Despite the circumstances of his creation, Baden had been the only thing worth living for while she’d been held as Athan’s prisoner. She’d loved the child as much as any mother could have.
Kayla realized Athan had taken Baden away from her to limit her influence over the boy. He’d wanted his son to be molded in his own image, unfettered by his mother’s ideals.
It was, without question, the cruelest thing Athan had done to her. While she’d been free of him for a decade, to have this last knife twisted in her heart told her she would never truly be rid of the damage Athan had done.
“It stands to reason I would have changed over the years.” Baden rolled his eyes, addressing her with contempt. “I was destined to have the same power as my father. It was your choice to reject me after I was turned.”
She shook her head, frowning. “I didn’t reject you! I was told you were dead and gone! Why can’t you believe that?”
“You knew I was a vampire like Athan! Dying is simply part of the process!” he shot back. “Don’t try to win my favor now simply because you’re afraid.”
“I didn’t know how any of it worked. Athan is cruel enough to kill his own children. Why should I have believed otherwise?” she asked. “He did it to take you away from me, so he could manipulate you. In doing so, he took away the only thing I had to focus on. Athan’s jealousy over my love for you was most likely as great a motivation for him separating us as wanting to turn you against me.”
“Oh, please, don’t give yourself so much credit!” Baden’s teal eyes fixed on his mother again. “He only wanted you around to study you, to see why you posed a possible threat to him. It’s the only reason he wants you back now. You’re simply too dangerous to allow to roam free.”
“If I was merely a threat to him, he would have simply killed me a long time ago, Baden,” she said.
He pressed his lips together tightly and shook his head. There was a thread of truth in her words, and he knew it. Athan’s unraveling after her escape had hinted to far more than the elder vampire worrying over a minor threat.
“You hate Athan to such a degree that you were determined to turn his son against him,” he said, leaning back against the wall. “Then, when you realized you couldn’t change what I was, you refused to let me live in the fortress proper. I was only allowed back in after you’d escaped.”
“Do you not remember the things he used to do to me?” she asked. “I know you were young, but you weren’t so young as to not recall any of it.”
“You were disobedient to your master, and you deserved everything that fell onto you,” he said.
Her spine straightened up. Athan had been given too many years to poison Baden’s mind. “No one deserves what I endured. All of the abuse pales in comparison to having been shown my child was dead. It destroyed me. It overwhelmed me with grief, giving Athan more control over me.”
Baden grimaced and looked away again, unmoved and not believing what she said. Though he could see into people’s thoughts like his father, Kayla was a locked vault, and Athan had warned him about her ability to manipulate her mind. Her anguish felt real, but he wouldn’t be fooled into trusting her projected emotions like his father had once been.
“You’re a fool,” he said quietly. “You could have had anything you wanted. You could have been the wife of the most powerful being in the world. Instead, you insisted on being strong-willed and deceitful. Even if I give you the benefit of the doubt and pretend you didn’t order me away, keeping me far from you and your treasonous ideas was in my best interest. Athan understands what I am and what I am destined for. How could you? You are not like he and I.”
Kayla hung her head and closed her eyes. “It’s been too long, and you were too young when he got to you. The temptation of power has been pushed into you. Athan has turned my dear boy into a mirror of himself.”
“He wanted me to be strong, not to grow up a pathetic mother’s boy.” Baden shifted and turned away from her. “You had nothing to offer me, regardless of how or why we were separated. Athan has everything.”
Kayla brought her hands to her face and leaned forward, trying to force back the pain she felt. All the mending her heart had done over the years had been undone in the previous few hours.
Keiran stopped his conversation with Jerris and turned his gaze toward his sister. The feeling of grief in the air was cutting.
He got up and crossed the room, crouching beside her. “Don’t let him toy with your feelings.”
“I’m a mother with a son who is dead to her, even though he sits before me,” she whispered, her voice choked with tears. “Will Athan’s torture never reach an end?”
Baden’s hearing was just as sharp as Keiran’s, and he heard every word. Without looking at them, he scoffed. “She had her chance. Trying to prove her resistance to Athan was always more important to her than I was.”
Kayla dropped her hands to her lap. “I’ve spoken only the truth.”
Baden fell silent again, bored with the conversation.
“Kayla, if being down here is going to be too stressful, you can go on deck for a while. You’d still be close enough to keep his abilities muted, wouldn’t you?” Keiran asked.
“Aye. Perhaps I will go up for a while. I know he’ll try his assorted tricks along the way. I suppose I need to resign to the reality of the situation.” Kayla stood up and patted Keiran’s shoulder. “I won’t be gone long.”
“Take your time.” Keiran gave her a smile and stood up as she departed. “That poor woman.”
Baden glanced over his shoulder once she was gone before turning around to face Keiran. “Certainly you can understand Athan has more to offer me than that simple woman.”
“Shut up, Baden.” Keiran went closer and loomed over the other vampire. “I’m sorry you’re too stupid to see otherwise, but Athan is a wretch. I’ve no doubt you’ve been spoon fed only limited amounts of information about the world at large by him over the years. You think you’re absolutely brilliant, but you are an arrogant, ignorant little boy.”
“I’ve been well educated,” Baden said back, resenting the remark. “I’m not stupid in the least.”
“What you were taught was very, very selectively filtered, I assure you. He tried to have my father do the same thing to me. Fortunately, I had some people around me who allowed me to see the bigger picture.” Keiran smiled to no one. “Regardless, you, the superior one, are chained to the floor, and I am not.”
“You’re King of Tordanian only by my father’s good graces,” Baden countered. “You have nothing my father couldn’t take away on a whim. He’s told me how weak-willed you are.”
Keiran glared down at Baden again. “Aye, he could have killed me, but he hasn’t, and he won’t. Athan bores of people he can figure out and predict. Those he can’t fascinate him. People like your mother and I give him something to fret over, to obsess about.”
Baden’s brow furrowed. “Obsess about? He doesn’t obsess over anyone! He grows frustrated with the stupid resistance people like you and that woman insist upon.”
Keiran bent down and smirked only inches away from Baden’s face. His headache was still wracking his brain, making him irritable. “You’ve been with Athan for all of these years. You know what her escape did to him. I’m certain you saw it. Did that seem like simple frustration to you? No, it didn’t. Kayla and I are all he has worth living for. Everything else in his life bores him, including you.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about!” Baden wriggled to scoot back from his uncle, his back hitting the wall. No one aside from Athan had ever dared to get in his face and talk down to him before. Though Keiran was supposed to be weak, he certainly didn’t act afraid.
It was an alien an unwelcomed feeling.
Keiran didn’t let him get away, moving in again until he was uncomfortably close. “Little nephew, let me tell you something. Your father has, at regular intervals, terrorized me my entire life. For all of your bravado an
d bluster, you’ve got a long, long way to go before you even begin to approach his level. After all I have been through at Athan’s hands, pardon me for saying this, I’ve run out of any damned fear for him. Needless to say, I have none towards someone like you.”
Baden reached forward and tried to pry into Keiran’s thoughts, wanting to see if it was merely an act. He couldn’t get in, however, only getting the sound of screeching metal filling his head from Keiran’s migraine.
Keiran could feel the younger vampire’s meager attempt to dig into his mind, but it was amateur compared to what Athan had subjected him to over the course of his lifetime. Baden winced before him, though Keiran had no idea the younger vampire was only responding to the migraine he still suffered.
“Save it, Baden. I’ve managed to ward off your father a time or two, you’re not strong enough,” Keiran said, straightening up and moving away.
Baden’s shoulders rounded and he grumbled. “We’ll see just how confident and strong you are once I’m freed.”
Keiran gave a sidelong glance to Jerris and shrugged.
“Mouthy little rat, isn’t he?” Jerris asked.
“Aye, like his father, I’m afraid.” Keiran looked toward the stairs leading to the deck. “I’m going to check on her. Will you be all right with him?”
“I suppose.”
Keiran stopped halfway up the stairs. “Jerris?”
The redhead sighed. “What?”
“Don’t do to him what you did to the last guy.”
Jerris snorted as he watched Baden’s head snap up and turn toward him. Apparently, Keiran’s little nephew didn’t know a joke when he heard one.
* * *
Kayla stood near the rail, looking down at the frothy surface of the river. She heard Keiran coming up behind her, though it was obvious he was trying to make noise as to not startle her.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
She turned toward him and shrugged. “I don’t know. Of all the things I thought I would face coming here, this wasn’t one of them.”
Keiran leaned back against the rail beside her, crossing his arms over his chest. The rain had stopped for the time being, the now-dark sky still overcast.
He shook his head. “You couldn’t have foreseen something like this happening. Did you ever have any other children?”
“Only long after Baden, but no others by Athan. A sympathetic servant within the fortress took to bringing me bog bitters once a week. It kept me from conceiving during the remainder of my time there.” Her eyes closed, a faint smile appearing. “It was with Sytir that I had my other children. Quite a surprise, as there had been no recorded instances of Nahli and human doing so. Still, we were very happy to welcome our twins into the world, even if they are the only ones of their kind.”
“Twins?” One of Keiran’s brows rose.
“Aye, a boy and a girl. Alaroth and Tysa.” Her eyes opened again. “I miss them dearly. I’ve enjoyed having everything with them I missed out on with Baden.”
“You’ll be home to them soon,” he said. “I’d imagine they’re eager for your return.”
“I suppose they’ve grown a little since I left. They were already getting very tall like their father. They are beautiful, Keir. I know all mothers feel like that about their children, but they are truly something else.” She turned around to lean back against the rail, imitating her brother’s pose. “I’d thought my child bearing days were over by the time they were conceived. They did so much to heal my heart after what I’d been through losing Baden.”
“But now you know he’s not lost.” He straightened up and paced forward a few steps.
“Isn’t he, though?” she asked. “I can only imagine what he felt when his father killed him to spark his transformation. The fear… and then to be lied to and told I rejected him.”
“You had no way of knowing or stopping it,” Keiran said.
Her jaw tensed, her next words pushed through her teeth. “Of all the ills Athan has foisted upon me, it had to be the lowest. Is there any real chance I can break through to him?”
He pivoted back toward her. “You can try.”
“I don’t have much time. After we get to Minar, I will have to rush into the Wastes, lest Athan find a way to get me before I’m under the protection of the Nahli again.” She glanced back out over the water. “I cannot take him with me. The Nahli have already suffered too many risks because of me. I will have to leave Baden behind, as we have already planned.”
Keiran stepped up beside her again. “I’m afraid I don’t have any other ideas to offer.”
“We can’t solve every problem.” Kayla’s eyes narrowed. “If, in the end, he still stands by Athan when our plans come to fruition, he will have to be killed, just as you said before.”
Keiran couldn’t think of an appropriate response to that. Despite the tragedy in it, it was true.
She forced up a smile and patted his shoulder. “We’re not there yet, though. Who’s to say what will happen?”
Chapter 6
“I can see Tordan Lea again!”
Athan set down the book he held. Sabetha stood in the doorway to his library, having thrown open the door. “I had little faith it had actually vanished.”
“No!” In her excitement, she hopped forward toward Athan like a small bird would do. “You didn’t know! No one knew! But it’s back!”
“We’ve discussed this, you need to walk properly.” Athan shoved the book forward on the desk. It annoyed him when she bounced around as she tended to knock things over carelessly when she did.
Sabetha stopped and twisted her neck to the side, giving out a frustrated grunt. Her down-like hair on the top of her head stood on end and she walked the rest of the way toward him. Her long fingers writhed from the joints of her wings. “But I see it.”
“I’m very glad you do.” He stood up and walked around the desk. “Now, perhaps you can relax again. I don’t want you getting over stressed. You know how ill it makes you.”
Her feathers fluffed and then smoothed back down. “I am not sick. This was something outside of me.”
He wasn’t in the mood to argue it further. Doing so would get nowhere with her, anyway. “Well and good. Now, what is Baden up to?”
“Baden?” Her neck extended forward, her head turning nearly upside down.
Athan drew a long breath. Though she frustrated him, he couldn’t express it to her. “Yes, Sabetha, Baden. Where is he? I hope he is on his way home by now.”
Her dark, vacuous eyes closed half way as she searched through town, working her way toward the castle. While she generally could get a sense of where to look for someone, there was no pull originating from the vampire. “No Baden.”
“He’s not in Tordania?” Athan took a step closer.
“Not in Tordania, not anywhere! Baden is gone!” Sabetha’s eyes flew wide, her wings extending from her body.
An unfamiliar wince of worry grabbed his chest. “Nowhere? Sabetha, where is Keiran? What is he doing?”
After a few more minutes of frantic searching, her head lowered down between her shoulders. “There is no Keiran. There is no Baden. The others are at the castle. Old man, old woman, queen, infant.”
“Damn it all!” His heart rate spiked uncomfortably. What if Keiran had found a way to block Sabetha’s sight? Had he gotten a hold of Baden, somehow? “I don’t have time for this!”
She recoiled a step, her would-be hands gnarling together before her chest. Her entire body began to shake. “I’m trying to see!”
Athan closed his eyes and gave himself a second, forcing down his rage. “Little Bird, I’m not upset with you. Something is going on in Tordania or with Keiran. Baden may have gotten himself in trouble or worse. I don’t like this.”
Her neck twisted again, her voice a whisper. “I told you it was a problem there.”
Athan quirked a brow and lifted a hand between them, his jaw locked from tension. A vision of reaching forward and ripping ou
t a handful of her leathery feathers flashed through his mind, but he held back. “Sabetha, please. Leave me to my thoughts.”
* * *
Keiran had never been to the sea before. His experience in Tordania had been from Tordan Lea southward. He stood on the pier, taking deep breaths of the unusually scented ocean air. His senses were overwhelmed with the new information, his eyes watching a strange bird hover motionless in the air above the water.
Being out of the small river boat was a relief. Baden hadn’t been a pleasant cabin mate during their journey. The previous night, he’d decided to use the chamber pot given to him as a weapon, sending it and its vile contents hurtling toward Keiran. Fortunately, he’d been able to duck out of the way, but the damage had been done. The stench within the cargo hold had been unbearable. They’d left Baden below deck through the night to wallow in the mess he’d created.
“With as well as that went, I can’t wait to see what the trip across the sea has in store.”
Keiran turned around and spotted Jerris coming down the boat’s ramp. “Hopefully, that was a one-shot affair. Leaving him down there with it should have taught him a lesson.”
“Damned animal, that one.” The guard looked at the larger, sea-faring ships around them. Neither he nor Keiran had ever seen anything quite like them. “So, one of these, then?”
“Aye.” Keiran gave him a nod. “That one over there looks like it’s being loaded. Stay here with the others, and I’ll go see if I can persuade the captain to give us a ride.”
Jerris crossed his arms over his chest. “Baden is worthless as long as your sister stands by. I can’t let you wander off on these docks, Keir. I’m going with you.”
Keiran frowned, not in the mood for anymore Steiner family stubbornness. “Fine. Go tell some of the ship’s crew to stand guard. We have to get this done quickly.”
Jerris trotted up the ramp to do as instructed, returning within minutes.
With the guard at his side, Keiran began walking toward the ship he’d spotted. The lines to the other ships along the dock creaked and groaned as the waves slowly rocked them against their moorings.
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