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Ash laughed, half-amused, although I didn’t understand why he found the question entertaining.
“Not in the literal sense, like me,” he replied. “Ironically. But they were more evil than anyone I’ve ever crossed paths with. I’ve yet to meet anyone who despised their own progeny as much as those two.”
Sadness overwhelmed me.
“You have siblings,” I pressed. “Or had.”
Ash drew back as if I’d slapped him. “I had a sister. Mathilda.”
For the first time since I’d known him, pure emotion colored his face, a fusion of pain and anguish painting his complexion in a hideous way that made me long for his demon face.
“She was mortal—and human.”
Now I recoiled, stunned. “Really? How is that possible?”
Ash snickered mirthlessly. “The world has changed a great deal over the past two thousand years.”
“Two thousand years?” I asked. “I know that more powerful shifters can live longer, but two thousand years?”
“Do you know how shifters and enchanted beings came to be?” he asked me.
I didn’t know. The blank expression on my face must have indicated that I was clueless about the topic.
“You’re far too young to understand how things were before the Originals were formed and the chaos that ensued, but it was madness. Two thousand years ago, shifters didn’t exist. I was human once.”
My mouth opened in shock. Why hadn’t I learned about this? History wasn’t my favorite subject, but I would have remembered this if I’d ever been taught it during my years of private homeschooling.
Ash went on. “There were thirty-six of us on a battlefield, trying to kill a being that had terrorized our village. We didn’t realize what we were battling. The being we killed was powerful, like a god, I suppose. We don’t actually know. We got lucky. So many people died that day, but those that remained charged after him, and to this day, we are not sure what the fatal blow was. His power exploded from his lifeless body, and we should have died. But instead, we all changed. All thirty-six of us became immortal. We are the Originals—the source of all the enchanted beings who walk amongst us today.”
All the pieces were falling into place. Ash was the most powerful being I had ever encountered. I’d sensed his magical and physical strength from the moment I’d first met him. No wonder beings cowered in his presence.
“And you’re all immortal?” I asked, still in shock.
“In a sense. We don’t die from natural causes,” he explained, not taking his eyes off mine.
“But you can be killed,” I filled in for him, my heart racing for him to finish the story. I wanted to know everything.
“Yes, and some of us have died,” he said. “It’s not easy to kill us, though. From what we’ve learned, each of the Originals has one weakness—something that can kill us. Most of us don’t know what that weakness is until it’s too late.”
“Do you know your weakness?” I asked. I didn’t believe he would share it with me, even if he knew what it was.
“No,” he said flatly.
“After you turned, what happened to your sister?” I asked quietly, sensing that she had not simply passed naturally of old age.
Ash grimaced and looked away. “I happened to her,” he growled, avoiding my eyes. “Just like I happen to everyone else I get close to.”
The response perplexed me. “What does that mean?”
He ground his teeth and jerked his head to look at me balefully.
“I hurt her when I was young, coming into my power. She was much younger than me, and I wasn’t in control of myself.”
“You…” I couldn’t bring myself to say it, and he rolled his eyes.
“I didn’t kill her, but I may as well have. She was my responsibility, and I didn’t save her.”
“She was your parents’ responsibility—” I started to say, but Ash cut me off.
