As always, disclaimers on the first chapter!

I must not be the only one with finals this week. It's been kinda quiet on the review area, eh? I really did expect more activity. I miss you guys! I lurves your comments and thoughts on what might or might not happen! Also, it gives me something to comment about here in this area, rather than all my endless babbling and stuff. I mean, really, who wants to read this nonsense? How about another chapter instead, eh? Enjoy, y'all!

Unveiled

Two days later, I was still feeling like fate was pushing my hand as I sat in the passenger seat of the rented Escape and watched signs, stores, and trees zoom by. By hour three or four of our little road trip up to Vermont, Nick was still carrying a monologue of light conversation topics. I was only half listening, nodding or shaking my head at appropriate times, unless the question he asked called for something more...like a grunt.

Just as he was getting back to yes or no questions and I was about to recede into the world in my head to mull over the new developments in my situation, Nick pulled off the interstate and into a hole-in-the-wall diner. I blinked through the window at the small building.

"I'm starving, and since you didn't eat breakfast, I don't even want to try to imagine how hungry you are."

Nick's smile to me was one of his genuine smiles with an edge of concern in it. The tone of his voice, though, held something that I had never heard come from Nick. It sounded a little like actual worry. That didn't make sense to me, though. The Pack has handled far worse situations than the one we've been handed. Besides, it's not like they had an inter-dimensional visitor to deal with, right?

In that exact moment, something clicked in my brain and the words "we know about you" swam through my head over and over again. The message wasn't directed toward the Pack. It was a personal message, from someone I never even met but seemed to know about me. The thought sent shivers through my body. If I was hungry after skipping breakfast, the idea that someone was watching me and knew about me stole away what ever appetite I may have had.

Nick must have seen me shiver because he was holding out the wool lined jacket I picked up before leaving New York. "C'mon," he said softly, "let's get some food."

Instead of wearing the jacket, I draped it over my arms and hugged it close to my chest. The scent of new clothes, wool, and Nick drifted up from the article and I concentrated on that more than the dawning realization that time had run out and I needed to tell the Pack about me. I followed Nick into the diner, to a quiet corner booth where a waitress handed us menus and scurried off to another table before our butts touched the vinyl seats.

I barely had time to glance over the menu three or four times before the waitress came back and took our drink order. I asked for both a mug of hot chocolate, a coffee, and a third mug to mix them in. As Nick was giving the waitress his drink order, I turned toward the window and watched the powder snow falling from the sky. So quiet, compared to the near-tropical storms that we get during the Southern California winters. My view was soon briefly obstructed by someone walking by the window. My eyes followed the figure until he was out of my sight, but when I looked back to watch the snow again, I saw my own eyes looking back at me.

As my focus became my reflection, I studied my face. It was thinner than when I was first plopped into this world and my eyes seemed to glow. Well, the glowing may be the headlights that kept passing by, but I looked so different in the reflection of the glass than I did the last time I really looked at myself in the mirror.

During my scrutiny of myself, our drinks arrived. I was vaguely aware of Nick telling the waitress that we needed a few more minutes for our order as I turned away from the mirror and poured coffee from the pot into the empty mug. I was trying to carefully pour the hot chocolate, still lost in my own thoughts when Nick broke into them.

"Interesting way of drinking coffee."

Startled, my hand twitched and sent hot chocolate spilling to the table. I snatched up the paper napkin under my silverware and cleaned the dripping mug. After setting it aside, I placed the napkin over the small puddle my spill made and looked at Nick.

He was looking at me over the rim of his mug, smirking at my misfortune.

"It's something my old roommate showed me," I mumbled with a half-hearted smirk. "Easy way to get a good mocha in places like this. Well, relatively easy, and I question the 'good' part."

Nick put his coffee mug down and reached across the table. His hand rested over mine and gave a reassuring squeeze. Before he had a chance to speak, the waitress was back to take our orders. Nick sat back and ordered steak and eggs and I just nodded to indicate that I wanted the same.

We didn't speak again after the waitress left. It was as if the moment was ruined and we both were afraid to try and build it back up. When our food arrived, we still hadn't said anything to each other. I felt Nick watching me as he scarfed down his meal and I picked around mine. A few bites of steak and I was done. I just hadn't felt that hungry. Nick wouldn't let me get off that easily, though. He took the hash browns off my plate, but insisted that I eat the eggs and steak. I picked at a few more bites, but was too lost in thought to realize that I wasn't helping in getting myself out of the diner any faster.

After our plates were taken away, Nick insisted on dessert. I wasn't even aware that he ordered a slice of chocolate pie for me until the waitress placed the plate in front of me with a clean fork.

"Nyx, I wish you would tell me what's wrong."

Nick's voice was so soft that I looked up from my plate at him, blinking as if I had been woken from a deep sleep. "Huh?"

He smirked. "You're not eating, not talking, just sitting there all emo-like. Nothing like after the play, though I can understand why. What's on your mind?"

I licked some whipped cream off the prongs of my fork before setting it back down on the plate. My hands folded in my lap and I started picking at my nails nervously.

"Have you ever seen The Neverending Story?"

"Yeah. It was definitely one of those painfully obvious 80's movies," Nick laughed. "What does that have to do with anything?"

I fidgeted a bit, still picking at my fingernail as I started to quote from one of the final scenes of the movie: "'He has suffered with you. He went through everything you went through. And now, he has come here with you. He's very close. Listening to every word that we say.'"

I looked up from my hands to Nick, who was staring at me with confusion in his eyes, chewing on a bite of his pie. I looked back at my fingernail and continued quoting, hoping that eventually it may click. "'Just as he is sharing all your adventures, others are sharing his. They were with him when he hid from the boys in the bookstore. They were with him when he took the book with the Auryn symbol on the cover, in which he's reading his own story right now.'"

Again I looked up at Nick, my heart thudding in my chest with nervousness. I was worried that he would not understand or just not believe, worried that he would decide I'm absolutely insane and recommend that the Pack put me down immediately, but, most of all, I was afraid that he would leave me there alone in that diner.

None of my worries had come true just yet. Nick was still staring blankly at me, not having made the connection. I suppose movie versus book would confuse some people. I took a deep breath and tried a more direct approach.

"I'm from... The night of... When Clay and Elena..." I swallowed, unable to get the words out. Afraid that my choice of explanation would damn me and eventually end me. "I'm not supposed to be here!"

Nick sat up straighter, blinking at my sudden outburst. I caught myself glancing over his shoulder to see if anyone had noticed, but the diner was conveniently empty of other patrons. Looking back at Nick, I bit the side of my tongue to distract myself from the first prickle of tears threatening to come.

"What do you mean?" Nick's brow furrowed as his mouth turned down in a confused frown. "Jeremy thought it best if you and I both--"

I shook my head. "Not here, here," I pointed to the table we were sitting at. "I mean here, HEEEEEERE!" I pointed all around me, the universal sign of all encompassing, right? Wrong...

"Nyx, I don't understand what you're saying."

I made a whimpering sound of frustration. "I mean I went to sleep in front of my computer in California and I woke up in a cage in Stonehaven! Where I come from, there is no interracial council, there are no supernatural races, there's barely any magicks left worth mentioning!"

His expression changed from one of confusion to something more guarded. I reached across the table to place my hands over his, as he did for me earlier.

"Nick, where I come from there literally is no such thing as werewolves. The reason I know so much about you and the others is because you're a story. A series of novels written by a woman named Kelley Armstrong who decided after a crappy episode of X-Files that she could do better. It's how I was able to readily accept being bitten, how I knew Jeremy's name, how I knew about you and Antonio being father and son; it's how I know about Malcolm..." I paused to lick my lips, feeling my throat tighten and my voice become a whisper as I tried to get everything I had to say out before my tears made their grand entrance. "...it's how I know that your grandfather, Dominic, was the last Alpha and died of a stroke without a named successor."

My eyes locked on his, I felt Nick pull his hands away from under mine. No one in the pack talked about the last Alpha, especially not to me. His eyes had darkened and he seemed to be holding back growling at me. "I need to make a call," he said softly.

I watched him as he walked past me and stepped outside. For a few moments I watched him through the window as he pulled out his cell phone and called someone. I assumed it was Jeremy. When I felt sure that he wasn't going to abandon me, or maybe it was that I was too numb to worry about it, I looked down at my melting slice of pie.

Chocolate... I loved chocolate. Nick was the only one who didn't bother asking me what flavor I wanted when a dessert run was made. He would always bring me back something chocolate. Suddenly chocolate was making my stomach knot and turn, so I shoved the plate aside and waited for Nick to hopefully come back.