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Through my peripheral vision, I saw her stand, her eyes narrowing as if she was suddenly seeing me in a completely different light.
“You know who her father is, what he does,” she choked.
As I'd intended, I should have come to Rachel before, but my pride had stood in my way. I’d never wanted to tell her or anyone else about the curse that had followed me, but I had to do it now. Or I did if I wanted her to stop looking at me like I was the literal devil.
“It’s safer for her to be away from me. For her and that child, no matter where the baby ends up,” I insisted. “At least they’ll both still be alive.”
Rachel gaped at me in horror. “What is that supposed to mean?” she gasped.
“Sit down,” I ordered her.
Cautiously, with one eye still on me, she obeyed my command and ambled back around the desk to reclaim her chair.
“Why would they not be alive if they came here again?” the fae demanded. “You’re not making any sense, Ash.”
Inhaling, I set my head back against the chair and closed my eyes, mentally preparing myself to finally disclose the tale that had haunted me for so long. I barely knew where to start, but at the beginning.
“Ash!”
My lids parted, and I frowned at her.
“Let me tell you on my own time,” I snapped.
“It seems to me that we’re running low on that,” she retorted. “Why would Briar and her baby die if they came here?”
Gnawing on the insides of my cheeks, I began.
“I had a sister once,” I explained. “Back then, parents cared less about their children’s well-being, allowing us to raise ourselves as they dabbled in their own debaucheries.”
I peeked at Rachel to see if she was following me, and she seemed to be hanging off my every word.
“Mathilda was fifteen years younger than me, and a human, of course. My parents neglected her. They would have let her starve if not for me. Their only interest was themselves.”
I shuddered at the memory.
“When Mathilda was ten, I had just been turned into an Original, and with that comes great power—stuff I can’t even describe. There are energies that wake you in the night, and you’ll find yourself standing in the middle of a field of fire without any recollection of how you came to be there. Getting a handle on these newfound abilities takes time and patience. And no children should be present.”
Shame overpowered me, even after all this time, my chest tightening.
“I don’t know how it happened. I had gone to sleep, but when I woke, Mathilda was screaming at me to stop, her body bloody and broken before she fell into a coma and wouldn’t wake.”
Rachel gasped, and I swallowed, wanting to get defensive, but there was no defense to what I’d done. My fingers curled now, as if to mimic how they had been at Mathilda’s throat, bile choking me.
“I was beside myself,” I went on, the memory two thousand years old and yet as fresh as if it had happened yesterday.
I replayed the terrible scene in my mind often, wondering what I could have done differently, how I could have protected my sister better and saved her from my demonic ways.
“Did she die?” Rachel asked quietly.
I swallowed again and shook my head.
“No… although, sometimes, I think it would have been better if I’d let her.”
Rachel’s head jerked back, and she narrowed her eyes at me. “What does that mean?”
I drew in another breath. “There was a very powerful fae—an Original—the start to the Ambrose bloodline. Her family was the most renowned in the region at the time, and Valeria adored me. All I could think of was Mathilda and getting her well, regardless of the cost.”
“What was the cost?” Rachel asked flatly.
