“Vinna, stop," Aydin implores. “I’m sorry that just happened, but please let us explain.”
I vacillate between my need to escape this nightmare, and the need to make sense of what the hell’s going on right now. I step out of the room.
“Vinna, please!” Silva begs, and I pause.
I stand half in and half out of the room, not sure which way I want to go. Keegan walks Lachlan over to the stone bowl, and he starts chanting. Lachlan mumbles something and runs a finger across his palm where a slash appears. He closes his fist over the bowl and blood trickles in.
Keegan chants some more, and the inside of the bowl flashes again. Lachlan releases a relieved breath and calm washes over me. I don’t know where the feeling comes from, but I know it’s sure as hell not from me.
“Vinna, come, sit down, and we’ll explain,” Keegan tells me.
I shake my head, not willing to go anywhere near these paladin or casters or whatever the fuck they are. The best I can offer is to lean against the door frame.
“I’m related to you?” I question, looking at Lachlan like he’s shit I just discovered on my shoe.
He solemnly nods, clearly not any happier about this revelation than I am.
“You knew from the minute I told you my name in the car, didn’t you?”
“We all suspected, but we couldn’t be sure until we completed the spell,” Keegan explains.
I stare at Lachlan with more scrutiny than I previously had. His hair is dark like mine and styled in a veryMcDreamykind of way. His eyes are a darker green, more emerald to my sea foam. We share the same high cheekbones and oval face, his the masculine version of mine. He’s all chiseled jaw and manly edges with the faintest hint of stubble on his face. I choke a little on my sudden thought.
“Are you my father?” I croak out, my breaths becoming rapid and shallow.
“No, I’m your uncle.”
“Where are they…my…uh…my…parents?” I finally manage to get out while trying to keep from free-falling into full-blown hyperventilation.
“We were hoping you could tell us that," Silva confesses.
“I told you, I’ve only ever known Beth.”
I’m losing the battle with my runaway breaths. Evrin hops up and strides toward me. I’m bent over at the waist, but I hold out a short sword at his approach.
“Don’t…come…near…me," I warn him between frantic breaths.
“I just want to help you," he soothes.
“I don’t care, I don’t want any of you to come near me," I huff out, labored and slow.
I look up at Evrin to make sure he listens, and I see the hurt on his face. I move my gaze down to his chest and watch it rise and fall with his calm, normal breathing. I focus on that, trying to match my own inhale and exhale with his.
It takes time, but my panic gradually recedes, and my lungs inflate rhythmically as I get myself back under control.
“If you’re my uncle, are you from my mother’s side or my father’s?” I ask, staring at the ground.
“Your father’s.”
“What’s his name?” I whisper, tracing the pattern of the carpet with my eyes.
“Vaughn Aylin…we’re identical twins," Lachlan laments, his voice breaking at the admission.
This revelation shakes me. This is what my father looks like. I stare at Lachlan, going back over the pieces of myself in his face.
“I don’t know how you came to be, but I know that Vaughn would’ve never willingly walked away from his child," Lachlan tells me.
I think he means for his words to comfort me, but they don’t counteract the holes in the story of my existence. I have my father’s last name. Either he knew about me, or Beth knew more about him than she admitted.
