“And he’s a monster,” my father interjects, a vein bulging in his forehead. To my relief, I feel no bloodlust on my behalf, just a father’s protectiveness. “I can’t even…I can’t let myself imagine what he put you through.” His voice goes quiet, eyes on fire. “What he made you do.”
“He didn’t make me do anything,” I tell him, feeling defensive even though I shouldn’t. The things I had done to me I wanted done to me. I think about Wolf between my legs, Absolon watching me, enraptured.
“That’s what he wants you to think,” my mother says. “They compel people.”
“He didn’t compel me,” I tell him, though I know that wasn’t true on a few occasions, like when I got into the ice bath. “It puzzled him that he couldn’t. I think it kept me alive, to be honest.”
“So he was trying to kill you.”
I shake my head, avoiding their eyes. “No. He wasn’t.”
I thought he was. But if he’s being truthful about never intending to sell me, then that changes things. Why didn’t he just tell me that instead of keeping me in fear?
Because fear is his upper hand.
“He would have fed off you, drunk your blood,” my father says.
I shake my head again. “No. He never did.”
“Oh, come on,” my mother says with a huff of irritation. “He’s a fucking vampire. That’s what they do.”
My mother rarely swears. It raises my brow. “I’m a fucking vampire too now. I don’t see myself drinking your blood. Maybe he’s just really good at controlling himself.”
“Why would he even want to control himself around you?” my father mutters gruffly. “The whole reason a vampire would take someone like you is to benefit from your magic.”
“Maybe that was part of the plan,” my mother says to him. “Saving her for later.”
I swallow. Could that have been true?
“I…I don’t really have any magic,” I say softly. “He knows it too.”
“You do,” my mother says. “You just created a damn earthquake. We can only pray it didn’t hurt anyone. Thank god this city is made for them.”
I think about that for a moment, then eye my father. “Then if he’s such a monster, why do you know him? Why does he know you? Surely if you’re such good witches, you wouldn’t be hanging around a monster like him?”
He looks at my mother and then gives her a grim nod. He exhales softly, looking me square in the eye. “Absolon helped us once.”
A cold feeling spreads through me, all my knowledge of what he is and what he does.
A mercenary.
“Helped you with what?” I whisper.
“He gave us the location of your parents,” my mother says tightly. “I’m sorry, sweetie.”
He lied to me. Didn’t he?
No. He just didn’t reveal the truth.
Why not?
I already hated him. It wouldn’t have hurt to hate him more.
“You’re sorry,” I say. “For what? For killing them? You went behind the backs of the people who are supposed to keep you organized, the guild, and you flat out murdered them. For what? For me?”
“We didn’t know about you,” my father says quietly.
“But Absolon did.” My voice comes out in a hush.