The Blood Moon Twins
Chapter 124

REMY

I didn't know why I felt so nervous. It was just Caulder I was talking to. He had never looked down on me for the things I liked or wanted, and he was always on my side. He was the one person I knew would always have my back, no matter what happened, so this should've been an easy conversation. Yet, my heart was racing at the thought of opening my mouth.

We were walking through the small garden in the backyard for some privacy. Caulder moved at a slow pace, and I was sure it was because he was still worried about my health. I woke up feeling completely fine, though. The wolfsbane had finally cleared my system, so all of my wounds healed while I was sleeping. My body only felt a little stiff from how long I had been lying in bed.

"Okay, you're starting to worry me a little," Caulder finally said after several minutes of silence. "You're not usually this quiet. What's going on?"

I took a deep breath to prepare myself, and then I knew it was time to rip off the bandage. "I've been thinking about it a lot, and I don't think I would make a good leader for this pack."

Caulder stopped walking. "What are you talking about? You're so caring. If you want to lead this pack, then I'm sure you could do it."

This was what I was afraid of. I knew Caulder didn't want to be the leader, and if I backed out, it would put him in a tricky situation. "That's the thing. I don't know if I even want to be the leader anymore. I know I have been talking about wanting the chance for almost my entire life, but now that it's sitting in front of me, I realized that I may have only wanted it because you had it."

Caulder's eyebrows knitted together. "What do you mean by that?"

I stepped to the side and cupped a pink rose. All of the flowers were in full bloom with summer right around the corner. This was the time the garden was most beautiful. The summer heat still hadn't arrived, so it was a joy to be outside and enjoy all of the foliage. It was interesting seeing the flowers looking as beautiful as ever. They didn't have to worry about the drama that came with life. They just had to be.

"I looked up to you. I still look up to you," I corrected. "You have always been so talented, and everyone looks at you like you can do no wrong. The best compliment I got growing up was how cute I looked, but no one complimented me on my fighting skills or any other skills, because I was never as good as you."

Caulder hesitated. He took a step towards me, but he stopped before he was standing next to me. "That's not true. You have your own special talents that I don't have. You can read people better than I can, and you are much more caring. Part of me wonders if Julie would have cracked the way she had if I hadn't slept with her and then tossed her to the side when I was done with her. Everyone thought I was perfect, but they were only overlooking my flaws."

I turned around and smiled at him. I knew more than anyone that he wasn't perfect, but he was still the perfect brother to me. "But that's the point. People looked past your flaws and praised you for everything. I wanted that attention. I was desperate for that attention, so I thought if I acted like you, I could get it. That's why I wanted to run the pack. I wanted a chance to prove myself, just like you had."

I took a breath to try to calm my heart, but when that didn't work, I continued talking, wanting to finish my explanation. "Now, things are different. I love you, Caulder, but I don't want to be you. I want to be me, and I'm grateful I have had the chance to find myself. However, I realized I don't want to run this pack."

"Are you sure?" Caulder's voice was neutral, so I couldn't tell if he was upset by this or not.

"Yes, but I don't want you to feel obligated to take over the pack. I know it's something you were struggling with, and I don't want to be selfish." I was talking too fast to breathe, but I didn't want Caulder to think I was just giving up and forcing him to take over the pack.

Caulder stepped forward and pulled me into a hug. "You're not being selfish. You're just being honest with yourself, and I'm so happy that you have realized all of this before you forced yourself to do something you didn't want to do."

He let go of me, and I stood there, just blinking at him for a moment. "You're not mad?"

"Why would I be mad?" he chuckled. "Honestly, this works out better than I would have expected." He started walking again, continuing down the garden path.

I skipped to catch up with him. "Okay, your turn to talk. What's going on in that head of yours?"

He clasped his hands behind his back and took a couple of dramatic steps forward. "Well, I was going to wait to find the right time to talk to you about this, but you brought it up first. The past couple of days, I have felt different. I think dad noticed that, and he gave me more responsibility on the rescue mission. It was easy for me to step up and take charge. I don't exactly know why it felt different. Maybe it's because I had choices in what felt like the first time. I wasn't obligated to take charge, but I wanted to. It felt like the right place for me to be."

He flipped around and started walking backwards, so he could look at me directly. "I didn't want to just take it from you after what you went through to make our parents realize you deserved a proper chance. I was going to suggest co-running the pack." I clasped my hands behind my back and matched Caulder's odd steps. It was something we always did as kids. One of us would take dramatically large or small steps, and the other would match the pace until one of us changed it up, only for the other to follow the lead again.

"I think you should just take it over. It would be less complicated that way, and then I could figure out what I want to do with my life," I said. My fear was completely gone, and I felt younger with one less thing hanging over my shoulders. "Well, have you ever thought about a career path?" Caulder asked.

"I used to think I wanted to be an artist, one who traveled the world and drank coffee at little cafes in big cities." That was a very old dream of mine, and I hadn't thought about what else I might do. I had just assumed I would stick around the pack, helping out where I could. "With those stick drawings of yours?" Caulder raised his eyebrows, and he was clearly teasing me.

I jumped forward, trying to smack his arm, but he easily dodged my attack, fully knowing I would try to hit him for a comment like that. "Yeah, that's why I gave up on the idea of being an artist a long time ago." I stuck my tongue out at him, knowing a physical attack would be pointless. "But maybe I could still travel, see the world, you know?" Caulder turned around and returned to a normal walking pace. "You want to leave the pack?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "I don't exactly want to leave, but after everything that has happened for the past few months, it made me realize how little I know about this world. I am not going to run away or anything, and I don't even know if it's something that will happen. Blade and I have to figure out this prophecy. Plus, there is the whole Blood Moon War vision that I don't even know where to begin with. But after all of that is over with..." I shrugged my shoulders. "Who knows what Blade and I will end up doing, or if we'll even be alive." Caulder froze in his steps. "Don't say stuff like that."

I stopped walking so I wouldn't get too far away from him. "Death is part of life. Just look at how many werewolves died to rescue me. If a war actually breaks out under the Blood Moon, there are only going to be more deaths."

The idea of war terrified me. I didn't want to admit that the death toll would jump if the pack fought vampires in another fight, but I didn't want to be naive about the subject. Between Darian and the recent deaths, I was becoming numb to the idea, and I didn't want to pretend like I was immune to something that was only natural, even if some deaths happened unnaturally early.

Caulder looked off to the side, avoiding eye contact. "I'm not naive. I know death will happen, and if we fight the vampires again, we will lose more people, but I don't want to think about losing you, or anyone else. I want to do what I can to stop it. I want to hunt Draven down and kill him to stop this from happening. Maybe that's just wishful thinking, but I would rather prepare for life than death."

Caulder's mood completely shifted, and I knew it was because of what I said. Maybe he was right. Maybe I should be focusing on how to make sure me and everyone else I cared about lived instead of assuming many of us would die.

"You're right. I'm sorry. We have a couple of months before the timeline of my vision, and we should spend it doing what we can to stop it and the prophecy from coming to fruition." I smiled and grabbed Caulder's hand. I skipped forward, pulling him along. "Come on. Blade should be done helping out the warriors now. Let's find him and Harper and get some food."