Probably not an aw-shucks day for them.

“Maybe this was a bad idea,” I state with my confidence on the decline.

The road I’m on dead-ends at a massive gate that is no less than fifty yards away once I top the hill. VVH is over the massive gate that is already open.

“Little too late to turn back now. They’ll still need things, and while the Van Helsings have a protocol in place that forces them to give up their home for a case like this, it isn’t likely they’ll do much else to help these people out or make them feel comfortable.”

“Do you have a pen and paper?” I ask her as we go under the gates.

“Yeah, why?” Leiza says, always prepared as she starts digging around in her bag.

“Because you’re going on a shopping spree today. They’re going to need even more than you’ve already acquired for them if no one else is going to help them. Besides, I’ve seen their cages before. I won’t see them again,” I go on, a very abrupt, somewhat crazy plan forming in the back of my mind. “And then I’m taking them home with me.”

There’s a long beat of silence where everyone just sort of stares at me like I’ve sprouted a tail and a second head. I probably needed a bridge from our conversation to that announcement.

“We’re going to need a bigger house,” Tiara finally points out, eyes on me like I’m crazy.

“We’ll put them up at Vance’s instead of leaving them here. I read that rule book Mom gave me. They can put up their House anywhere.”

“But Idun will lock site in Shadow Hills, and—”

“Doesn’t matter. Nowhere in the rulebook does it say anything about multiple Houses not being in the same location for the Neopry family. It’s a nonissue, because there’s always been plenty of territory to spread out and claim. The House has to have a three-fourths majority vote to change a law.”

I stop talking as we pull up in front of the massive, eighteenth-century, castle-like home that faces a vast field full of magnificently healthy, shiny horses. I stop just to admire the beauty for a second, because it really is a full work of natural art.

“So the guy who built this place—”

“Is Vanzuela Van Helsing,” Leiza says as though she’s finishing my sentence, her tone riddled with slight terror.

“The alphas call him Zuela. We call him the Van Helsing monster, because of how much he loves killing our kind,” Lemon says in a hushed tone. “He’s gone, right?”

“Emit wouldn’t have let Violet out of the house if he was expected to be here,” Tiara whispers like she’s convincing herself of that.

“He can’t just kill us without a reason, though, since we’re not at war,” Ingrid also says like she’s convincing herself of that, her tone even softer than Tiara’s.

She scrambles over the backseat and disappears from sight after that.

“How do wars even work with everyone so close together?” I ask, still reveling in the captivating beauty.

The castle doesn’t look old and dusty. It almost shines with glory and awe…if that makes sense. I idly wonder if Vanzuela is as much of a perfectionist as Vance.

“We all pull to various points of one country, and the alphas move to the bunkers there to rest and feed. Then they war across the land during the times in between, until someone captures a metaphorical flag of sorts, and everyone has to regroup. Then alliances shift when someone pushes the boundaries another won’t cross, and the war shifts, reigniting, and we start all over again until the alphas finally reach some sort of understanding,” Leiza says in a whisper like she’s carefully prepared that speech for me.

“That’s the gist of it, isn’t it?” I ask with a grin.

She pats my arm. “It’s an easy compromise, since I suck at remembering the fine details.”

“It’s a time of great separation and brutal sacrifice, Violet. Tensions run so high after a war that it’s not much better. If not for Arion’s tantrum, we’d be much farther along in the healing process,” Lemon adds, as we all just continue to stare up at the gorgeously intimidating home.

“Not to mention how very critically inconvenient a war would be in this era. They’ll live long enough to see the world plunge back into the dark ages, but we likely won’t. Too many cameras and touch-of-the-button technology out there. We’ll be the reason the world is plunged into the dark ages if we cause widespread hysteria, and we’ll be mostly wiped out,” Mary adds very quietly.

“Then the alphas will just pick themselves back up and start all over again, caring less and less with each stupendous failure, because it’s simply too painful and too hard to keep caring. Aside from the Vampyres, who are a little more psychotic by nature,” Tiara goes on, always getting her vampire jabs in when she can, “the alphas didn’t all start out soulless. They once cared.”

“It just did no good to care, because Idun always broke their favorite toys, or so Marta would say. It’s when they cared the least about Idun. Marta mocked them for it, got in her punches when she could, even managed to kill them on occasion, when she was really pissed off at them for all the power they’d allowed Idun to garner.”

“Allowed her to garner?” I ask, confused.

“Long story for another time. You’re just stalling at this point. The longer you stall, the less time you’ll have before those Neopry skin walkers rehydrate and all hell either does or doesn’t break loose.”