Chapter 14 Secrets

Luther POV

I step in front of Laura. She is not happy that I pushed her out of the way to go first, but she will have to get over it. I do not want her going in here at all, but she is stubborn and will not listen to anyone. Maybe if I go through here and find nothing, she will be satisfied and move on. I have to admit I am curious myself, but not enough for either of us to get hurt.

Ando follows behind Luara and me. The wall is solid stone. Maybe it will not fall. I guess I should be more worried about anything crashing down from above. The tunnel goes deeper and deeper. There is plenty of light as we walk down the passage, but it is getting smaller as we go. This is made for a fairy, not two big wolves. I am not sure where all of the illuminations are coming from; I am sure it is some sort of fairy magic. At least, that is what I am going to tell myself.

"Do you see anything? Yet?" Laura asks me.

I turn to look back at her. "No, it is just a passageway. It does not seem to lead anywhere, we should turn back. The three of us will end up trapped down here on top of each other," I say to her.

Laura pushes in front of me. Just great. Now I am following her. This is all I need, her trying to be tough. "It could be another secret opening, you know, like the bookcase. If the big bad wolves are not scared, follow me," Laura says.

"Have you ever thought that maybe there was a reason all of this is secret? Maybe we should not be down here. Maybe whatever is down here is none of our business," I say to her.

" I am queen now and whatever is down there is my business. You know something, I do not ever remember seeing my father coming in or out of that bookcase. My mother would pull the books down and dust the books. You know, I think she would hand them to my father, but I cannot place him at the bookcase, not ever," Laura says.

"So you think this was your mother's hidden passageway?" I ask her.

Laura stops. "I do not know. I do not think my mother had anything to hide," she says slowly, looking at the wall.

I run into her. "We are at a dead end, Laura," I say to her.

"I can see that. Feel around, and it might be a door or something," Laura says.

Ando, Laura, and I feel around the wall. The space is cramped. "Laura, there is nothing here; we should go back," I say to her.

CLICK! A sudden click from Ando's wall. Laura and I both stop and look. "I think I found something," Ando says.

The wall begins to move. It opens slowly. The wall moves forward as the door moves. Laura and I walk toward Ando as the door opens. Ando goes inside first. "It is safe, come on," Ando says.

"See, it is safe," Laura says. I roll my eyes at her. Just what I need, Ando encouraging her reckless behavior. Laura follows Ando through the door. I go in behind Laura.

Behind the door is a room filled with books, papers, cabinets, pictures, documents, and lots of boxes. "This is odd," I say.

"Yes, it is odd, nice observation," Laura says as she starts rummaging through everything laying around.

"What do you think all of this is?" I ask Laura. Ando joins Laura looking through the boxes.

"It is documents about the tribe. There are marriage certificates, birth records, all kinds of stuff," Laura says.

Ando keeps looking over the documents. He moves from box to box. "There are divorce records over here," Ando says.

"Divorce records, no one has ever gotten a divorce here," Laura says. She shakes her head.

"Well, let me correct myself, there are two in this box," Ando says. He takes the two divorce records and brings them to Laura. I stand over her reading the document.

"Who is Trip?" I ask her.

"That was my uncle, his wife died and then he left the tribe lands. This was long before I was born. I remember my mother saying his wife was sick and it made him crazy or something. I do not know what happened to him after he left. My parents never really talked about him much," Laura says.

"He was married before the wife that died?" I ask.

She looks over the paper. "I guess so, he was married to, holy shit, look, Luther, he was married to a wolf," Laura says. She hands me the paper.

I take the paper from her. "Divorce granted on grounds of breeding forbidden by the council. Hybrid breeding is an immoral practice and should not be done," I read the paper out loud.

"Who was his first wife?" Laura asks me. I flip the paper over to the back to see the signatures.

"My mother, Selena Delacroix. She signed the paper Selena. She hardly ever uses that name. She prefers to be called Selene, " I answer her.

"She introduced herself to my parents at your ceremony as Selena and then said but we could call her Selene. They did not act as if they knew her," Laura says.

"Maybe they did not want to start trouble, or maybe they were just being polite," I say.

"Who is on the other divorce paper?" Laura asks.

I look over the paper, but everything is blacked out. I can not read anything except divorce granted on grounds of breeding forbidden by the council. "It is not readable," I answer her.

"I am taking these papers with us," Laura says.

"Why?" I ask.

"I am going to ask the council about it," Laura says. Laura grabs the papers from me and folds them. She starts looking through more boxes.

"Laura shouldn't we get out of here. You should rest. We can come back and go through this tomorrow," I say to her.

She digs through a few more boxes. She pulls out a folder. "One thing about us Fairies, we keep great records," she says. She adds the folder to her collection of papers.

"Are you ready now?" I ask her.

As we go out the door of the hidden record room, I notice something strange on the wall. "Ando can you reach that picture?" I ask him.

"I think so, Alpha," Ando says. Luckily Ando is taller than me. He reaches up and grabs the picture off the wall. He hands it to me. I look at it. Hmmm

"What is it?" Laura asks.

"The answer to the mystery," I say. I show her the picture.

"This cannot be real, Luther," Laura says.

"It is real, let's go. I want to talk to the council myself," I say to her.

I look down at the picture. Laura's mother and my mother together with their mates. Now, I know why my mother said Laura and I were not the first wolf and fairy to be in love. She knew from personal experience. It still does not explain why she killed Laura's parents.

Ando, Laura, and I make our way out of the passageway. There are a lot of questions in my mind about my mother and now Laura's mother too. I know her busy brain is working into overdrive. I wonder if the other divorce papers belonged to her mother. What if her mother was married before she married Pip? I am sure the council knows the answer to this question. They will explain all of this to us.