A Matter of Truth (Fate Series 3)

by Heather Lyons

  It’s a lesson I hope I haven’t learned too late.

  Cameron finally comes to stand in front of me after several minutes of forever silence, in which I contemplate a dozen different reactions from him, a hand scrubbing over his face. He’s tired. And surprisingly not raging. Or fearful. Which sprouts tiny, tender shoots of hope within the walls of my chest. “I have a confession to make as well.”

  Okay. Maybe I jumped the gun there. Maybe he’s gonna kick me right out of here after all. Maybe he’s—

  “I already knew you were a Magical. I’ve known for quite some time.”

  —gonna call the police or the military, and they’re going to cut me open and—wait. What?

  “I’m sorry,” Will says for me, since my mouth is dangling open in an unattractive and fly-luring fashion, “but did you just say you knew Chloe was a . . .” He shoots me a guilty look, like he was going to dub me a monster or freak and then thought better of it out of fear of me zapping him into oblivion, too.

  “A Magical.” Cameron pats his son on the back, a long sigh escaping his lips. “Indeed I did. I suspected she was the missing Creator, but I didn’t know for sure of her Magical heritage until the night she was in the hospital.” He stands up and wanders over to his desk. Both Will and I watch him in a fragile stillness as he picks up a framed photo of him, Will, and Will’s mom, Molly.

  He knew? He KNEW?

  “And now, a confession for you, son.” Cameron gently touches a finger to his wife’s smiling face. “The reason I am familiar with Magicals is because your mother was one.”

  Had the sky ripped apart and rained furious wombats down upon us, I would not have been more surprised, because, hello. I SO DID NOT SEE THIS ONE COMING.

  My mouth flops open again, my eyes widening. As if we were genuine blood and bone siblings, Will’s features match mine.

  “Furthermore,” Cameron continues, voice hoarse, “Molliaria Hellebore was not Human—not like I am. Your mother was an Elf. She immigrated to our plane of existence for her father’s job when she was a teenager.”

  Will’s mouth snaps shut, a sound suspiciously like the love child of a gurgle and old-fashioned choking emitting from his thinning lips.

  Will, an Elf? Or—half Elf? I can’t help but stare at him as his version of reality collapses down around him in grand, movie disaster fashion. He’s always been insanely good-looking, but Elvin? How could I have missed that? Was it because I didn’t want him to be anything other than what I had hoped for—a normal boy who fit into what I hoped to be a normal life?

  Because studying him now, I can finally see those features. The exotic slant of his eyes. His swan-like neck. His graceful, elongated fingers. All of them are faint, hidden within the influence of his father’s Human genetics. He’s a far cry from Callie Lotus, who radiates her Elvin heritage. Her Human features are the ones that take a back seat. Or even Erik, who I could tell was Elvin even as I was drowning in vomit. But Will—Will’s the opposite. And I feel stupid for being so blind, and annoyed at my astonishment, because why ought one species naturally outshine the other in all cases?

  Cameron sets the photo down. “I know this is a lot to take in, son, but—”

  Adrenaline supersedes pain, because Will shoots off the couch. He’s shaking—and I’m not sure if it’s in rage or shock. “Is this a bloody joke?”

  His father solemnly shakes his head.

  Will turns to me, the plea in his dark eyes tugging on my heartstrings, but I have no answers to give. Or explanations. Or anything other than my support, which I attempt to offer in an awkward hug after an equally awkward extraction from my chair.

  Even his voice shakes against my ear. “Did you know?”

  I tighten my hold against him as much as I can, given our matching Frankenstein monster-like wounds. But he pulls away, adrift in his new existence. “No. But, Will, it’s not—”

  It’s not what, Chloe? Bad? Shocking? Reality destroying? The worst thing? Because in this moment, I can see how all of these things could be truth to him.

  He waits for me to finish, but I can’t.

  So Cameron tells us his story. How he met Molly, how they fell in love, how he knew early on what she was and what she was capable of. Of how they were met with stark disapproval from her parents, kept his in the dark, and tried living within Annar’s society and boundaries until the strain of their frowned-upon union got to be too much. How, after careful discussion and consideration, they agreed that Molly would make a break from Magical society and try to live life without Magic since she didn’t want her son to be stigmatized as a half-breed like other children born of Magical and non unions. How she and Cameron decided to keep all of this from Will during his childhood and raise him simply as Human. How they eventually found an outpost of such couples and children in Glasgow, and of how there are some, like Erik the nurse practitioner, who’ve gravitated to Anchorage.

  Upon his own admission, Cameron assumed there’d never be a time in which he had to reveal Will’s heritage unless absolutely necessary. Will rarely got sick over the years, yet when he did, Molly always sought out people within these surprisingly large networks of so-called half-breeds, which is why Cameron was so insistent on neither of us being treated at a regular hospital. He knew Will’s Elvin genetics and blood type would send up red flags. How mine—even though I’m technically Human—would do the same. He admits that, when I was in the hospital for alcohol poisoning and the doctors pulled him aside, telling him they’d found abnormalities in my blood work that I don’t remember giving (thanks to puking my guts out), his suspicions about me were confirmed. He paid off somebody, another half-breed here in Anchorage, to go and destroy my records, then poked around until he got the lowdown on a missing Creator. From there, it wasn’t too difficult to put the pieces together, especially since it was second nature for him to want to protect me just as surely as he does his son.

  He tells us, his voice quiet and steady, that this is what his wife would’ve wanted. Molly didn’t want to be involved in Annar society, yet desperately wanted to make sure anyone and everyone who felt they didn’t have a place there did have a place somewhere. We learn that there are numerous children and adults running around Anchorage right now not knowing they’re the products of Magical parents.

  The entire time he tells us this, time ceases. I don’t even think the clock on the wall ticks. There’s nothing, no one but Cameron and his truths. And when he’s done, his heart on his sleeve and his good intentions laid out, ready for bruising and judgments, I find that there is no way I can deliver anything but love for this man. He knew what I was and still chose to love me. Protect me. Give me a home and a family. Support me as I got back on my feet.

  “I’m bloody furious at you for this,” Will eventually says, his voice as hoarse as his father’s.

  Cameron accepts this.

  Will’s good hand, the one untouched by Cailleache’s fury, shoots through his sandy hair in carefully controlled bursts. “You’ve lied to me. My whole life. You and Mum.”

  There’s no argument. No defensive comebacks or further rationalizations. Nothing but Cameron accepting his son’s anguish in the same calm, steady manner that marks his character.

  “Can I do what Chloe does?” There’s a wild desperation in his eyes. “Magic, I mean?”

  Cameron slowly, but surely, shakes his head, his focus never leaving his son’s face.

  “Will,” I say quietly, “to have a craft, a Magical must have two full-blooded Magical parents.”

  He closes his eyes, and I can’t help but wonder—is it relief he feels, knowing this? Or disappointment? Callie Lotus carries her bitterness over what she perceives as a poorly dealt hand that Fate passed to her on her sleeve for all to see. But then, she’s grown up with Magicals, has watched Magic practiced by everyone she knows, respects, and loves. Will never had that. Will’s only ever known life as a non.

  Finally—“We need to get Chloe home.”

  Which remind
s me, I have work to do when we get there. I blew a huge hole in that house this afternoon. The skies above know the poor place is probably drowning in snow by now.

  When we leave, it’s done in silence. But while Will storms ahead of us, his fury allowing him to overcome his pain, I reach out and grab Cameron’s hand and squeeze it.

  And he squeezes mine back.

  Constant, brutal winds have ensured that the plateau I now find myself precariously standing upon remains barren of anything but scraped, raw rock. Even still, I inch closer to the uneven edge before me so I can peer out into the yawning expanse of canyons, rivers, and creeping tendrils of darkness that stretch as far as the eye can see.

  Something wails from somewhere within the alcoves in the distance, something mournful and yet angry all at once. Unease skitters across my skin; the wind does me no favors by refusing to blow it away.

  I shade my eyes from sharp rays of dying, orange sunlight and peer down, scanning row after row of jagged, twisting tunnels. Nothing. Another round of keening sounds, closer still, followed by such a gust of wind that I’m knocked down to my knees. I reach out to grip the surprisingly soft edge I’d just been standing on, only to find chunks of rock crumbling beneath my palms.

  “It seems impossible.” I hold up handfuls of bleak, gray shards of rocks and watch the remnants float away in the wind. “And truth be told, I’m terrified.”

  Jonah simply stares at me in return, dark hair cutting across his face, as he approaches the edge.

  A new wail drifts up to the plateau, circling us before floating higher and away.

  The tips of Jonah’s toes dangle over the edge as he surveys what I’ve been studying for hours. “You shouldn’t stand too close.” I brush my hands on my jeans. “The wind’s pretty strong up here.”

  This sigh that escapes him drifts directly into the wind.

  He never understands. “You can’t blame me for caring. For wanting to keep you safe.”

  Another sigh, but at least he backs away from the edge. But then, just as I’m about to push myself up, he reclaims the steps he’d lost in a run and then flings himself right off the plateau.

  I scream his name, but my only answer is another round of keening that transitions into full-fledge shrieking. Back-to-back gusts of wind drown my words out while driving fear even deeper into my pitted bones. Just as I’m about to jump myself, a hand grabs my arm.

  I whirl around to find Kellan. Dirt smudges his face and arms, exhaustion nearly drips off his body.

  Thank gods. “Jonah—”

  Kellan holds up his index finger and presses it against his mouth. The look in his eyes is so sad that my heart crumbles just as easily as the rocks below me.

  He lets my arm go. Before I can even complete a full blink, he follows his brother’s lead right over the edge.

  The screaming in the wind is deafening.

  I wake up from my dream, shaking so hard that I break down sobbing in the comfort of my bed and darkness.

  Will didn’t speak to his father the rest of the night. Other than to ask me how I was doing and whether I was hungry—his need to take care of loved ones via cooking overriding even his rage—we didn’t speak that much, either. Once the house was repaired and put to order, he went into his bedroom and hasn’t reemerged.

  “Give him time, hen,” Cameron says to me as we drink coffee in the early morning. “Will’s always been the sort who is slow to change. But he’s a good boy, and a logical one despite his hotheaded Scottish heritage. He’ll come around.”

  I find it ridiculously endearing that Cameron strives to comfort me when I’ve been trying to do the same for him for the last half hour. “I never thanked you last night for saving me at the hospital,” I tell him. “And for everything else you’ve done for me.”

  He ruffles my hair. “I would do it again—no questions asked.” His dark eyes flick towards the hallway. “You know, Molly would’ve adored you. She loved her son—was the fiercest mama bear you could imagine—but part of her wanted a girl, too. We thought about adopting at one point, but . . .” His smile turns bittersweet. “But life goes the way it does, and the next thing you know, you’re saying goodbye, and there’s a box full of unfulfilled plans.” He sips his coffee. “It’s truly serendipitous you came about just when we needed you most. When I deduced who you were, I figured Molly sent you to us.”

  Tears for a woman I’ve never known, but who must’ve been incredibly special, prick my eyes. I’m just a weepy mess today, aren’t I?

  “Of anyone, my Molly knew what it was like to fight for what you want out of life. She was never one to sit back and let this so-called Fate bulldoze her future. She may’ve walked away from the life she knew as a Magical, but she did it on her own terms. There are a lot of people out there—more than you could possible imagine, hen—who’ve done the same. But I have a feeling, even though that may be what you’ve thought is your best choice, maybe it’s not after all.”

  And . . . he’s right. I barely slept last night thanks to that horrible nightmare that led me to two conclusions: 1) as scared as I am, I need to take care of the Elders, and 2) I need to make things right with Jonah (and Kellan). In order to do both, one thing is certain . . .

  It’s time I go back to Annar and finally take responsibility for my actions.

  “I’m afraid,” I tell Cameron, and it’s an incredible feeling, knowing it’s safe for me to open myself up to him, without fear of besmirching the family name. To know that he’s here for me. “I’m afraid that if I go back, I’ll be right back on the hamster wheel I’d been on before.”

  He nods slowly, rubbing his closely cropped beard. “It is a possibility, true. But the thing Molly always stressed to me was that Magicals are just like everyone else. They’ve only tricked themselves into believing they have no choices. You have a choice, lass. You can go back and get right back onto that hamster wheel, or you can go back, chuck the bloody thing into the trash, and make your own way on your own terms.”

  He makes it sound so simple.

  “We’ll go with you. You won’t have to go alone.”

  Will’s standing in the doorway, his shirt and hair rumpled, his eyes ringed in dark smudges which tell me he didn’t sleep much last night, either.

  I simply stare at him, sure that what I just heard come from his lips was wrong.

  But Cameron gives his son a nod, his smile transforming again. This time, pride curves his lips upward.

  “Look. I’ve thought about this—I guess . . . I guess I can see where you and Mum were coming from,” Will says to his father. “You guys thought you were doing best, protecting me from what you perceived as an injustice done to so-called”—he shudders slightly when he says this—“half-breeds. But I’d like the same choice you claimed is available to Chloe. I want to see all of this for myself.”

  Cameron’s smile grows even more satisfied.

  My heart threatens to swell to unnatural proportions. “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah,” Will tells me. “I think maybe this is a journey we all need to go on.” He lets out the sound of rue turned into a burst of breath. “That’s if you want us to go with you, I mean. There’s always the possibility you’ll tell us to bugger off, but—”

  “Yes.” Yep. My heart’s ready to burst out in ishy, squishy goo made of pure love.

  Will’s still tired, still . . . shell-shocked. His world has been rocked. But here he is, smiling that crooked smile at me, and suddenly things don’t feel so undoable anymore. “Family sticks together, you know?”

  “Yeah,” I whisper back.

  Cameron’ arm loops around my shoulders and I lean into his familiar, nurturing comfort. “Then it’s settled. While you two go to work, I’ll start making plans for us to return to Annar.”

  “What the hell happened to you two? You look like you got ran over by a bulldozer made of barbed wire.”

  I ignore Frieda while attempting to tie on my apron. She takes surprising pity on me and gently kn
ocks my hands away so she can tie it. “Car accident,” I mumble, and I wonder—even now, even after I’ve bared my soul to Cameron and Will—when will the lies stop rolling off my tongue so easily?

  All of her natural hostility fades as she turns to Will. “Your truck?”

  It makes me want to laugh, the way she says this, like his truck is sacred and his life is changed forever by its destruction. Only, the truck will be fine as soon as I get the okay to fix it. Will’s life, though?

  He’s refused to talk about it with me so far. No questions about the Elves I know, no voiced curiosities about what life in Annar is like—nothing. Just a resigned sense of weary acceptance that hurts to see on his face. I left him and Cameron alone after they decided to move to Annar with me so they could talk, but mere minutes after my door shut, so did Will’s bedroom door.

  Will does laugh here with Frieda, though. It’s normal sounding, the kind he’d do on any other day than the morning after his world was turned upside down. Maybe Will’s as good of an actor as I am. “Truck’s fine. The important thing is Zoe and I are okay.”

  Zoe. When just ten minutes before he called me Chloe.

  “Obviously, you jackass.” Frieda goes to swat his arm, but pulls back with only millimeters to spare.

  “I’m not fragile,” he teases her.

  There’s a bit of envy in me, hearing him say that with such conviction.

  Throughout the day, I allow myself to contemplate how I’m going to make my way back home. On paper, it seems easy enough: get myself to Juneau and go through the portal back to Annar. And yet, like everything else in my life, my return cannot be this simple, as there are so many factors I need to consider that it makes my head spin. Aside from the truly shitty way I treated my fiancé and friends by abandoning them without a word, I’m also a first tier Council member, and I fled my job and responsibilities. I have no idea what the repercussions are for that. It’s not like there’s another Creator to fall back on, so they’re stuck with me until a new one is born and Ascends. But what if they put me under arrest? Do they even do that? Maybe something like house arrest? For all anyone knows, I could’ve been captured and/or killed by the Elders. Are they out there searching for me, like they did for my team, missing now for over a year? I let myself imagine, for the briefest of moments, that Nividita, Harou, and Earle were found, safe and sound, and all three are in Annar right now, exactly where they should be. It’s a lovely feeling, until the reality of my abandoning of my responsibilities weighs down on me once more. Countless beings on seven different planes count on Creators.