The Savelli Family

Close encounter

Siro’s POV

Even after all their time getting ready, Sofie and Louisa were still the last to join us. I could see Louisa looking for my reaction. I would have thought she would have taken the hint by now, but no. She was going to make me reject her. I sighed, turning to the stairs.

When we arrived at the party, I could instantly smell that there were humans, wolves and other supernaturals in attendance. Then I smelled something I had never smelled before .... it was another supernatural but not the kind I was used to. I looked through the crowd, Seth beside me, having smelled it too. I pinpointed the scent or more scents across the party. I made my way towards them hesitantly, my curiosity needing to know who they were, but the mystery of them making me cautious. Seth noticed it first, the crystals that hung from their necks. My brother linked me “they couldn’t be, could they?”. We stopped as they looked towards us and quickly their brows furrowed. A woman who looked in charge led them towards us. She halted just in front of us and asked simply “who are you?”. “I may ask the same” I replied, avoiding her question. “I am Lora, advisor of Nathair, god of the faerie dragons and pseudodragons. Now tell me who you both are. And don’t try to lie to me unseelie, what has your queen sent you here for?” she said, too quiet for any human to hear. As she spoke she never broke eye contact as she moved between Seth’s and mine. “We serve no Queen”, Seth said sternly. Lora’s eyes widened as she searched our faces for a hint of a lie. When she was finally satisfied she saw none, she asked “but you are unseelie?”. I rolled my eyes, crossing my arms over my chest as I gruffly replied back to her “technically”. “Look, this isn’t really the place for this conversation” I added, motioning around to the mix of people around us. “You’re right” she said as she snapped her fingers. “f**k” Seth said beside me as we realised she had popped us with her. As I looked around, the scenery was absolutely breath-taking. I was almost swept away by it. Almost. “Where are we?” I said bluntly back to her. She shrugged “in Seelie lands. We will wait here for Skerrit”. “I thought you served Nathair?” I asked cautiously. “I do, but my elders also asked in such situations I call Skerrit instead” she said, looking over the horizon. “And what is he god of?” Seth asked beside me. Lora smirked back at us “you’ll see”. My stomach twisted with her smile. What could be worse than than the god of dragons? I met her line of sight, looking towards the horizon, when I heard a crack of twigs to our right. I turned my head swiftly, taking a step defensively closer to Seth. Seth seemed to do the same as we knocked into each other.

That’s when he came into view. A centaur. But not just any centaur, he was massive, the biggest horse I had ever seen, with his human form just as giant. He wore armour and was heavily clad in weapons. Not that he would need them, his hoofs were big enough to be weapons of their own. I didn’t take my eyes off him as he walked casually toward us. When he finally stood mere metres before us, he turned to nod to Lora before looking back at us. “Unseelie, I am Skerrit, god of the centaurs. Now tell me what brought you to the human realm. What has your queen asked of you?” His voice was hoarse and deep, but most of all it radiated the power beneath. “We serve no queen”, Seth groaned beside me, “ We already told her that” he added, motioning to Lora. I could see Skerrit tense, obviously not used to being spoken to that way. “I’m sorry.... my lord. What my brother means to say is we are unseelie yes, but our family left our herd many moons ago. Now living our lives as part of a werewolf pack”, I said respectfully, with a slight bow. “And how did you come to be there?” He said as he took another step uncomfortably closer. “Our mothers true mate is a were” I answered honestly. “And they just accepted her? Accepted you?” He said, taking another few steps closer. Before I could answer, he answered himself “I believe not, since magic has tried to block your fae scent, may work on weres young wolves but it will not work on us”. I said nothing as I slightly bowed, Seth copying my actions beside me. Skerrit now turned to Lora, “quite the conundrum, unseelie and yet not at the same time. Makes the question of what to do with you ever more complex that you are half were”. I peaked up to see his face, he looked like he was mulling it over in his mind. I stood frozen, my brother beside me for what felt like an hour. In truth, it was probably a few minutes before he spoke again. “You are free to go.... for now. But if we hear so much of a whisper of misdeeds connecting to you, we will act. And act without mercy. You and your family are truly one of a kind. I have never heard of a were accepting his unseelie mate.......Quite rare indeed. Now go, before I change my mind. And don’t think we won’t be checking in on you from now on, we aren’t that naive” he said as he began walking away from us and by the time he finished, he had vanished from view. I turned back to Lora as her fingers snapped and we were back at the party, not a second seeming to have passed by. “We will be watching” she warned, as she too walked away. After she was gone, I turned to Seth and he looked as bewildered as I felt “home?” I suggested. He nodded with a simple “yeah”. We walked back towards the pack house together. It was quite a distance and usually we would have shifted for such a trip but we both needed the time to wrap our heads around what had just happened. The seelie now knew of our existence and would be ‘checking in’ on us. We both knew we needed to tell our parents. We also knew this might scare our father into turning rogue in an attempt to hide our family from the unknown motives the seelie now had towards us. Before we reached the pack house I slapped my hand on Seth’s shoulder, gaining his attention. “ We need a plan first”.