“What is it?” I croak.
“Dear Gabriella…Did you know I knew your mother?” he asks, halting all thoughts of escape with his change of subject.
I take in a sharp breath, choking on the thick saliva that I am sure is mixed with more blood. “My…mother?” I sputter between raspy coughs.
“Yes,” he smiles, tilting his head up to the ceiling in remembrance. “She was very strong. Very efficient and talented. Fierce. And beautiful. What a beautiful woman she was,” he remarks breathlessly. His expression suddenly turns dark and contemplative. “I envied her. She was better than the rest of us and she knew it. She felt invincible. I hated her arrogance.”
Xavier swallows laboriously and runs a hand through his neatly styled brown hair. He takes a deep breath before letting his shoulders slump. “But I loved her. I loved her so much,” he says in a broken voice.
I almost feel sympathetic at the sight of his pain when a tangible shift in the atmosphere steals my breath. The shell containing his immense power, his human form, falls away piece by piece, unleashing a ghostly form. This is different from anything I’ve ever seen from Dorian or even Aurora. It’s bright, blindingly so, and nearly translucent, more like a premonition. A whisper of a body.
He convulses as he shifts, fighting against his rage, trying to put himself back together again. He wants to remain in control. Once he’s got his emotions in check, and the pieces of his humanity have fallen neatly back into place, he scowls at me, as if I am to blame for his momentary lapse.
“She couldn’t love me, though! She couldn’t give me her heart. Because of him!” he screams pointing at me. Wind whips through the desolate space causing my blood-matted hair to fall into my face. The cement slab under me rumbles with his sudden outburst.
“I could have given her everything! But she wouldn’t love me. She would rather commit treason than be with me. To be with him!”
He’s at my side quicker than my eyes can see, crouching down, his face just inches from mine. I can see the reflection of my terror in his wide, crazed eyes. “We could have been so happy together,” he whispers, though his soothing voice doesn’t match his insanity. “And look at you…just like my dear Natalia. Drawn to the Dark treachery. Did he fool you, love? Did he make you fall for him with his mind games? Make you believe that he loves you too?”
I’m too afraid to answer him, too frozen in overwhelming fear to even whimper a semblance of a response. If I could move, I’d be trembling violently. If I could sob, I’d be drowning in my own tears.
“Answer me, dammit!” he screams, spewing spittle in my face. He grasps my shoulders and shakes my limp body, causing the pain to spread even more.
“No!” I cry. “He didn’t do any of that. He really does…he does love me.”
“Impossible,” Xavier sneers, dropping my body back onto the slab. My head throbs viciously and I’m sure the wound has opened even more. My vision goes blotchy and I feel cold. So unbearably cold. It won’t be much longer now.
Seeing me slip away, he grasps my cheeks in his shaky hands. “No, no, dear love. I need you to stay with me.” Then he leans forward and presses his open mouth on mine. Comforting warmth spreads through me, and I feel some of the debilitating ache subside in my head. However, I still don’t have usage of my limbs.
Xavier pulls away after only a few seconds. “That’s enough,” he says with a satisfied grin. He looks over me, lost in his thoughts and rubbing an index finger over his lips. “Maybe it was you all along. Maybe you knew consorting with the Dark would help conceal you. Would throw me off your scent. Maybe you knew I would have to deflect, and in turn, would not be able to detect you. Is that it? Is that why you want him?”
I try to shake my head but it’s no use. “No. I didn’t know what he was. Not at first.”
“And once you uncovered the truth? Surely you knew what kind of sheer, unrelenting evil he harbored. Didn’t you try to escape him?”
“No,” I answer confidently. “I… I love him.”
Xavier snorts. “And where is your prince? Where is your dead father’s best friend and brother in arms? Ah…that’s right. Marrying his own kind. You see, Gabriella. They can bed our women and create…monstrosities…with them. But they always go back to their kind. They would not dare taint their precious bloodline.”
“My father didn’t leave my mother,” I reply, rage taking over my trepidation. “He was killed for loving her. He died for love.”