“Do you understand, Darkor?” Dannie asked her son. Her expression one of a mother desperate to connect with the child who had been out of her reach for an eternity. A son she had spent thousands of years trying to save.
“I go by ‘Shadow’ now,” he told her, less bite in his words than before. “And I do understand. I’m not sure I’m happy about it, but I’m old enough now to see the sacrifice you’ve made. And I might actually owe you…” He looked at me but didn’t finish the sentence. I was desperate to know if it was about me, but there was no way to ask and not sound completely narcissistic.
Dannie stepped closer to him, and it was almost painful how awkward they were. It must have hit them at the same time that this was their chance for healing. He wrapped his arms around her, and it was the sort of hug that usually destroyed me on the rare occasions he handed them out.
His hugs were A-game material.
“Two questions,” he said when they pulled apart. “How come you couldn’t break the spell on the door, being as powerful as you are?”
Dannie didn’t like this, her brow furrowing as a dark expression crossed her features. “I was weakened when I had you, Shadow. My power is yours now, and I’m nothing more than a figurehead, still here trying to keep the balance.”
I sensed that she hadn’t expected to lose part of herself to a child.
She reached up and touched his cheek. “I don’t regret any of it, I promise. But I definitely don’t command the power I used to.”
He thought on this, his expression unreadable.
“What’s your second question?” she pushed.
This time, there was a chink in his armor. “If you were on Earth for years, why did you never try to find me? I thought the entire aim was to get me home. To see me again.”
He’d missed his mother, and fuck, if that vulnerability didn’t make him seem—for a moment in time—like someone much less jaded and alphahole-ish.
She swallowed roughly. “I’m weakened in the human realm, away from the Nexus. It’s why Mera’s much stronger than me. She doesn’t have my limitations, in either land.”
Shadow focused on me, looking for a moment longer than was polite. “Sheisextraordinary.”
Slaying me as always. “Sheis sitting right here,” I added, forcing normalcy to return. I didn’t want to think about being a mist-born creature of power. I just wanted to be Mera. Me. That was enough.
They both just smiled at me and I wondered how the fuck I’d ever missed the similarities between them. “How exactly do royals have children?”
The question was out before I thought about the intricacies of it. Was I about to get the Shadow Realm’s equivalent of the birds and bees talk?
Dannie’s grin was knowing. “It’s a joining of body and power. It requires you to exist in the head of your mate, and it’s intense to the degree that many can’t handle. Pleasure beyond what you can imagine, but it’s also how I lost energy to give to Shadow. So be aware of this.”
That part didn’t bother me as much as the thought of allowing anyone to exist in my head. My messy, messy head.
“What is our next step then?” Angel asked. She’d been quiet, taking in all the new information. There was nothing she loved more than discovering new facts about the worlds. She took her role as the quiet observer very seriously, cataloguing it all away, her super-brain never forgetting a thing.
“Now we must correct the power balance in this world,” Dannie said, dusting her robes off. “Mera and Shadow are the two able to return the royal rule to its correct position. Cristell, I’ve been trying to keep an eye on her, but her energy keeps morphing and changing. I don’t know what you’ll find when you return to the compound.”
It was clear she hadn’t been back there since the day her son had been stolen, too weak to do much more than search for a way to return him. She’d said it had taken near two thousand years to get the Nexus to produce my energy, and honestly… that was dedication. A true mother’s love for a child.
“Where the fuck is Ixana?” Shadow asked suddenly. “She’s disappeared and she has my bloodstone.”
Dannie’s eyes turned murky, which was always a bad sign. “She is gone. And…” She focused on me. “Can you feel your creatures, Mera?”
Flames licked across Shadow’s arms, his face set in angry lines. Ignoring this, I tried to feel the creatures in my bond, and… they were still there, but it was weak. Much weaker than I’d expected. “The connection is fading,” I choked out. The power of this Nexus had hidden it, but now that I was focusing my attention on the bonds, it was obvious.
Shadow rumbled. “Wait here,” he said to me. “I’ll look into it.” He disappeared into a blur of shadows, and I tried not to freak out.
“Can you ever forgive me, Mera?” Dannie asked, her voice flat. “I dragged you into this war. Without your permission.”
“You did it to save Shadow,” I said, keeping my true feelings hidden away. I got it, but it stung that the one adult I’d thought had given a shit about me had only been interested in what she could use me for.
“At first, yes.” She surprised me with her honesty. “But all too quickly, I loved you. I even contemplated figuring out a way to stop you from taking this journey. Risking you didn’t feel worth it, even to save the realm from its ultimate end.”
“It’s dying?” Angel cut in, surprised. “There has been no talk of that.”
