“What?” She gaped at him in horror. “That’s barbaric!”
“It is the Calbernan way. The death ofimlanifemales from two of the most powerful Houses of Calberna was no small loss.”
“So your people’s answer is more death?”
He drew a breath, exhaled in such a way as to make her think he was holding on to his patience. “Have I not just told you of the nature of Calbernans? The sacrifice was a measure of our grief, yes, but also necessary to prevent weakening House Merimynos and House Calmyria beyond repair. We have no Sirens, Gabriella. Even one with a power like yours could have provided strength enough to make the sacrifice of so many unnecessary. TheMyerial’s mate would still have perished, but the others... many of them might have been saved.Youcould have saved them. Your power—that gift you fear so badly you can’t even bring yourself to speak of it—that power could have saved them.”
She stared up at him. She’d never thought of the monster as anything more than a danger to be contained. “You don’t know that. You don’t know anything about my power. You don’t understand what it can do.”
“So tell me, Gabriella. Tell me what it can do. Tell me why you fear it so.”
Dilys wanted to reach for her, to hold her, to help her face the demons of her past. He would battle them himself if he could. But she hadn’t given him that right... and she’d made it clear she would not thank him for taking it. So he stood before her, silently willing her to finally open up and trust him with her truths, with her secrets. To share with him, as he had shared with her.
For one, gut-wrenching instant, he thought she’d rebuff him yet again, but then she began to speak.
“You know about my father. How he died. The things he did.” Summer plucked a spruce branch from the hedge and began denuding the twig of its soft, fragrant blue-green needles. “Storm tried to keep the worst of it from us, but I overheard her talking with Wynter once. I know our father tried to kill her more than once. I know he nearly succeeded.” Her brow creased as emotion welled. “Our father—m-my father—was a monster.”
“He was not well,” Dilys agreed softly.
“He was insane.” She crumpled the remains of the spruce wand and let it fall. “He loved my mother so deeply, that when he lost her, he lost his mind.” Her beautiful eyes were swimming with tears. She tilted her head back to look at the sky and blinked rapidly, but they leaked from the corners of her eyes to trickle down the sides of her face into her hair.
There was no way he could keep his distance. Not when her sorrow was spilling from her eyes. He caught her in his arms. “I’m sorry,moa leia.I am so sorry for your pain. But what happened to him has nothing to do with you.”
She wrenched away. “I’m just like him! Don’t you see? I’m just like him!” She turned and took off running.
He chased after her. Because she was headed for the center of the maze rather than one of the exits, he waited until she slowed before catching up to her. She was calmer then. Her tears had stopped.
“You’re nothing like your father, Gabriella. You couldn’t be. You are a Siren. Your heart is filled with love. You could never become obsessed with hatred and a lust for power the way your father was at the end. It’s not in your nature.”
“What proof do you have of that? Siren, I may be, but if I am, I’m the first of my kind. A Siren born of royal Summerlander blood—not Calbernan. How many of your ancient Calbernan Sirens carried the power of the Sun and who knows how many other forms of ancestral magic in their veins, as I do?” They had reached the center of the maze. She paced across the grass to the fountain and stared hard at the falling water. “You think I’m a Siren. Everyone else thinks I’m like my mother. You all think I’m loving and calm and gentle, that I would never hurt anyone—that I would never do anything horrible... But you all think that because that’s what I want you to believe. If you knew what I was really like...”
“Gabriella...”
“I am my father’s daughter.”
“No, you aren’t.”
Her face creased with an expression of anguished affection, as if she both loved and hated how swiftly and stoutly he jumped to her defense.
“Yes, Dilys, I am. The monster that lived in him lives in me, too. You saw what I did to Lily’s father.”
“I did. And if you hadn’t killed that worthlesskrillo,I would have. Your brother-in-law would have. Every one of my men, every one of your brother’s guard, even your own sister Khamsin would have. Would you stare at us all in horror and call us monsters, too?”
“Lily’s father wasn’t the first person I’ve killed, Dilys.”
Chapter 17
There. She’d said it. Admitted it. That horrible black stain on her soul.
Summer stood before him, fists clenched, chest heaving as if she’d run a hard race.
“Tell me,” he said. And he reached for her hands. There was no horror in his eyes, no fear, just warmth and compassion and acceptance. One at a time, he peeled back the tightly curled fingers of her hands, kissed each palm, and pressed her hands to his chest, pressing his own hands atop them to anchor them there. All the while, he kept his eyes locked with hers. Steady. Accepting. Unwavering.
“Tell me,” he said again.
And as she stared up into the endless sunlit sea of his warm, golden gaze, she could almost hear him singing softly, his voice a sweet enchantment,Give me your pain,moa kiri. Let me bear it for you. Let me set you free.
Her mouth trembled. Gods, she wished she could. Never had she wanted so badly to be the sweet, loving, gentle woman the world thought she was. Never had she wanted so badly for her soul to be unstained, for the monster to be gone. If she was everything she’d spent her lifetime pretending to be, she could have thrown herself into his arms, surrendered herself to the promise of paradise. She could have accepted his courtship, his love. Let herself love him in return.
