Eclipse, Chapter 18
As they crossed the road to the path, Carys reminded herself not to stare at Emily, and not to ignore her either. And then she remembered Emily's scars, and reminded herself of the same, for an entirely different reason.
Knowing as much as she did, Carys didn't like Emily or Sam, but she knew she would have to put up with their presence and be polite for the sake of the alliance.
The thing was, it wasn't simply that they'd betrayed Leah due to an imprint. That would be bad enough.
What was worse, was that Emily had out and out lied to Leah for quite a while about her relationship with Sam. Even if she'd been well intentioned in the beginning when she'd told Leah that she wouldn't go off with Sam after he left Leah for her, she'd acted wrongly afterwards. Emily had lied to Leah constantly about seeing him, about standing with her, about not breaking her heart all over again.
During the time before rumours of their relationship reached Leah - because they were less than discreet about spending every day together - struggle or not, she'd played her cousin. Like a fiddle.
And it was only when there was no denying it, when her mother had confronted her about her behaviour, and then Leah had, that Emily had gone to Sam to break up with him.
It was truly terrible what had happened next, and Carys was horrified they were still together after it, but it was everything that led up to that moment that showed Carys that Emily was not the sort of person she liked.
It would have almost been less cruel of her if she'd simply told Leah she'd changed her mind and wanted to get to know Sam. That way, at least, Leah wouldn't have been relying on someone who was betraying her behind her back for months.
Carys wondered if Leah would have been able to bear it a little more if her trust hadn't been undermined and broken so completely and consistently by first her childhood sweetheart, and then both him and someone she looked to as a sister and confided in.
Emily may seem like the nicest person in the world to others, but there was no getting past what she'd done to the woman who she was closest to. Just as there was no real getting past what Sam had done to Emily - from Carys' point of view. It seemed as if the matter was truly in the past for the others she was about to see.
But Sam was, at least, in the matter of Leah, honest enough to break up with her. He, at least, had made his position clear from the start. He'd ripped the bandaid off and broken Leah's heart. Emily had tried to have her cake and eat it, breaking Leah's ability to entirely trust that anyone in her life but Seth would truly stand by her.
Well Carys would.
She squared her shoulders as they came to a turn in the path and were faced with Emily's little house.
It was small - a little bigger than Carys', she thought - and faded grey, with a blue door that had seen brighter, more colourful days. The window beside it sat above a window box filled with the brightest collection of marigolds Carys had seen for a while. Orange and yellow, the flowers were clearly loved and tended to; an indication, she supposed, of the sort of home it was.
Carys' small smile firmed and fell away. Leah glanced her way, and her lips tipped up again of their own accord.
Pausing mid-step a good ten feet from the door, Carys rocked on her heels.
"Worried you'll like her after all?" Leah asked quietly as she too stopped and turned to face her. "Like I said, it's pretty normal. She did used to be like a sister to me. I understand how easy it is to like her."
Lovely people don't go behind their sister's back for months, especially not when they're lending them a shoulder to cry on at the same time, Carys thought.
She took a deep, centering breath. "No, it's not that. I just need a sec, if that's okay?"
"'Course," Leah said. "Getting your stiff upper lip in place?"
Carys smiled despite herself. "Something like that," she quipped. A few moments later, she nodded and they started off again.
The door flung open at very moment they reached it, revealing Paul. He was dressed all in black this time, with his t-shirt matching his cut offs and trainers.
Carys grimaced at the wide grin on his face as he looked her up and down. Leah chuckled.
"A little birdie tells me you've been talking about me," Paul said with a wink. "Honestly, Carys. No need to be shy. Yours wouldn't be the first cold bed I've warmed lately."
Carys' jaw dropped, and she emitted a long, faint, whine of horror.
"My bed is-is-"
"Yes?" Paul smoothly replied.
"Plenty hot and steamy," Carys gasped, crossing her arms over her binder as she held it in front of her as a shield. "Not that it's any of your business."
Paul tipped his head back and laughed, involving both his chest and shoulders in the action.
"Good one. Damn, you're funny," he announced, giving her one last wink before he turned and headed back down the corridor, disappearing through a door to the right from which the sounds of loud chatter and laughter could be heard.
"It is," Carys whispered to Leah, who merely clapped her on the back and smirked before following after him. "No, but it is," she insisted. "Really hot and steamy. I'm talking Mills and Boon might blush."
Leah whipped around and walked backwards. "Sure it is, Carys. That's the spirit. Dream it and one day when you're a bloodsucker, it might be true," she said, punching the air the moment before she too disappeared.
Why did no one believe her? It was. It is. It had been for five hours that morning, and it would be that night as well. Probably.
Carys wiped her feet on the welcome mat by the entrance and closed the door behind her before she followed, looking about her as she did so. The small corridor was filled with various paintings and drawings. Nearly all were framed, and some were marked in the bottom right corner with the signature: E. Young.
They were really quite good. Not that Carys would mention it. She was determined not to say a thing.
"I'm an art teacher," said a soft, sweet sounding voice from the top of the stairs behind Carys, and she turned to see Emily descend towards her.
Don't say it. Don't say it. Don't say it, she chanted to herself.
"They're really rather good," Carys politely replied.
Damn it all to hell.
Emily smiled radiantly as she reached the bottom and joined Carys. The middle of the three large scars that ran down the side of her face tugged at her lip when her expression gradually eased, leaving her with the impression that she was constantly on the verge of smiling.
She was shorter than Carys and Leah - shorter than she had seemed the first time they'd met - and Carys realised it was because beneath her light dress, she wore dark leggings and socks. She must have been wearing heels to the funeral.
The chatter from the other room ceased, as if everyone else in the house were listening out for something.
"Thank you," Emily said, meeting Carys' eye with a warm, wistful glint in her own. "I like to think they're alright."
Carys nodded and fiddled with one of the corners of the binder she still clutched to herself. "I should be getting in," she said awkwardly, nodding towards the open door.
"Of course. Please." Emily swept out her arm to indicate Carys go first.
Carys turned and quick marched into the room, then stopped short. Which she figured was now a funny turn of phrase, because she was one of the shortest people there.
It was rare she felt tiny, but she did faced with the room of wolves, all standing or sitting around the kitchen. All staring at her. The room was unbelievably warm, which she attributed to all of their body heat in one concentrated place. It made her head a little woozy.
She looked about and recognised most, but not all.
Leah drew her gaze immediately. She sat on one of the countertops to the other end of the large space, away from almost all the others, munching her way through a doughnut.
Paul lounged against the wall beside Leah, slowly - a little too slowly - picking off a piece of a large muffin, which he placed on his lip when she met his eye and-
Carys looked away before he drew it into his mouth. That was awful. It was one thing that she had said he was hot. Once. By accident. Another that he was trying to get a rise out of her. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction.
Her gaze fell on Seth, sitting at the table between Jacob and a boy who, despite his height and appearance, seemed as if he were younger than the rest. It was in his nervous expression and loose posture. Collin or Brady. Brady, Carys amended. Collin sat opposite them, on the other side of the large spread of baking in the middle of the table. She knew it must be him as turned his head to stare wide-eyed adoration at Leah after the briefest of moments.
Sam stood closest to the door, and Carys side stepped out of Emily's way when she quietly cleared her throat behind her. Emily headed straight for Sam, who snatched her into a tight embrace and planted loving kisses to the right side of her face. She turned, her back to his chest, to watch as Carys' eye moved quickly on.
Normally Carys would think such a display was sweet, but not when it was them and Leah was sitting mere feet away.
Jared leaned against the counter nearest the oven, to her right, watching her over the top of the large muffin he was taking huge bites of.
Quil and Embry sat together on the left side of the table, to one side of Collin. While Quil was slumped in his chair, Embry had tipped his back onto two legs to look past his friend's shoulder.
Carys sidled further into the room, unsure where to go. She wasn't going to go and sit beside Leah as she'd planned. Not when Paul was still eating as if each bite was the most savoured of his life. It made her skin itch unpleasantly, as if his regard meant she was doing something wrong.
She shifted uncomfortably and stared at Seth, hoping he would notice the appeal in her eyes.
His grin grew tremendous as he threw his chair back and stood in one quick motion, drawing the startled attention of the room as he shoved past the back of Jacob's chair, past Jared, to Carys.
Carys squeaked as he slapped his hands to her waist, gripped, and deposited her onto the countertop behind where she'd been standing. He blushed, drew away, and looked behind him as everyone began to laugh.
"Thanks Seth," Carys said, a little loudly. The laughter cut off and Seth looked at her again, his body blocking most of the room from view. "I wasn't sure where to sit. Thanks for helping; you're the best."
Seth's blush deepened as a proud smile lit his face.
"I thought I was the best," Leah shouted across the room. "What happened to that?"
Seth scrambled onto the counter beside Carys, his feet almost touching the floor.
Carys bit her lip and spoke around it. "You are the best." Releasing her lip, she leant against Seth's arm and added, "But so's Seth."
"And I'm the best looking," Paul announced with a bark of laughter.
Carys shook her head vehemently. "Leah's the best looking, followed by Seth - in a not weird way."
"That's just 'cause they got all the genes," Embry complained with a frown, then explained, "they're the only ones descended from all the three wolfish families."
Carys drew slowly away from Seth and gave him a wide-eyed once over. He leaned in when she motioned him to, and she whispered, almost silently, and without moving her lips, in his ear:
"Does that mean you're inbred?"
Seth shook his head and pulled back, leaning in again to whisper, "No. Not really. It's over loads and loads and loads of years."
Carys met his eye as he straightened, and nodded. Once.
Returning to the room at large, she said, "Sounds like you just proved my point, Embry." She listed off the fingers of one hand as she spoke. "Best looking, best genes, best family, best people, best wolves."
Jared grinned as he scoffed, and loud exclamations to the contrary coursed through the room as Leah leaned forwards and laughingly yelled over the top of them:
"Can't argue with logic! You all suck! Enjoy the bottom of the barrell, boys! Ugly, the lot of you! Inside and out!"
Carys laughed, feeling more at ease as they yelled back and forth than she had since she entered the room. With their attention refocused, she felt far less of an interloper. The ice had been broken. No one was on their best behaviour.
The ease lasted all of a minute before the cacophony of sound died down.
"Have you eaten already, Carys?" Sam asked in his low, booming voice, nodding his head towards the table. "We thought you might be hungry from what you said earlier, so Emily whipped some things up."
Carys' eyes and nose pricked. She was hungry. And the remaining doughnuts had been placed on a plate in the middle. And Emily had baked. But Leah. But could she be rude enough to say no?
No.
"It all looks delicious," she told him, staring at the platter of muffins. She'd never seen larger in her life. "I will, if that's okay?"
"Of course!" Sam said, though Carys' question had been directed to Leah.
Leah nodded imfentissimally as Sam stared intently down at Jacob, who, after a brief silent exchange, sighed and stood up, loading a plate with a muffin, two doughnuts, and a savoury pastry before carrying it across to Carys.
Carys looked around her and shuffled back, lifting her thighs before she placed her binder down onto them and took the plate from him.
"Thanks, Jacob."
"'S'okay," he told her before he returned and slumped into his chair.
Carys glanced at Seth. He'd said the exact same thing. In the exact same way. Smiling, she looked back and hesitated, the pastry halfway to her lips.
"Quit staring, you weirdos!" Leah snapped, swinging her arm out in Carys' direction as she kicked towards Brady. "How's she meant to eat with a bunch of teenagers gawping at her!?"
Most of the wolves did as they were told in so much as they darted looks at her and pretended they'd looked away, but Brady, Seth, Leah and Emily continued to watch as Carys took a slow bite.
Deliciousness exploded on her taste buds. She'd never tasted anything quite so incredible. It was all she could do not to close her eyes and moan as she chewed. Salty, crunchy, smooth, buttery, flaky, and melting on her tongue all at once.
Damnit! Emily was a good baker to boot!?
Carys swallowed the bite and looked up to Leah, who smiled encouragingly. "What's in this?" she asked as she looked again at the pastry.
Heaven, perhaps?
"Cheese and gherkin pickles," Emily told her. "Seth said you like them together."
Jared grimaced. "Which is why the whole plate's left. You Brits have some really weird taste."
Emily looked towards the floor.
"Shit. Sorry Em," Jared backtracked, waving this hands through the air in front of him. "It's not your baking, I swear!"
Carys stared at Emily as she raised her head and smiled a little at Jared.
"Gherkin pickles?" Carys wondered aloud as she returned the pastry to the plate and set it down in the space Seth created between them. "It's really good, don't get me wrong, but I think he meant pickle as in pickle."
They all stared at her.
"Pickle?" Jacob asked slowly. "Isn't that pickle?"
Carys floundered for an explanation under their scrutiny. "It is. A kind of pickle. But pickle in England - that is to say, what we call pickle when we say cheese and pickle, it's... How to I describe it? Um..." She bit her lip and glanced at the ceiling momentarily before she stared out of the windows at the other end of the kitchen. "It's like... I guess it's like relish? Made from... Pickled carrot and onion, and... Other veg? And it's all kind of together? In this jar... With... Well, it's dark brown, and, and you can have it chunky or smooth, and it's... Well, it's pickle..." She trailed off lamely.
Ten shapeshifters and a human eyed her warily.
"So that's not what you meant?" Emily worried as Sam's arms tightened around her. "I'm so sorry. You don't have to be polite; that must taste awful. Seth, would you?"
Seth went to take the pastry. Carys realised what he was going to do and, without so much as a thought, grabbed it, stuffed as much of it as she could into her mouth, and chewed, shaking her head at him.
Seth sniggered and let his hand drop.
Carys chewed some more, swallowed, and then gulped in a breath just before she surrendered the last of it to its fate.
"Now you see what you all look like," Leah called. "Acting like its your last meals. The state of you all. Not you, Carys. You're fine," she added quickly.
Carys whimpered around the delicious mouthful and blushed as she realised half of the room had their jaws hanging open.
"Sorry," she whispered awkwardly, covering her mouth after she'd swallowed. "It was just really good."
"I guessed. You nearly bit my hand off," Seth joked.
"Sorry." Carys grimaced.
"Well. I think it's safe to say Carys is taking the rest of those home in a doggy bag," Quil said with a faintly shocked sounding laugh.
Carys' cheeks grew hot. She twisted this way and that.
"Maybe the bloodsuckers don't feed her," Jacob said, to a chorus of murmurs.
"I'm right here," Carys said as she straightened up, "and I eat just fine. I just skipped breakfast is all."
"What's for breakfast?" he asked, emboldened by the response of his friends. "Blood sausage?"
"We eat black pudding with a full English, so more likely yes on my own than with the family," she archly informed him, "but Carlisle usually bakes me a croissant or two for when I wake up, and makes me coffee to go with it."
"Croissants?" Embry asked with great interest as he leaned over the table. "Every morning?"
"Every morning," Carys confirmed as she realised she'd forgotten her coffee in the car. "Almost every morning, anyway. He was... busy this morning, so we picked up doughnuts on the way in."
"Do you get lunch and dinner too?" Brady asked before Embry could, his eyes alight.
Carys chuckled again. What did they think it was? Prison?
"Every day," she confirmed with a nod.
"And snacks?" asked Collin.
"And snacks. Probably too many snacks sometimes."
"But you do all the rest of your own cooking?" Quil asked this time.
Carys shook her head and adjusted her binder, curling her hands over the edge so she could let her legs slump. "I do cook, but sometimes Carlisle and I will cook together, or I'll do a slow cooker job. Sometimes we get dinner in, or one of the others will cook for me. There are whole weeks where I'll not cook a thing because Carlisle's cooked instead."
Brady's eyes rounded. "But it must taste bad," he asked genuinely, "I mean... I mean... I mean... Because," he lowered his head and voice to say, "they don't eat..."
"You don't always need to eat to cook, I suppose. I feel bad sometimes, but Carlisle says he likes to cook for me."
"I like the way you say things," Collin breathed, his eyes as large as Brady's. "You have a really cool accent."
Most laughed, but a couple of the others in the room nodded.
"Thank you," Carys indulged.
"Is it, is it, is it, um, is it true," Collin asked in much the same awestruck, interested tone, "is it true that you're..."
Carys tipped her head forwards and waited patiently.
"That you're... That you told them not to call us dogs?"
"Ah. Yes, I did, but I had help."
"And they listened?" he asked, twisting his hands together. "Just like that?"
"Well they had to," Carys informed him with a kind smile. "They knew what they were doing was wrong."
"Did-um, did your vampire?" Brady asked with a glance to Jacob. Carys liked the sound of that. Her vampire. "Did he call us dogs too? Because-because Edward did."
Carys glanced around the room to find almost everyone hooked on her every word. "No, Carlisle put a stop to it too. More than me, really. He didn't know, and he was horrified when he found out. So was Esme-"
"She's the one who slowed things down for us, isn't she?" Brady cut across.
"Not for us," Jacob told him with a roll of his eyes, not quite sharing the younger boys' interest in the Cullens. "For her."
"Well, yeah..." Collin murmured for his friend, ducking his head. Looking up at her from under long lashes, she prompted, "But still?"
Carys indulged him with another warm smile, and he lifted his head with a small smile of his own.
"She is," Carys said. "We're all really sorry they called you that. It wasn't right."
Embry drew her attention next. "Jasper seemed to really respect your input, but you're a human," he said, leaning further back in his chair. "Tell us about that."
Carys smirked. He sounded like a news anchor. He seemed more confident with the rest of the wolves present.
"Give me another of those pastries, and I'll explain?"
Quil snatched one from the plate and pushed himself up, leaning across the space to hold it out to her. Carys leaned as far forwards as she could without falling and grabbed at the air for a second before getting a hold on the end and taking it from him. Seth held out his arm so that she could use it to push herself back, and she thanked him.
A minute or two later, pastry consumed, she brushed the crumbs from her fingers onto the plate beside her and stared at Leah as she said, "As Carlisle's mate, I guess it's a bit like Emily."
Leah's face was a blank mask.
"Emily?" Embry inquired, waving her to go on with a roll of his wrist. "How so?"
A few of the boys laughed this time.
"Well, I'm his coven mate. Which means, as he's the head of the coven, so am I."
Everyone stopped still, then shared speaking glances with one another. Quil covered the side of his mouth with his hand and whispered something to Embry.
"Emily's not the Alpha, Carys," Leah said as she leaned forward, gripped the countertop, and kicked her legs. "She's Sam's fiancée."
Carys head whipped to Sam and Emily.
"You're not the head with him?" she asked.
Emily and Sam shook their heads, bemused by the turn of events.
"Oh... Well... Maybe it's just a vampire thing then?" Carys mused aloud, addressing the room at large. "If I had a coven and Carlisle became my mate, he'd take his place as co-head. As he has one, I do the same. It's the same for all of them."
There could be power structures in place within the relationships of the leaders which effected the overall power structure, but Carys didn't mention that.
"So, you mean to say that I've invited the head of a vampire coven into my home?" Emily asked with a twinkle in her eye.
"More like Sam did for you," Carys said, nodding towards him. "I did offer an alternative."
Leah snorted, and Carys smiled at her.
Slapping her binder, she said, "Which reminds me. To business... Now... Some of this might not be PG-13... I don't know if I should show it all to you."
"It will be fine," Sam responded before Brady or Collin could voice the denials that lifted them almost from their seats. "We've seen and shared a lot. I'm sure there's nothing in there that could be a shock."
"There is," Carys told him worriedly.
"I assure you, there won't be," he replied.
"I think there might be though."
Sam rolled his eyes. "Why don't you tell us what you think is too graphic, and we can decide for ourselves?"
"It's really bad."
"You can at least say what it is?"
Carys looked to Leah, but her friend said and did nothing, so she sighed. "There are pictures of vampires next to a corpse, and one vampire ripping another's jaw off," she told him quietly.
Emily gasped and Sam's jaw firmed. Time and movement ground to a halt. The only sound came from Embry's chair thudding back onto four legs.
"I knew you had pictures," Leah said softly, barely audible across the space, "but I didn't realise they were hunting when you... Fuck...ing hell..."
Carys nodded at her as vomit rose in her throat. She shouldn't have said it the way she did. She was usually better at containing her reaction and convincing herself not to respond to the pictures; distancing herself from them. But to say it out loud...
"Collin, Brady, Seth. Out. Now," Sam ordered.
Seth was the only one to complain, "I'm old enough!"
"Someone needs to patrol. Go, Seth," Sam added when Seth opened his mouth again.
Carys covered her mouth and retched, and was suddenly enveloped in warmth as Seth hugged her from the side. She leaned into him, resting her chin against his shoulder and patting his arm when he didn't immediately let go.
"Can Collin and Brady patrol and I just don't look at those pictures?" he asked over Carys' head. "Please, Sam?"
Sam didn't answer. The seconds stretched.
"Please?" Seth asked again, drawing out the word. "I promise I won't look. Leah? Please?"
Carys settled her cheek to his shoulder instead and looked back and forth between Leah and Sam. Leah's face hardened.
"Yes, you can stay," she told him, ignoring Sam as he snapped his head in her direction. "As long as you swear you won't look."
"I swear," Seth promised quickly.
"On everything," she double checked.
"On everything."
"Alright," Leah said, continuing to ignore Sam as Brady and Collin filed from the room. Sam looked thunderous, but he didn't contradict her. "Let Carys go, Seth. And Carys? I think you'd better fill in all the gaps this time."
"I plan to," Carys promised as Seth did as he was told and released her. "It's a long story, and one with a couple more twists and turns... I'm not sure I'll come out of this smelling like roses."
"How come?" Jared asked in a business-like tone as he and Paul crossed to the table and sat down in the newly vacated seats. "What's so bad you haven't told Leah already? We already know you noticed some vampires in Seattle and tracked them for a couple of weeks. And took photos. And we know you recognised one of them and worked out who another was. What else? Yeah. We know it's the red-head behind it all."
"Well..." Carys shifted in her seat and glanced at Seth, who took the hint and hopped of the counter to go and sit beside Leah.
She had her permission to tell the story, and to give full context to it all, but Carys was a little unsure of how to go about it.
"I suppose our story really starts in 1920, when Victoria - that's the red-head's name - when Victoria's mate, James-"
"I thought her mate was dead?" Jacob exclaimed.
Half the wolves shushed him immediately. Sam and Emily took the chance to grab two chairs from beside the wall and sit down behind Jared, Embry and Quil.
"He is," Carys said, "but he was alive and kicking then. So... Our story begins in 1920, when James found his blood-singer. A blood-singer is-"
"Bella explained about those," Jacob cut in again, ignoring the shushing this time. "It's when someone's blood is irresistible to a particular vampire, isn't it? Like Bella's is to Edward."
Carys nodded. "Yes. Now. There's a good lesson actually. Because Edward's unheard of in resisting her. He's overcome his thirst because of his love for her, but most vampires would have immediately attacked her. It's rare that they wouldn't."
She waited for their ahh's and oh's, and a couple of confused murmurs to die down.
"If anyone else interrupts, I'll personally take them outside," Paul said, cracking his knuckles as he looked at them all.
"You were in 1920 for some fucking unknown reason," Leah prompted.
"Right. So." Carys' voice lowered as she returned to her storytelling. "James found his blood-singer in a young woman named Mary. Now, Mary was special. Incredibly special. She could tell and feel things were coming sometimes that other people couldn't. Because of that, she ended up being sent to an asylum - that was what they called them back then.
"There was a psychiatrist working there - a vampire. He realised what the other doctors didn't. He took her under his wing... One day, James caught her scent. Unfortunately, I can't be sure of the details, but what I do know is this: the vampire protected her.
"He tried to keep her safe, but James was a relentless tracker, and so, in the end, keeping her safe meant turning her. When James came upon them and realised that Mary's blood was changing, he killed the vampire protecting her in retaliation. But really there was nothing more he could do. She was turning into a vampire, and James' anger and bloodlust wouldn't be sated by a half-turned meal.
"So. He left her alone, and she woke up once the transformation was complete, with no memory of her human life. But her ability to sense things had come with her into her new life. The first thing she saw when she woke was her husband. The second, her family."
"I thought she was alone," Embry asked. "And you said she couldn't remember anything."
"I swear to God, Embry." Paul gritted his teeth and growled low in his chest as tremors wracked his body.
Carys jumped.
Seth flinched as Jacob whacked a hand to Paul's shoulder, gripping until the tremors died down. When they had, he slapped Paul's arm twice and drew away.
"Please, continue," said Sam.
"Are-are you sure?" Carys asked faintly.
"Extremely," Seth told her with a grin. "Who's Mary?"
"Well...," Carys said in a low tone as she spread her hands wide. "I said she saw them... I didn't say they were there..."
"So Mary's Alice, then?" Leah said with a roll of her eyes. "Fucking dramatic story, this."
It was Leah's turn to be shushed, and Carys smirked.
"Yes," she told them quickly. "Alice was once Mary. And she was James' blood-singer. Only," she said, looking at each of them in turn as she showed down again, "she didn't know it... Fast forward... eighty-five years. It's early 2005."
"Oh for fucks sake!" Leah exclaimed, banging her head back against the wall.
Carys laughed heartily. "Buckle in, Leah. It's gonna take a bit."
Thanks to: Guest (ahh! I hope you won't be disappointed when you find out! So excited! We get two chapters with the wolves!), BMBMDooDoo- Doo- Doo- Doo, Shelley J88, GuestMG, jhaenox, KEZZ 1, Momochan77, 0oKitteno0, Jane (they really do make an impact - each and every one of them - thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with me, it honestly means more than any of youn know! Thank you so much - I've definitely started to over time, but I would have disagreed back when I was writing Twilight. I'm so proud of this, it's a little embarrassing! As for the specific guest reviews - they definitely made me feel that way, and almost made me want to only post once a week going forward, but I realised they're not reading my replies if they're still going, so perhaps I'm worrying over something where they're not giving me the same courtesy), hellocherryblossoms, souverian, 19irene86, and Guest (I can't always update daily - this chapter is less than two days after the last) for your reviews.
