Page 13 of Nazab

“Yeah,” she confirmed, grinning that he’d noticed her skills. “Just because we’re living in the apocalypse doesn’t mean we need to have disgusting, matted hair.”

“This Mad Prophet you spoke of,” he said, changing the subject again. “What sort of information has he relayed to his listeners?”

“All sorts of things and a lot of them don’t make much sense,” Monica said. “Sometimes, it sounds like he’s talking to specific people, warning them of danger or giving them cryptic advice. I’m pretty sure he was talking to your brothers who’ve been arriving in gold comets since the Rapture.”

Nazab straightened in the recliner, becoming laser focused. “Has he called any of them by their names?” he queried.

She shook her head. “Not that I’ve heard,” Monica said. “But the theme is always the same.” She’d been debating about whether she should mention everything the oracle had said.

“What is the theme, female?” the knight asked.

Monica felt as if she was standing on the edge of a precipice. If she told him the truth, they would probably step over the edge of the cliff and fall into the unknown together. If she withheld the information, they would remain stuck in place without any clue about what to do. Staring into his gorgeous brown eyes, Monica took a deep breath, then stepped off the edge. “All of your brothers have been searching for specific females,” she told him. “I think you were meant to find me and keep me safe.”

Chapter Ten

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A THRILL SHOT THROUGH Nazab at Monica’s words. “Are you saying you’re supposed to be my female?” he asked, seeking clarification. Fate had used humans to relay messages to the knights in the past. He hoped this wasn’t just a misunderstanding. The idea of having someone to cherish, even if it was just for the duration of their war, filled him with intense longing.

Blushing yet again, Monica shrugged. “I’m not sure what the relationships are like between your brothers and the women they’ve been told to find,” she hedged.

“What are your impressions, female?” the knight asked.

“I think they’re all couples,” she admitted. “The Mad Prophet has been giving some pretty strong hints along those lines.”

Nazab shifted his gaze away from the enticing cambion to stare at the wall. “In all of the eons of my eternal life, I’ve never been allowed to love a female,” he said softly, but he knew she could hear him. “None of us knights have given our hearts to another, or sired children. Dangling this in front of us could be the cruelest thing Fate could possibly do.”

“Don’t you want a wife and kids?” Monica asked, now sounding a bit hurt, as if she thought he was rejecting her.

“I want this more than words can express, female,” Nazab said, shifting his eyes back to her face.

“But you don’t want me because of my leg, right?” she figured, withdrawing behind a protective shell. “I get it,” she added. “How could a heroic Knight of Order possibly want a defective cambion like me?”

He winced at her bitter tone. “It doesn’t bother me that you’re missing part of your leg,” he denied. “But the fact that you’re a cambion could prove to be problematic.”

“Why?” she asked in confusion.

Nazab sighed, knowing he needed to tell her what he and his brothers had done to her kind in the past. “Do you not wonder why the knights have never procreated?” he asked.

“I figured you didn’t want to get saddled with a family,” Monica said. “Especially when you’ll just have to leave them behind when you either win or lose your wars.” She was still withdrawn and refused to meet his eyes.

“An unwillingness to abandon our families is part of it,” he conceded. “But the real truth is we don’t know what our offspring will turn out to be like.”

“I don’t get it,” she said with a frown. “What do you mean?”

He braced himself for the possible fallout once he’d divulged the full truth. “Every single cambion our enemies have ever spawned have been evil,” he said. “Except for you.”

Her eyebrows rose in surprise before lowering. “How could all of them have turned evil?” she asked.

“They were born with black souls,” Nazab said. “Some turned feral and attacked their own sire. Lachial was forced to wipe them out each time.”

Monica put her hand on her chest, as if trying to delve herself. “I wasn’t born with a black soul,” she said. “Why am I so different from the others?”

“I’m hoping Amaros will know the answer to that question,” he said. “But taking you to my brothers could put you in danger.”

“Why?” she demanded, meeting his eyes again.

“Because one of our duties is to destroy the progeny of our enemies,” Nazab confessed.