Page 152 of Gates of Rapture
He was the author of blood slavery, he had led countless ascenders into addiction to dying blood, and he’d used his squads of death vampires to kill any who stood in his way.
Her son had no conscience.
And so he screamed.
Beatrice covered her ears and wept, unable to fathom how many years or decades or even centuries would be required to wash away the last ramification of all his evil deeds.
***
Grace had forgotten the trials of childhood.A vampire’s long life had created a nearly infinite distance between the sufferings of the two decades required to reach adulthood and the almost boundless challenges of living as a mature ascender.
She glanced at Leto, who stood on the opposite side of their small campsite, in a clearing in the forest on Mortal Earth, deep in the Cascades.He’d built a large campfire that had roared and crackled and was only now settling down.
She sat with Kendrew on her lap.He was the elder of Casimir’s boys—six years old now.Sloane sat in his kiddie camp chair, but he had drawn as close to her as he could get and held her hand tight.
These boys had had a rocky beginning, but their lives were beginning to smooth out and Grace was part of that, as she had promised.
But it was Kendrew who had brought up the current offense.He had entered the first grade in the Seattle hidden colony’s school and—children being what they had always been—one of his schoolmates had already brought up a supposed past crime of his father’s.He had told Kendrew that Casimir had been the instigator of a bomb attack in Las Vegas Two that had nearly killed twenty thousand people.
“I know for a fact that is completely untrue,” Grace said.
Kendrew twisted in her arms and looked up at her.“My papa didn’t do that terrible thing?”
“Not at all, and you can tell your friend that Fiona was there, Warrior Jean-Pierre’sbreh,and she told me that it was Greaves who had ordered his death vampires to blow up the building.Your father hadn’t even known about it.”Greaves had intended for Casimir to die as well, but Grace didn’t think Kendrew needed to hear that.
Kendrew smiled and turned back around to face the fire.Sloane now leaned against her arm.It was getting late, and the boys were tired.
Grace shuddered inwardly on Kendrew’s behalf.Maybe the six-year-old who had attempted to malign Casimir had gotten the facts wrong in this case, but one day someone would speak the truth about his crimes; then what would Grace say?Casimir’s list of wrongdoings was long, horribly long, and the truth one day would be out.
She leaned down and kissed the top of Kendrew’s head.He had curly hair like his father.“Your father is one of the bravest men I’ve ever known because he saved Leto’s life and almost died doing it.There is nothing greater on earth than laying down one’s life for another.”
At that, Kendrew once more turned into her and looked up at her.“He is brave.”
“Oh, yes.And smart, so very smart.And he has the funniest sense of humor.”
Sloane’s hand grew slack in hers.She could feel his body sinking against her.
“And now, my darlings, time for bed.”
Kendrew didn’t protest, but slid off her lap.Sloane, on the other hand, at three, could barely walk he was so drowsy.
She called to Leto.He turned and smiled that beautiful smile of his, now full of affection for her, of love.She inclined her head in Sloane’s direction.He moved swiftly and lifted the three-year-old as though he were a feather.
The boys’ tent was at a right angle to theirs and held two cots.She tucked Kendrew in and kissed him.She put her hand on his forehead and offered a prayer and a blessing.
She left the tent and Leto performed a similar ritual with Sloane, though the younger boy’s eyes were closed when he put his large hand on the small forehead and offered another blessing and a prayer.
When Leto zipped down the front of the tent, he led her back to their larger tent.Before going inside, he glanced around.“I was going to put a dome of mist over our campsite, but then I realized it wasn’t needed.The colony is safe, and the one vampire powerful enough to break through Diallo’s mist is corralled on Fourth Earth.”
In the distance, she heard wolves howl, a long plaintive cry in the dark.She loved that sound.She loved Mortal Earth, where all life had begun, humankind and vampire-kind alike.She loved the hidden colony as well.She would have been content anywhere, in any dimension, with Leto, but she confessed she was happy in this quiet, secret ascended world, happier than she would have been on Second Earth.
This was a good place to begin her life with Leto, camping with Casimir’s boys.She wanted to have children, and maybe one day she would.
***
An hour later, Leto was buried inside Grace and trying not to laugh.Making love to her and attempting to keep as quiet as possible in order not to awaken or frighten the boys had given his woman the giggles.
“I’m just not used to this,” she whispered, laughing all over again.
