Page 55 of Mortal Blood
“I did. It wasn’t until I was arrested by the humans’ police that my parents found out. They were furious. They covered it up, of course—the exposure risk alone could have meant the council intervening if they’d caught word of it. But I think more than anything they were horrified that I’d lowered myself to interact with the human population. They saw it as a betrayal, and perhaps it was. They tried to lock me in my room, so much as they could without raising the suspicions of the clan.” He shook his head sadly. “I was smart, and resourceful. And determined. No matter what they did, I broke out, and kept finding ways to feed my addiction, no matter who it hurt.”
He dragged his hand down his face and I could do nothing but watch, rapt.
“It wasn’t until they threatened to kill Thessalia that I stopped escaping.”
“They threatened to kill her?” I blurted in my horror.
“I don’t know if they would have done it, or if they just wanted to shock me from my self-absorption, but in either case, it worked. I made a deal with a fae to help me get clean. That’s how I met Cole, actually.”
I blinked. “Cole?”
He smiled, a genuine smile this time that almost reached his eyes. “It took me months to get clean, to be myself again. Once I was, the fae summoned me to fulfil my end of the bargain. As I was leaving the Wandering Willow—”
“The Wandering Willow?” I interrupted. “Your deal was with Aodh?”
Thaden inclined his head. “It was. And Aodh never forgets a bargain struck. As I was leaving, feeling cheated and disillusioned at the cost of preserving Thessalia’s life, I bumped into Cole—literally.”
“And you made friends?” This part had always confused me—shifters and vampires hated each other. Except Thaden and Cole.
Thaden laughed. “No. We beat the hell out of each other. He broke two of my ribs. And it felt good. Not the pain, as such, just being able to feel something,anything, for the first time since I’d gotten clean. We made a habit of it after that—but that, sweetness, is a story for another time.”
“Thank you,” I said softly. “For telling me. I had no idea.”
He gave me a rueful smile. “It’s not something I like to advertise. There could be consequences if word got out.”
“You still think Thessalia might be in danger?”
“Not just Thessalia. You’ve been in our world a year and a half now, sweetness. You know what it thinks of weakness.”
I nodded. I did know. I’d seen it firsthand. We’d started last year with a lot more students than we had now.
Thaden released a breath and leaned back against the wall. “I can’t lead the Moritego clan if I can’t even control myself.”
“And my blood makes you lose control,” I whispered.
“I swore I would never be that person again, and yet, here we are.”
“It’s not the same,” I protested.
“No,” he agreed. “It’s not. Because the fae can’t help me now. There’s no getting clean from dhampir blood. ‘Impossible’, that was the word Aodh used. Amongst other things.”
He shook his head and pushed off from the wall, his face hardening. “Good talk, sweetness. See you around.”
And with that, he strode off, leaving me staring after him.
Chapter Eighteen
If I’d thoughtThaden would treat me differently after everything he’d told me, I’d have been disappointed. Luckily, I’d long since lost that kind of naivety. Well, mostly. And at least now I understood why he was acting the way he was. That should have made it easier to stomach.
And yet, somehow that made it worse. I saw Thaden only when he needed to feed, and then he was cold and distant. He wasn’t outright insulting me anymore, which was something, but somehow this felt…worse.
My feet dragged to a halt as I reached the track through the woods that led to the clearing where Ryker held his lessons. I didn’t much fancy getting there before Cole. I wasn’t afraid of the other shifters—I mean, I probably should have been, given that any one of them could rip me limb from limb, but I wasn’t—but I didn’t think I could stomach dealing with any other students making snide remarks about me right now. At least if Cole was with me, they’d keep quiet. And if hiding behind Cole made me a coward, well, it was hardly the worst thing I’d been called since I got here.
Footsteps crunched across frozen ground behind me and I turned quickly.
“Hey, princess,” Cole said, his eyes tracing my outline, and then he frowned. “Hey, Jax, go on ahead. We’ll catch up.”
Jax nodded and cut ahead into the trees, leaving me alone with Cole.
