Page 54 of Mortal Blood
Thaden blew out a heavy sigh. He started to reach for my chin, then paused and allowed his hand to fall away. I turned to look at him anyway.
“I hate what your blood does to me,” he said. “I hate the way I crave it. I hate the way it makes me lose control. But I don’t—I couldnever—hate you.”
“But you said…” I swallowed, hating how small my voice sounded. How hurt. “You said there was nothing about me you wanted.”
Raw pain flashed through his eyes. “I’m sorry. I was angry.”
“I didn’t mean to get you addicted.”
“You misunderstand me. I wasn’t angry with you—how could I be? Everything you said was true. I took your blood when I had no right, when you begged me not to.”
“Then…”
“I was angry with myself.” His expression was one of self-loathing, and he avoided my eye. “You don’t know much about me, do you? About my past, I mean?”
I shook my head mutely. I knew he was a friend of Cole’s, and that Cole had planned to marry his twin to form an alliance between the shifters and the vampires—the strongest pack and the most powerful clan in the country. Until I’d come along. But beyond that, he’d never spoken about his life outside of the academy. I’d never asked.
“Do you know much about how vampires raise their young?”
“A little.” He nodded encouragingly so I continued. “They adopt human children at birth and raise them as their own. On the child’s eighteenth birthday they’re bitten and turned, and then sent to the academy.”
“The human who gave birth to me was chosen for her bloodlines. My parents are royalty, and they needed an heir who would be fit to rule in their place should the time come.”
I shivered. “I didn’t realize it was so…calculated.”
Thaden barked a bitter laugh. “I was no baby abandoned at an orphanage, if that’s what you mean. The human was well compensated.”
“She…sold you?”
“I was never hers, nor Thessalia. Humans have similar customs. Surrogacy is not uncommon in the mortal world.”
“I guess.”
“My whole life I was groomed to take my place in our clan’s royal family; Thessalia, too. When we were young, they tried to pit us against each other—as twins, either of us could have been considered the true heir. When that didn’t work, they used our closeness against each other. If one of us broke a rule, the other was punished.”
“That’s…barbaric.”
He gave me a sad smile. “But effective. We were trained for our future roles, schooled in languages and cultures, taught how to fight and how to make peace. And always, always taught to understand that our humanity was a temporary state, that we were different—better—than the true humans who served as our feeders and staff. It mattered to my parents that we understood that all vampires are superior to humans, and that we weresuperior to all other vampires in our clan. Nothing was more important than hierarchy.”
I said nothing, trying to keep the horror from showing on my face. Judging by Thaden’s expression, I failed.
“It’s difficult for an outsider to understand,” he said. “My family is very old, very powerful, and few things mattered more than tradition. And for the most part, I agreed with them. I understand the importance of stability, that power must be used correctly to keep from unrest, to prevent war or the exposure of our kind. But as a teen, it felt…oppressive.”
“Can’t imagine why,” I mumbled sarcastically.
“I suppose to you it must seem strange that I didn’t rebel sooner,” he mused. “But it’s the way of my world, and I was raised from birth to know my place in it. Just as you were raised to know yours. As a child you never questioned looking after your mother?”
“Fair enough,” I conceded grudgingly. “Go on.”
“I was young and powerful—perhaps not physically, but everyone I met deferred to me. Humans, vampires, hell, even the visiting fae treated me with careful respect. It was…isolating. I would see the feeders’ children playing, but anytime I got near, their parents ushered them away, and prostrated themselves, hoping to gain favor with my parents. I was fifteen when I was first brave enough to sneak out of the clan’s territory. I didn’t go far. There was a human town a few miles away, and none of them knew who I was. Can you imagine it?”
He searched my face. “No, I don’t suppose you can. For the first time, I wasn’t Prince Thaden, heir of the Moritego Clan. I was just another faceless kid. People spoke to me. Someone actuallyinsultedme.”
He smiled at the memory, and then his lips turned down.
“Before long, I was sneaking out every chance I got. I fell in with a bad crew. They never knew who I was, or who I was destined to become. I was just another nobody. No past, no future. It wasn’t long until I tried drugs for the first time. It was freeing. To be able to just…feel. Everything was brighter. Sharper. Better.”
I stared at him as his words sunk in. “You became addicted.”
