Chapter 24

Luka

“Mia!” I ran across the fitness studio and hugged her. She picked me up and kissed me on both cheeks. I tried to imitate her, but I mostly missed.

“Luka! You look amazing.”

My head instinctively turned to see Caleb’s response, but there was no reaction.

“So do you.”

Mia grabbed my shoulder. “When my brother told me what you were practicing, I had to come....”

“Mia here was the world champion in Capoeira,” Caleb explained.

“Capo…”

“It’s Brazilian,” Mia declared. “All you need to know is, one part dancing and one part kicking-ass. More importantly, it’s something I’m actually better at than my brother.”

Mia started sweeping her body side to side in a meditative motion, like a cat about to pounce, but sideways. Caleb rolled his eyes while taking a fighting stance. He started moving laterally, then they began circling each other rhythmically.

Mia’s chest pulled backward, but her legs arced into a circle in front of her. Caleb fell, and I gasped, partly out of concern, partly because I’d never seen him bested. I didn’t know it was possible.

Caleb brushed himself off. “Yeah, good job, little sis. I was teaching Luka the element of surprise, so thank you for providing that demonstration together.”

“Uh huh. A demonstration of kicking your ass.” Mia winked at me.

Mia sparred gently with me, teaching me the basic moves. Every so often, Caleb would join us or comment on our form, but this was Mia’s playground. She loved it.

“You should have seen me the other day on the training floor, Luka. I took on two of his buddies…” Mia pointed a thumb in Caleb’s direction. “...and pinned both of them, like that.” She snapped her fingers.

“I’d love to watch you in action sometime,” I said.

“I’d love that too.”

Mia threw a look at Caleb, in the silent two-person language of siblings, foreign to anyone else. He gave an indeterminate look back, and they interacted this way for a while. I wondered if their wolves were talking to each other, too.

We cleaned up after the long workout, which lasted hours but passed quickly, and Mia stayed for dinner. Fittingly, we had Brazilian food. She talked about how she lived there for a while to study Capoeira and samba. She showed me a picture of her in the carnival parade, dressed like a psychedelic butterfly.

“I’ll take you someday, Luka,” Mia said. “In the meantime, I brought some of Brazil to you. I got it once I knew we were doing the lesson.”

Mia handed me a dainty box. After the gift before, I tempered my excitement. Please, not more socks.

Inside, a brilliant bright green stone, almost blue, radiated like sunshine. Mia, in typical fashion, giddily hunched over me and insisted on taking it out of its case to place around my neck.

“It’s Amazonite, Luka,” Mia explained, sealing the clasp. “From the Amazon River, in Brazil.”

“Thank you, Mia. It’s beautiful. I’ve never been given anything like this before.” I loved the necklace, but it made me sad. It was everything that Caleb’s gift for me wasn’t. Romantic, special, unique.

Caleb was silent, barely nodding, focusing on the fish and rice in front of him.

Mia plowed on with her stories. “Luka, you should have seen the swordfight the other day. You would have died laughing.”

“Really? What happened?”

“Well, I was in close combat with Rien, a member of the honor guard. He’s good, not as good as me, though. So…” She was shaking from suppressing laughter and held up a finger to wait. “So, wielding this huge sword, I spun around him. Then all of a sudden half his tunic was on the floor…I turned it…into…a…belly shirt!”

Mia and I collapsed into laughter. Even Caleb was snorting a little bit.

“I’m sure he loved that,” Caleb quipped. “He’s always trying to be so macho.”

“I know!” Mia banged on the table for emphasis. “The whole honor guard bowed and said, ‘My lady.’”

“What did he do?” I asked wide-eyed.

“He curtsied and said, ‘Thank you, my lieges.’ And, the piece de resistance, he sliced his shirt right down the middle, solving the problem entirely. All the girls were following him around, drooling.”

It sounded so fun to be Mia, to have friends, to feel like your presence was something people actually welcomed. I’d never done anything worth sharing, so I didn’t really know how to tell a story. I was born, I was taken by Long Lake Pack, I served a family of tyrants, I moved here.

“You’ll meet him when you train with the pack.” Mia popped a piece of cake into her mouth.

A new round of mysterious looks flew between them until Myrna brought out the tea.

“Oh, Mia, that reminds me,” I started saying, emboldened by her openness to attempt to tell a story. I pointed to the tea.

“The tea reminds you? Do you need a certain kind?”

“Oh, no. I don’t know anything about tea. No, Caleb was teaching me yoga…”

“You were, Cay? Luka, he hated doing that as a kid. He just wanted to fight. ‘No stretching, just fighting.’ Such a boy.”

I imagined him in loose yoga clothes, pouting with the same frown he had now.

“I was six, Mia. I’ve grown up just a little since then.”

“Yeah, not that much…” Mia and I exchanged a conspiratorial look. “So, what were you saying, Luka? Yoga?”

“Yeah. Caleb told me to do ‘T’ pose, and I went like this.” I got up and mimed the poured-out teapot.

Mia clapped in amusement. “That’s so creative, Mia! I never would think of that. How did that occur to you?”

“I didn’t know what the letter ‘T’ was.”

“Wait.“ Her face got solemn. “You can’t…?”

I lowered my head. “I know, it’s shameful of me…”

“No, it’s not. It’s shameful of your previous pack. But we’ll change that. Right, Cabe?”

“Right.” He barely looked up from his plate. “Once she’s healed, we can work on tha. Need a healthy body for a healthy mind.”

“I thought it was the opposite,” Mia said.

“They’re both important.”

“Good to know.” Mia turned away from Caleb and rolled her eyes. So serious, she silently mouthed, stretching out the words dramatically.

After dinner, Mia spent almost an hour insisting she had to leave before getting caught up in one story, then another, then another. After the actual last one, Caleb and I were alone.

The silence was overwhelming without Mia’s bubbly voice. I kept waiting for Caleb to say something, but he was silent.

This morning, I had been so disappointed when he said we wouldn’t be alone. Now that we were, it felt awkward.

“So…” he said.

I raised my eyebrows expectantly. “Yes?”

“You and my sister get on quite well.”

“Yes.”

“That’s good.” He took a sip of tea.

“Mm-hmm.”

I tried to think of something to say. I wanted to ask if he still wanted me here, if he still thinks of me as a mate, if there was something else behind him saying it, if the current situation is what I should expect indefinitely.

“The training is going well.”

I dreaded him following up with a “but…” He said nothing, which was worse.

“Yes,” I agreed.

I tried to wring out my courage to ask him the questions on my mind. He always had an air of intimidation, but with him acting more like a brick wall lately, I was even more nervous.

“Well, I think it’s time to call it a night.” Caleb backed up his chair. “You don’t want to be tired for tomorrow.”

“What’s tomorrow?” I asked.

He looked at me like I was crazy. “More training. What else?”

“Right. But what kind?”

“More jiu-jitsu? Unless you want to do capoeira. Just with me, though. No Mia.”

Caleb got up from his chair, then pulled mine out, offering his hand. As he walked me down the hall to my room, I tried to coax out my question, but my throat was too dry.

“Sleep well, Luka.” He started walking away.

I began to close the door to my room, then threw it open and popped out my head.

“Caleb! Wait!”

“Something wrong?”

“Yes. I mean, no. I mean, maybe.”

He came a little closer, hesitantly. “What’s on your mind?”

“Well, I was thinking, hearing Mia’s stories…”

“Yeah, she’s known for them. Don’t believe them all.”

“It’s not that. They’re fun. It’s like traveling to another place. No. My question is…”

He waited.

“So, I think I’m improving. The training. I’m stronger. Do you think…that I could…”

“Could what?”

“Train with the pack?”

His eyebrows knit together for what seemed like an eternity. “I’ll consider it,” he finally answered.

“How long do you need?” I tried my best not to sound argumentative and failed miserably.

“How long do I need, Luka? As long as it takes.” He bowed and backed away. “Goodnight.”