The Vampire’s Servant
Chapter 97

On Tuesday, Rosario was still trying to get close to Sean. I didn't know if there was anything I could do, so I just stood by. I knew this might not work out, but she wanted to make him more confident in who he was. She wanted to make him feel accepted. Link told me I needed to be focusing on my own issues. I told him about the dream I had Friday night. He said it sounded like my mind trying to cope with the idea of being taken again. Like it was preparing for something I couldn't be saved from. Link said it was pretty normal and that I needed to do affirmations of safety and security. I promised to try. The day was like our new normal at school. Several of Harmony's friends hadn't come back from renewing old acquaintances. Melissa never sat with us anymore. Every table she sat at ended up clearing as she got there. I felt a little bad for her. Rosario was always with us now. She told me she was my liaison to the fae. Her mother wanted her to pass along everything that I needed to know and she would pass back information.

For the most part, we were able to keep our true nature from the humans that sat with us. Harmony could mindlink with the pack, so she would talk to them that way. Now that I was able to hear Gray and Victor, Amy was teaching me her trick for mental communication.

She was a great teacher and I was starting to get the hang of it. We found that I didn't need to be very close to communicate with people, but, for me to hear them, they needed to really focus on me. Amy said I would probably get better with it and not need as much concentration from others as I became healthier.

My manifestation of my werewolf abilities was a clear indicator to her that I was slowly getting better. She said I was starting to have the scent of pack wolf mixed with my natural scent. Lucien was a lot more relaxed around me because of it. I would miss them when they were gone.

Over the last few days, I'd found myself talking to Lucien and Amy as if they were my sister and brother. They always had answers to my questions, never talked down to me, and wouldn't tease when I didn't know something common. Not that Dillon teased, he just looked at me with such pity that I couldn't bear to talk with him about things.

Amy recommended that I did, though. She told me that Dillon taught her a lot of things about the world and he always treated her as if she was an equal and not an innocent for not knowing things. I was probably different. Everyone said how innocent I was all the time.

It's not like I enjoyed being innocent. I wanted to be confident and take charge. I wanted to say the things on my mind. I was just muted from years of being taught not to speak without permission. I was still figuring out who I was outside of my old house. When Wednesday finally came, I was thrilled. I wanted to find something useful. Something that would give us what we needed to figure out the curse. I wanted the curse to be in the past. I didn't like it hanging over our heads like it was.

After training, we said goodbye to Amy and Lucien. They would be heading to her old pack before going home. She said she wanted to be there early enough to see her family before the ceremony began.

"We're kind of working against the clock." She chuckled. "Very soon, my heat is going to start and we need to be somewhere comfortable."

"What's that?" I asked.

"It's the mating urge that wolves have. Rogues only get it every six months, instead of every month like pack wolves. It's been six months since my pups were born. My friend, Cara is already pregnant with her first pup. We wanted to try and have our babies together, so I'm going to ride that Alpha until I'm pregnant again." She winked.

"My sister will have that?" I asked.

"She probably already has had her first heat." Amy said.

"Will I have one?" I wondered.

"I doubt it. It's really a shapeshifter thing. I bet you'll be more like a vampire that way. They don't actually lose their fertility, in females at least, until they've been dead a year. They don't have heats or periods, though. When was your last period?" She asked. "What's that?"

"It's that time once a month when you bleed." Amy explained.

"From where?" I asked.

"You've never had a period, have you? You would know from where when I talked about bleeding if you had." She laughed. "I think you need to talk to Talia or Marius about vampire fertility. I only know that females lose the ability to get pregnant a year after they're reborn."

"I need to figure it out. Gray and Victor both want families. I want to be able to know when the best time is. One day, I want to be a mom, too." I admitted.

"Make sure you're ready. Babies change your entire life." Amy smiled.

"Were you ready?"

"Ready and eager. I can't even tell you how happy I was when I found out I was pregnant. I've always wanted a family. I very big, loving, family. Lucien and I are thinking about a dozen kids." She said.

"I don't think I could handle that many. Maybe four. Two for Gray and two for Victor. I think I could handle four." I replied.

"You should talk to them about it and talk to Talia about birth control options. Some human methods might actually work for you. Like, other than condoms. You need to decide when the best time is and you need to make sure you don't leave out your mates. They're as big a part of your family plan as anything else." Amy told me.

I nodded and went to get ready for going to see Gray's great-grandparents. They told me to call them Gammy and Grampy. They made me feel so happy and accepted, I couldn't wait to spend the day with them.

When I met Gray in the entryway, he was also wearing comfortable jeans and a t-shirt. I was fairly certain I had made the right choice, but that made me feel better. He smiled at me and took my hand. "Ready for a long day of hard work?" He asked.

"It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure I remember how to work hard." I giggled.

"I hope so. I'm counting on you to do most of the heavy lifting while I eat all the pie Gammy has in her house." Gray joked.

"Sounds like you know your skill set then." I laughed.

"If you need a pie eaten, I'm your man." He winked.

I hadn't noticed Dillon enter until he started laughing. The confused look on our faces made him laugh even harder. We shrugged and headed out to the truck.

During the ride to his great-grandparents' house, I talked with Gray about school stuff. We were going into the last few weeks of school. It was my first time experiencing the close of school. He told me about how graduation would go, we would actually graduate half way through May and wouldn't have to go to school after that.

It seemed a little silly that I was just there for a month and a half of school. Victor had wanted me to have the experience and the diploma. It was the least I could do for him after everything he gave me.

When we arrived at Gammy and Grampy's house, Gray helped me down. I didn't really need help, but it made him happy so I would wait on him to help me in and out of his truck. We went up the walk and knocked on the door. It wasn't long before we were being pulled into the house and Gammy was taking us to the kitchen.

She had made pie, like Gray had said, and insisted we have some before heading down to the basement. No matter how much I wanted to save Victor, the thought of spending a day in a basement made my stomach twist. Picking at the pie was a way of gathering myself before I went downstairs.

Gray looked very happy. He was smiling and talking to his great-grandmother. She pinched his cheeks and called him her 'little Gray'. It made me smile a little. He loved her very much, I could tell she loved him just as much.

"Echo, sweetheart, are you feeling alright? You've barely eaten. I don't want you working on an empty stomach." She said.

"I guess I just ate a lot at breakfast." I replied softly.

"You know you can't lie to a werewolf, don't you?" Gammy chuckled.

"I forgot." I cringed a little. "I'm just nervous about being in a basement. It's nothing against you or anything. I just haven't been in one since... since I was saved by Gray and Victor."

"Oh, dear. I totally forgot about your kidnapping. Grayson, you go help your Grampy and bring boxes up here to Echo that might have what you're looking for. She can say whether or not it will work for what you need. I'm not letting her go down there." She insisted. "I'm sorry, angel. I wasn't thinking when I volunteered us for this job. I'll make sure that you don't have to go down there. Stay with Gammy, maybe you can talk about wedding stuff. It will be a while before I come back up. Eat your pie, angel. I'll be back as soon as I can." Gray said.

"I'm sorry. It wasn't until I was thinking about it today that it really hit me. I didn't mean to be difficult." I apologized.

"You're not difficult. You're simply wounded and we don't believe in picking at wounds. You stay here with me and look over some dress options. I want to know what sort of thing you want to wear for the wedding. Let me go get my books!" Gammy grinned. "That's my cue to run for it. I'll be back in a little while." Gray smiled and headed for a door that led downstairs.

The scent of basement came from that direction. It was a mixture of dust, stone, damp, and wood. I hadn't minded the smell when I was living in the basement, but I grew to truly detest it while in Daniel's care.

Gammy returned with an armful of books and magazines. She talked about dress length and necklines. I looked over the picture with her.

It reminded me of my mom looking at dress magazines with Harmony. I always wondered what it felt like to have that kind of attention and caring. Gammy had her arm around me as she flipped through the pages.

A couple hours after we arrived, the door to the basement opened and Gray came out with a medium sized box. It had some faded writing on it. Gray was grinning.

"Alpha's journals 1910 through 1919. There are actually a few boxes. This is just the first one. It seems to be about two years to a box. Great great-grandpa William wrote a lot in his journals. Once we figure out which box has the year we're looking for, we can start looking for the two or three months that cover the time we need." He said excitedly.

"Do we know what year? I can work on sorting." I offered.

"The year was 1919, according to the letters from Grigori. The boxes down there are super out of order, so I don't even know which years these are."

"Go on. I'll look." I told him.

I opened the box and pulled out a book. It was for June 1911. I picked out another one. October 1910. This wasn't the box we needed.

While I waited for him to come up with the next box, I organized the books by month and year, then we wrote the years on the box directly, to make it easier for whoever needed to look through them later.

When the next box came up, Gray grabbed the one we'd dealt with and took it back to the basement. I swiftly opened the box and started looking through the journals. January 1915. April 1914.

We organized and labeled the box. The next two boxes didn't have what I needed either. I knew we would have it eventually. That was what I held onto as we worked. The journals were there, and we would find them.

Finally, Gray brought up a box and the first book I pulled out was December 1918. I hugged it to my chest. This was it. The box we'd been searching for.

I quickly sorted the journals by date and marked the box. We set it aside and worked on making a large lunch. The men came up to eat.

"That was the last one from the right time frame. We were just organizing a little more. That was the one, right?" Gray asked.

"Yes! I organized it. Now we just have to figure out the months." I smiled.

"It was right around Christmas time that the Master came to town." Grampy said as he sat at the table.

"I actually pulled out that month first. So we need the journals covering December to February?" I asked.

"I would go to March. Just to be safe." Grampy told me.

We ate our lunch with a happy air around us. Gray wanted to get started. I did too. It would be fast to just pull them out here and mark the passages that marked the start and stop of the Master's arrival and departure. After Gammy and I cleaned up from lunch, we pulled out the journals from December 1918 to March 1919. We each took one. Grampy got us some sticky notes from his office, so we could mark anything interesting. We went into the living room and started reading. I found the passage about the arrival of the Master of the territory. I couldn't believe it. We were really going to break this curse. This had to be what we needed. If Alpha William wrote about the curse, as much as he could, after it was set, then we would have a lot more information. I marked the arrival of the vampire, followed by some mentions of Fenton Aimes. Soon, it was time for us to go. Gray carried the box of books down to the basement and I packed up the other books, which now had a collection of yellow sticky notes popping out of the top. I finally felt like we were getting somewhere. We were going to save Victor. I wouldn't lose him, or Gray. I just knew we'd break it. I grinned the whole ride home. When we arrived, I went up to warm Victor's bed and ran back to the office to start reading. I needed to know what happened.