The Wiccan Diaries: Neophyte Adept Part 43

"Please don't bring up the past, Ballard. I'm trying to block it out," I said. "Do you mind?"

But he just said: "I liked those two bloodsuckers. What were their names, Dallas and Chenille?"

"Not helping," I said. I put my fingertips to my head as though I had a migraine. And I did. If I could've given it a nameI would've named it Ballard. Ballard Rosen.

He just chuckled.

"If you strike those poses for too long," he said, "eventually you become them. What's that?"

"I don't need any more soph.o.m.oric Ballardisms, thank you very much," I said, looking at what he was pointing at. So much for secrets. My Wiccan Mark was burning like fire.

"It's really real," he said. "Look at that! Halsey, it's like you've been tricked out or something. You're marked."

Ballard whooped; I did not.

He couldn't stop staring at my Wiccan Mark. I still had my hoodie on. Part of me was, like: Show me yours, I'll show you mine, Ballard. But he needed to know. He needed to know that there were things which were happening and we had a part to play. So I pushed back my sleeve.

It was like I was revealing to him my s.e.x. Ballard looked at it like he had never seen one before. He licked his lips. He was all excited.

"This is my Wiccan Mark, Ballard Rosen. There are eight Wiccan virtues, but this one's mine. Honestly, it's like you haven't even seen your sister Lia's before," I said. I was thinking something was up with her Mark and like Lia didn't want it to be seen or something. Ballard's tool clunked.

"Show me some magic," he said. He had a hungry look on his face. Was something up with Lia? What wasn't he telling me? If she was hiding her Mark from Ballard, it must've developed a certain way, maybe even wrongly.

I made my Light pop on; he ooh'd as I shot it around the room. And then it disappeared. Rosens hiding things. Imagine that.

I needed no reciprocation from Ballard. I just wanted him to know that I was bada.s.s. Not that I didn't want to see his werewolf. His t.i.tchy little were-Ballard. "We have to get out of these abstractions," I said. "Only what is real. I think, you know, you have to choose between the life you imagined, if you follow me, and the life you actually end up having, Ballard."

He nodded, glumly.

"You can't reasonably keep doing something without it becoming who you are," I said. "I think we have two lives, the one in which we imagine what we can bemovie star, film director, President of the United States; and the other one, the one that's actually important; the one that's actually who we truly are. I don't want to say I want to be this or I'm going to do thatbecause I won't. I do want to say that I need your help, and that, together, I think we can do something, which is really important. I also want to say that I don't want to fight anymoreunless it's with Vittoria." I cat-clawed the air. "We need to be like this." I did the finger thing. And then for good measure, I said "stronga.s.s and together," as Lia had once said to me. "Chasing dreams is good until you catch them," I said. "What I want is real, Ballard. You know? Because anything else, you throw your life away trying to catch it, and then one day it just turns its back on you, and you're left hanging in the wind. Like a wet and floppy pair of skivs, you know what I mean? And I don't want to be a wet and floppy pair of skivs. Do you?"

"I know what you mean," he said, "it's like truth and lies. The truth only hurts. Whereas a lie, if you don't like it, you can just disregard it, and pick up some other truth. Maybe reality is lies, did you ever think of that?"

Marriage, a boyfriend, familyWicca, magic, a sisterhood, a place, a feeling of purpose Those were the things I craved. Maybe they were all lies. I shot my sleeve down, and said, "Sometimenot now, but sometimeI am going to want to have a talk with you, Ballard Rosen. It's about what we are, and what we wantbut for now, I want you to finish that motorcycle. Whose is it, by the way?"

Liesel'she said it was Liesel's. It was hot pink with lots of chromoly.

"You don't mean to say she's angling to be alpha dog too?" I said.

"Angling, shooting for the moon," he said.

"Never mind that. It's not important," I said.

It was a mark of Ballard's gentlemanliness that he was helping Liesel to improve her chances of winning this motorcycle compet.i.tionbecause, despite what he said, a big part of Ballard wanted to be in that race. I knew he did. He had ambitions of being Il Gatto himself. He couldn't hide it from me. And then, I imagined, Liesel wouldn't look on Ballard so unfavorably. I asked him how it had gone with her. He said: she said she was too old for him. A subtle way, he said, of the pack reinforcing its belief that he was too young to join them. ("A very Lockean point of view," Ballard called it.) "But you did kiss her?" I asked, referring to Liesel.

Ballard blushed; I decided not to pursue the subject. The last thing I needed was to be on the outs with any more of the crucial people in my life. But he said, "We may have gotten that far. Yeah."

"Oh, Ballard, congratulations!" I said.

He kept his thank-you speech to a minimum.

But how to resolve this Locke situation?

The Pack couldn't be under Lockeit couldn't. All you had to do was use Locke's argument against him. The next Il Gatto would be the most important in their historyour history, because I had been made an honorary member.

Ballard took a swig from his moonflask.

"Life is interfering. Do you feel it?" he said.

"I want you to enter that race, Ballard. And I want you to try to win it," I said. "Okay? We'll talk later, Ballard, all right?"

"Okay," he said. And then: "I can't imagine Locke parlaying with the House of Houses. They would eat him alive."

"Let me deal with Locke. I'llfigure something out," I said.

Something had pa.s.sed between usmaybe Ballard saw the Wiccan in me. Whatever it was, we were like this. And that's all I could ever really ask. To be like this with somebody. I think that's all any of us could. Because when you find somebody you can be intertwined with First things first, I thought, huffing: I needed an excuse to get away from my obligation to Ravenseal House. Luckily Ballard supplied me with one. "I forgot," he said. "Lia wanted me to tell you. The date's been s.h.i.+fted."

"What date?" I said.

Perhaps he could see that I was having trouble concentrating, because Ballard waited for me to make eye contact, before continuing. I brushed the hair out of my face. "Ballard?" I said.

"Lia's wedding. You didn't forget, did you?" he said. He smiled at me. I laughed back, chagrined. "No. Of course not," I said.

"Goodbecause you've got a whole month and a half more to think about it," he said. He looked at me, as if to say, What fun!

It was a moment before I understood what he was saying.

"It's called Lupercalia," he said, "a werewolf holiday, here in Rome, happening this coming February. The thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, if I remember correctly."

"You have a holiday... celebrating... werewolves?" I said. "Publicly?" I couldn't keep the skepticism out of my voice. "And Lia's wedding will be on that date?" It made no sense. Weren't they supposed to keep it quietthat they could s.h.i.+ft? Wouldn't this make it harder for Ballard's family to hide the fact that they were werewolves?

"Wait. There aren't people who knoware there?" I said. "That you canthat you areI mean, you do keep it a secretdon't you? Or try to? That you s.h.i.+ft."

Ballard gave me a pitying look.

"Did you know that there were werewolves?" he asked. "Did I? Did my sister Lia? Or Gaven? Of course not. Anyway, it's called the Wolf Festival, Lupercalia, and it's thought to exorcise this city of evil spiritswhich is exactly what we do, so maybe somebody did talk, an old Defender or somesuch. Although I can't think whom.... Lupercalia is also good for pregnancies...." he said. "What?"

"BallardL-Lennox is not"

"Oh, come on. You can't even say his name."

"He's not evil," I said.

"Then where is he?" he asked. I couldn't answer his query. "Ah-hah!" he said.

"I'm sure he's just beendelayedis all," I said.

"If you say so," said Ballard.

Hadn't I just said we shouldn't fight?

"Look. I justcare about you. All right? If he's... leading you on..." said Ballard.

"He's not! You have no idea how complicated things are for him," I said. Teenage emo-queen person.

"You mean, the fact he's a vampire, and we're his mortal enemies, and we've drawn a line, and said you to your corner, and we to ours, and now he's broken that, by coming to Rome? GeeI never thought of that," said Ballard.

"The Lenoir told him to come here," I said.

"Exactly. And in the processthreatened the sanct.i.ty of our sovereigntyor something."

"He's never fed here, BallardLennox is a good vampire. He only drinks Blood Cups."

"Whose blood, Halsey, is in those Cups?" said Ballard. "It doesn't matter. I don't want to fight. This place"and here I thought he meant Rome"is likeI dunnolike my luminarium, or something. It's where I come to be myself, if that makes sense. It's where I can reflect."

He was speaking about the garage. "It's almost January," he said. "Soon it will be the Wolf Moon. Then there's the Worm Moon and the Blue Moon, the Hunter's Moon. All kinds of moons. If I drop my pants, I can show you the Ballard Moon." He laughed, cutting the tension.

"You're so hipster," I said.

"Rome is a bastion. It protects us. I am not like my brothers and sisters. I am more powerful. And I am thisthis werewolf, that I am, for all time; only Gaven and I have spoken of this. You must know, Halsey, because we are linked. You need to know there is this connection between us. It does have the wider effect of complicating our relations.h.i.+ps with the other supernaturals. I and my family, we are bound, through oath and pledge and centuries, to being Protectors of Romeand now I feel this same kind of connection with you, I don't understand it. I know that you are soon to leave us, and that you will ask me to go with you.... What you and I are about to do transcends the Sons and Daughters of Romulus," said Ballard. "We've never had a member of the Pack protect an outsider before. You are one of us, Halsey Rookmaaker, a Romulan Daughter."

"Wait... what?"

"For Lia, she continues to be over-the-moon. Gaven is the One. It's only a matter of time before they decide to have kids. I have spoken to Gaven..."

"Wait... what?"

"How else am I supposed to interpret these feelings?" he said. "I feel you hurting inside of me. Almost as thoughno, it's as though It causes me physical pain. Your pain is my pain."

When I meant for Ballard to show me his, I hadn't meant all of this.

"I am working to keep these feelings under control," said Ballard. "Probably, because I know how you would feel, if I told you. Terrifiedor like we couldn't be friends anymore. But there is an upside. I think I will always know when you are in trouble."

He dropped the torque wrench he was carrying, as if my emotions were causing him physical pain.

Ballardfelt things. It was almost like he was standing naked before me. He was showing me his. "But you don't feel that way about me. Do you?" he said.

"Wait... what are we talking about?" I said. I was confused. More than usual.

Was Ballard talking about what I thought he was? Was I supposed to be a Romulan Daughtermore than just honorarily? And these feelings of his. I needed him to explain that. He knew when I was in danger?

"You and me," he said.

"What about us?" I said, before I could stop and think.

"I understand if you don't feel that way about me," he said, talking at cross purposes.

"Wait... Ballard..."

"Never mind. It's all right."

My Mark p.r.i.c.kled, flaring painfullyI slapped it with my off hand. Maybe it was in conflict with who I was. It was really starting to hurt. Maybe I was in conflict with myself. Had Ballard just declared himself to me? "WAIT," I said, out of breath from the pain. "I don't want to lose you, Ballard," I said.

He made some laughing, dismissive hand gesture. "Honestly, I don't even think that's possible," he said, tapping his forehead.

"Huh? What does that even mean?" I said.

"Ask Lia. I know I have."

"Ball-ard," I said.

"It's nothing. Lia just thinks thatif she's magic, maybe I am too. And maybe that's, you know, why I could see you comingwhen I did."

He was wiping off his hands, searching for another tool. Looking at me only every now and then.

"My senses are heightened," he said, "all right? I get these feelings. Like I'm... constantly on edge or something, I don't know what it is."

"Has it ever happened before? And what precisely is it?" I asked.

I came forward to help him.

"But one thing is certain" he said. "You and me, we're supposed to do something."

He waited for me to say something. I nodded my head. I think my brain had stopped working.

They will have a Power... A Power of Sight...

"Look. It's all right. I can deal with it," he said. "It's not like I have a choice about the way I feel. Only Lia thinks it may be a Risky thing. Like I haven't got enough to worry about, I may also be the ghost of my dead uncle."

He laughed humorlessly.

Ballard's emotional state was my main priority. He had dropped anvil-sized hints of his feelings for me in the pastwhich was why I had encouraged the Liesel thing, but apparently that hadn't worked out. Now what was I supposed to do?

"We need to talk about this later," I said. "Definitely later. Right now, I want you concentrating on that race. Ihave some things I need to do."

Meanwhile, Ballard's feelings may have been caused by something else, entirely. I didn't want to diminish them, but couldn't they have something to do with the fact thathe was my Protector? Maybe he was bound, as he said, to see inside my screwed-up head, or to at least know when I was out of sorts. Out of mind, out of sight. A power of Ballard.

"That's what Gaven said," he said. "He seemed to think they were natural feelings, my instincts, my p.r.i.c.kly apprehension when you are not around."

"So you can't read my mind..."

Ballard looked at me defiantly. His words held a separate meaning.

"I only see the real. Not the unreal."

If Ballard's Protector thing was the reason he was getting these feelings... about me... that would make me Her. The Wiccan Prime Mover. Which I was not. I couldn't possibly be. I was sure of that. LiaI needed to speak with her. I decided to go home first. I asked Ballard about the racethe Il Gatto triple circuit of Trastevere. He said it would be sometime after the New Year but before Lia's wedding, "If..."

"That's right. If...." I said.