Chapter 9 #3
“In truth, it’s no less safe than any other mission. We always go in knowing there’s a chance we might not come out of it. But it is now much safer thanks to you,” she said in a serious tone devoid of flattery, even though her last sentence stroked my ego.
“Glad to be of service,” I replied teasingly, making her smile.
“That said, I doubt that it is my old cult. Elliot is around my age, and I never met him in the Sanctuary. He would have been among those of us who were freed and raised by the Church or placed in an orphanage. The portals surrounding that waypoint by the swamp are also gone. I strongly feel that this is merely a case of scavengers using it. I also have no memory of having to enter a black vortex.”
“What about the Sanguine Crocuses?” I inquired.
“I don’t recall seeing them glowing,” Eleni said pensively. “We were hardly ever allowed to leave the Sanctuary, and we always traveled with far too many handlers to allow us to escape. But the few times I did, it was either broad daylight, or the moon was out.”
“I see.”
She smiled at the unenthusiastic way in which I responded.
My gut told me that the cult was indeed involved.
Elliot seemed a bit too happy that Eleni specifically had shown up with Vivian.
Then again, he hadn’t seemed to know that she would be the one coming to rescue Sienna.
So maybe this truly was a mere coincidence.
“But enough about me,” Eleni said before putting a bit more food onto her plate. “What about you? Was your youth more entertaining than mine?”
“In many ways, yes. But my conception was just as messy as yours,” I said in a neutral town.
Her eyes widened. “How so?”
“My sire tricked my mother,” I confessed, the old shame, anger, and resentment resurfacing. “I believe he used an illusion. According to rumors—since my mother always refused to go into the details of what actually happened—he passed himself off as the male she loved.”
Although I already considered Eleni as my mate, until our bond was sealed, I couldn’t tell her that my sire pretended to be Lord Azrael, the great Angel of Death himself. Together, my mother and Azrael had already conceived my brother Pharos.
“My mother and her beloved had planned on having a second child together, and they were supposed to try to make it happen that night. So my sire took on his appearance after delaying him so that he could take his place,” I said bitterly.
“But how did he know that it was to happen that night?” Eleni asked, rightfully baffled.
“I don’t know. They’ve kept too much hidden from me. But my understanding is that my sire knew him and conspired to delay his arrival.”
“That’s horrible!” Eleni exclaimed, her disgust palpable although thankfully not seemingly directed at me. “Did he use a glamour spell?”
I shook my head. “No. My mother would have seen through it. Like me, he was a doppelganger. When we shift, it is nearly impossible to detect the deception. Physically, we literally become the person or creature we morphed into, down to our scent if we sampled their blood or flesh. Usually, the only way someone will discover our treachery is if we slip up by not having a specific answer to something we should know.”
“Nine Hells!” she whispered.
“Her beloved sent my mother a message warning her that he would be late, but she didn’t receive it in time,” I said dejectedly. “To add insult to injury, my sire tricked my mother into promising that she would take extra care to make sure she brought me to term.”
“What a fiend!” Eleni hissed, outraged. “He knew that his treachery would be discovered sooner than later!”
“Exactly,” I said, anger audible in my voice.
“And of course, she agreed. She wanted that second child with him—or at least with who she thought he was. But her real beloved walked in while they were still together. He understood immediately what was happening and pulled my sire off her. A part of me wished I had the full detail of what they did to him once they realized his betrayal. I’m not even certain if all this is accurate.
All that I know is that my mother utterly destroyed him for taking advantage of her. ”
“So maybe it didn’t actually happen that way?” Eleni suggested carefully.
I shook my head. “We’ve had many arguments about it.
Mother never denied anything when I asked specific questions about my sire tricking her.
But every wrong assumption, she denied. Like me, my mother never lies.
For me—as is the case for any doppelganger—it is genetically impossible for us.
For her, I can’t say if it’s the same. I just know that if she cannot—or doesn’t want to—give an honest answer, she will just deflect, dance around, or flat out say she will not speak of it.
But she won’t lie. So by deduction, this general accounting of the event is accurate.
“To be fair, it is understandable that she might not want to talk about it,” Eleni said gently. “It must have been a dramatic experience for her, and one she doesn’t want to think about. But what of her beloved?”
“He never blamed her,” I replied firmly. “Of that, I am grateful. However, as far as I know, they never coupled again.”
Eleni frowned. “So he did blame her or at least resented that she was with another.”
I shook my head and repressed a snort. My mother had hundreds of children, most with different fathers—which wasn’t uncommon among the Gods and Ancients like she was. Azrael had hundreds—if not thousands—of offspring. They didn’t care about such things.
“Not at all. As I understand it, she was the one who refused him. A part of me thinks that it is indeed trauma. Being with him would undoubtedly remind her of my sire and ruin the moment.”
“Fuck!” Eleni whispered, with horrified understanding.
“She loves him deeply, and he adores her. But I don’t know if they can ever be together again. Maybe one day,” I said with a sad smile. “After all, time isn’t an issue for them.”
Eleni stared at me with an unreadable expression for a few seconds that nearly had me squirming in my seat.
“What happened isn’t your fault, Lyall,” she said softly.
That comment struck a nerve, and I visibly flinched before regaining my composure. “I didn’t say that,” I replied a bit too defensively.
“You may not have said it, but it doesn’t take a mind reader to see that you think it,” she countered gently.
My shoulders slouched, and I bowed my head in defeat. Obviously, my head understood this, but my heart couldn’t let it go.
“You had zero control over what happened. He was the monster and appropriately paid for his crime,” Eleni said forcefully. “Surely your mother doesn’t blame you for it, right?”
I shook my head firmly. “No, she doesn’t and has stated it many times.
“See?! You’re a demigod. That means that your parents also are or maybe even higher in the divine hierarchy.
If your mother blamed you, she would have taken revenge and found a way to eliminate you.
After all, the pledge your sire extracted was only about getting you to term.
After that, your fate became fair game. And yet, here you are. So she didn’t want to harm you.”
I snorted and studied her face with a hint of amusement.
“You sound just like my mother,” I said teasingly.
“She said that?” Eleni asked with curiosity.
I nodded. “She stated that if she wanted me gone, I would have been wiped out from both realms of existence a long time ago. In fact, she sent me to you.”
This time, Eleni recoiled, the fork she was lifting to her mouth pausing midway as she stared at me.
“She did?!”
I nodded again. “She told me to go pick flowers I absolutely knew she didn’t need by the crematorium on the specific day and around the time that you went to rescue the clerics.”
Eleni gaped at me, robbed of words.
“Who in the world is your mother?!” she asked, stunned.
I smiled. “You’ll find out in due time.”
The irony of using that sentence my mother far too often triggered me with almost had me snorting again. It was all the more amusing looking at my woman making the same annoyed face I undoubtedly made every time I got that answer.
“Fine,” Eleni muttered begrudgingly. “Whatever her reason for sending you there that day, I’m glad she did.”
“So am I, my mate.”
She stared at me for a second, no doubt in reaction to my possessive term of endearment. The tension I didn’t even realize had crawled up my back faded away seconds later when she gave me a smile that hinted she didn’t actually mind and maybe even liked it.
I smiled back and then tucked into my food.