Аполлион

“Do you think you can accomplish anything as a Sentinel?” his father asked, and I wondered if he’d been this way in real life. Cold. Disciplined. Was that where Aiden’s near-rigid control came from? But Aiden had never let on that was the case.

His father wasn’t done. “You’re wasting your life, and for what? A sense of revenge? Justice? You shirk your duties while our family’s seat remains empty?”

“You don’t understand,” Aiden said. “And… none of that matters right now.”

The change that came over his mother was nothing short of dramatic. Gone was the warmth and elegance. “You shame us, Aiden. You shameus.”

I blinked. “Wait a second—”

“You have no control.” Disgust dripped from his father’s voice. “We taught you to never take advantage of those who are under your charge. Look at what you have done.”

The mother clucked her tongue. “You risk her, knowing she could be harmed because of your lack of control. How could you be so reckless? How could you do this to someone you claim to love?”

My mouth dropped open. “Oh, now that’s not—”

“You can’t protect her.” His father gestured toward me. “You couldn’t protect us. You’re a failure. You just don’t see it yet, but you will just keep on plowing forward until you can’t go any more.”

His mother nodded. “I’m surprised that Deacon has made it this far. But then again, look at my baby boy—a drunk and an addict, all before eighteen. I’m so proud.”

I whipped toward Aiden and pleaded, “You don’t need to listen to this! You can stop this.”

She smiled coldly, continuing as if I hadn’t even spoken. “And her—look at what you did to her. Placed her on the Elixir, stripped her of her will. You’re less than a man.”

“You bitch,” I spat, readying to throw my blade at her, ninja-style.

“Go now,” his father said. “Leave this place. Or her blood will be on your hands.”

Never in my life did I want to exorcise some ghosts more than I did right then. Anger hummed like venom through me. “Aiden, don’t listen to them. They aren’t real. What they’re saying is bull. You—”

“What they are saying is real.” Aiden swallowed hard, sparing me a brief glance. “But it’s not them saying it.”

I didn’t get it at first, because I so doubted his parents were such big douchebags in life, but then it sank in.

“What my mom had said… it’s us.” I turned to him slowly. “What they are saying? It’s what you really think?”

When Aiden said nothing, I think I was more horrified by that than anything else that’d happened so far. He thought those terrible, horrific things about himself? And how long had he been carrying that with him? Years?

“And your brother?” his father said, shaking his head as concern pinched his face.

I was going to gut both of his parents.

“He is unprotected right now,” added the mother. “You should be there, not here, chasing a fool’s errand. He will die, too, like us, and it will be your—”

“Enough!” Aiden roared, shooting forward.

I hadn’t even seen or felt him take the sickle blade from my fingers, but he had. The blade arced through the dark sky.

“You’ll be sorry,” his mother said, a second before the blade sliced through both his parents.

Like my mother, they broke apart into thin, wispy strands of color and smoke and then vanished, scattered into the air around them. And like with my mother, their words lingered.

Aiden stood with his back to me. Wordlessly, he hit the release on the sickle blade and with a soft, sucking noise it disappeared into the tube of the handle. There was no danger now. Three wards had come to pass—guards, hellhounds, and spirits.

But I couldn’t control my pounding heart. “Aiden…?”

His shoulders tensed and he turned his head to the side. His profile was grim, the line of his jaw hard. “I have thought those things for a long time. Becoming a Sentinel was the right thing for me, what I wanted and needed, but was it really the right thing?”

I didn’t know how to answer that. “But you’re not shirking your duties or whatever. You are still doing something so important, Aiden. And one day, if you wanted to take your seat… you could.” The words hurt to say more than they should’ve, and for a purely selfish reason. If Aiden took his seat, there’d be no chance of us ever being together. No future with the house, the dog, and the cat.

But I wouldn’t stop Aiden if he felt he needed to take his seat. And his parents or inner voice could be right in some sense. With a seat on the Council, he could do more in regards to changing things, but…

Hell, nothing mattered if Seth was successful.

“I could,” he said almost too himself, and I winced. “My brother—”

“Isn’t an addict.” I paused. “Okay. He was a bit of a drunk and stoner, but he’s not an addict. Seth’s an addict. A daimon is an addict. Deacon is at the cabin making marinated steaks.”

That brought a faint half-smile to his face. “He’s safe.”

“Yes.”

He faced me and exhaled roughly. “I really don’t think I’ll get you killed.”

“That’s a relief to hear.”