Page 12 of Conflicted Fate
“It wasn’t an accident,” I growled. “I was on the ice, and I was singing that stupid song. I wouldn’t come back until I finished it. I didn’t listen to her or my mom, who told us not to go out too far. I justhadto sing it, do the whole routine. And as I did, the ice cracked. Lanna came out and saved me, but that meant she went under when the ice split. All because of that song.”
Kiel nodded. “I understand. It’s still not your fault, Jada. You didn’t mean to. It was an accident.”
I didn’t respond. There was no point. I would never forgive myself for her death. Nobody could convince me of that.
We both stared out at the sun as it slowly sank in the sky. Eventually, it would sink below the mountains and out of sight, though that was hours away still. But for the moment, we enjoyed the peace of it in silence.
“I hate it because of what it did to my people.”
We’d been quiet for so long that his voice startled me.
“They were vilified by it, turned into the worst things imaginable and stuffed into a children’s rhyme. Demons and child-killers, my people are now the bogeymen of an entire culture,” he said, his voice raw and ragged with pain.
“Kiel,” I half-moaned in sympathy. I’d never considered it like that before. About Kiel, yes, but I’d never made the jump to his people. His entire clan.
“Not to me.” He shook his head. “To me, they were the bravest of all. They chose, theychose, to sacrifice everything they had to join me in resisting. To take a stand and fight back against the monsters the Alphas had become. Every single one of them. They all sided with me against the darkness.”
“I can’t imagine,” I whispered.
“And what did they get in return for such courage?” he spat. “Death and a song that turned every single shifter against them. Spitting on their memories, dancing on their graves. That’s what.”
Against my judgment, I reached out and laid a hand on his bicep. He didn’t want to let himself grow closer to me, and I steeled myself for rejection, but I couldn’t just stand there and not do anything. The pain radiating off him was too palpable to ignore. It seemed impossible for him to shoulder that burden for so long on his own.
“You know what I hate the most?” he asked, glancing at me, his eyes shining with tears.
“What’s that?” I managed to get out in a hoarse whisper.
“Knowing that none of them will ever have their deeds remembered. Nobody will ever write songs about them. No praises to the glory of heroic last stands, delaying the enemy so that the wounded and young could escape. No songs sung about gallant charges into the face of a superior enemy andwinning,” he snarled, clenching a fist, a tear finally falling free. “The things I saw, Jada. The things theydidshould be on everyone’s lips. Even now, centuries later,theyare the people who should be looked up to. Because they sacrificed it all.”
I was crying now, too.
“Libraries. I could filllibrariesworth of their exploits. But nobody will ever know,” he said in a low voice, almost groaning in pain. He toed at the river’s edge, taking a few small steps into it until the water ran around his ankles.
Tears flowed freely down his face as he stared at the mountains, looking into the fog of memory, seeing things that only he remembered, that only he knew had occurred. I couldn’t join him. I could only be there to support him. The guilt and pain that had bowed his shoulders for all that time came crashing free. He let it shine. In front of me.
I wanted to reach out with more than just a hand. I wanted to open my mouth, to tell him that their time was coming nearer by the day. Once we stopped Lycaonus and the other Alphas and shattered their Fate stones, then things would change. He could take the time to write the stories of his clan, of the Callis and their true nature. It would take time, but people would come around. They would see the truth.
And wrongs would be made right.
But I didn’t. I couldn’t. My mouth wouldn’t work. It wouldn’t let me give him those assurances.
It was too busy listening to my feet.
“Jada?” Kiel was frowning at me, his tears gone, though the streaks down his face were there, proof of the moment. Not that I needed it.
“Shhh,” I said, crouching as I pressed my hands to the ground, not trusting my bare feet alone.
“What is it?” Kiel whispered.
“The ground,” I said, looking up at him.
“What about it?” he asked from where he stood, his feet still in the river. Which explained why he hadn’t sensed it yet.
“You told me to listen to it,” I replied, standing up and looking around. “And it’s telling me that we’re about to have company. A lot of company.”
Kiel splashed his way back to me until we stood shoulder to shoulder on the edge of the river, staring at the trees and the tundra, waiting for whatever was about to show itself.
Chapter Eight
