Chapter 413: Farewells
Gram was just releasing Meira as I stepped through into her wiry arms, forcefully pressed to her thin body while she shook and hugged me as if she'd never let me go. I clung to her just as hard, feeling the warmth of Sassafras as he wound himself around our feet.
I was jerked free of Gram's embrace and slammed bodily into Charlotte for half a second before she pushed me away from her and shook me so hard my teeth rattled together.
"Don't ever leave me again!" I had a moment to register she looked like hell before she hugged me again, hands clawed against my back. I let her feel my magic, slid it around her, held her with it until hands gripped her shoulders and gently pulled her free. Her long, blonde hair hung in limp strands around her face, cheeks and eyes sunken with dark circles, lips dry, flaking. She swiped at her face, tears pouring down her patchy skin, once flawless beauty now pasty and damaged.
Mom held her back, one arm around her as I continued to feed the weregirl with my power. She stilled at last, her shaking, twitching body settling down, the color returning to two very bright points on her cheeks.
Charlotte slid free of Mom and squared her shoulders. "You're staying?"
I nodded. Reached for her. She swatted at my hands, the cold expression I was used to returning to her face though she continued to tremble just enough I knew she hid just how much harm I'd done.
"If you go anywhere," she snarled, "I'll kill you myself. Now, if you excuse me, I have to take a shower."
She stomped off as if I'd offended her, grumbling and muttering to herself, looking back over her shoulder at me several times before she disappeared up the stairs.
"She's been a handful." Mom hugged me, shaking herself, though she kept her tone light and soft. "How was your trip?"
I laughed into her hair, inhaling the scent of lilacs, amazed as I hugged her to look over her shoulder and see my very human hands.
"Oh, you know," I said. "Met the family."
Mom's deep laugh echoed mine. "How lovely."
Her blue eyes sparkled as she welcomed Meira, hugging us both.
It wasn't until she let us go and turned to face Dad that all the joy went out of her. I felt Gram's hand take mine, held it tight as Mom approached him.
"Harry." She reached out as if to touch him as his human form filled the effigy, grim expression telling her everything wasn't all right. "Thank you for bringing them home."
"Miriam." His voice caught as he swept her into his arms. A huge sob rose inside me, but why I didn't know. Damn it, this really felt like goodbye. "It's finally time."
Mom gasped, pulled away. "My love?"
"I didn't have a choice," he said. "I had to take the Seat."
Mom's whole body collapsed in on itself for a moment, but she pulled herself together before Dad could hold her up. "I see," she said.
"I don't." I pulled away from Gram and confronted the two of them, Meira right beside me. "Dad's been acting like this is the end of something ever since Grandmother made him fight." I looked back and forth between them, feeling my heart splinter as their eyes met, both of them so sad I knew what was coming.
"We have to sever our mating," Dad said, apologetic, broken.
No. No way. Not after everything we'd been through as a family-
"Now that I'm Second Seat," he told us, "I must take a demon wife. Have demon children. It's part of our law."
Mom let out a soft sound, tears on her face, but she didn't buckle, didn't waver again, looking as much like a statue as the one Dad inhabited.
I wasn't so solid. "This is all my fault." The sob finally came out, my chest aching from its release. "Mom, Dad. I'm so sorry."
But Dad was shaking his head, Mom too.
"Sweetheart," Mom said. "It's not." She sighed out some of her own sadness, the air heavy with it. "We both knew this day would come eventually." She smiled up at him, glittering tears making shining paths down her face. "Harry is immortal. I made him promise we would end our mating before I was too old."
"And with me so close to the Seat, we both knew it was coming." Dad kissed her softly. "I just wish we'd had more time. But I'm grateful for what we've had, my love." He met my eyes, then Meira's. "I want you both to know," his gaze drifted to Sassafras whose ears lay flat, body crouched low to the ground, eyes full of sorrow, "the three of you, without your help, I'd still be the monster I became when I emptied Vandelarius." I shuddered at the memory, felt the stirring of the beast inside me at the thought and nodded. "The lessons I've learned here," he hugged Mom around the shoulders, "loving your mother, having you two, has taught me so much, so many things I can take back home with me. To make Demonicon a better place." He paused, swallowed a few times. And when he spoke again, his deep voice cracked. "Mating with Miriam, being your father, was the greatest thing I've ever done."
I rushed forward, hugged him, Mom pressed to my side, Meira between us, sobs clenched tightly in my chest as the truth of what he was saying finally broke through my denial.
When he finally let us go, his cheeks were wet, but he was smiling.
"I love you all so much," he said. "And I'm sorry things had to end this way. Syd, Meira, take care of your mother. And Miriam," he bent and kissed her gently, "my heart will never leave you."
Mom faked her best smile back but her face looked frozen, even as her lips quivered, hand clinging to his.
I turned away as Dad swept Mom into his arms and held her close, unable to watch their one last desperate, parting kiss. Meira wept on my shoulder before pulling back and facing them both with anger.
"This is her doing." I knew exactly who my sister was talking about. "And I actually thought I loved her."
Meira ran off, still crying, her footfalls pounding up the steps and overhead as she retreated to her room. Sassafras paused, bowed his head to Dad.
"Harry," he said, his own words full of grief. "Be well, my Prince." He then turned and scampered upstairs to comfort my sister.
Meira was so right. I stood there, cursing my grandmother, hating her with more passion than I'd ever felt as Mom and Dad finally separated. I slid my arms around Mom while Dad bowed his head. Ahbi-I would never call her Grandmother again-had finally done what so many others had tried to do, failed to do.
She'd destroyed our family at last.
Dad's hand rose, amber magic in a thread sliding out from his fingertips. Mom's own came up as if against her will, blue power flickering with green and white touching Dad's. I felt the power snap, saw their connection break, the recoil making Mom cry out while Dad's face crumpled.
He met my eyes as he left us, his statue again cold and shining, a diamond of incalculable value now worthless to me.
My dad was gone.
Mom wove a sheet of power, each thread connecting in perfect harmony to the last until it was tangible, complete. With trembling hands but a resolute expression, she shook it out and up, draping Dad's statue in darkness.
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