Chapter 10: Normality? Restored.

Chapter Eight: Normality? Restored.

"Shit Meg," Lux rubbed her arms worriedly, head ducking as we crossed another street. Our shoes were soaked through and our socks were heavy with rainwater. She twisted around, checking the dimness behind us. "I thought I was going to wet myself."

"That would have been funny." My heart was thundering. I felt only fear on my tongue and I was distracted as I walked, my mind retuning to him as if he had it hooked to him.

"Maybe it would have lightened the mood," Lux shivered, glimpsing up at me uncertainly. Her blonde hair was plastered tight to her skull and her skin was getting mottled and pale. I didn't feel the cold as much, but I had not stopped trembling since I left the apartment.

"Doubtful." He was back. He was back and I was here. Not running. Panicked, broken thoughts whirred in my mind. I could only think of how hard it would be to start over again. How heart-broken I would be to have to leave everything I had earned here behind. Nights sleeping on the streets again. Searching for a job with no qualifications.

No. I wouldn't leave.

I had come too far and worked too hard to get even here. I didn't care if I spent the rest of my days cleaning toilets and scrubbing floors, because it was mine. We climbed the steps into the apartment and I shook my head, shaking droplets of water across the lobby.

"Ms. Carol is finally getting the wiring fixed," Lux pointed to an electrical van parked across the street.

I glanced at the monstrosity of a van briefly. 'Maira & Daughters electrical'. "You'd think that they'd know better than to park there. They'll be clamped in no time. Even in this rain."

Lux and I climbed the stairs to our floor in soggy silence. The hallway was quiet, though I was conscious of the noises pressing against my neighbours' front doors. The static of tv. The murmur of a lover's conversation.

When we neared my door, Lux pivoted on her heel, her chest swelling with a nervous breath. "Why don't you come into my apartment and we can watch movies, eat bad food and forget about what happened tonight."

"Are you sure?" I asked critically. "I wouldn't want to get in your way. Besides, everyone goes out for drinks tonight. Sad that I'm missing it, to be honest."

Lux blinked at me. "And why won't you go?"

"I've made a show of myself." I motioned to my sopping self. "A damned fool of myself."

"You handled yourself very well." Lux got that gleam in her eyes. "I mean, we could sit around all evening and let you stew, or we could be downing the customary 'end of show shots' with everyone else."

The idea was tempting. "People will be staring at me."

"Only until they're too drunk to care."

I eyed her. "Do you want to go?"

She stared right on back. "Only if you want to go."

One last party. If I did have to leave the town, at least I would go in style. Not sulking in my apartment. If a man who held the title of Alpha Supreme wanted to find me, I doubted a lousy wooden door would stop him.

"I should be running. I don't want to be chained up by some brutish male." We were leaving puddles of water in the hall.

"If he did that, he would throw eight years of his own hard work down the drain and would incite a county-wide revolt. His own followers would be disgusted to follow a man who turns against his own ideals." Lux smiled widely. "And if either of us wants to leave, I have two pints of ice-cream in my freezing and a new movie rented."

I matched her smile, though mine was far more toothy. "You've convinced me. Text John and ask him if people are still heading to the pub. Don't say I want to come. Lordie forbid that gets around."

"What are you wearing?" Lux fished out her phone, her thumb moving dazzlingly fast over the small screen.

"A new jeans I picked up. It only cost me like three credits." I unlocked my front door.

"I can't wait to see that." Seconds after the message was sent, Lux's phone illuminated. "John says 'yeah, come on down. Rachel's just boasting about getting to talk to the Alpha Supreme. No one's mentioned Meg yet. I don't think Rachel wants to shift the attention from her. ISL"

"ISL?" I asked.

"In stitches laughing." Lux explained calmly. "Short-hand text. Why don't you get a phone, Meg?"

"Can't afford it." The familiar scent and feel of my apartment greeted me. "Give me ten minutes to run a brush through my hair and change."

"Alright," Lux set the timer. "I'll race ya."

I kicked the door shut behind me, peeling off my sopping clothes and tossing them to my already full wash basket. House-work. Even an engineered beast couldn't escape them. My jeans – my pride and joy were carefully folded in my near-bare wardrobe. Blue denim and then, a bedazzled duck cartoon on the lower left leg. I threw on a woollen jumper, conscious that I at last had to pretend that the rain bothered me.

I might give me a cold, but my body hadn't been balanced right. Weather could make me sick after a while, but whatever way they had morphed my body twisted my body's ability to tell me the conditions weren't right. One minor issue that Doc-Mai had missed. How could they have spotted it when they hadn't let me out in eight years?

I met Lux back out in the hall and she let out a bark of laughter. "Love it," She motioned to the duck. "Have you named him?"

"Barry." I motioned to her outfit. "I believe the word is on-trend. Chic."

Lux rolled her eyes, snuggling her chin into her thick, knitted grey scarf. She was wrapped up like a marshmallow but Lux usually had terrific sense of fashion. She had spent most of her teenage years re-fashioning the clothes her mother had bought for her until her mother finally realised that the dresses and skirts and make-up wasn't just a phase.

"I don't know if that's a compliment from the woman wearing jeans with a bedazzled duck!" Lux laughed. This time we had umbrellas to use against the torrent of rain. Across the street, the electricity van still lingered.

We made our way back through the winding streets. Lux chattered easily, her cheeks rosy with the bite of the cold but I kept watch around us, half-afraid that the dimness would conjure a beast far stronger than I to take her.

The theatre's pub stood across the street from the theatre and then down a narrower street that was reserved for pedestrians. Aptly named the 'Singer's Lounge', it was a hot-spot to get into after a show. I had been surprised that we had been allowed in when I first went after a show because I wasn't a performer, but Lux had waved at one of the bouncers and he had let us straight in.

"Micheal," Lux greeted the bouncer cheerfully, ignoring the small crowd forming. Crowds of richly dressed patrons and younger faces who desperately wanted to get in amongst the Lainly theatre performers.

Micheal swept his gaze over to us, his expression softening. He was a brute of a man, as most fully grown Lycan males were, but had been as soft as dough when I got to know him. The beast under my skin didn't let me relax around him and that knowledge that I had been prepped to kill creatures like him always lingered as an afterthought.

One that soured as always when he gave us his customary, off-kilter smile. "Ladies."

The crowd grumbled when we cut in front of them. 'Sorry lads. I have eight years to catch up. You can wait'. Inside, the pub was warm and spacious. It was built of dark wood, booths and stand-alone tables. Across the left wall, stretching up the entire length of the tavern was the bar. It was fully manned tonight and by the sounds of it, the theatre crowd were already full of drink.

Lux slipped a peppermint into my hand. "You've got this. I've got this. We are fine."

I inhaled the scent of sweat and drink. The scent of people. Lordie, this was better than stewing in my apartment isolated and alone.

We moved through the crowd to the back section of the pub where ropes cordoned off the Lianly section.

"Lux!" John cried out, raising a pint to her. "You came!"

Then, his attention cut to me. He lowered his pint, but his smile was just as warm. "Meg."

Tension eased from my shoulder. "John."

The crowd who had been facing Rachel twisted at our approach. With my cheeks burning at the onslaught of greetings, I took the chair offered to me.

"Surprised you came, Meg." Rachel said pointedly.

"And why wouldn't I?" I asked sharply.

"I'll get your favourites," One of the dancers rose, slipping through the crowd easily.

Rachel had thrown her dark hair back, binding it with a red tie. "You left so quickly, I thought you'd be long gone by now."

"And miss the chance to see you again," I smiled, all teeth and fake niceties. "I would never do something so dull, Rachel. That's your forte."

"Ouch," Lux breathed beside me.

"Did you get to meet the Alpha Supreme, Meg?" One of the singers breathed. "I'm so gutted I missed him. He came backstage to greet the performers for a minute."

"I met him just for a second." My smile was tight. "Just in the foyer before I left to go home."

Did they not know? How could they not? I met Ailish's gaze; the lead singer – the star was subdued. She raised her glass to me, her eyes twinkling as she said. "He was polite and then he left. Just as expected."

The dancer returned with our drinks and I thanked him, feeling relieved. What had happened in the foyer had remained a secret. For how long was another story, but I would take the grace period. Conversation diverted back to the Alpha Supreme's praises of everyone's performance and I sunk back, content to listen and observe.

Soon, one drink turned to two and then to three. More people piled into the pub and though they had put days of sweat and tears into their performance, the Lianly crew were up on the pub's meagre dance-floor, sliding and slipping on alcohol slick floors and singing along the singers that Lux had tried to get me to listen to. Lordie, music these days.

Some-time after twelve, I braced myself against the bar and waved down a bar-tender. John was partially slumped against the counter beside me, his lids heavy and his breath reeking of vodka.

"If Mrs. Murphn saw us now, she would kill you, John."

"Not you?" John belched.

Disgusting. "I'm not that easy to kill."

"I do weight-training!" the bartender set down the drink in front of us.

"So?"

"Nova." A familiar voice called to me. My head shot up, my smile faltering as I spotted Sunny and Darren at the door of the theatre. They walked inside and no one followed them. The tension in my body did not abate and I watched them coldly as they approached, tensed to spring or run – I hadn't decided.

"You need to get away from me." I said lowly as they approached. John just blinked at them dumbly, a knot forming between his brows.

Darren braced his forearms on the counter, waving down the bartender casually. Sunny eyed the bedazzled duck with a bemused smile.

"So, where is he?" I downed my shot. "Is he waiting outside with a big net?"

"No..." Perplexed, Darren eyed the door as if his Alpha Supreme would burst through with a giant butterfly net. "He sent us in his place."

"Is he a chicken?" I asked, even though I remembered the hulking Lycan male that would challenge even the Omega's strength.

"No." Sunny's voice was level. Across the pub, I saw Lux turning to look for me. Sunny cleared her throat, calling my attention back to her. "He thought you would be more open to speaking to us."

I snorted. "He has really over-estimated how much I care about what you have to say."

"Nova..." Sunny reached for my hand.

I flinched away the touch, furious as I met her gaze. "Why do you think you have any right to just touch me?"

She raised her hands, lips pressed tight to avoid showing me her teeth. A Lycan show of submission and yet, carried over to an apparent human.

"So," I dragged my attention to Darren, my voice cold. "What does he want?"

"To see you." Darren explained levelly. "And to have a conversation."

"A conversation," I repeated. "Tell him that I'd rather shove hot needles under my nails than entertain a conversation with him. I have nothing to say to him."

"It could help settle the bad air between the two of you," Sunny suggested.

Lux spotted me and rose, frowning as she surveyed the two Lycans beside me. John had waved the bar tender again, his tone slurred.

"Bad air?" I tried to calm myself as Lux wove through the crowd. "Bad air is saying he dumped me and left me for someone younger and more beautiful. Not that he marked me and left a scar."

"He wants to extend an olive branch." Darren hedged.

Lux reached the bar, smiling as if the two Lycans were old friends. Still, she slipped herself between us and braced her elbows on the bars. "So, Meg. Ready to go?"

Darren and Sunny looked at me and I stared right on back, my tone resolute. "Yeah, Lux. I want to go home now."

"Nova, please," Sunny's tone was desperate. "It won't be safe for you if this gets out."

I couldn't keep the snarl from my face – one harsh enough that Lux flinched away. "And what exactly am I in danger of? Being locked up? Tormented and tortured? I mean, how bad will it get for me?"

Sunny went to answer, but Darren lay a hand on her arm. His tone was calmer now. "The Alpha Supreme has a lot of enemies, Nova."

"And?" I questioned sharply, raising my hand for another drink. "So do I. Maybe my enemies are scarier than his."

"Meg," A voice called out with saccharine sweetness. I blinked, drawing my attention to Rachel. She pitted herself between the Lycans and I, smiled beautifully at them. "Introduce me to your friends, would you?"

"No." The bartender gave me another drink and I tipped the glass up to my lips, eyeing Rachel drolly. The woman just pouted, smiling brightly at the Lycans.

Lipstick on her teeth.

Content to watch Rachel act as an unintentional buffer and make a fool of herself, I finished the drink.

"So, how did you meet Nova?" Rachel asked. "Did you volunteer at one of those homeless shelters? Drop some money into her coffee cup?"

Darren's eyes flashed. "That's very rude."

Rachel's cheeks darkened. "It was a joke..."

"And do you know us well enough to joke like that?" Sunny flipped sun-light bright hair over her shoulder, her inhumane eyes cold and watchful. "Maybe you find someone's misfortune amusing, but I don't. Neither does my brother."

Brilliant. I had never been able to dig the knife quite deep enough, but that was because Rachel didn't respect me. I should have felt some sympathy for the woman floundering in front of her heroes. I set down my drink and their attention snapped back to me.

"This has been remarkably fun." I fished out an ice-cube to munch on it. "But I am bored now. Bye. Rachel, there's lipstick on your teeth."

Rachel gasped, a hand flying to her lips.

"This won't be the last time you here from us," Darren reminded me gently. "You're the Alpha-Supreme now."

"Not Luna?" Lux questioned lightly, pushing my purse into my hands. "That's strange."

Darren surveyed how Lux slotted herself between us, smiling patiently and yet, there was steel in her eyes. Slowly, he said, "A new regime brought in new rules."

"Cool," Lux tugged at my arm. "But it's late and raining and I have a pint of ice-cream back at ...uh, my considerably large semi-detached with my husband and our three children and Meg is staying over, so ...bye."

I let Lux steer me towards the door. We said our goodbyes to the theatre, pushing out of the tavern and into the night.

The cold hit me like a sledgehammer to the gut and I shivered, pulling away from Lux to dig my hands into my pockets.

Lux and I walked. Eventually, I asked, "Why did you tell them you had a house?"

"Don't know," Lux shrugged. "I thought it would be a good idea at the time."

"Oh." I didn't want to tell her that it would be very easy for them to find us.

We fell into silence again and said nothing until we reached our apartment block. More reserved and wary now, I swept a gaze over the street, marking that there was nothing new in the air. Just smoke, sweat and the night air.

"I don't want to sleep," Lux sighed. "Why don't I dye your hair? Like I promised last week?"

"You'll burn the air from my head."

"I'll only to the ends." She pouted. "Come on, Meg. Purple would be so nice in your hair. Really spice you up."

"Am I a dish of some kind?" We reached the sixth floor and Lux was wheezing slightly, but at my confirmation, Lux beamed brightly. "Come on then. Grab some pjs. I'll pick something to watch."

I didn't question it. I gathered my things, stripping from my beer soaked jeans as I moved around my apartment, dropping clothes wherever I went. I avoided my reflection in the windows as I wriggled into my pjs; a great mis-mash of colour – fluffy blue pj bottoms adorned with yellow ducks and a knobbly woollen jumper that swamped even my long frame.

When I pushed my way into Lux's apartment, carrying a pint of ice-cream in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other, the air was heavy with the smell of butter and her little tv was spluttering as she tried to get the tv to connect to her laptop. "Feckin' thing."

"Ahaha, Meg." Lux perked her head around the corner, her hair pulled into a bun atop her head. "I think you have an obsession with ducks."

"Having two duck adorned pieces of clothing does not mean I'm addicted to ducks!" They certainly were delicious though.

I pulled out the popcorn, diving a hand into it even as Lux glared at me. I was a mess of falling hair and mis-matched clothes, relying heavily on my neighbour and work-friend to keep my mess of a mind from overwhelming me.

"Thanks for bringing some stuff," She eyed the ice-cream. "Is that nougat?"

"Disgusting." I wrinkled my nose. "It's crispy caramel."

She winced. "There is something seriously wrong with you."

Laughing, I threw the ice-cream into her freezer. "If only you knew."

Though I loved my apartment, Lux's was a close second. It was a tiny place just like mine, but every available surface was covered with grand, leafy plants. Her 'beautiful babies' that she cared for meticulously. Though pets were not allowed, her cat Muffin was the corridor's best kept secret.

"Hey Muffin," I cooed, dropping to my haunches as I spotted cat hiding under the couch. Muffin appraised me critically for a moment and then slunk out, meowing loudly at me. She approached imperiously, allowing me to scratch her head before she trotted off to her favourite window sill position to watch the rain.

Lux fell silent again as she fiddled with the telly and I munched on her chocolate unashamedly, curled up in the corner of her couch. The rain was falling heavily against the window. I let the sound wash over me, rolling my head to try and pull the tension from my neck.

"Do you..." Lux turned to me, uncertain now. "Do you want me to call you Nova now?"

"I – I guess the cats out of the bag now." I picked at my popcorn, my mind stirring. I would need to make a plan. Maybe going for drinks was a bad idea.

"Nova is a pretty name," Lux tucked herself onto the sofa and seized a handful of popcorn. "You can stay over with me tonight. I can grab some extra blankets and you can sleep on the couch. If – it would make you feel safer."

Nova. Nova. Nova. The name reminded me of the stars. Wild and free and burning bright. The same stars I saw when I stopped running that first day. Hearing it said so casually struck me and I had to glance down, a lump in my throat. "I'll consider it."

I didn't really like being alone. I liked silence, but not the aching stretch of nothingness that came with being lonely.

"Okay," Lux nodded. "I'll put a chair against the door all the same. There'll be no unwanted Lycans invading our fun tonight."

"I don't think a lock and a chair would stop him." It felt okay to say that here. Eight years of shoving any emotion down had stopped just for one, smiling human. Sometimes, I felt as if we were kindred spirts. Both running from something, racing towards another thing.

"I have a bat." Lux tossed her hair over her shoulder. "And I've seen you lifting props back stage. Between the both of us, we could fight him off."

I bit down a smile. "Play the movie."

"Oh you'll love this," Lux curled her legs under her. "It's about dragons and fire and a lot of explosions."

"I do love movies with explosions." I conceded.

The movie began to play and Lux already had begun chatting, trying to fill me in on today's humour. It was a silly little movie really. Graphics had really improved in the eight years I had been gone and dragons were a rare breed nowadays so movie-makers had to make do with CGI and all kinds of other things that Lux gushed over. Every so often, I was listening to the hallway outside. The street. Through the thundering rain for any strange sounds.

"Why is she so secretive?" I demanded half way throughout, fishing into the bottom of the bowl for the unpopped kernels. Lux was disgusted as she watched me eat them.

"Are you even watching it Me...Nova!" Lux demanded. "Her family are evil and everyone will hate her if they find out!"

I scoffed. "So, kill them. Doesn't she have that little whelp of a dragon anyways?"

Lux rose, shaking her head. "You are a macabre soul."

"I mean, you're not wrong there Lux." I motioned at the screen with a forefinger. "But the whole back and forth between that insufferable know-it all and..."

"Don't." Lux put up a hand. "Don't even start on that."

Lux stepped into her bedroom, muttering about how I could never just appreciate the movies she made me watch.

Which was rich – considering that she mostly made me watch movies about cartoon animals. They always made her cry and Lordie, they almost made me cry too. I had ripped into rabbits and deer and all things living when I ran from the Ravi and I hadn't felt an ounce of guilt. I had torn through people in the Mad-Maze. Sometimes for fun and sometimes because I had to and had done so without a second thought.

But a cartoon horse searching for his family....

It made me think my tear ducts could work again. .

"I got the goods," Lux held up the dye. "Throw this towel over your shoulders and lets see how this goes. Put your wine on the table there. This is going to be a fancy salon tonight."

"This doesn't feel very professional." I hedged, moving begrudgingly to sit on the rickety chair. "I think you've had too much rum for this to be safe."

"Boo hoo." Lux pulled on a pair of clear plastic gloves, humming under her breath as she gathered a few things. As she passed a few plants, she checked on them, clucking words of affection. "Okay. So I need to do a strand first. And we'll see how it goes."

"You sound very uncertain." I glanced over my shoulder at her.

She beamed at me crookedly. "I am unsure. You can back out at any time."

Shaking my head, I let her potter around until she was satisfied. Instinctively, I tensed as she stood behind me. Needle in the neck. Needle in the neck.

My breathing shallowed. My nails dug into the centre of my palm. Closing my mind, I tried to count to ten. I got stuck on four. I tried to keep track of the scents in the room. Peppermint. Muffin. Buttery popcorn.

A heavy weight settled on my legs and an indignant meow sounded as Lux began to unwind my hair and brush it. I settled a hand over Muffin, stroking her back. Satisfied, she quietened.

"I swear," Lux clucked her tongue, "That cat would turn on me in an instant if it meant getting affection from anyone."

"Maybe Muffin loves me more," I commented absently, comforted by the heavy weight on my legs. Muffin kept an eye on the window, balefully ignoring us once more.

"Hmmm," Unsatisfied, Lux began to section out my hair and I tried not to relax. I hated people standing over me but any sort of affection could knock me into a light sleep. A strange and unexplained mix, but I had not been touched with anything other than violence for eight years and any softness was enough to melt me.

How dangerous am I now, Doc-Mai? Lux began pulling slightly on my scalp, muttering about this looked easier on the box.

"This hair dye smells," I wrinkled my nose, trailing a hand along Muffin's spine.

"Does it?" Lux paused over my shoulder and in the beat of silence, a great fork of lightning illuminated the sky. Muffin startled, yowling and darted up over the table in front of me, spilling a glass of wine over my lap.

"Muffin!" Lux cried. "Oh come on. That was my good wine!"

"My ducks!" My beautiful PJ bottoms were soaked in red wine. I shook myself off, side-stepping the pool of wine spreading across the floors. "Let me get some kitchen paper."

"No, no." Lux waved me away, glaring at her cat who had hidden under the couch. "I would make Muffin do it, but she'd laugh at me. I'll do it. You go change. I might have some spare trousers in my wardrobe."

"Thanks," I commented dryly. As I crossed the short expanse from my chair to her bedroom, Lux cleared her throat. "Do you – do you want to take about him?"

My good mood which had been building over the hours, snuffed out. "There's nothing to say."

"If you don't want to talk about it, Nova, that's fine, but I know what it's like to keep a secret and to keep it well. You're the Supreme's moon-bound. That's nothing something to sniff at."

"Well, he wasn't some Supreme Alpha when I met him."

"And since then, he's climbed the ranks and dismantled the monarchy."

"He tore into my neck without my permission." I told her, trying to avoid Muffin who had begun trying to figure-8 herself around my ankles. "And I had been too weak and too young to fight him off."

Lux bit her lip. "I don't know what it's like to have that happen to me, but I do know what its like to have people try and strip you choice and person away from you so I won't press it any further."

"I – thanks for asking, Lux." I stepped into the bedroom, with Muffin still meowing piteously. "I've never thought it out and I think...that it might be too much to try tonight."

"That's fine." Lux called back. "But we still have to finish your hair or you'll end up looking ridiculous."

"Oh imagine." I pulled on a pair of Lux's pj trousers and stepped out of her bedroom to cross the foyer. She was cleaning up the wine spill and giving out to Muffin who had gone out to her in search of attention.

"That cat is going to get me in so much trouble one day." Lux told me with a huff. "Keeping her a secret is already so tough."

"I'm pretty sure Ms. Carol already knows..." I slowed as I passed the television. The scent in the air had changed, hidden under the harshness of the hair dye. I had gotten used to the scent of alcohol, Lux and her cat but this was different.

This was a cloying, putrid scent, coupled with the scent of men.

My vision pin-pointed and I whirled around to face the door, panic and aggression tightening my throat. It couldn't be.

Had the Ravi found me?

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Welcome back to the world of Lycans and teeth-gnashing. Tell me your thoughts, theories and conspiracies!

Has normality been restored?   What kind of normality?

What do you think awaits for them in the next chapter? Ravi Madness. Lycan brutality?

Until next time - Saoimarie.