48. Chapter Forty Eight Lennox
Chapter Forty Eight: Lennox
Jumping back, I caught the swing of Ellis’s blade, my mother’s Spring Consort. The scene I found myself in now felt so surreal. I knew this confrontation was coming and knew this might be an outcome, even if I had hoped it wouldn’t come to this. However, it seemed my own father had no such compunctions about killing me now despite my lack of desire to do the same for him.
For so long, these monsters had been my parents who did their best to corrupt me. They had tried for years, and for a long while, I let them believe that they had succeeded, using my mask to hide the fact that their actions were slowly killing my soul. At some point, they had rid me of all desire to keep going, leaving me with only the hope that I could gain my freedom from them upon the completion of the Trials.
Looking back, I could see how foolish I had been to hope for such a thing, and yet, Avalonia had given me the freedom I hadn’t known I desired. She’d given me Rhowyn, the first person to truly love the real me. She had despised my mask and had somehow made me feel safe enough to become the kind of man I revered. For her, I would do anything. Even if it meant killing my own fathers.
I hated them all, despised them with such intense disgust that I never wanted to see them again. However, there was a part of me, one I think I could never fully rid myself of, that yearned for their love and approval. Even though I knew they were all incapable of such love, unconditional and forgiving, my heart didn’t care about logic. It wanted what it wanted, and despite the reasoning I had done with myself, it refused to budge.
So, as I fought against my father, I couldn’t quite bring myself to strike the killing blow. Instead, I occupied him, my own skill far surpassing his after being trained by Callum when we were younger. After he’d been taken as a slave, I hadn’t kept up with my training, but I’d found that the skill was like riding a bike, coming back the more I used it. And I’d had plenty of opportunities to use those skills since meeting Rhowyn.
Stepping to the left, I avoided a thrust from Ellis’s sword meant to impale me on the end. My heart broke at the intensity on his face, the utter determination to end me despite having raised me and possibly being my actual sire. Mother had never told me which one was my actual father, having raised me to believe they all were, which was the fae custom.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Brannoc using Bernard as a shield against the ice daggers cast from my mother’s magic. Instead of killing Brannoc, she ended her own consort, anger and frustration her only emotion at the loss of him. The contrast between Rhowyn’s feelings toward us and my mother’s need to use everyone, including her own consorts, was stark.
A glint off the blade swinging toward my right side brought me back to the fight I was in. I blocked his attack easily, dancing around to retaliate. Back and forth, tit for tat, we traded blows as both of us slowly tired of the dance. He wanted to finish me, but he wasn’t skilled enough.
I caught sight of Callum stepping in to help Baer, relieved that he was whole again. The damage that had been done to him only increased my hatred for my parents and threatened to bring me to my knees inside the temple. Rhowyn had held her composure a lot better than I had been able to. I had physically flinched at the sight and swore under my breath. How she had kept the emotion from her face and her voice as calm as she had was inconceivable to me.
Blocking another strike from Ellis, I noted the darkening of the sky, shadows blocking out the light. Chanting in a foreign language pulled my attention, everyone pausing at the magnitude of magic now swarming my mother, infusing with her own. Callum darted toward me, snapping Ellis from his own stupor. I struck out, turning his back to Callum, who lunged, his blade piercing all the way through Ellis’s chest. The reddened silver peeked through the armor, and I watched my father die almost as if I was no longer in my own body.
My eyes met Callum’s, sadness swamping me at the thought of me having a hand in my own father’s demise. I knew it would have to happen, but it didn’t make it any easier to accept. Though I was grateful that I hadn’t had to strike the final blow, glad that Callum had stepped in for me.
I caught sight of my mother as Callum went to help Arryn, rushing to stand beside her as my mother sent a wave of magic out toward Rhowyn. Flinching, preparing myself for the blow I knew would be devastating, I let my eyes close. However, after a few seconds of nothing happening, I snapped my eyes open again to see Rhowyn using my powers.
She stood tall, shoulders back, arms and feet spread wide as she braced against the force of the magic she was now sucking into herself. The shadows flowed toward her in an unending stream. The magic that was foreign and intent on destroying everything in its path was now being made inert. Rhowyn’s abilities never ceased to amaze me, and I couldn’t keep myself from gawking at her now.
I had felt the magnitude of the magic Mother had absorbed from the book and knew there was only so much of the magic she could suck into herself. Eventually, she would reach her capacity, and I feared what would happen when she did.