Thorn looked at his son who had no idea of his alternate water dragon form that Simi knew about. He wasn’t sure how to answer that so he decided silence would be the most prudent response.
Thankfully, Simi didn’t seem to notice. She pivoted around to face him. “Well, the Simi better get back afore akri wonders where I wents off to. Or akri-Lexi start looking for me.” She smiled at Cadegan. “Nice meeting you.”
“You, too, me lady.”
She wrinkled her nose. “The Simi loves how you talk. I could listen to that all day!”
An unexpected wave of jealousy went through Thorn with such force that it actually startled him.
“Bye!” She vanished.
Cadegan returned to his food.
Still rattled by that unexpected jolt of raw emotion, Thorn took a moment to watch his son. How he wished he could tell Cadegan who he really was.
If only he had that courage.
For now, he’d watch his son closely and make sure nothing changed.
And that Simi stayed far away from Cadegan.
16
October 13, 1045 AD
Thorn felt his own powers surging to fight as he saw the darkness within Cadegan. It was growing even before his eyes. His son had done the unthinkable.
He’d taken human lives. The one thing Thorn had forbidden him to do it.
The one thing Brigid had warned them all against.
Even though Thorn tried to stop it, his own eyes began to change. “What have you done?”
Ashamed, Cadegan looked away from him at the same time Thorn’s demon servant, Misery, appeared by his side. While he didn’t trust the sultry demoness at all, he knew she never lied to him. She didn’t dare.
She only withheld the truth.
“He killed humans,” she whispered in Thorn’s ear. “Midlings who were trying to protect their sister he coveted for his own.”
Thorn winced at the fear that his son had done the one thing he’d been forbidden to do. The betrayal and hurt cut deep. In all the world, Cadegan was all he had left.
All he loved.
Hoping, praying it was a lie, that Cadegan wasn’t turning into the monster addanc he feared, Thorn glared. “Is this true? Did you take a human life?”
“Aye, but?—”
Enraged as his own demonic blood ignited, he backhanded Cadegan.
His son knew their laws and why they had them. Theirs was a tenuous truce with the Nasaru soldiers and others. One misstep and all of his Hellchasers would be banished back to the hell realms they’d populated with enemies who would do anything to lay hands to them. Enemies who would tear them apart and grow even more powerful. So powerful, the others would never be able to stop them.
Thorn didn’t care what they did to him, personally. He’d more than earned his damnation, and he’d come to terms with that long ago, but the others who’d loyally served him … They deserved the salvations they’d earned.
“There are no buts, boy! You swore to me that you’d never draw midling blood. Is this how you uphold your sacred oaths?”
Cadegan’s eyes turned completely from human to demon. “They attacked me first.”
Thorn winced as he felt Cadegan turning even more toward the darkness that flowed through their blood. Justification for cruelty was the slipperiest of slopes. Once begun, there was no turning back. Evil fed upon such blameless behavior, and it thrived with it in the heart of its tool.
