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“Because you’re an idiot!” Oracle barks, staring him down.
His eyes go red as his power rolls off him in waves until it starts to affect everyone in the room. The need to cower surges through me. I fight the urge to kneel in front of Oracle. The power pushes hard enough to make us all step back away from him. His anger is palpable and rolls out upon us like a wave crashing higher and higher on the shore.
“Oracle,” Ettie whispers, daring to reach up and touch him. Slowly the color leaches from his eyes and he smiles at Ettie.
“I am okay, Little One,” he says and then turns to Endy. “Listen up closely, I only intend to go over this once. There is always power in blood. Humans need it to live. Animals,” Oracle hisses at Endy as the man growls low in his throat, reacting to the power just as much as the rest of us. “Need it to survive. They may not need it to feed daily but to survive they will need their mate’s blood. Without it, you will lose your humanity to the beast inside you.”
“What does that mean?” Jacob asks through gritted teeth.
The power in the room recedes a bit. It feels like all of us take a collected breath now that Oracle’s power isn’t forcing us to submit.
“One day,” he begins, “those creatures you shift into will take over, leaving you forever bound in that form,” Oracle announces. At least there’s no riddles. That seems self-explanatory.
“You’re lying!” Endy argues. “If that were true, why didn’t you give us this information before?”
“Because I can see ahead of you. I could see how you would react. You weren’t ready to listen,” Oracle tells him, quirking an eyebrow as if daring him to argue. “Now you have no choice but to listen and learn.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Endy says snidely, puffing up arrogantly. “Jacob and I are free. We always have choices.”
Oracle glances at him. “If you don’t care that an enemy is ready to decimate your whole pack, leave,” Oracle says dryly. He looks and sounds done with this. I’m surprised he’s put up with it this long. He looks away from Endy to an empty spot next to him. “I know, Luciana, I know. I shall rest soon.”
Jacob grabs Endy’s arm as he opens his mouth to say something else. “Let him finish before his mind wanders or we may never hear it,” Jacob whispers harshly. Endy closes his mouth as Oracle bares his fangs, the anger still there, boiling beneath his calm exterior.
“We’re all supernatural creatures. And as such we have power in our blood beyond human capability. That’s why there will always be enemies wanting to harness it. There will be those of our own kind wanting to control everything. It is in our DNA. Our very makeup is that we want to protect our mates and be in charge. That urge is in all alphas, it’s just on steroids when it comes to our kind.”
“I can definitely see that,” Ettie teases, her gaze centered on Leo. He grins at her.
“The same is true with humans. One human or even ten is not something to worry about, but when humans fear something is different, they band together. That is when they become dangerous. There will always be strength in numbers.”
Oracle doesn’t need to tell us twice. We all know this firsthand. We all remain quiet and let him continue.
“Our blood longs to bond with another’s. It’s why the connection it forges is so powerful. The mating bond is our destiny. It is what we’re designed for. The bonds we forge not only make us more powerful, they give us purpose. Draven and Scar were hellbent on trying to hunt down mates because of it. The blood others’ mates could give them wouldn’t make a mating bond, but it will still create a bond that feeds power upon power. That is addicting. It can rot your soul and poison what little humanity we carry before our mates find us. That happened to Draven, and he used his mate to fuel that dream. He was determined to create a dynasty and rule over all of creation.
“That means mortals have mates the same as we do then, right? So, Grace must realize I’m her mate. Somewhere inside her, she has to know.”
Oracle turns to me and nods—although I think I can detect pity in his gaze. “She does, although her fear has it locked out. She’s scared of things she doesn’t understand, but that’s a story for another time. Grace is…unusual. Humans that are mates aren’t like ordinary everyday people. Those destined to be mates have blood that might appear normal, but it’s designed to accept the bond with their mate so they can become equals,” Oracle explains.
