Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 121854 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121854 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
“Young Aodhan,” she said with a smile that reached those ancient eyes. “I’m pleased to see you again, and looking more rested than when you visited Amanat.”
He’d had only one real conversation with Raphael’s mother the entire time since she’d woken from her more than a thousand years of Sleep. Prior to that, he’d dealt with her staff or—at most—exchanged only necessary words with her as part of his duties.
It wasn’t that he didn’t like her. Nothing so personal. She’d simply been an Ancient unknowable to him until he’d come to Amanat after ending his term as Suyin’s temporary second. A short break where he could rest and rejuvenate himself for the long flight home. Instead, Lady Caliane had altered his entire understanding of his relationship with Illium.
We often don’t see the hurt we put on those we love most. And he is so bright, Sharine’s son, so full of life and laughter. He hides his bruises well, I think, your Bluebell, using that joyous self as an impenetrable shield.
“Lady Caliane, I thank you for your time.” Then, though he wasn’t a man who trusted many with his innermost thoughts, he spoke to her. Because she understood in a way no one else could—both because her closest friend was Sharine, the Hummingbird, and because her own losses and grief had given her a wisdom profound.
“Illium is struggling with his emotions,” he told her. “He doesn’t understand that deep inside, even as he wants to hold on to me, he doesn’t trust me not to abandon him again.”
“Ah.” Lady Caliane’s expression softened. “You want to ask me if you should tell him? Expose his unknown scars to his eyes?”
Aodhan nodded.
“First, young Aodhan, tell me what your own choice would be?”
He frowned, but shook his head. “I think it’ll damage him to know that he carries such wounds. Right now, he’s handling everything other than us without issue—Lady Sharine’s return to herself, his father’s awakening.”
He pressed a fist to his heart. “I feel it here that if I show him this wound, he’ll blame himself for not being able to get past it, for not being stronger. Lady, he has already been too strong for too many years—I don’t want him to just power through because he thinks it’s what I need. He gives and gives and gives, has dealt with blow after blow.”
His mother’s absence of the mind, her shattered psyche.
Aegaeon’s abandonment.
Aodhan’s abduction and long recovery…and his choice to immure himself in a world of silence and distance.
Just dealing with it. One blow after another.
All without losing his smile or his ability to love, his beautiful heart bruised but refusing to callus over.
“He has done enough.” Aodhan’s voice was firm.
“There, child, you have it.” A soft smile. “You know him better than himself in this—and perhaps for some things, that is as it should be. In time, he will be ready to see into these wounds, but not now. Not when he is in a phase of transition.” A pause. “We are fragile at such moments, more breakable than we understand. Protect Sharine’s son through this.”
“Always and forever.” Aodhan inclined his head on that vow. “Thank you for speaking with me. I know your time is valuable.”
“Not so valuable that I do not have it for those who have stood by my son’s side so valiantly all these years.” Eyes of endless blue darkened. “I wish you both well, Aodhan. I would see joy for you both—for in your joy, Sharine will find her joy, too. Perhaps it will ease a little of my friend’s guilt.”
Then she shook her head. “But that is not for you to consider. At this point in the turning of the hourglass of eternity, you must be selfish on Illium’s behalf. Sharine’s bright, beautiful child does not have it in him, I think, to be selfish for himself. He is too much his mother’s son.”
4
Aodhan was still mulling over Caliane’s words when there came a light tap on his door. He opened it to see a man with shaggy hair of a true silver, his eyes the same against skin of deep brown kissed by gold. Dressed in a gray T-shirt paired with black cargo pants, he would’ve passed muster as a vampire serious and strong with most people.
But Naasir wasn’t a vampire. Neither was he an angel or a mortal.
Naasir was Naasir.
“You made it.” Because it wasn’t only a casual gathering tonight—all of the Seven would be at Illium’s homecoming. With things still unstable at the time of Aodhan’s return, no gathering had been possible, so this was the first time Aodhan had seen Naasir since Aodhan’s term as interim second to the Archangel of China.
It was clear to him that the most primal member of the Seven wanted to haul him into a hug, but wild at heart though he was, Naasir had never crossed the boundary Aodhan had laid down over two centuries ago. Despite the fact that Aodhan knew his response had been a thing induced by trauma, not a conscious choice, he suddenly wondered why he’d applied it to this man who had only ever hauled him out of harm…and who’d introduced him to wonders untold.