Gypsy Origins (Page 10)

“What happened later on?” I ask, leaning forward.

Emit’s eyes meet mine again in the mirror. “Alphas fight, Violet. Caroline was a Neopry alpha. However…she was from the Simpleton stock. She couldn’t shapeshift and walk around in another’s form like the skin walkers of the Neopry family.”

I hate it when they give me a bunch of words that don’t answer my question.

“Originally, gypsy freaks were considered the misfits of a family. A family of gypsy freaks was thought to be of the devil by even our own people,” Vance says like he’s rolling with the new subject. “My family and I were hunters and marksmen. Not gypsy freaks like Emit’s family and Idun’s.”

“Damien’s family too,” Emit inserts, causing Vance to nod.

“Despite their unique threading ability, Portocale gypsies weren’t considered gypsy freaks by everyone,” Vance goes on.

“Van Helsings did a lot of bounty hunting. Always found their bounty too,” Emit elaborates.

“Still do. Eventually. These wolves will be easily found once I get a trail,” Vance adds, though it sounds more like it’s a burden now instead of a point of pride.

“Well, I need the trail of a gas station because my eyeballs are floating.”

Emit takes a turn onto a side road, a grin on his face, as Vance groans.

“You’re one of those,” Vance adds on a tired breath.

“I was hauled out of my house over a shoulder and forced to go on this trip. We’ve been on the road for hours. Most of which was spent in silence. Stop complaining about one trip to the bathroom.”

I swear Vance fights a grin.

They find the oddest things to be amused about.

Or maybe I’m just on the outside of centuries of inside jokes between them, still stuck in the middle of someone else’s story.

“Why is that so amusing?” I ask them.

“Because we’ve been on the road for hours so that I could drive the speed limit and keep you from getting sick in the car,” Emit tells me, which makes me realize this is an inside joke I should get.

I’m not sure why that makes me smile, but I wipe it away quickly, not getting sucked into the sense of belonging that always bites me in the ass with them.

“So Idun Neopry was the first-born, I’m guessing, since that seems to be a theme.”

“Actually, she was just the first-born skin walker to the family. Her brother, Bobo—”

“Bobo? Really?” I interrupt with an incredulous tone while staring at Vance.

“Balder was his real name. He was a giant, but a rather soft fella. His name was later reduced to Bobo because he was considered…the village idiot,” Vance goes on, clearing his throat.

I withhold my judgment for a minute. It’s hard to do.

“Idun could easily manipulate him. First-borns of that time were very important in everyone’s mind. Including Bobo. He had to be the one to make the family offering,” Emit adds.

“Which was?”

“Their red apples,” Emit says, eyes flicking to mine.

He specifically asked if I had any other fruit. I wonder if he also thought I might be Idun.

His eyes hold mine, and he gives a slow shake of the head, like he knows exactly what I’m thinking and is assuring me that wasn’t his intent.

Damn glad my apples aren’t red at this point. All the suspicion is fucking with my head.

“Idun’s family’s red apples were as prized as Portocale oranges,” Vance goes on. “They rotted immediately, never to be grown again,” he adds. “It was their only source of income at that time.”

“The entire family had a lot riding on us finishing up the second sacrifice, but we weren’t told about it until after the altar sacrifice. I went catatonic, so to speak, mourning my wolves and hating myself,” Emit goes on a little quieter.

“I’d given up the only thing still holding my family together—the last piece of silver that hadn’t been taken in the raids. It was our failsafe, should times get too hard on us. It was my grandfather’s, and with the loss of it, so came the loss of his guiding spirit,” Vance answers just as quietly.

“And silver, according to lore, kills some of the things that go bump in the night,” I deduce.

They both glance at me—Vance turns and Emit looks in the mirror.

“My silver kills all the things, except for skin walkers,” Vance tells me.

“What’s the difference in shape shifters and skin walkers?”

Vance opens his mouth to explain, but Emit beats him to it. “Shape shifters can take the form of animals. Skin walkers can take the form of other people. Idun created shape shifters, but her family remained the only skin walkers. Just as with us, the infected are always much weaker.”

“Are there still some of those around? No one has mentioned them,” I state, eyes spotting a small town ahead.

My bladder wants to weep with joy, but since a weeping bladder is just peeing on one’s self, I tighten my legs and start rifling through my bag, finding that one pair of jeans.

“They’re around,” Vance states vaguely.

“Who do you think runs the mortal cult that kills off Portocale gypsies?” Emit asks me seriously.

My stomach twists in dreaded knots. I hate it when they simply toss out things like that as if they’re of no importance.

Idun is the Forsaken?

“Shape shifters or skin walkers?” I ask as I sit up, bladder forgotten.

“They want us to raise Idun. They’ve protested it since the beginning, and they know it weakens us when a Portocale dies. It often makes life hell when we’re put down by that curse, because we’re useless and things can get out of hand quickly,” Vance tells me.

“And though you can find everyone, you can’t find the cult?” I ask the Van Helsing in the vehicle.

Vance cuts his eyes toward me. “Idun trained her betas. Even her omegas are far more vicious by nature. She knows every weakness we have. She knows every strength we have. She’s the reason for this curse. For now, that cult is my Achilles heel, but eventually, I find everything,” he says, repeating that last part from earlier. “And I kill it,” he adds with a tight smile. “It’s what I do.”

The mortal cult was never human?

“So the perfect woman she created for each of you, was it anything like her?” I decide to ask.

“No,” they both state in unison.

“I meant looks wise,” I elaborate.

“No,” they both say again.

One word answers mean the talking is mostly over.

“You never explained the part about when you can all die at once,” I say as I shed my robe and start pushing my pajama shorts down my legs.

Emit’s eyes flick to the mirror, and suddenly the vehicle jolts when he runs off the road.

Vance curses, and I make an embarrassing shrieking noise.

A strong hand catches me before my head can smash the window closest to me. It takes me a second to realize that Vance is suddenly in the backseat with me, holding me against him, as Emit manages to right the car on the road.

“Forget how to fucking drive?” Vance gripes at him as he continues holding me against him, cradling my head to his chest like he’s protecting it.

My breaths stagger when my body becomes acutely aware of how closer I am to him. I can hear his heart beating quickly with my ear pressed so close, and smell the subtle, refined scent of the cologne he wears.

Why does him touching me always mess with my head? I liked it better when I thought he was gay.

“I wasn’t expecting her to be stripping in the backseat,” Emit mutters, bristling.

Focusing on Emit’s words and not Vance’s touch, I cut my gaze toward the front.

“You run around naked all the time, so I didn’t think modesty was an issue. Vance has seen me naked before. I didn’t think it’d be a big deal, since I at least have on underwear,” I defend. “I can’t go inside a store wearing my Hungry Hippo pajamas.”

Emit scrubs a hand over his face and then tilts the mirror up toward the roof.

Vance’s hand on my head slowly moves down my back, as we drive on steadily. I immediately try to put some distance between us, since like I said, touching him always fucks with my head.

His gaze dips between us to my homemade panties that are not symmetrical or pretty. I immediately start tugging on my jeans, since my embarrassing underwear is causing a spectacle.

My gaze pauses when I spot my male ghost stalker glaring at me from the side of the road, just up ahead, arms crossed over his chest. I’ve decided he’s a little too crazy, and his grief-stricken girlfriend…has no idea who he ever was. So…yeah…he died crazy and I’ve got enough crazy in my life at current.

That ghost now gets salted when he comes around.

He vanishes seconds before we pass him, like he knows what I’m thinking, because he’s smart enough to keep his distance.

“Was that an incorporeal friend of yours?” Vance muses.

“Not all ghosts are like Anna,” is my only response.

Fortunately, we’re pulling up at the gas station, and I keep my pajama shirt on. After stealing Emit’s jacket from the backseat, I pull on my boots and hop out.