Summary – Hunter arrives in Widows Vale with his mentor Ciaran MacEwan. There he meets his half brother Cal and his girlfriend Morgan, whom he feels strangely drawn to, and is sucked into a cat and mouse game that has played between Ciaran and Selene Belltower for years and on top of it all he is reunited with his cousin Sky who is a Seeker for the International Council of Witches and has been hunting him down for years.

Disclaimer: These are all Cate Tiernans toys. They're just in my playground.

A/N: Okay so the second chap is ready sooner than I thought I'm making good progress. I'll try and get as many out as I can before next week. The reason for this is because I write my fics at work and don't get much opportunity to write at home and with the christmas rush coming up I'm being changed departments until the middle of December to help out in the warehouse which will mean I'll have no access to a computer to do this. :-( I'll try my best not to leave you hanging for too long. In the meantime, here's chapter 2. Enjoy x

To hell with my Parents. They left us! Why should I waste my time hunting for them when they don't want to be found? I could focus my time and energy doing what I am destined to do. I know now, the taibhs told me. I need power, more power. I must leave this stifling town and my family. They grow suspicious of me, my cousin Sky especially. The taibhs whisper to me about other witches like me, I'm setting out to find them. I'll leave tonight.

Giomanach

Awkward wasn't a strong enough word to describe the overall feeling in this room. The second Cal had walked through the door he was seated opposite me. Selene had introduced us, "Cal," she had said, "You remember Ciaran MacEwan?" Cal had nodded, "This is his apprentice Hunter," She hadn't mentioned my last name and it was obvious that she was deliberate in doing this. She wasn't going to give him my full name so he could connect the dots.

Ciaran, however, was. He jumped right in and told him my last name and explained to Cal that I'm his half brother. That's all it took for Cal to take an instant dislike to me. It was obvious he holds a deep resentment towards our father, probably because Selene poisoned his thoughts against him.

It wasn't long before Ciaran dragged Selene out the room so that they could converse in privacy, which left me and Cal sat alone in the kitchen. I knew Ciaran did this on purpose so that Cal and I would have the chance to get to know each other a bit. I looked up at Cal, he didn't take his eyes off me and if the looks of burning hatred could kill I'd be a dead man.

I had done nothing wrong here, he was mad at our father, he had no reason to be mad at me. "Look, I only just found out about you myself and if it helps you feel better he left me too. I have just as much reason to hate the guy as you do," I finally said

"He left you too?" he chuckled darkly,

I nodded, "He and my mother just packed up one night and left me, my brother and sister. They left no note, gave no reason, we were taken in by our aunt and uncle."

I could tell that Call still didn't trust me, but he seemed to relax a little. That was a good thing. I wanted to get to know my half brother. We had something in common besides blood.

"So how long are you and Ciaran sticking around in town for?" Cal asked me

I shrugged, "Goddess knows."

"Well if you're still here at the weekend, why don't you come along to my coven circle?" he offered, he was trying too. The awkwardness was still there but at least he was trying.

"That would be great," I said earnestly

"Well apart from me, and my girlfriend, Morgan, it's just a bunch of non witches. The circle feels pretty juvenile, but it's cool to finally be able to lead my own circles,"

"So tell me about Morgan," I asked, "I hear Selene say she's pretty powerful, this generations Sguirs Dan. She and Ciaran seemed pretty excited,"

Cal's face changed, "Yeah, they are,"

Something was bothering him, "What's wrong?" I asked

"Between you and me?" he lowered his voice, I nodded, "I was fine with it all, getting close to her, getting her to trust me, I was doing my part, being the good son and earning my brownie points for Amyranth. My mother wants to drain her powers, but I don't know if I'm okay with that anymore. I like Morgan,"

"You've fallen for her for real?" I leaned forward

"I don't think so," he said, "But I like her, I mean… I don't know" he buried his face into his hands, "I just don't want her to die," he said finally when he looked up. "Why am I telling you all this? You'll probably just tell Ciaran and it'll get back to mother, she'll kill me."

"I promise I won't, we may have only just met Cal, but we are brothers after all. I'll not tell."

"Thanks," Cal sighed in relief, "I'd like you to meet her, I think you'd like her. She may be uninitiated and unlearned but the strength and determination she has! She can send witch messages and light a candle with her mind and she's been practicing a little over a month now. But it's not just her power after everything she's been through lately, finding out she was adopted the way she did, and how she's handling everything. I just really admire her. She's like us Hunter. Her parents didn't want her either. I don't want to hurt her."

That's why Cal was attached to her, she was another young witch unwanted by a parent, or in her case, like mine, it was both parents.

"Since you spilled a secret I'll you tell one of my own," I offered, Cal may have poured his heart out to me a moment ago in a moment of weakness, but it didn't mean he trusted me, to gain trust I'd have to give him something personal too. Cal looked up interested, "I've never been okay with the killing." I admitted, I'd never even told Ciaran that, "I've always been extremely uncomfortable with it. There's a lot of reasons why I've chosen this path, I want more power, I don't want to limit myself. But I don't believe killing anyone is the way forward. I know it doesn't make sense, and I know Ciaran doesn't actually like having to do it either. But he believes it is necessary and in some ways I see his point. But conjuring the dark wave, it doesn't just target the coven, it eliminates whole towns. That is a lot of innocent people who have to die for the sake of a few witches. What makes that necessary?"

"I'm totally on your side with that one," Cal sighed, "What if we can manipulate Morgan into joining our side. Then my mother, Ciaran and the rest of Amyranth wouldn't consider her an opposing threat."

"Do you really think they'll go for that?" I ask, "Surely they just want her power for themselves?"

"And her mother's coven tools," Cal added,

"Her coven tools?" Cal nodded and explained to me how Morgan was the last living descended of the Irish Woodbane coven named Belwicket. Her parents were Maeve Riordan and Angus Bramson. Maeve and Angus had fled a danger in Ireland and came to America with their daughter. Morgan had found Maeve's book of shadows here in Selene's library and had used it to find the location of her hidden coven tools. I had heard of Maeve Riordan, Ciaran had spoke of her once. She was a very powerful witch. But she was a Woodbane who had renounced the dark side. I hadn't missed the way Ciaran spoke of her, he had loved her.

"So they gave Morgan up to protect her,"

Cal looked at me like I was stupid, "It doesn't matter why they gave her up!" he spat, "They should have stuck together as a family,"

Clearly Cal had more abandonment issues than I did, "Cal, Morgan would be dead if they hadn't let her go, surely you can see that?"

Before Cal could answer Ciaran and Selene returned. "Thank you, Selene." Ciaran said, "We shall be on our way. Hunter and I will stick around in town for a while. I would very much like to meet this Morgan,"

"Come by tomorrow evening," Selene said, "My coven Starlocket will be meeting here and Cal will be bringing Morgan. I've also extended an invite to your cousin, Sky, Hunter. I'm sure you'll keep her entertained for us." She smirked at me

"Yes, of course, Selene," I replied. As if the reunion with my cousin wasn't going to be bad enough, it was going to be under the eyes of everyone else.

I thought about what Cal had told me about Morgan, I didn't know whether to mention to Ciaran whether Morgan was Maeve daughter, he loved her, I could tell and he may be bitter about Maeve having bore a child with someone else and that would have an effect on whether or not Cal and I could convince them to get her to join our side instead of killing her for her Magick. I decided not to say anything. That is if Selene hadn't already. She would, without a doubt, already know. After all she had Maeve's book of shadows. But because of the way they kept playing mind games with each other I just knew she wouldn't have told him.

We said our goodbyes, luckily Cal no longer seemed to be irritated with me for my comment earlier. We exchanged phone numbers before he ran up to his room. I followed Ciaran out to the car, I was still a little pissed at him for dropping off the Cal bombshell on me. "How long have you known?" I asked him a little while after he had set off,

"Since you told me who your father was when you first came to me," Ciaran admitted,

"And you left it until now to inform me of a half brother I never knew I had?"

"It didn't seem important at the time," Ciaran brushed off my anger

"It didn't seem important," I chuckled humorlessly, "Of course it's important Ciaran! He's my brother, I had a right to know, how can that not seem important to you?" The man actually had the nerve to sit there and not answer my question. He looked amused with himself, it irked me that Ciaran would sometimes play me like a puppet, there will come a day when he will no longer be able do that to me.