Page 87 of Shattered Silence

“For saving me. For listening to my bullshit and not judging me. For bringing me home.” She stopped, turned, and looked up at him. “Don’t you ever get homesick for Kythia?”

“No,” Enki said bluntly, ice entering his voice. “Never. My place is with my brothers, but more importantly, it is with you.”

She remembered the chilling cries that had erupted from his lips in Zharek’s labs, just after the Tharian had left his body. How wildly and inhumanly he’d fought. At one point it had taken all three warriors just to hold him down. Trapped on the other side, all Layla could do was watch in horror until they released the Qualum door. She’d rushed inside, and the General had beckoned her to Enki’s side.

Then, as quickly as they’d appeared, the cracks in his armor were gone, sealed up like the impenetrable exo-armor that could coat every inch of his body.

He never spoke of that incident afterwards, and Layla didn’t push him.

But she always wondered where he’d come from. What had happened to him to make him so scary-cold, hiding his secret heart beneath layers of silence and ruthlessness?

His secret heart was only for her, so did it really matter?

“We are made of fragments,” he said at last, leaning in so that his forehead touched hers. He caressed the back of her neck with his bare hand as the warm wind whipped at stray tendrils of her hair. “I learned of my past from information inside a datacube. Sometimes, true memories break through, but only rarely. Apparently, I have the look of a true Kythian highborn, but I have not lived the life of one, and I do not want anything to do with their ilk. I have witnessed first hand their mindless cruelty as they destroyed the entire Tharian civilization with their bombs, because the Tharians would not bow to Kythian rule. They did not seem to care that myself and an entire Division were stationed on Tharos, holding the Tharian Royal Family hostage while negotiations took place in low orbit above us.”

Layla stared at him through her dark lenses, horror unfurling in her heart. “That’s why you ate Anuk’s heart, isn’t it? You were the only one to…”

“Survive.” His tone became heartbreakingly bleak. “I had been requested for that particular mission. The nobles liked having our kind at their disposal, because we strike fear into the hearts of our enemies, and because they liked to believe they could control us.”

Layla shook her head. How the hell did anyone control you?

Her question must have been obvious, because he inclined his head in acknowledgement. “We were originally conditioned to obey our masters, but over time, the effects of the conditioning lessened. The creator of the program intended for that to happen. At the time, I was under the illusion that the Empire was supreme. After the bombs hit, I was no longer their son. It was then and there that I understood the Universe we had helped build was worse than than any of Kaiin’s Nine Hells, and I vowed to kill the one who was responsible for the destruction.”

“And what happened after that?” Layla held her breath, enthralled by Enki’s dark story. She desperately wanted a happy ending for him, but it seemed that in the old Kordolian Universe, there was no such thing as a happy ending.

“They never expected me to survive. Lies were told. An accident. A miscommunication. They gave us ample warning. We did not evacuate on time. Lies. But even they did not understand how hard it is to kill one of my kind. Only General Tarak understood. Of course he refused to believe them. He is one of us, after all. He came to retrieve me. I was insane by then, a shell of my former self, starved and haunted by thousands of enraged, bodiless Tharians… and the incessant voice of the Tharian that had possessed me.”

“Enki…” Layla leaned into him, inhaling his heady scent. His presence was an addictive drug; she could never get enough of it. And now she was caught up in the terrifying tangled web of his past, trying to understand the unimaginable. “Did you do it, in the end?”

“Hm?”

“I mean, did you kill the one who did this to you?”

“I did not.” He stiffened. “I was still insane at that point. They placed me in a containment chamber for many cycles, and it took the longest time for me to come back. General Tarak took the blood-revenge on my behalf, killing Vethal in front of the entire High Council. Choked him to death with his bare hands. It was a lesson to them, and they did not retaliate, because they knew it was his—my—blood-right.”

“Oh.” Somehow, Layla understood, and she felt relieved.

“But I killed the other.”

“Other?”

“The one who sired me.”

“Your father?”

“In blood only.” His voice was arctic, and his face was a perfect mask of stone—all except for his lower lip, which trembled ever so slightly. Actually, his entire body was trembling. “He was the one I shot on the bridge as we escaped the Ristval V.”

Should she be horrified? Shocked? Afraid? All of these were normal, logical, human reactions to what he’d just revealed, but she didn’t feel any of those things.

The Kordolians she’d encountered on that dark ship had been inhumanly cruel, and Enki had killed several of them. She doubted the man on the bridge would have been any different.

Slowly, Layla put her hands on his shoulders, sensing the deep pain that was trapped inside him, warped, crystallized, unable to be expressed. Enki remained perfectly still, his forehead resting against hers, his hands on her neck, his eyes hidden behind impenetrable black lenses. The sun was so bright, and yet she stood in his shadow, wondering what the hell she could say.

There were no words.

But perhaps just being here with him was enough. In the middle of the desert—parched, sun-baked, exposed—he revealed another side of himself, making Layla fall for him all over again.

Enki glanced in the direction of the homestead, some inexplicable emotion crossing his face. “Is this what you want, Layla?”

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