Page 103 of Entranced By the Basilisks

Everyone looks at me and I struggle. My father has the expression of someone standing in front of a firing squad. The same pride that I carry and use to prop myself up is in his bearing. I should send him away. He hasn’t bothered to be a part of my life before.

“Why now?” I ask. By his own admission, he failed the role of fatherhood years ago.

It’s not being familiar with him as a person that allows me to read the microexpressions on his face. It’s a familiarity with myself. The way I keep my emotions from broadcasting to the world with the stiffness of my expression, only the depth of his gaze and the slight crease of his eyes give him away. There’s a chasm of pain in him that I only recognize now because of our shared appearance.

All these years, I’d assumed that he didn’t care.

“When the Circle refused to save your mother, I withdrew.” His voice cracks and he clears his throat before continuing, “I had failed you and didn’t feel as if I deserved to be a father to you. I regret what I did. That I was too busy wallowing in self-pity to be there for you and by the time I’d realized it, it was too late. I want to… try again.”

His words unravel emotions I’d buried a long time ago. Hurt and loss weren’t useful things to allow myself to embrace, so I’d discarded them. Or so I thought. The poignancy of his absence had carved a deep well in my heart and the worthless emotions that I’d thought I’d banished had remained there, poisoning the rest of me with reminders that if I could be so easily forgotten by my own family, who would ever want me?

Ari had, does, and it had taken years of his resilience to break down the belief of my unworthiness. The belief that someday he’d stop calling me and stop accepting the scraps I give him. Isn’t some of that belief still there? The belief that I don’t deserve a spot in this triad, that I don’t deserve Emilia.

They still stare at me. Ari’s eyes are soft as if he feels the struggle in my soul and my father’s lips thin as if he’s preparing himself for my rejection just as he’d been rejected by the Circle to consider my mother as a candidate to be a Chosen. A measure that would have saved her life.

“Jasper, you aren’t going to introduce me?” Emilia asks. Her words break me out of the tension. I turn and she’s close enough to take my hand. Her fingers brush against my fingertips. The claiming gesture calms the inconvenient, illogical fears about my place.

Her vibrant presence is proof to that poison that I am valued. I am wanted. Her and Ari have shown this to me again and again, only for my mind to try and have me pull away at the worst-timed moments.

The well needs to be drained and even if my father doesn’t deserve forgiveness, I deserve this opportunity to be free from these doubts.

“I accept his assistance,” I say.

My father’s shoulders fall in relief. Emilia squeezes my hand. Her support aids me in embarking on whatever comes next.

“Dad, this is Emilia.”

* * *

I’mno stranger to awkwardness, but the process of interacting with my father is like moving through molasses. With my declaration of accepting his presence here and helping us, I’ve put something into motion that I’d never anticipated.

Social niceties.

Ari and Emilia have done much to move things along. Ari tells my father that he should call him Ari and I don’t miss the way Dad clocks this detail. He only nods.

Nerves that I’ve never had to worry about start to sink into me. He has to know that Ari and I are lovers. If he heard about Emilia, he definitely heard about Ari claiming me. The scandal of a Zeyad publicly claiming a relationship with an Adder probably spread like wildfire. The presence of an unbound Chosen in the world isn’t nearly as salacious of a topic.

We sit down for lunch and things start to get better when my brave restorationist, who has a hard time talking to people, sits next to Dad and starts a conversation. Emilia asks what my father does. Her voice is quiet, and I can tell she’s going out of her comfort zone. I’m touched.

The tension leaves the room as my father talks about his archaeological work. Emilia slowly becomes more animated in her questions, and I see in real time what she meant about having a hard time until she gets to know a person.

I’d forgotten how engaging my father’s stories could be. We share the same sternness, but he lacks my coldness. I’d always assumed that it was my basilisk nature that sliced at the comfort of the people around me, but now it occurs to me that it may just be my personality.

Once, early in our relationship, Ari had asked if I would mind him doing business with my father. A fact that completely skipped my mind until Dad brought up a shared business connection.

“And then he berated the poor boy for losing the three vases in shipping!” Dad exclaims.

Ari’s smile is sharp, and he confides to Emilia. “I think it should be stated that that poor boy is in his second century. No children were verbally abused.”

My father shrugs. “Time hasn’t helped the man’s absentmindedness.”

Ari lifts his cup in agreement. “True.”

Ari has been doing business with my father—albeit with my permission. I gaze at the mate of my heart in consideration.

“How long have you two been doing business together now?” I ask.

Ari doesn’t break eye contact with me. There’s a knowing gleam in his eyes, but my father clears his throat. “It’s been some years now, hasn’t it? Six, maybe seven years.”

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