*****
It took almost three hours for Finn to wake up, and when he did, he looked much better than he did when he collapsed. The first thing he did was check to make sure that I was in one piece. After assuring him that I was alright, he asked if there was anything to eat, and when I told him there wasn’t, he frowned.
“I can go find something,” he offered.
“How do you plan to do that? We’re in the middle of nowhere. I don’t see any convenience stores.” He just stared at me in silence until I started to get uncomfortable. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“I actually meant that I could shift and go hunt.”
“Like as an animal?”
“Yeah, that’s generally what we shift into,” he said dryly. “Do you have a problem with that?” he asked, getting defensive.
“No, of course not! Finn, you just saved my life. You were willing to fight that werewolf to get us both out of there. I won’t ever forget that.”
“It was nothing,” he mumbled, looking away.
“Though to be honest, I don’t know what you were planning to do with just one hand.”
He looked at me and smirked. “You’d be surprised what I can do with just one hand.” He waggled his eyebrows, looking much more like the arrogant Finn I knew. Making sure I got his good shoulder, I reached over and smacked him.
“Don’t be gross,” I said, even though I was grinning along with him.
The two of us lapsed into a thoughtful silence, and I immediately went back to thinking about my mother. Finn must have sensed that something was bothering me, because he was watching me with something that almost looked like genuine concern. “Are you alright?”
Can I talk to him? Would he understand how I feel right now? It’s not like there’s anyone else that’ll understand…
I took a deep breath. “While I was there, Andrew tried to teach me more about necromancy. We were in his library, and I was supposed to be raising some recently deceased animals. As I was trying, I saw another ghost that made me lose focus and I raised them all at the same time, which is what Andrew wanted, but it really freaked me out. He was so focused on what I was trying to do he didn’t even see her. But I did.”
“Who was she?”
I sighed. “It was my mother. She appeared to me in the library,” I said when Finn didn’t speak. “but I haven’t been able to contact her again. I thought it might be because I didn’t have my pendant, which was originally hers, but I don’t think that’s it anymore. Maybe I was wrong and it was just a trick of the light.”
“Do you really believe that?”
I shook my head. “No. She was there. I just don’t understand how she could be there now, after all of these years, and then not appear to me again. I spent three days in the dungeons after seeing her, and I thought I was going crazy. It would have been nice to have someone to talk to while I was there.” My eyes had started to burn with unshed tears, and I looked away so Finn wouldn’t see. “I was all alone in that cell, and she wasn’t there for me. I’d give anything to see her just one more time. To tell her goodbye.”
Finn sighed. “I understand how you feel.”
“Do you?” I asked, yawning. Everything was starting to catch up with me, and I could practically feel my eyes closing against my will.
“I lost my mother when I was twelve. I know what it’s like to miss someone so much it hurts.” I looked over at Finn, surprised to find no arrogant smirk on his face. He was relaxed, open, and sharing parts of his life with me. When he noticed me watching him, he shrugged his powerful shoulders. “It was years ago, and I’ve gotten over it. You will, too.”
That woke me up a little. “My mother’s been dead for years, too. But that doesn’t make it any easier, especially since I always got the feeling that she was the only person in my life that actually loved me. My dad gave up his rights to me when she died, and I went into foster care.”
“My dad killed my mom,” he said so quietly that I would have missed it if I wasn’t focusing on him. “She was having an affair with our pack leader, and when my dad found out, he killed her. Our pack leader threw him out of our pack, and I became a burden to the others around me. I left my pack when I was sixteen and I’ve never looked back. I couldn’t.”
“That other werewolf was part of your old pack, wasn’t he?”
Finn nodded. “An old friend of mine. He hated me for leaving, but he just didn’t understand that there was literally nothing there for me. The pack was full of angry bloodthirsty animals, and I didn’t want any part of that. When I left, he saw it as a betrayal. They all did. Now I’m an outcast, and if any member of my pack ever sees me again, they’ll probably try and kill me, too.”
“Just because you left?”
He looked at me with a frown on his face. “A werewolf without a pack is a rogue, and rogues are never trusted. We’re worse than dirt in the supernatural world, Ronnie. I know you’ve seen how the Council treats me. They tolerate me because most werewolves won’t have anything to do with the supernatural community and they can use the extra muscle, but they don’t trust me, and they certainly don’t like me.”
I slid closer to him until I was pressed up against his side. “I trust you. You’re good Finn, and anyone that thinks otherwise is a fool.”
He didn’t say anything, but I didn’t expect him to. He was still staring at me as if I’d just grown a second head, and I expected it had something to do with the fact that I was curled up against his side, and was resting my head against his good shoulder. I should have probably moved, but he was warm and comfortable, and I was tired, and my eyes were already closing.
I was almost asleep when I felt Finn’s good arm snake around my waist, pulling me closer.