The Alpha's Secret

KEEPERS MANOR II

MORIA

I follow quiet and slow behind them, content to have even a few minutes alone to myself.

My first since the last time I almost drowned.

The trees lining this path look like weeping willows, but their leaves, drooping down to brush the base of their trunks and moving listlessly in the cool breeze are a cacophony of colors.

Bright orange and red shades not unlike the colours you would see in autumn except I suspect this is how they look like all year round. Blues and pinks and purples interspersed between them.

It feels like walking through a painting.

I can hear birds chirping and the sound of tiny creatures rustling between the golden leaves and the shrubs.

It all makes me want to stop for a minute and close my eyes so I can soak in the peacefulness of it all till it calms my frizzled nerves.

But the path is a short one and soon we leave the enclose of trees and Tristen is pushing open a set of ornately carved wooden doors so that we step into one of the blue, dome roofed buildings I had seen from outside.

It is a foyer.

An extremely large one at that.

With the vaulted ceiling reaching so high, I can just barely make it out.

There are wide, winding staircases in all four corners of the space and ornate balustrades running all across the upper floors.

But the most mind-blowing part are the people.

There are people and creatures everywhere I look.

Walking, flying, floating.

Their voices ricocheting off the white stone walls.

A plush red carpet leads out from the door to the reception area which consists of large marble top on the front side of which is carved a large circular emblem.

The emblem is sectioned like a pie, each section bearing a colourful sigil carefully emblazed unto it.

A Sun of silver backed by transparent wings

A Golden chalice of Blood

A Crystal globe surrounded by mist and wisps of light

A Sea shell of the colour of salmon with a pearl in it's center.

A Wolf against a back drop of the moon.

The hairs on my arm stand on end.

But again before I can get a better look, Tristen turns right and marches towards the sweeping stairs to the left.

Barely sparing a glance at the reception desk and the two tiny, white haired Chryseis look alikes floating behind the huge counter who had perked up at his arrival.

Their similarities to Chryseis is almost startling.

The same angelic heart shaped faces and round blue eyes. The same minuscule size. The floating.

They must all be from the same division or at least the same Clan.

Axe smiles, winking at them so they blushed eagerly.

I find myself rolling my eyes behind him even as we follow Tristen up the steps.

I try and fail to ignore the open curiosity my is presence is generating.

All the eyes on me. All the strange creatures wondering who I am.

It makes me want to make myself smaller.

I wonder if they call tell that I'm not from their world.

I catch up with Axe at the third step.

“Do you flirt with everyone or only the floating, white haired people?”

The raised eyebrows and smirk on his face tells me I have just stepped on a land mine.

His lips pull into a smirk and he throws his arm over my shoulder.

“Oh baby…don’t be jealous, there’s plenty of me to go around. Besides it’s not my fault the every one in their division finds me irresistible”

I could have sworn I hear Tristen who was a step ahead of them scoff slightly the same time I do.

I lift Axe's arm off me. “Somehow I feel Chryseis would object strongly to that."

He shrugs. “Denial does not change fact. Faeries love me"

I can't help but snort back a laugh at his charming obnoxiousness. “Okay Mister irresistible. Dare I ask what division you are?”

He spreads his arm wide. “You my dear, are looking at a Drifter from the clan of Mages.”

Then he lowers his voice in a conspiratorial whisper. “…the other clans would deny it but we’re the only clan who can do any real magic”

Even Tristen can not resist rolling his eyes at this one.

We reach the top of the stairs and take a sharp right so the foyer disappears from view.

I find myself watching him quietly.

The way he walks, face forward, back ramrod straight.

The way his shoulders fill out and stretch shirt across his back.

He moves with the surefootedness of one who is not accustomed to being questioned.

The light from the fires lining the walls of the passage and burning a bright, curious white, reflect off the shiny dark locks of his hair and I start to wonder just what Clan had produced this man.

But before I can summon the wherewithal to ask him, we are stopping and he is knocking on a tall, narrow door.

A female voice bids us entry.

The room we have stepped into was not what I had been expecting.

The walls are still the same white stone.

Except now there is a plush white carpet creating a central path and there are gray pillars that don't quite reach the roof on both sides.

The part of the floor uncovered is now a shiny slate varnish so clear I can see my slightly distorted reflection in it.

The room itself is narrow and strangely long.

So much so that the other side looks impossibly far away.

Then something even stranger happens.

We take only a few steps but suddenly the end of the room which had looked so distant, is now barely a feet away and when I look back at the door through which we had come in , it now looked like it is a mile across.

Somehow we had covered that distance in less than a minute.

I whip my head back and forth. “How…”

“The distance is an illusion”

I almost do not hear the actual words because for the first time since I got here Tristen had just spoken to me without the coldness in his voice I had come to associate with him.

Now it is a tone of indifference and I don’t know which one I hate more.

“You’re late”