It had angered him that the Watchers would kill her for being human. She had trespassed, but it wasn’t to do any wrong against them. Listening to her cry and beg had filled him with an insatiable need to protect her. So he did. That infuriating need followed him each moment after. Granting her immunity had been done on impulse and spite when his father had questioned him, but he struggled to understand why he was so compelled to save her.
“You do,” his father insisted.
If they would have a conversation, Cassiel didn’t want to be impeded by royal propriety. “May I speak freely?”
“Have you not been doing so?” he responded with a chuckle.
Cassiel looked out to the cove, watching the waves crashing on the shore. “I ask you not to patronize me, Father. That human is a foolish peasant who found her way here unknowing of our laws. I saved her out of pity.”
“Peasant? She is well-spoken and literate. Deny it if you must, but I believe you care what becomes of her.”
“Not in the slightest.”
His father shrugged and continued smiling. “Say what you will.”
Cassiel scowled. “Are you mocking me?”
“I am not.”
“Then I do not pretend to know what you’re insinuating.”
“I touched her soul as well, son. It is too much like yours to deny that your fates are not intertwined.”
Cassiel narrowed his eyes as he absorbed the meaning. A new suspicion arose about the purpose of tonight. “I feared you may be mad to bring a human and a beast here, but I should have known it was with intention. You assumed I had taken a liking to her.”
“Why else would you save her life and grant her immunity?”
“Because it was right, nothing more,” he replied tersely. “Is it so questionable that I spared someone that did not need to die?”
“I said the same when I spared your mother, but there was a reason for our meeting as I believe there is a reason you met Dynalya. She has not once questioned why you are unique.”
That was true.
Did she not realize he wasn’t a pureblood? It was clear that he was not like the others, but she didn’t treat him any differently.
“You told her of The Decimation and about the half-breeds of Gamor. Misbegotten sin, was it?”
“That is not how I see you, son. I said it to provoke her, and she reacted unexpectedly.”
Cassiel frowned, recalling Dyna’s tears glimmering on her cheeks. Tears for the loss of those she never knew. “Yes, well, you misled her to believe they were put to death.”
“I will leave it to you to tell her the truth if you wish.” His father shrugged. “She would be glad to hear it, I’m sure.”
“Why lie at all?”
“I wanted to know her opinion on the matter.”
Cassiel scowled, something hot rising in his chest. “You wanted to know what she thinks of me, you mean.”
“I believe she would not judge you for being different.”
“I do not care what she thinks nor do I want anything to do with that human,” he snapped. “I will not repeat your mistakes.”
His father turned to him, tone sharpening. “I have made many mistakes in my life, but your mother was not one of them. You willneverrefer to her as a mistake again.”
Cassiel grimaced and looked away to the kingdom below. He hated this place. Her memory was embedded everywhere. He couldn’t stand it any longer. “I’m leaving tomorrow.”
“When have I dismissed you? Less than a month has passed since you have returned home from Hermon Ridge.”
