Page 71 of The Eternal Mirror
“Now we wait, and you stay hidden,” I say. “At the moment, you’re my ace in the hole. No one knows you’re here. If things get too bad, you can get me out, and we’ll run.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.” But what does too bad look like?
No food, maybe. But that won’t happen. Khaosti can sneak into the kitchens and steal me some. What else? I really don’t like the idea of torture. I’m not sure how well I’d hold up. But why would Khronus torture me? Just for fun? Maybe not torture me, but something else, something worse? I remember that look in his eyes when he talked about my mother. I suspect he had a serious crush on her. And he’s starting to see me as some sort of substitute. Ugh. I think I’m going to throw up.
I definitely don’t want to go there. Not even to save the world and everyone in it.
I shift my weight—the floor is hard. But at least I have company. “What was it like growing up with Khronus as a father?” I ask. I suppose it goes a long way in explaining how he became the man he is. I don’t think I’m being overcritical when I say that he was an asshole when I first met him. I mean, I was seriously worried about my taste in men. Because however horrible Khaosti was to me, I still wanted to shag him.
Anyway, he’s not so much of an asshole anymore. At least not to me. But I’d love to understand him better. He’s always been reticent about his past. But then, so have Zayne and Josh. I guess when something’s so bad, you don’t want to talk about it. You just want to forget.
I’ve given up on him answering by the time he finally speaks. “He didn’t play a huge part in my life when I was young,” Khaosti says. “I saw him every now and then. But he was distant. I wouldn’t have even known he was my father if people hadn’t called me Prince.”
Aw, poor little boy. “So who looked after you?”
“A lot of people. Sheela was there much of the time. And then, when I was five, Khendril was injured and came back to serve my father in the palace. He was good to me. He was the first person who voluntarily spent time with me, almost as though he liked me. It was strange.”
“Oh, that’s sad,” I say. “I’m sure Sheela liked you.”
“Maybe. But she’d lost so many people already, that she kept her distance. And now I understand—she hates my father, with good reason. She lost both her mother and her father to Khronus.”
“I always think it strange when people say ‘lost’—like you mislaid them or something. But I think you’re right. It makes you wary of allowing yourself to be close to anyone again.”
“I suppose that’s what happened to me after Khendril left. It nearly broke me. That’s how I ended up in the dungeons the first time, forced into my wolf form. My father got so pissed off at me for trying to make him go after Khendril and rescue him. I was sure something terrible must have happened to him. When, in fact, he just left us.”
“He had his reasons,” I say.
“Yeah. He left me...for you. When I first met you, I hated you for that.”
“I noticed.”
But actually, it’s good to understand his reasons. And I can’t really blame him. If Zayne up and left me with no explanation to look after some stranger, then I might be a little bitter.
“He used to talk about you a lot,” I say.
“Yeah? Did he tell you what an asshole I was?”
“He said you were the hope for the future, and it broke his heart when he had to leave you. But he had no choice. And when he needed to send me somewhere safe, then he sent me to you.”
“Fucked that right up, didn’t he?”
“He did what he could. The shadowguard came for me. I wanted to stay and fight, but he said I wasn’t ready.” I’d been sixteen, and I’d lost so many people. I hadn’t wanted to lose Khendril. But I did. And I found Khaos instead.
“Was Khendril your only brother?” I ask. “I mean, surely if Khronus is that old, he must have had other children.”
“There were others. But none that survived.”
“Do you think he killed them? His own children?”
“Maybe. He’d kill me if he could. Maybe if they got too ambitious. Or just pissed him off.”
“Not a great dad then?”
He snorts. “No. You and I have that in common.”
I glance toward the door—not that I can see him, but I can feel him. The bond is like static, always humming at the edge of my skin. We’re bound together, whether we like it or not. Sometimes I like it a lot; those are usually the times when we’re not talking.I have a flashback to the feel of his hard body covering me, filling me...
