“Why didn’t he?”
“He never had the chance.” Adarian pulled Nick to a page where a pair of lips were imprinted on the ancient vellum. “Before Monakribos could use it against them, Cam had Rubati place a note to her husband in the book and seal her letter with a bit of her blood that binds her to it. It’s part of her, too. After that, he couldn’t bring himself to destroy this bit of her being. Like you, it now contains a balance between them and so it has become our guide. A conscience of sorts for our species that confuses more than it helps. It’s Rubati’s pure soul that keeps us from using the book’s knowledge to destroy the world. It’s also why we have to keep it near us. Why we can’t be without the cursed thing.”
“Is that why you put Nashira in it?”
He nodded. “I was hoping her hatred of me would override Rubati’s spell and allow me to either destroy the book or use it as it was intended. Instead, she only vexed me more.” He shoved at Nick. “Likeyou!” Adarian sneered the word, yet this time Nick felt the love that undercut his father’s derision.
“So how do I save Mom? Please, you have to help me figure out a way to do it.”
Sadness darkened Adarian’s eyes, turning them orange. “Have you seen that night?”
Nick shook his head. “I can’t.”
“It’s not what you think. And it’s not what you know.”
He scowled at his father’s cryptic words. “For the love of God, can you not tell me a straight answer? What is that supposed to mean?”
Adarian roared in anger. His breathing labored, he grabbed Nick’s shoulders and forced him to meet his gaze. “If you want to fix this, forget what you think you know about your life and the future, moron. Find Cyprian before he finds you, and stop him. It’s that simple!”
“How?”
“The same way your mother saved you, Nick. No child is born rotten. No matter what they say. We all come into this world the same. Cold and hungry, seeking warmth and comfort. Every last one of us. We’re snatched out into this madness, dazed and confused and all we want is for someone to hold us and tell us that it’s going to be okay. A steady hand to keep us from falling. You were lucky that you found one that held you instead of slapping you at every turn.”
Nick scowled at his father as he realized for the first time the difference between them. While his mother had wrapped him up in her love and held him close to protect him from the world, his father had been shunned and left to fend for himself. With no mother to care what happened to him. Nobody had ever protected Adarian.
Not once.
Rather they’d all taken turns abusing and using him until he’d become the very monster he’d been foretold by destiny.
“I’m sorry.”
He growled at Nick. “I don’t want your pity, boy.”
“That’s not what I’m giving you, old man.” Nick swallowed hard as the full tragedy of his father’s life hit him square in the chest. Adarian couldn’t even recognize what it was he was offering him. He had absolutely no concept of it. Couldn’t even recognize what was right in front of his face.
And that burned Nick most.
“In spite of it all … in spite ofyou,you worthless piece of dung, I do love you, Dad. I just wanted you to know it. You weren’t much. But you were my father. The only one I’ll ever have.” And before he could stop himself, he hugged him.
At first, he thought Adarian was going to throw him against something. But instead, he fisted his hand in Nick’s hair and held him tight to his chest. “You ever tell anyone about this and I’ll rip out your throat.”
Nick laughed at a very typical Adarian reaction. “Don’t worry. No one would believe it, anyway.”
Not even Nick really believed it. Maybe all of this was some hallucination. Maybe he was dead already. That would explain it.
But even so, he savored this one rare instance of being held by the man who’d fathered him. Even if he wasn’t really a man.
You can’t choose your father. You can only choose how you deal with him.
Nick was at peace with Adarian for the first time in his life. He finally understood his mother’s way of thinking and how it was that she managed to live the way she did. No wonder her soul was so beautiful.
If only his was.
But then that, too, was a choice.
Try as he might, he still wasn’t a creature of forgiveness. He had a monster to stop. One who was determined to ruin him.
One who was out there, right now. Plotting against him and his friends and family.
