As I'm aware, the story is taking a long while to update. To save time for those of you who are awaiting an update, and unsurprisingly, can't remember what happened in the last twenty odd chapters, here's a brief recap: (I will point out now - if you haven't read the actual story, this is not even the bones of it.)
Prologue:
Chatoya is haunted by Blue's promise to destroy her. Blue finds out someone has been sent to assassinate him; we see a flash of a girl's face.
Part One:
Circle Strange discuss Blue; the conversation turns to the habit they all have of keeping deep dark secrets that inevitably get revealed and cause problems. Cougar and Jepar find out their girlfriends have been sharing rather more about their private lives than they would like; Cougar flies into a temper and Chatoya escapes out of the house to a favourite refuge of hers, a bluebell grove. Blue turns up, and unsurprisingly, Chatoya kicks him and tries to run. He catches her, and tells her if she doesn't do what he wants, he'll start systematically killing her friends. And what he wants her to do is raise the dead.
Part Two:
A brief glimpse of Blue's assassin; we learn Blue changed her in some way.
Chatoya goes to the Black Dahlia, wanting to tell her friends about Blue's threat. In the end, she can't bring herself to. Something of the group's reputation is discussed. Thom announces his cousin from Ireland is coming to stay for a while as he's on a gap year. Cern comes in - Toya remembering Blue's threat to kill him, decides to do the spell.
Her fear sets in, and keeps her awake. She feels as if her life is empty of meaning, and her thoughts wake Blue up. Annoyed at this, he turns up at her house, demanding to know what's wrong with her, wearing a vaguely obscene T-shirt, and getting Chatoya so angry that she forgets her pain and comes up with a plan to give him just what he deserves.
Part Three
The next morning, Chatoya, Aspen and Blue meet in the cemetery to go and find the tomb of the man they're going to raise. She learns she's going to raise the man who created both Nightfire and Ryars Valley. Aspen tells her that he's giving up Pursang, the organisation of assassins that he runs but there's a catch - he has to be defeated in single combat first.
Meantime, Iager, a dragon, learns from Tri that he is to be sent to Ryars Valley to find out about Blue and Aspen.
Sean, Thom's cousin, arrives in Ryars Valley.
Part Four
Aspen notices that something is definitely going on between Toya and Blue. Chatoya puts her plan into action; she reads the spell, but uses it to raise the angry dead against Blue. And there are a lot of dead people angry with him. With them comes a wraith who possesses Aspen and attacks Blue. It pounds him into a small pile, and turns on Chatoya. Drawing on resources and magick she didn't know she possessed, Chatoya hurls it back into limbo between life and death.
Sean is introduced to Ryars Valley; we learn Thom's little sister Kirsty has been selling information not only to the Nightworld, but to Blue.
Part Five
The Circle are enjoying the last of summer; chat moves to Chatoya and Sean, the new arrival.
Blue is somewhat furious until he realises Chatoya beat Aspen in single combat and Pursang now belongs to her. She tells Blue that the man he wanted her to raise wasn't there - and therefore is still alive.
Part Six
Chatoya and Cougar have happy platonic hour in a hammock; both fall asleep. We learn Blue is somewhat worried as Chatoya had almost got one over him. Chatoya dreams of Blue as a child, who was tortured by his family. On this occasion, he is rescued by a nine-year old Cougar. She is shocked at this other facet of his life. Both she and Cougar waked, shocked that they shared a dream. Chatoya lets him feed from her.
Part Seven
Chatoya and Cougar meet Sean briefly, though they don't know it's him. Chatoya discovers that Cougar is still protective of Blue, and Cougar behaves very strangely with her for a moment.
The mysterious assassin watches Blue and does a bit of plotting.
Ria decides to leave; desperately unhappy with her relationship with Cougar, she chooses to spend a year abroad, in Australia. Cougar knows, and shares his pain - briefly - with Toya.
Part Eight
Worried about her inheritance of Pursang, Chatoya goes to the lake to try and find Jepar, who is a good listener. Instead, she finds Sean and chats to him. They hit it off and she agrees to show him round. The Circle girls are thrilled for her; Cougar is not, but Toya puts this down to him being upset over Ria.
Cougar asks her to their autumn ball, and she agrees. That night, Chatoya dreams about Blue again, but this time, he has control over the dream, and does a bit of light seduction, mixed with a few threats.
Part Nine
We learn that Sean is in fact, Iager, who created Ryars Valley, and begot Nightfire.
Lisa and Alisha take Toya shopping for the ball. Alisha argues with Cougar, and his fragile temper snaps. While they shop, Cougar goes to see the Pack to try and find out if Cern Akafren (see Nightfire) is okay. He finds Felicity Serafine, one of the Pack, They chat about Cern, then move onto other people in the valley. Flick learns that Aspen lives here, and confesses she was attacked by his father, who is obsessively searching for Aspen after he ran away from the enclave and Bernie (his father). She tells Cougar that Bernie knows where Aspen is and is coming to find him.
The Circle go to the ball, but minus Cougar, who feels he should warn Aspen.
Aspen's second-in-command, Jacqui, an extremely devious Monacon vampire, turns up to meet her new boss.
Part Ten
Jacqui learns something of Blue's plans for Toya, and we are told a little more about Nightfire / Pursang's way of operating.
Flick tells Cern to snap out of his depression after he lost his soulmate. He tries.
Cougar tries to find Aspen, but learns he's at the ball.
Chatoya is approached by Blue who introduces her and Jacqui. They loathe each other. Jacqui decides that as Chatoya is a witch, she will be easy to kill.She arranges with some of the less moral members of the Pack to kill her.
Blue seduces Toya on the balcony.
Part Eleven
Tali and Lisa - worried because they've seen Blue - go to find Toya, and discover her and Blue locked in what can only be called a steamy embrace. Thoroughly shocked, they disappear downstairs. Blue and Chatoya - as ever - argue, and part on a less than happy note, with him warning her of his promise, and her telling him what an utter bastard he is.
Iager is out by the lake, using his dragon powers to spy on Blue and Aspen; the girl assassin is watching him.
The Circle confront Toya; all of them are furious, harsh words are exchanged. Cougar comes in, and Chatoya tells him before the Circle can; he is utterly distraught, and runs off. Toya follows him.
Part Twelve
Chatoya catches him; they have an argument and she hits him. He gets so angry, he nearly bites her and warns her away. She goes, and after such a miserable night, decides to walk home - the Circle have all left, so she has no other way home.
Blue drops Jacqui home and in the process, reads her mind and discovers she has paid the Pack to attack Toya. If she dies, it will ruin his plans.
On the way back, Chatoya is attacked. She is rescued by Blue, who takes her back to his house and puts her up there.
Part Thirteen
Chatoya awakes screaming with nightmares of the wolves and is comforted by Blue. In his own rather unique and merciless way.
Cougar, needing to feed after the ball, finds a human victim. He is then found by the girl assassin, who turns out to be Sandrine, a human slave from the enclave, he Blue and Aspen lived on as children. She is changed; far colder. She tells him Iager is the assassin sent to kill Toya in order to harm Blue.
Part Fourteen
Iager realises someone was watching him. We learn that he knows Chatoya and Blue are soulmates. He steals 'home' and finds Kirsty has been awake, and wandering round town. She has seen a strange vampire; an older man.
Morning dawns; Chatoya wakes in Blue's house (in his arms, in fact). She leaves furious with him as ever after a particularly biting exchange on both sides.
Part Fifteen
On her way home, Chatoya meets Sean who is shocked by the bites and scratches she is covered in after the attack. Before she can accept a lift, Cougar runs up and throws her over his shoulder - he throws a parting shot at Sean/Iager, telling him that he knows Sean/Iager is a dragon.
Jacqui is on the phone to Bernie, Aspen's father - it is she who has called him here. Thinking she has got rid of Toya, that means Aspen is still leader, and Jacqui plans to use Bernie - of whom Aspen is absolutely terrified - to destroy him, leaving her in power. We learn she was once attacked by Bernie, and rescued by Blue, but since has grown powerful enough to defend herself.
Cougar tells Toya that Sean is dangerous. He almost confesses something to her, though Toya isn't sure what.
Part Sixteen
Jacqui has invited Blue and Aspen for breakfast in a local café, claiming to have news. Tam, Aspen's soulmate, doesn't really want him to go, but lets him.
Toya gets into the boys' home to find Thom there, who is as shocked as Cougar at her wounds. Cougar tells him about Sean, and Thom goes out to find his 'cousin'.
We learn that Ryars Valley is named after Ryar, Iager's wife, who he married without loving her, until the end when she died. Iager buried her beneath the lake, one of his favourite haunts. Thom finds him there.
During a conversation with Cougar, Chatoya finds herself thrown into Blue's mind at the café; Jacqui has emptied the place and is controlling the human owner's mind. Bernie comes in, and Aspen falls to pieces.
Part Seventeen
To be continued...
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