Gage pulled his wife into his chest and they both grieved and made their ways off the podium. The entire room was silent as another woman stepped to the podium and showed a picture of Grey Houst.
"Grey Houst was called the next music prodigy of the century," Anna said into the silence, her eyes softening as the camera zoomed in on the picture being held in the liaison's hand. The boy's light brown hair swept slightly into his shining gray eyes. The picture showed the boy smiling at the camera, as if right on the edge of laughter, his skin as pale as his father's. He was a spitting image of his parents. The adorable boy had Anna feeling tears well in her eyes.
"Was he?" Bran asked, looking slightly unsettled. "And how did I not know of this event?"
Anna shrugged her shoulders as a new couple took the podium, whining about their dogs being eaten by a wolf that was wandering their neighborhood. She snorted. Turning back to the continue her errands in the kitchen, Anna continued in her words to Bran.
"A lot of people thought that she was only doing it for publicity and that it was actually her husband who had cut her up so badly."
"That's impossible," Asil shook his head. "A human would never have been able to make those marks."
"I didn't say it was logical," Anna spoke as she pulled out the food she had stuffed into the oven earlier and set it on the burners to cool. "I only heard about it from Boyd and Justin when it happened. The mystery of the kidnapping was large news in the werewolf underworld, apparently." She shook off the thoughts of her time under the Chicago pack, not wanting to get sucked into memories.
"There were also rumors that Gage killed Grey when he was apparently cutting up Sydnie and that they dug him a grave in the back of their house."
"Then why would he rush her to the hospital?" Bran asked, the rumors sounding ridiculous.
"To hide the crime?" Anna asked as she stretched to place a bag of chips in the top rack of their pantry. "Who knows? Welcome to the land of rumors. But, back to earlier, because of the criticism, Sydnie retired and retreated into her house. Gage was kind of right behind her. They both have the money to do that." A pause. "I guess...after the revealing of werewolves to the public, they have come back out to look for Grey."
"Do you think he's alive?" Samuel asked, his voice unsure. "He got attacked too that night, right? He might already be dead."
A sad silence filled the room and Anna couldn't help the little voice in her heart that said, against all evidence, "maybe not."
