Page 86 of The Wolf and the Chimera
Mirroring my own emotions, hurt and anger loomed in Dad’s eyes. Though every fiber in my being had missed him—had desperately, secretly hoped to see him again—we were not the same people we had been before that day on the burning yacht.
I was not the same.
“Just say it,” Dad said quietly and lowered his hands. “Say what you’ve been wanting to say since you saw me.”
I swallowed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The words tasted like a lie. Memories swirled in my mind, faster than I could stop them.
Flames, then suffocating darkness and prodding touches and silence so loud it drilled into my ears—
“I know you, Ella-Bella,” he said. “You’re angry with me.”
My heart throbbed, but I didn’t release the words clogged in my throat. I couldn’t—Iwouldn’t. Once I unleashed them, I couldn’t take them back.
My inner beast stirred beneath my skin, and heat surged through my veins. I stiffened my lips to lock in the truth.
It wasn’t fair to spew my thoughts, not when what had happened wasmyfault. I had lost that damned pendant. I had given the High Witch the key to finding me, all for foolish, stupid dreams, but—
“Tell me,” Dad commanded.
He looked so different—so different from the man withthe kindest smiles and the best sundaes and the greatest stories. Before becoming my parent, he had been a history professor, who specialized in mythology. Violence hadn’t been in his nature, but he had crafted himself into a weapon. He fought like it was an art.
Combined with his teaching skills, he was a hell of a trainer.
“Why?” I asked. Tears brimmed in my eyes. “Why did you leave me defenseless? Why didn’t you teach me how to fight back?”
There had been a moment.
There had been one precious moment between the cloying effects of the High Witch’s sedatives and the clasp of a Handmaiden on my arm. I had been given one, tiny moment to fight before getting put on that altar like a slab of meat, and I hadn’t used it.
I hadn’t thought there was a chance in any dimension that I could fight back.
Desperate to escape the memory, I squeezed my eyes shut.
As Dad’s arms wrapped around me, I sobbed into his chest.
“I didn’t fight, Dad,” I whispered. “I should’ve fought back, and I didn’t.”
“I’m sorry,” he whispered into my hair. His voice was thick with emotion. “I’m so sorry.”
I sensed Ryder drift closer, but my focus remained on my father. I pulled away from him to meet his stare.
“You were always so kind,” he said and smiled sadly. “So empathetic and curious and kind. You had no interest in your mother’s and my training.”
He was right. As a little girl, I had been more interested in Dad’s history lessons or visiting local art museums than in Mom’s weak attempts to teach me to fight.
“Your mom wanted to train you,” he said, “and she was right to want to train you, but as I watched you grow up, Icouldn’t help but think how unfair it was. If you were any other kid, you would’ve never formed a fist in your life. We would’ve enrolled you in art classes or debate or anything you wanted.”
I saw it—the life he dreamed for me—the one in which there was no monster under my skin, no sorceress watching over my shoulder, and no witch hunting me with her every breath.
Human Elle would’ve gone to school with other kids and worn a fabulous prom dress like the ones I had admired on social media. She would’ve attended a good college and been in a hundred clubs and later worked as an archaeologist or art dealer or professor.
She would’ve been normal and unthreatening andfree.
“I didn’t want to change you,” Dad said and hung his head. “I didn’t want to force you to be someone for the sake of survival. I thought-I thought I could protect you for longer.”
Dad hadn’t just protected me from those who hunted me, but from the weight of my future. He had let me follow my joy and hone my wits instead of my body. He had let me dream of being someone else, someone human.
