Chapter 9 Vidar
Chapter nine
Vidar
It’d be so easy to let anger eat at me as I sit on the hard stoop outside our mansion. But all I feel is foolish.
And drained.
Golden shouted at me, and I wish he hadn’t stormed off. Rather than Ramy’s cool disappointment. I promised when I left my isolation to do better, and yet I’m like some bull stumbling around, knocking delicate things over and saying whatever stupidity pops into my dull head.
How can I possibly make this right? Never speak to Kai again?
The bond between us, though weak, aches at the idea—and, if I’m honest, so do I.
To forever be without jade and sandy-blonde, without the prettiest shade of brown and a field of wild lavender…
It’s a punishment I deserve, but one that sucks the life from me.
The sound of a car slowing pulls me from my thoughts, and I watch as a dew-wet black car rolls to a stop, before Rurik steps out in the silvery morning sun.
“He’s safe,” Rurik announces as he makes his way over. “I dropped him off with Apollo.”
I nod. “Thank you.”
“What did you say to him this time, Maker?” Rurik asks, stopping in front of me. His blonde hair is crystal-white against the barely peeking sun.
It’s difficult to face Rurik—who thought his mate was dead for fifty years—and admit what I’ve done. Worse still, I said it all in front of Lucero, who lost three soulmates before he found the courage to turn Golden.
However, silence won’t hide my shame.
Luckily, I have Ramy, who is all too willing to share my stupidity. “Kai overheard Vidar saying he should wait for him to be reborn into a more ‘pleasing form’.” My youngest side-eyes me from where he leans against a stone pillar, a slash of black against silver fog. “Did I get that right, Maker?”
“Yes, thank you, Rahim,” I grunt.
“That’d do it,” Rurik states, sitting beside me and clapping my leg for emphasis.
The door clicks shut, Lucero’s voice soon following. “Golden hates you.”
I groan, rubbing a hand over my face.
Ramy sighs. His shoes scuff against the ground before he lowers himself on my other side. It isn’t long before I hear Luc stroll over and sit next to Ramy.
I listen to the rustling trees, their fresh evergreen scent carried on the mist that eddies at our feet.
In this grey hour between night’s end and day’s break, it’s like being caught in an in-between place where time stands still for all but me and my offspring.
I should feel off-balance, like when I first stood on a boat, and yet, there is a certain peace that flows around us.
As if all our mistakes and disappointments and regrets are somewhere far beyond the fog.
“How long since we’ve all been together like this?” I ask no one in particular.
“A long time,” Rurik answers, all his usual roughness smoothed.
He doesn’t count the times when they visited me in a run-down mansion, apathy chaining me to the walls more completely than any shackle could, and I’d lash out. Hurt them to feel something other than the deep well of nothing.
“You did well taking care of everyone in my absence, Lucero.” Turning, I stare at my second oldest. Since I’ve been back, I might be getting everything wrong with Kai, but I’ve also forgotten to be a leader to my offspring.
Or, that was something I forgot well before meeting my soulmate.
Lucero stretches out his long legs over the stoop and crosses his ankles. “I somehow managed to keep the three of us together when Sen left.” Lucero plays the blasé playboy well. But I see that glimmer in his eye, the one he normally reserves for Golden.
Happy. Yes, Lucero’s happy, and he deserves to be.
“Have you heard from Sen?” I ask.
After my eldest left, I expected the others to follow his example. I wouldn’t have blamed them, but for some reason they stayed. Maybe it was a sense of loyalty or just the fact that vampires crave the familiarity of their family unit; either way, I’m grateful.
“The last I heard, he’s hunting down artefacts for rich humans under some ridiculous pseudonym,” Lucero replies. “But that was a few years ago.”
Despite everything, I chuckle. “That does sound like him. I’m sure it’s also very dangerous, and he’s nearly died a hundred times over.”
“And the asshole is probably charging them a ridiculous amount,” Rurik adds.
Ramy drops his elbows onto his knees and rests his chin on his fisted knuckles. “Sen was really that adventurous?”
I often forget my youngest never met my oldest. Overcome with a tenderness for Ramy, I lay my hand on his head to stroke his dark locks. “He was, and a terrible flirt. If there was trouble to be found, Sen would find it.”
“Once—” Before Rurik even begins his story, he’s laughing, “once when we were somewhere in the Middle East, Sen wanted us to break into a castle surrounded by a moat filled with crocodiles.”
“I’m certain it was West Africa,” Luc corrects, and Rurik flips him off—smirking and calling him an asshole.
“Was there treasure inside?” Ramy asks, leaning closer.
“Absolutely,” Lucero replies. “But that isn’t why he wanted to do it. The noble who lived there was proud of a hideous piece of art, and we wanted to take it away from him.”
“A crown made out of gold, wasn’t it?” Rurik frowns, trying to find the memory.
“Something to that effect,” Lucero replies with a wave of his hand. “Anyway, after much debating on how we’d deal with the scaled beasts, we snuck in through the sewers.”
A loud laugh bursts from my chest. “Oh yes, horrible experience.”
“You all really did that?” Ramy asks, shoulders shaking with quiet laughter.
“I protested,” Lucero adds.
Rurik scoffs. “Of course you did, not enough silks and pretty boys to rub your feet.”
“That wasn’t the only thing I wanted rubbing…”
Grinning, I elbow Luc while twisting Ramy’s hair between my fingers. “Yet once we were inside, we managed to lose Sen.”
“But we did find the golden mushroom,” Lucero proclaims.
“It was a crown, asshole,” Rurik corrects.
“And—” I sit up, smirking like the devil at Ramy, “we also found guards.”
He gasps, and if possible, leans closer. “What happened? Did you kill them?”
I raise my chin as I tuck a strand of hair behind my youngest's ear. “Where would the fun be in that?”
“Before they could chop our heads off, Sen and the noble came stumbling into the chamber,” Lucero tells, lip quirked. “Apparently, our brother was getting the man incredibly drunk.”
“So he saved you?” Ramy asks.
Rurik shakes his head, snickering. “That asshole acted like he’d never met us.”
Ramy grins like he very much approves of Sen’s antics. “What happened then?”
“Well…” Lucero begins, launching into a complete lie about our daring escape. Rurik rolls his eyes and follows it with the truth, which is far more boring and involves another sewer.
But the story, truth or lie, doesn’t matter as I listen on. My chest filling with all the warmth of the sun as it begins to creep into the sky, casting away any lingering mist. I have to make things right with Kai. But to have my offspring's smiles, well, for now…
That is more than enough.