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Lucian rose as well. “Marius, if what Gabriel is saying is true about you and your abilities, you have to try to embrace who you are. We need you because it sounds like you’d be able to battle Daniel and defeat him.”
Marius felt panicky. “Maybe there’s something off with the blood-chains. That has to be it.”
Gabriel was on his feet and Adrien as well. They began moving in his direction and a terrible nausea came over him. His mind flew back to being on Daniel’s table, his skin and muscles split open to the spine. Daniel had forced him more than once, through the terrible pain he inflicted, to betray the plans that his brothers had made to get the three of them out of Daniel’s compound.
As the men converged, he had to speak the words. His family needed to know what kind of man he really was. When they stood in an arc in front of him, he said, “I betrayed you more than once. Adrien. Lucian. I betrayed you.” He felt like his heart was on fire, like it would incinerate and burn up his entire body because the words had left his throat.
“What do you mean?” Adrien asked. “When?”
“Yeah, what kind of betrayal are you talking about? When exactly did you do this?”
He rubbed the back of his neck. He could feel the top of the scar, the one that Daniel had created through repeated incisions down the length of his spine. “Three times we were going to escape and each time I told Daniel about it. I couldn’t help it. I betrayed you. I was in so much pain and I told Daniel all about the plans. There, you see how special I am?” He shouted his rage at having betrayed his brothers, who had protected him countless times by taking Daniel’s punishment in his stead.
“Three times?” Adrien asked.
Marius knew with every cell in his body that today he’d be separated forever from the family he loved, from his brothers and Gabriel. They’d have every reason to cast him out for good.
And he’d deserve that. “I’ve tried with every ounce of my strength all these centuries to make up for what I did, hoping somehow that I’d be able to atone for my betrayals. But I know now that nothing can make up for it. Daniel would make me listen to your screams in the hallway. He’d chain me there so I’d have to hear what my betrayals cost each of you.”
“So you did this three times?” Lucian stared at him, repeating the same thing Adrien had asked.
Marius straightened his shoulders. “Yes. Three.” He felt empty inside, but the confession also relieved him of the burden he’d carried. Even though he’d have to go forward by himself, at least the truth was out. The python that had lived within his body all this time dissolved and could hurt him no more.
But a strange thing happened. Both Lucian and Adrien began to smile, something Marius didn’t understand at all. Smiles turned to ridiculous grins and after that his brothers started to laugh. They laughed so hard that tears began to run down their cheeks.
“I don’t understand.” He turned to Gabriel, who in turn shrugged.
Finally, Lucian grabbed Marius by the back of his neck, pulling him to touch foreheads. “Marius, I wish you’d said something before now. We all caved. Three times each.” He then drew upright and held Marius’s gaze firmly. “Daniel made each of us give up the truth about our escape plans. Do you think I was stronger than you or Adrien? Think about how sharp that blade was. You weren’t alone. It just had never occurred to me that you believed our earlier plans failed because he’d gotten the truth out of you. In reality, he’d figured things out on his own. And remember, we were kids back then. The servants could have alerted him to our bungling efforts. The final escape just involved being cleverer than before and a little luck. That’s all.”
Adrien drew close and planted a hand on Marius’s shoulder. “We both thought you knew, Marius, I swear it, or Lucian and I would have said something before now. Damn, I hate that you’ve carried this all these years. I’m so fucking sorry.”
Marius was in shock as he drew back slightly and shifted his gaze back and forth repeatedly between Adrien and Lucian. “So I’m forgiven?” It seemed impossible.
Lucian shrugged. “There’s nothing to forgive. Not a damn thing. We were all caught in the grips of that psychopathic monster we had for a father.”
Marius remained standing where he was for a long time, processing what he’d just learned. Daniel had played them one against the other, yet somehow Marius had been too young to figure that out. He tried to recall if the subject had ever come up before. Even if it had, Marius suspected he’d been deaf to the discussion because of his intense guilt over the betrayals.
“Be well, Marius.” Lucian sought his gaze.
Marius stared at him and felt the last of his guilt leave him. This, too, had been Daniel’s fault: that he’d carried something all this time that wasn’t his to bear.
After a long moment, he planted a hand on each shoulder. “I was sure that once you knew the truth about what I’d done, I’d never see either of you again. I lived with that fear all my life, of losing you both.”
A joining of arms around shoulders followed, all three brothers together, full of shared love and grace and the bond because each had suffered at the hands of their father in the same way.
When Marius drew back, he met Gabriel’s gaze. His surrogate father smiled and nodded. “I know what courage that took. Well done. But I’d like to suggest something.”
“Sure.” Right now Marius would have agreed to anything. He was happier than he’d ever been and the release of all that guilt made his chest feel like it was stuffed full of cotton. He’d never felt so free.
“Given everything that you’ve said about Shayna, and these latest revelations that seemed to come from her own perceptions, why don’t you keep her with you a little longer? I think we need to know what Daniel’s up to, and it seems to me she can help with that.”
Shayna.
Though he couldn’t explain why, he knew that his coming to terms with what had haunted him for centuries would have an impact on how he viewed her. More than anything, he wanted to share what had just happened and that her encouragement to confess the truth had given him that extra push to bare his soul.
He turned physically, angling in the direction of the guest room some two miles away through the intricate Pharaoh system. He could feel the trajectory of their shared guest room the way he could feel himself breathe.
He glanced at his brothers, then at Marius and Rumy. He even smiled. “I’ll be right back.”
