“Vex likely would have known the magical bindings on you were weakening,” Finley agreed.
Maybe he was making excuses for the Night King. If he was honest with himself, he struggled with the idea of Vex wanting to hurt Declan. Vex had seemed intently interested in his son. Not murderous. Or maybe he didn’t want to see it. He wasn’t sure that he could be completely unbiased here. Vex had saved his life. Vex had given him the secret to magic for humans. Regardless, his first loyalty was to Declan. If Vex really was going up against his best friend, he knew whose side he would be on.
Declan continued to explain, haltingly, “He wasn’t… expecting me. That’s not the right word. He didn’t know he had a son. He never intended to have any. My mother didn’t… didn’t tell him about me. She hid me from him. It’s a long story and I don’t know all of it. To be honest, I don’t think he knows what he wants to do. There are moments when he’s… he’s… I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter. I don’t intend to have anything to do with him or the Kindreth from now on.”
“Do you think he’ll let you? Just go, I mean? And after what happened in Illithor, Helgrom and Rhalyf are pretty sure you sent up a flare for all to see. People will come looking for who did that,” Finley said.
“Well, they won’t find me. After I've recovered, I’m going to ask Rhalyf to teach me to disguise myself like he does,” Declan said almost fiercely. “If he can pass for an Aravae, I can pass for a human… at least for a while. When I don’t age…” Declan paused again, “Well, I’ll think of something then.”
“You’re going to hide yourself forever?” Finley couldn’t help the dismay and disbelief in his tone.
Declan’s red eyes met his in the mirror. “What other choice do I have? The Aravae will never accept a Kindreth in their Empire. It will just cause trouble for Aquilan and, like you said, people will be looking for a Night Elf. They can’t find one here.”
“I just don’t know how realistic that is, Declan. You’ve already done things that people know a human can’t do,” Finley said carefully. “Seith and Leisha, for instance.”
“Did Vex really kill them?”
“Yes,” Finley answered.
“Just because they harassed me at the Dawn? That’s… that’s… insane,” Declan shook his head.
“And more proof that he doesn’t want to kill you. Or, he’s leaning in the opposite direction. After all, why protect you from them when he wants you dead himself?” Finley again found himself reaching for something positive. But it was also logical.
“Maybe. But they weren’t really a threat! I could have handled them–”
“Yes, for a while. But if they had escalated things… Declan, maybe he didn’t want you to be forced to kill them to protect yourself,” Finley said.
“I wouldn’t have. If they wanted to out me to Aquilan I would have let them. I mean, I didn’t know myself what I was. Would it have made things difficult for me? Yes, but to kill them…” Declan shook his head. “He takes lives so easily. But then again… maybe he knows more than I do about them.”
“He could have done any number of things to them. Indeed, killing them seems excessive, but–”
“What are two Aravae lives worth to him?” Declan sounded exhausted.
“That could be true. He could not value life, but I don’t think that’s the case. But, then again, I just spoke to him briefly. I can’t really say. You may well be right,” Finley admitted.
“I’d like to believe something else about him, too,” Declan said softly. “He is… my father.”
He was. And that alone, made it seem impossible to Finley that the heir to the Kindreth Empire–the Night Prince–could simply walk away and keep on as a bartender at an inn.
Or is that my own desires talking again? I have to be very clear in my own mind what is going on for Declan. I spent years attributing his magic as proof that humans generally had such an ability when I should have realized he wasn’t human at all.
Now looking back on it, it was so clear to Finley that Declan wasn’t human. His inordinate strength, his superior speed, his preternatural grace and then, of course, the Sun sensitivity and the Blood Tattoo. It was all there. All for him to see. He who claimed–at least to himself–that he was a Kindreth expert had missed that his best friend was one of them. The glamour had hid quite a bit, but there was so much that was obvious.
If I hadn’t been blinded by my desire for humans to have magic, I would have looked at what was happening to Declan through clearer eyes. I would have helped him find out the truth about himself.
Finley, therefore, was determined not to make the same mistake twice. So he emptied his mind of everything he thought and listened to what Declan was saying. Though his best friend thought of words as weapons against him, when he did speak, what he said was often profound and true.
“Will he let me go?” Declan repeated his question and, strangely, stared into the mirror again. “Maybe not. Maybe he can’t help himself.”
“You’re his son. The only one he’s likely to ever have,” Finley said carefully. “That makes you rare and precious and–”
“Dangerous,” Declan let out a soft huff of breath then repeated in a sadder tone, “Dangerous.”
Finley immediately flashed on that crude grave Declan had made for his mother. Lady Ashryn Zinsadoral. Did Declan remember her now? Should Finley fill him in on all he’d learned from Vex? Yes, he should. But how to begin? The trauma that Declan had gone through had likely been impossibly great and… But then he yanked himself back to how this conversation had begun. Declan had found Tyler Wilde. But… but how? Where? Yet there was only one answer for this. In the Under Dark. In the Leviathan nest.
So another trauma to add to his ledger. Oh, Declan, I’m so sorry.
“You said you found Tyler,” Finley said softly and leaned against the bathroom’s threshold.
