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“You bet it is. And to think you were about to throw it all out the window…”
Alexi didn’t say anything for a long time. The mark on his back didn’t burn anymore. It was barely visible, the harsh lines having started to retreat under his skin when Kain’s aura had taken over and stimulated Alexi’s cambion sigil. The warmth of their embrace, the thin sheen of sweat on their skin, the hard muscles and rough edges of Kain’s athletic body… it all felt right to Alexi.
?
“I understand what Sophie is going through.”
“How can you? I’ve tried… I’ve gone through enough shit myself, but the truth is… if I ever killed a demon by mistake, I wouldn’t know how to deal with the guilt. So… how can you understand her?”
Kain kissed the top of his lover’s head, then went back to staring at the ceiling. They had been lying in bed, half naked, their legs and arms entwined, for what felt like hours. The conversation had come naturally.
“You’re so different,” he whispered. “So kind and forgiving… It always baffled me how you studied each case carefully, learned all there was to know about the type of demon you were going to face. You always do your job with such calm and professionalism, you close your cases in such a clean, uncomplicated way… I did analyze your MO, you know.” He stroked Alexi’s dark hair, smoothing it down only for random strands to stick back up stubbornly.
“Why? I never took you for a calculated guy who actually cared about how other cambions did it.”
“Because I envy you?”
Alexi raised his head just enough to shoot Kain a confused look. “Bullshit.”
The blond laughed half-heartedly. “Now that I know about Gremory and what he did to you, I find your MO even more surprising. How can you hold back when one of these creatures hurt you so much?”
“The answer is in your question. One of these creatures, not all of them. The demons we hunt down and bring to Lure all have their own sins, but that doesn’t concern me. I mean, it doesn’t concern me personally. I see no reason to make them suffer for something that Gremory
and Gremory alone did to me.”
“Fair, I guess.” Kain made a long pause to gather his thoughts. He had never thought there would come a day when he’d willingly tell someone what he was about to tell Alexi, but he knew he had to. Maybe he couldn’t help Sophie right now because her wound was too fresh, but he could guide Alexi through his pain. “I understand what Sophie feels because I’ve been there a long, long time ago.”
Alexi’s ears perked in curiosity.
“It was before Lure Academy. Before I even knew what I was.”
When Alexi didn’t say anything, Kain continued. In fact, he was glad his lover wasn’t interrupting him with questions. It was going to be easier to simply get it all out in a single breath. Metaphorically speaking, because the story was quite long.
“I was around 20 and I met this guy… He was gorgeous! But, not only was he sex on legs, he was also fascinating as a person. Well-read, interested in everything and anything, from philosophy and literature to history, geography, science… Damn, when he spoke I was entranced. You could swear he had read my father’s entire library, and then some. Of course, I was stupid and horny back then, I had no idea there were such things as demons, succubi, incubi, or cambions. I kept wondering when this guy had had time to read about all those things, since he didn’t seem to be older than me. Yeah, you got that right… he was a demon.” Kain felt Alexi tense, and he rubbed his shoulder to reassure him. “One of the lesser ones, nothing fancy. I was lucky, I guess. He could have never compared to your Duke. Maybe that’s why it was so easy for me to figure it all out. My powers were just starting to surface. I remember waking up in the middle of the night with a terrible pain in my chest. In the morning, I would see small lines and circles, weird symbols fading slowly into my skin. I had no idea what it was, of course. All I knew was that something was changing. Every time I was with him, I could finally fight the attraction, I could clear my mind and find it within me to stop him when I didn’t want something, ask him to slow down, and sometimes, even to leave me alone. I loved him. I was so sure that I loved him. Even if there were times when he did things I didn’t particularly enjoy, I still felt incredibly attached to him. That was until he noticed what I was doing and he upped his game. He wouldn’t let me use my cambion aura against him anymore. Every time I tried, he would just push harder and overwhelm me with his aura to the point when I would pass out for hours. That was when it struck me and I started thinking… it wasn’t right. What was happening wasn’t right, and the relationship we had wasn’t healthy.” Another pause, shorter this time. “My father was a librarian, have I ever told you that? Not my real human father Satene screwed so Mikal would have the necessary seed to impregnate my human mother. My mother’s husband, more exactly. Anyway, his name was Boris.”
“No.”
“Well, we lived in a small town in Croatia. Only the two of us.”
“Where was your mother?”
A small crease appeared on Kain’s forehead, but Alexi had no way to see it. The blond bit the inside of his lip before answering. “She died when she gave birth to me. Maria. Maria was my mother’s name.”
“I’m sorry…”
Kain gave a short laugh. “It’s okay. She was only the first one to die because of me. I got used to it with time.”
“Don’t say that!” Alexi sat up to look into Kain’s eyes. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“Yeah, well… Boris never quite forgave me for that. Maybe he felt something. Maybe he knew, deep down, that I wasn’t his son. Anyway, it doesn’t matter now. He was a small town librarian who struggled all his life to raise me with very little money. For that, I will always be thankful. So, when my gut told me there was something off about the guy I was seeing…”
“You never mentioned his name.”
“And I never will. His name is not important. He’s just an old, sad memory.” Kain’s voice did catch a bit at the last words. “I went through the Occultism section in my dad’s library for the first time in my life,” he continued his story. “That’s how I found out about succubi, incubi, and their offspring. I didn’t believe any of it, of course, but I couldn’t ignore that the pain in my chest was getting stronger and that the strange lines and circles on my skin often didn’t disappear in the morning. They were beginning to form some sort of tattoo. And then I came across a book with pictures of various demon and cambion sigils. That was how I learned the difference between them: demon sigils are bigger, with harsher lines and sharper edges, while cambion sigils are always smaller and have circles or curves, something that demon sigils never have.”
“I can’t believe you found out you were a cambion way before Lure Academy came to recruit you! That’s… How did you even manage to deal with it?”
“I killed my demon lover, that’s how I managed.”
