Chapter 206

I couldn’t believe that Candido was continuing to go through with this, but as I watched and listened, there was no sign of him stopping. Duster, or whatever his real name was, was left twitching and foaming at the mouth. Blood started to run down his cheeks from his eyes.

“He’s the familiar of…” Psyche pulled back as he choked and went still. “There’s nothing left in there. His mind shattered.”

I glared at the woman. Estella scoffed and lifted her gun to Duster’s head. She fired. His head exploded in a burst of blood and brains that splattered over Candido. I covered my mouth as my stomach lurched. Candido’s eyes widened. He stared at Duster’s body as it fell sideways.

“She said that his mind was shattered,” Candido said. “You didn’t—Why did you do that?”

Estella looked at him and blinked as she couldn’t believe that he would ask her that. I stepped forward.

“It should have been Candido’s right to decide on his fate, not yours,” I said. “He was a member of Moon Shadow—”

“What good is a living traitor?” Estella asked, tilting her head. “Did you want him to potentially recover his faculties? Or maybe lead his vampire contact straight into Lunae? He’s a familiar, do you even know what that means?”

Everyone seemed tense, and Candido stared at her before speaking.

“No. I don’t.”

Her lips twitched. “I didn’t think you did. A familiar is a vampire who has established a link with someone by taking blood. It means that the vampire drank from him, and not only can they share thoughts, but he could find him if he were still alive.”

Candido swallowed and went still. “What… else?”

Estella frowned. “What do you mean?”

“What else could a vampire do with a familiar bond?”

Estella looked at Psyche. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Candido.

“Mind control is the most common if the vampire is of a strong enough lineage, and the vampire didn’t use that blood for power enhancement… It’s one or the other when it’s little more than a few drops of blood.” She paused. Her entire body was tense. “There’s mimicry too. Vampires have the ability to change their physical composition. Not like illusionary shapeshifting or even real shapeshifting. It’s usually just enough to change the way they’re perceived. Some people have a very high mimicry ability, others not so much, but we all have it.”

Candido set his jaw and jerked his head. “Thank you for telling me… I don’t get the sense that it’s a secret that’s usually shared.”

“It’s not a secret.” Psyche rolled her shoulders. “It’s part of the reason why vampires can walk around without being noticed much.”

“Mimicry?” Candido frowned.

“When you drink enough werewolf blood, you start to smell like one,” her lips twitched. “And werewolves killed the last human a long time ago.”

Candido looked up. “I… was always told that—”

He shook his head. “Never mind. Thank you, Psyche.”

“That’s it?” I cried and turned to Candido. “It’s so obvious that she just killed him to hide whatever else he was hiding. She had to be lying and just didn’t want a member of Blue Moon or Moon Shadow to read his mind. Why couldn’t she tell who he’s a familiar of?”

I glared at her. “Was he your familiar?”

Psyche cocked an eyebrow. “Are you done showing how crazy you are?”

“I’m not crazy!” I turned back to Candido. “Candido, she—”

“As he said, all of the mind readers of Moon Shadow are dead,” Candido said softly. “Blue Moon as well…”

“But—”

“Apollo was the last one,” he straightened himself. “I trust you, Estella. If there was nothing else to get out of him, there’s nothing else. Psyche… could you tell anything about his vampire contact?”

“I didn’t get an image or a name, but he was definitely connected to Marius.”

“How can you just trust her just like that? She’s—”

“Her heart didn’t lie,” he said. “Hers or Psyches.”

He turned to me. “Right now, we are all relying on each other to get out of this alive. This is a joint mission and we need to treat it as such. Let’s get going.”

I clenched my jaw and stood in front of him. “You can’t just take her word over mine in front of everyone. I’m—”

“Hedy,” Candido said softly. “Stop. This isn’t the time.”

My eyes welled with tears, but his expression didn’t soften. He turned and went to haul someone onto his back.

“Let’s keep going.”

I stood there, trembling, watching him walk away and lead the rest of the group forward. I sniffled, furious and unable to understand why Candido was treating me like this. It was so obvious that she was trying to come between us. It was even more obvious that he was letting her come between us. I had to get rid of her. As everyone continued to follow him, I set my jaw. I had to get rid of everyone who was standing between me and Candido. But how?

The Heart of the Moon would help change their minds, but would it be enough?

“Hey,” Peter said with a smile, coming up to me. He wrapped an arm around my shoulder and pulled me along. “Let’s get going. That makeshift barrier isn’t going to hold forever.”

I crossed my arms and looked up before leaning into Peter. I stared at Candido’s back as we walked, wanting him to look back and see me leaning into Peter, to see how he treated me, to be jealous, but he didn’t look back.

“What can you tell me about the Heart of the Moon?” I asked Peter.

“Storytime, hm?” Peter hummed. “I wasn’t alive when it was last seen, but I was told by the priests that it is a glowing stone tied to the moon goddess’ avatar, the sun. It’s supposed to shine like you’re holding the sun in your hands. All the warmth of the world is held within it, every drop of love and good feeling too… It is said to be the physical embodiment of the Goddess’ love for her creations.”

“Why… is it here?” I frowned. “I thought the Goddess loved werewolves.”

Peter’s lips twitched. “It’s crazy to hear how wrong the story on the other side really is. It’s said that when the world was split, and the gates to Lunae were created, the Goddess tore out her goodness, her love for creations and placed it in the hands of the Vampire King along with two other artifacts.”

“Why the Vampire King?” I said, stiffening. “Wouldn’t it have been better to give it to the Alpha King? He was the stronger of the two. The more loving of the two?”

Peter snorted. “The first Alpha King was nowhere near as strong as the Vampire King. Still isn’t, let alone loving.”

“Candido is stronger than a corpse.”

He cocked his eyebrow. “You… really don’t know.”

I frowned. “Don’t know what?”

He shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. I doubt it’ll mean much to you. You plan to stay with Candido, right?”

I narrowed my eyes. “We’re mates. Of course, we’ll be together.”

Peter hummed. “Well, the why isn’t all that important, so much as that it happened. The Vampire King hid it to maintain the gates of Lunae.”

“What does that mean?”

He hummed. “Well, a certain amount of… energy I guess you could say washes between this world and Lunae, sustaining this world. So long as the gates were open, this world was stable. Haven’t you ever wondered why the trees feel strange?”

I frowned. “They don’t.”

Pete hummed. “I guess you would have been too young to realize it, or maybe you weren’t alive? I don’t know—How old are you?”

“I’m twenty.”

His eyes widened. “Never mind. You definitely wouldn’t have been alive. When the gates were completely closed a little over thirty years ago, the forests started to die. The whole world started to decay.”

I frowned. “Our world is fine.”

He chuckled. “You haven’t noticed anything? The change in food? The lower number of births in the packs? Nothing?”

I frowned, thinking back. Candido had given me some of the documents regarding the territory a long time ago, but I didn’t remember reading them. I spent a lot of time pretending to read it and asking Candido questions just to get him to spend time with me, but I hardly cared about any of it.

“It’s okay,” Peter said. “It doesn’t really matter.”

I eyed him. “What do you mean it doesn’t matter?”

“It’s in the past,” Pete said. “And there’s nothing anyone can do to change it.”

I nodded. “Go on.”

“The legends say that so long as the Heart continues to glow, the gates would never been closed. For a long time, we were at peace. Then, the betrayal came, it turned dark and everything changed.”