His lips quirked as he watched her nibble on her lip. “You may ask me anything you wish,luxiva.”
How was it that he could read her so well? They’d only just met, had only known each for two days.
“Where are they? Your family?” she finally plucked up the courage to ask at his urging.
“My mother and two sisters died during the Plague,” he answered. Her breath left her, her chest pinching at the knowledge.
“I’m sorry, Cruxan,” she whispered, swallowing. That must’ve beenawful. She knew the bitterness of death, but to lose that many family members at once…she simply couldn’t imagine it.
“As for my sire,” he continued, his jaw clenching, “I do not know what became of him. He went off planet shortly after the attack. He never returned.”
Something about his hardened tone made Crystal think that it was a sore subject, that Cruxandidknow what became of him but preferred not to think about it…or talk about.
“Is he…do you know if he’s still alive?”
“Probably,” Cruxan replied. “But he has long been absent from my life and I do not spend my energy giving him much thought. He is a deserter. He left Luxiria when we—when I—needed him most.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
Crystal’s gaze dropped down to the flames. So, there was bad blood there. Did that have something to do with what he mentioned earlier…about past mistakes and not coming from a noble line?
The fire crackled and she found herself saying quietly, “My mother died too. It was sudden and unexpected.”
Cruxan’s gaze locked onto her, his lips pulling down into an even deeper frown.
“Luxiva…”
“My father left us too, like yours. I still have my sister though. Her name is Lauren,” she continued. “You lost a lot of family at once, Cruxan. I can only imagine a little of how that must’ve been, how you must’ve felt.”
Cruxan asked, “How did your mother die?”
“A brain aneurysm,” she said. At his confused expression, she said, “A blood vessel ruptured in her brain. She died on the way to the hospital.”
It had, undoubtedly, been the darkest, worst moment of her life. Growing up, her mother had been Crystal’s everything. But then she’d met Leo. She’d ignored the warning comments from her mother and eventually, the strong relationship they once shared had slowly fractured, little by little. Every time Crystal went to Leo, after everything he’d done, it broke another piece of her mother.
She’d talked to her mother on the phone the day before she’d died. Her mother had been crying hysterically, pleading with Crystal to leave Leo once and for all.
Crystal had been too frightened, too weak to. And she would always live with that knowledge, that her mother died, heartbroken over something that Crystal had had the ability to change.
The day after her mother died, she’d left Leo.
She blinked away the tears that had formed in the corners of the eyes. That was perhaps the worst thing that had come from her toxic relationship with him: the lost time with her mother. It wasn’t the abuse, the physical or sexual or mental abuse…it was theloss.
“Luxiva.”
Her gaze snapped to Cruxan and she straightened, locking those thoughts away. She had to do that, or else they would overwhelm her sometimes.
“Sorry, did you say something?” she asked.
He was studying her, but then shook his head. “Nothing,” he murmured. “I am just sorry for the loss of your mother.”
She gave him a strained smile, lifting a shoulder slightly. “It was a long time ago,” she murmured.
“Even still, sometimes loss can feel like a fresh wound.”
He would understand that better than most, she realized. She nodded at him across the fire, holding his gaze, a shared understanding passing between them.
The fire crackled loudly, suddenly, making her jump, the water gourd falling from her fingertips. Her cheeks heated, a little embarrassed, as she reached for it.
