𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐃 𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌𝐒, Volturi Kings

CHAPTER 26

HELIOS' POV

I knew that something was wrong with the woman in front of me. Her weeping consumed the entire room. It was horrific, honestly, and I didn't understand what I could do to help her. The bleeding was severe, and she didn't speak enough English to speak to the clinic doctor.

He was in over his head dealing with this woman. Didyme, an old name that I saw in the book. She was only referenced as my own father's former wife.

I didn't know he had a former wife. I thought Mama was the only woman he'd ever loved. That's how they told it to me. He was depressed, borderline suicidal, until he met Mama. The light of his life. The light of all three of my father's lives.

None of this makes any sense. The crying, the branch wound, the book's contents.

"She should be fine, Heelie," Anora whispered as she grabbed hold of my hand.

"What happened to her?"

"Stitches in some places, staples in others. Nothing lethal." Anora gripped my hand hard as she expressed, "I don't know if we can believe what we found in the book."

A frown emerged on my sullen face. "There's no reason to not believe that it's true. It's an old book, but it was clearly written by vampires. It's dumb to lie about such things."

Anora had always been like this. It was what I adored about her, the different perspective, but now wasn't the time for that. The book wrote it, it had to be true. The very concept of someone lying in a historical book about vampires seems silly. Vampires are secretive yet collective creatures that hide out in remote places and feed off of the evil that grows there.

Vampire's lie about people, not events.

"My mom said that her brother lied about many things," Anora noted. "He lied about loving their family. They were betrayed. Your mother was betrayed by him too."

"We're not supposed to talk about him, Nors," I reminded my mate. "You know how much Mama hates him. She doesn't want him anywhere near us. He has a hybrid daughter, too."

"I heard she hates them," Anora whispered into my ear, her feet dangling off the seat in the clinic. "Hates her parents, I mean."

"I get what you mean though." I sighed, grabbing the edge of my plastic seat. "People lie. Parents lie. I mean, I was on YouTube the other day and saw that video on lying to kids about Santa."

"Mom always said Santa wasn't real."

"Mama too, but it said that there's bliss in ignorance and whatever. Maybe that's why they haven't told us about this part of their life. What if this part is complicated and they didn't want us to know because we would be scared or worried about them?" I pondered.

My mate didn't have a response for that. She usually did, but this time she stayed quiet and waited for the doctor at the clinic to come in. There had to be news on what was going on with this woman, Didyme, that we took to this clinic. She was human, injured, and had a friend that wasn't able to get inside (The doctor said they couldn't confirm that she was her cousin because of lack of ID and the doctor knows us, so...)

"I think your fathers are looking for us," Anora whispered to me. "The bonds are going haywire."

"Have you tugged on them yet?"

"No, that would be mean." Anora looked down at the ground.

"You're not above being mean to the bonds."

"Yeah, but Marcus doesn't like it."

---

ANNALISE'S POV

You just can't leave your kids alone, can you? Not in this city, where they could be anywhere. I trusted the local churches to call me if they saw them out (the Nuns were good about bringing children home after dark, especially since tourists aren't always the best people) but there were still people in the city that didn't know me well enough yet to have my number to call.

My worries were cut short after being greeted by the voice of the local clinician.

"Ma'am, your son and his girlfriend are here, don't worry. I'm sorry for it being late, they brought in a woman with quite the wound on her leg and I was worried I wasn't going to be able to treat it myself. Johnny's got the flu and making him work while sick isn't great. He's a surgeon, not God. Anyways, come down when you can," he explained in quick Italian.

I was already on my way when I heard 'your son'. He was going to be in so much trouble. I mean, how many times have I told him to not go out at night, to not go out when Anora's been grounded? There's only so much you can do to punish a hybrid child. I really don't want to be assigning a guard to him...

It didn't help that Maeve was not answering me. She's been so finicky these days. Must be something important happening. She brought those others into my mind, freaked me out, and now she's all but ghosted me again. 

What a weird friend. I should be more angry at her, but in reality I'm just burnt out.

The clinic wasn't too far from the Clocktower, just under half a mile. The doors were left open for me to get inside, where I was met with the flash of fluorescent lights that I despised. I went through each room, seeing them all empty before I finally found the room my son was in.

"Mama-"

"Don't you mama me, Helios Volturi," I tried my best not to snap, knowing that wouldn't help this situation at all. "You're grounded until further notice. Anora," I looked at my future daughter in law, "I'll let your mother speak with you. You're so lucky I convinced her to let me get the two of you. Your father isn't happy either."

They must have known they would get caught. That's just it, though, the blight of teenagers. They do things even though they know it's bad and that they'll be in trouble. I was the same. So was every teenager in existence. I just prayed it would start at 15 instead of 13.

The two of them stood up, but the sound of pained moans coming from the room caught me off guard. The woman that they'd brought here.

"Say goodbye to the woman you brought, then we're going," I told them with a deep sigh.

The two of them looked at each other, the woman, and then to me.

"Go on, it's only polite." I tried my best to instill manners into the kids, but that's never easy when they're worried about being grounded when they get back. Anything to delay the inevitable. "Say goodbye."

"Goodbye, Didyme," both of them said in unison.

"What the fuck did you just say?"