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Undressing, I stepped into the surprisingly warm water, and heard the lake sizzle when Tharion followed. His form curled fully around me, like he wanted to make sure nothing else would get to me. His tail created almost a hot tub for me, so after scrubbing myself, I rested against his scales, enjoying the way they glistened, almost resembling smoked steel under the moon.
The more I thought about my father, the sacrifices he and my mother made, and how his own people treated his memory after what happened, the worse I felt. The whole thing made me not want to go back. The truth was, Asher was right. Conjecture, pain, and needing to fill the holes of what we didn’t know, usually made us believe the worst.
What made the most sense to them was that my father had fled, like a coward, and not knowing his secrets, my secrets actually, didn’t help. They saw the man they admired lose hold of the fiercest weapon they ever had against the Warlock King, and then leave. There was only one logical explanation… I supposed I couldn’t blame them for assuming that, though I would have appreciated for them to at least give him the benefit of the doubt. Especially after everything he had done for them out of pure love for his people.
It hurt that Evanna didn’t tell me herself, and then it was too late, but I would be lying if I said that if the situation were reversed, I wouldn’t have tried to protect the memory of her father for her. Keep the awful truth from her. Or in this case, what she believed to be the truth—white lies and all that.
If I tried really hard, I could even put myself in her parents’ shoes. Perhaps, allowing people to believe my dad had betrayed them, assured no one would ever go looking for him and inadvertently guide Raithian straight to us. It assured my parents would be—thatIwould be safe until it was my time to return.
This whole mess was on me.
No.
This was Raithian’s fault.
Everything was on him. All the hurt. All the lives lost. All the innocence stolen from those children who saw their parents, sisters, brothers, and grandparents murdered before their eyes, just to grow up and fight for a cause that got them killed too. How many warriors had we fucking lost? How many families destroyed because of the greed and inferiority complex of one powerful man?
Ire coursed through me once more, and I knew I shouldn’t be focusing on that, but I was so freaking pissed that it had all begun with someone I could have called family. Family was what I wanted and needed the most right now… but everyone was gone.
“Fuck you, Xavier Devenish!!” I screamed at the four winds, and Tharion’s roar accompanied my own.
Weirdly, the rumbling sound was followed by the sizzling of water, and I glanced at his body to see the red embers twinkling along his dark scales. Steam rose from all around him, except, that was not the only place sizzling. Tharion nodded towards my arms, and my gaze fell to fill me with both shock and wonder.
The skin along my lower arms had been replaced by scales. The same scales that saved me during the duel with Lachlan, but they now shimmered with the red embers of Tharion’s fire lava. Slowly, I turned my hands, noticing the heat radiating off them and to my skin. It was intense but not uncomfortable or sweltering. Somehow, it seemed part of me, as it was part of him.
“Same…”
My attention shifted to the water to find the reflection Tharion had just referenced. Both our scales mixed in the swaying surface of the lake.
“Yes, Tharion. We are the same.”
Unclenching my fists, the scales vanished, and I lifted my hands to stroke his side. A wave of love swept through me, and his affection for me made me realize I had been wrong. He was my family too, and he had done so much to protect me, even, somehow, sharing his scales.
“I’m not as alone as I thought, huh? I have you…”
“Don’t forget you have me too, Son.”
I whirled around to find the sight of my lake merging into my mother’sLake of Tranquility, with her standing on its shore.
