Page 18 of Blood of Two Crowns

“How did you know who I was directing my thoughts to?”

“You were deliberately projecting your thoughts. Loudly. My mind is already open to yours. Connected because we are of the same blood and ilk.”

My heart leapt in my throat as the question finally reached my lips.

“What are…we?”

“Your mother didn’t tell you?”

“I only met her yesterday.”

“I mean Leilani. She never told you who I was?”

“No.”

My father’s features tightened, lit only vaguely by the fae light touching the balcony. “Perhaps it was for the best. It would have made things too obvious if you had ever told anyone. We are Nephilim.”

The word settled on me like an affirmation, as though this was something I already distantly knew but had never deigned to acknowledge because I didn’t have the resources to piece the puzzle together. I had only ever seen them illustrated in historical tomes.

The fact I’d always believed him to be fae based solely on my mother’s word made me wonder if I even knew his real name.

“My mother told me your name was Tavian.”

The male’s brows pinched in disbelief before his head tipped back with laughter that sounded like tumbling boulders.

“Tavian?”

It was a relief to hear andfeelmy father’s laughter. It even had a smile blooming on my face for the first time in too many days since we had all been at Val’s chasing pixies. Mareina’s absence made the memory feel like a vice around my heart.

“Do you know a Tavian or something?”

My father’s claw-tipped hand clutches his broad chest as it continues to rumble with laughter. “Yes. Though I imagine the male is dead by now. He was Zurie’s Irae and a simpering fool. Miroslav and I had an ongoing game that involved him trying to woo Zurie with everything she hated. Leilani knew the male got under my skin.”

Zurie’s Irae.

The surprise that he was apparently close with myadoptivemother and Miroslav was stifled by the burning of mine and Mareina’s tether. My father winced as if it causedhimpain. Thankfully, he doesn’t ask about it because the last thing I feellike explaining to him is the absolutelyfuckedstate of mine and Mareina’s relationship. Or the fact that she left me for another male.

The moment the thought passed, his expression turned pained, and it really made me wonder if he also had a Knowingness.

“My name is Rumiel. Miroslav told me a lot about you over the years… I even chose your name.”

“My name?You knew about me? This whole time?”

He nodded, some unreadable emotion glittering in the twin black pools of his.

“But… If Miroslav knew you were down there, why couldn’t he have freed you?”

A corner of Rumiel’s mouth tilted up gently in a sad smile. “Do you mean other than face Zurie’s wrath and thus certain death because he vowed in blood not to harm her?”

At my silence, he continued.

“Zurie was the only one capable of opening my tomb. She made certain of that.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “But surely, there was some way to bargain with her…Something.You just spent 120 years in a fucking tomb! This whole time, you were right here! I could have had?—

Emotion clawed its way up my throat and I had to draw in a deep breath to ease it away. My father’s eyes began to glisten, and he reached out to grip my shoulder.

“You and yoursoulboundare destined to save Bellorum. In order for you both to become the only two people in this realm capable of doing so, there were certain things that needed to occur so that you could become who you are today… Just as a sculptor hammers and chisels away at slabs of marble to create their divinely inspired works, so are we all sculpted by fate…”

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