Page 50 of Awakening the Dhampir

“Do you hear yourselves?” I snapped, stepping between the two men and facing Damon. “Has it occurred to you that this might be a fae spell? Has any of you even seen a mark like this before?”

I poked the bird on Damon’s chest. It snapped its two-dimensional beak at me, and Damon growled.

“Don’t,” I warned the demon. “Think about it for just a moment. We know nearly nothing of her parentage. Dhampir should not be able to procreate, but Lorna is obviously half-fae and dhampir. What if the fae embedded a spell in her DNA that would only be triggered when her dhampir was awakened?”

Damon still glared at me, but I could almost see his mind working. I turned to face Elliott. “What if this isn’t the call of a fated mate, but just a spell as you suspected from the beginning?”

Elliott frowned and looked over my head at Damon. He didn’t say anything, but he couldn’t hide his doubt. I finally turned to Kenrid, who’d already put his shirt back on.

“Have you told them?” I asked the fae, knowing he’d understand what I meant.

“No,” he mumbled. “Can we all sit down for this?”

Seeing his slumped shoulders made my anger shift to empathy. He hadn’t wanted to share his secret with me a few weeks ago, and now he’d be revealing an ugly part of his past to the others. I just hoped Elliott and Damon would understand.

“Elliott, find some clothes,” I said as I headed for the bar. This wouldn’t be a pleasant conversation.

Chapter 19

Kenrid

Isank into the upholstered chair behind me as a knot of anxiety swirled in my stomach. It’d been hard enough to discuss my past with Nathan. I’d known I’d have to tell the story again; I’d just hoped it wouldn’t be so soon. Did that make me naive? Definitely. Elliott and Damon needed to know, and I probably should’ve told them when Lorna was kidnapped.

Elliott disappeared into one of the bedrooms to find clothes. Damon strolled—no, prowled—across the open space and settled into the chair next to me. His eyes never left my face, the accusation clear. I should’ve told him before we claimed our mate. I looked away, not able to endure his piercing gaze. He was right.

Nathan opened a jar of blood he’d taken from his refrigerator and placed it into a warmer. I’d seen him do it often enough that it no longer bothered me. While most vampires still fed off humans, Nathan rarely did. I never asked him why. The question felt too personal. And it was really none of my business.

As soon as Elliott emerged from the bedroom—now fully dressed—the three men who I considered family gave me their full attention.

I let out a deep breath. “The winter fae didn’t kill all of the dhampir,” I said. “They captured and imprisoned many of them.”

I closed my eyes at Damon’s sharp intake of breath, but no one said anything, so I continued.

“The winter fae, with the help of the summer fae’s most brilliant geneticists, were experimenting with the dhampir … trying to create hybrids that wouldn’t lose their minds,” I explained.

The same horrid memories consumed me every time I thought about what I’d done. Flashbacks of infants’ cries assaulted me. The pain. The blood. The death every time we had to euthanize an experiment. A child.

“What are you saying?” Elliott asked. “They successfully bred the dhampir?”

I could hear his judgment and disapproval, but I couldn’t blame him. I hated myself for the part I’d played.

“They tried diluting the dhampir genes after a couple generations of human breeding,” I replied with a nod. “But when they awakened the one-quarter dhampir’s magic, he killed immediately. They brought it down to one-eighth, then one-sixteenth, and one thirty-second. It didn’t matter. The dhampir still killed immediately. The fae moved on to other species. Trolls, goblins, elves, shifters, sirens. You name it, they tried it, but nothing worked, even after several generations. They couldn’t create a stable dhampir.”

Another round of pained cries assaulted my memories. The vacant eyes of so many children born in the lab and killed in the lab.

“For ages, the fae victimized their captives with their efforts. When the geneticists started using their own people—my people—I couldn’t do it anymore.” My voice dropped to a whisper. “I killed them all. All the fae in the compound. All the captives. All the victims.” I squeezed my eyes shut against the memories of their screams. “I armed thirty-four bombs with elemental fire and spread them throughout the compound. Then I sealed the doors.”

Silence filled the room, but I couldn’t bear to look at my brothers. I knew how horrible the events I’d just described sounded. My part in those events only made it worse.

“What does this have to do with Lorna?” Damon finally asked, breaking the silence.

I opened my eyes but focused on the floor. “The day I destroyed the compound, I helped a friend escape with his pregnant lover, one of the winter fae,” I explained. “They had used her as a surrogate mother. They tried, anyway. All the forced pregnancies failed or ended with a miscarriage. When her last pregnancy made it into the third trimester, Alyn claimed the child as his. I helped them escape the compound and left them in a small cabin in upstate New York thirty-four years ago.”

A wave of demonic magic filled the room. I glanced over at Damon and wished I hadn’t. His eyes glowed a deep red, something I’d never seen before. His clawed hand rested over Lorna’s mark on his chest, completely covering the little bird.

“She was created by the fae?” The low growl emanating from Damon made the hair on my neck stand on end. Of course, he’d put the details together quickly. Lorna was thirty-four years old and adopted in upstate New York.

“I don’t know,” I replied. “Her age is right, and she was adopted about an hour from where I’d last seen my friend and his lover. But I have no proof that she is the child I rescued.”

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