Getting back to penthouse was surprisingly exhausting. Despite the trek through the forest, we hadn’t really used much physical energy, but the mental toll from the last few days was fairly extensive. Constantly going from relaxed to excited to surprised was fraying my already haggard nerves. As someone who spent my life on a hair trigger this kind of emotional rollercoaster was even more exhausting for me than it would be for others. Sleeping helped, but despite the hours of rest I got each night the bags under my eyes were darker and deeper the woods in a Robert Frost poem.

If it had just been me I’d have just sucked it up, but Ali looked nearly as bad as I did, and Aiden was even worse. My sister, meanwhile, was basically unflappable and somehow flitted around mostly unaffected by any of the earthshaking revelations of our new life style. Erin had always been the type of person to go with the flow, but even I found myself blown away by how blasé she was about the whole thing. Our friends seemed worried about our mental states, and it was beyond frustrating not to be able to explain that Erin was the one who was really abnormal for being so damn chipper all the time.

Having mostly been raised as the descendants of pagan gods, despite not having known about the system, most of them seemed to take everything in stride. What really shocked me was that Sarah, who had no background in this world, seemed to be having the time of her life. Making friends and going on adventures with her new team seemed to fill the pretty blonde with a sense of bubbling excitement and she mostly just acted like there was no pressure on her at all.

I really envied her the carefree attitude and I resolved to try to emulate her over the next few years. Rolling with the punches would save me a lot of bruising, especially if this weeks craziness was any indication of how things would go in the future. I pushed my key into the lock and practically collapsed against the door after fumbling the lock open, Erin rushed past me and threw herself dramatically across the couch, somehow simultaneously coming across as energetic and displaying the most over dramatic, bone deep weariness I had ever seen on a human being.

Sometimes I could really see Alex in my sister. Growing up she had adored him, and vice versa, dad had been less than thrilled with his only daughter emulating his reprobate of a son, but seeing how it drove her to improve herself he hadn’t ever really cracked down on her outrageous behavior. I could see him in her sarcasm and her smile, in her manic energy. She had been influenced so heavily by him growing up.

Honestly despite being twins I envied their relationship. Erin and I were close, but Alex treated Erin like a princess, and she hero worshipped our older brother. The only real time I had ever seen Alex truly angry was when dad made Erin cry when we were children. Erin had broken some expensive knick knack and dad had grounded her for six months. Alex had been fourteen or so at the time and he just got really quiet and told Erin to wait there. He had gone to speak with dad and ten minutes later came back telling Erin dad had apologized and she wasn’t in any trouble. We’d never found out exactly what happened, but ever since, dad had treated Alex as a competent hunter rather than a lazy screw up.

The blue eyes all of our family shared met mine, as if my sister could read my mind and her mood got suddenly more somber. We always had been good at picking up what the other was thinking. “How has he been?” Her voice lacked the previous notes of joy or excitement. She seemed pensive, scared almost, though whether she was afraid of our brother being in trouble of some kind or being fine without her I wasn’t sure.

Erin only ever sounded like that when talking about Alex and even then only very rarely. I had long since theorized she knew something about why Alex acted the way he did, but she would never tell me anything. I wasn’t sure what convinced me so thoroughly that there was something wrong with him, but I just could never shake the feeling. I didn’t think it was too serious, or we would have been told, but maybe he was dealing with depression or something? That could be serious in its own way, but it might explain some things that had bothered me about my brother for most of my life.

I gave her my best encouraging smile “Same as he always is. Mad as a hatter and twice as much fun. He never really changes. You don’t need to spend so much time worrying about him you know. He can more than take care of himself. You and dad treat him so oddly, one of you acts like he’s some vital asset and one of you like acts he’s about to break. He’s easily the most stable of us all.” Sending our somber mood, Aiden and Ali had slipped out of the room, leaving us alone, and for one of the few times in my life that I could remember I was genuinely uncomfortable around my twin sister. The look in her eyes was sad and haunted, emotions that didn’t belong on her normally joyful face and were out of place in the current circumstances unless she really did know something I didn’t.

Her sad eyes met mine “You don’t get it. You never really did, but that’s not your fault, dad doesn’t really get it either, even if he thinks he does. He just sees the benefits, sees the opportunities, but he doesn’t realize what it costs. If he keeps pushing Alex like he has been something is going to give, and I have no idea how to stop it. Alex could make him stop, if he admitted what it was doing to him, but he never will. He’s too obsessed with being indispensable, to used to being needed. You’re all idiots.” Her voice was becoming ragged and angry her breath coming in short pants as she spat her vague vitriol at the only person she had to unleash it on.

I was in shock. Erin never talked to me like this, never talked to anyone like this, Erin didn’t scream and rage at people, she was always happy and smiling, always making the world a little brighter. The venom in her voice scared me almost as much as what she was saying filled me with a confused sense of unease. “Erin, what are you talking about? What what is doing to him? What is Alex doing that’s hurting him? Does it have something to do with why dad listens to him more than anyone else?”

I thought I could calm her down if I explained to her that I didn’t know what she was talking about but I had been wrong, if anything she seemed to get even angrier “Of course you wouldn’t know! Because dad never tells anyone anything and Alex is almost as bad! They just keep the family in the dark and plot their schemes!” She fixed me with a withering glare that almost made me physically flinch back at the rage and contempt I never thought I would see on my little sisters face “Maybe if you weren’t all idiots he wouldn’t need to keep so much to himself! You all stumble about thinking you’re so impressive, I hope you still feel impressive when he drops dead!”

And with that final bit of venom spat from between clenched teeth my sister burst into angry tears and tore out of the room, slamming the door behind her as she fled, and leaving me feeling hurt, angry, and most of all, afraid. Because Erin was dramatic but she didn’t say things needlessly, and if she was this angry and afraid it had to be for a good reason, and as I slumped miserably to the couch and dropped my head into my hands I couldn’t help but be afraid.

What was my brother not telling us? Why did Erin know? And was I really putting one of the people I loved most in the world in mortal danger through my own ignorance. Well, if anything I had solved one problem. Suddenly all this video game bullshit didn’t seem nearly as intimidating anymore. I had much bigger problems.