Surprise flickered over my father’s face. He’d expected something else. An emotional outburst, maybe? I was way too tired for those.
He leaned back in his seat and steepled his fingers together. “I’m afraid I must ask the reason for your anger.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re stalling. Trying to come up with an answer that won’t make me kick you out of my house? You know exactly what you did and why I’m pissed off.”
“You’re the future queen of every fae walking the worlds.”
“And that means you get to dictate my life?’
My father’s face went blank. “It means you are required to choose a suitable match, one who holds as much power as you do. One who will keep our bloodline?—”
The glass snapped in my hand, wine flooding down my fingers and onto my lap. “If you say pure, you and I are finished.”
Rage brought the Chimera roaring to the surface. My breath became shallow, my heart beating furiously in my chest.
My father tilted his head. “Rest easy, Evangeline. You are not completely fae, remember. I was going to say ‘compatible.’” He gestured toward the window. “Our bloodlines are tied to the natural world, though your mother is also tied to death. But your bloodline is more complicated. No fae blood has ever been tainted by the Chimera.”
He winced at his word choice before I could judge him. “‘Tainted’ is the wrong word choice. What I’m saying is your Chimera blood should be impossible, and yet, we know it is not. You and the person you choose?—”
I cut him off. “Caelan. I choose Caelan.”
A muscle in his cheek twitched. “Will be compatible no matter what. But you are not thinking far enough into the future. It’s possible your children will experience…defects.”
I stared. “Excuse me?”
“A Chimera isn’t a true shifter. Their blood is pure magic. A true shifter has one animal form and is half beast, half human. Some shifters have magic due to dilutions of their bloodlines, i.e., an ancestor marrying a witch or other paranormal species, but most only have their innate shifting magic and enhanced senses and physical prowess.” My father leaned forward. “I’mexplaining so you understand the potential ramifications of breeding with a shifter.”
I squeezed my eyes shut so I wouldn’t stab him with a flower stem. “Breeding?”
He waved a hand. “You’ve been with the humans for far too long. Procreation, then, if the word prickles you. If you have a child with a shifter, your blood might make something…monstrous. Something neither of you can control.”
“I don’t want to control my children.” But the words sounded mulish to me. Children required maybe not control, but discipline when they were young. Especially those who held magic in their blood.
“You must. You are borne from two powerful bloodlines, Evangeline. With the Chimera thrown into the mix, you must realize how dangerous procreation can be with another shifter.”
“Is this why you sent someone from Caelan’s past back into his life?”
The pause told me everything I needed to know.
“Sometimes a challenge is necessary to examine the mettle of a man,” he said cryptically.
“Or you could just stay the hell out of our business.”
“You’re the heir. Everything you do is my business.”
I glared at him. “Speaking of being the heir, that’s not quite true, is it?”
My father sighed and studied his fingernails. “Thalia is defective.”
I sucked in a breath. “Dad.”
“There’s no use sugarcoating things. A seer can never hold the throne. Someone like Thalia serves best by being at the ruler’s side.”
“So you can use her to hold onto your throne.”
“Again, my dear, you are thinking like a citizen and not like a queen.”
I bit down angry words. I’d never sacrifice my sister’s life to increase my power base, so he was right. I was still thinking like a citizen rather than a queen. A true ruler should be a citizen and should think like the people do. Otherwise, what was the point?
