A Cruel History
Kane
Emory has left for Moon Grove to persuade the other shifter packs into becoming our allies. I try not to be too hopeful tha e’ll succeed, not because I have no faith in her but because the enmity between our species has been around for far longer than Emory has been alive. It will take a lot of coaxing to get these old Alphas to want to fight on our side rather than be against us.
I have no choice but to let Emory move forward with her plan. I have to focus on what I can control. The information Lex has been able to provide me has slowed. King Peter is getting cagey which cannot bode well for me.
Rainer has not had progress with urging Willow to change her mind and join the war. The witch is prone to anger and has destroyed several pieces of furniture and other items in her room. Emory has also tried talking to her which went well enough but didn’t change anything. Willow refuses to talk to me and actively hides when I try to visit her.
The guilt I feel over what happened to the witches follows me, haunting me with questions I cannot find answers to. My father is long dead. Trying to communicate with the dead is not something my kind has knowledge of. The closest I could potentially get to finding out what really happened during the witch hunts is to talk to my mother.
The queen is having her usual lunch in the gazebo. She’s taken a likin to Emory’s younger sister Lola and makes sure to have the little girl’s favorite foods served during mealtimes. The blonde notices me first as I approach the gazebo by the rose gardens. She turns to my mother who whispers something to her.
Lola gets up from her seat and runs out of the gazebo. She stops in front of me and does a clumsy curtsy.
“King Kane,” she greets me.
Before I can reply, she runs off. I watch her disappear from the gardens, her green dress blending in with the trees. I have tried to be friendly to the child since she’s come to the castle, but she’s still very skittish around me. Emory reassures me that Lola will eventually warm up to me, but I’m not sure if that
will ever happen
Tenter the gazebo, and my mother is drinking from a goblet of blood
“Are you hungry?” she asks.
” haven’t had the time”
She waves a hand and the servants place a goblet in front of me. They fill the goblet with fresh blood from a pitcher sitting on the end of “table. I take a long drink and savor the feeling of becoming reenergized.
My mother puts down her goblet. “When is Emory returning from her trip?”
“In a week,” I reply. “She hasn’t been back to Moon Grove in a while. She wants to spend time with her pack.”
“I’m only concerned for her pregnancy. Travelling in her condition can’t be good for her.”
“She insisted on going.”
“And you let her?”
I give her a look. “I’m not her jailer, and she’s not my prisoner. You raised me better than that.”
She gives me a pleased little smile. “She is too headstrong to be bossed around by anyone. You chose well. You’ll have a true partner.”
“Like what you had with father?”
“Your father seeking out my council was unusual in our time, and most rules still prefer their wives only bothered with producing heirs and keeping their silence the rest of the time.”
I’m more than aware of how our society still values our women. Being raised by a political genius like my mother only showed me how much better my life would be if I don’t underestimate the women around me. When it came to choosing a wife, I had chosen Opal for the political and financial gain she would bring to our union. I hadn’t hoped to find a love match like my parents.
The bloodless way I chose a spouse came to bite me in the end. If I had
20
ANEMO
chosen different criteria for my future wife, I would not be dealing with the mess with Scarlett Thunder. If I had waited until I found Emory, I wouldn’t be in the middle of a war. It’s a thought process that keeps me up at night.
“Father trusted you to always give him the best advice,” I point out. “And you did. From what I’ve heard, you’re the reason there was less bloodshed between us and the shifters.”
“I never saw the reason to antagonize the wolves. W we may be stronger and faster, the tides can always change. There was a time when vampires were not at the top of hierarchy. We had to fight for our position.”
“That’s something I wanted to talk to you about.” She waited for me to continue, her pale blue eyes focused on me. “I need to know about the witch hunts. Why did father feel the need to hunt down the witches to extinction?”
I watch as my mother’s nail traces the rim of her goblet. “As you are aware, your father prided himself in his efficiency. He would quell any potential threats before they had a chance to even become a minor nuisance.”
“I am aware of that, but from what I’ve also heard, the witches were never a real threat to us. They didn’t have the numbers or the wealth. They didn’t even have the ambition to try and overthrow us. They were the weakest of all the
species.”
“They had magic, and that was enough for Michael.” my mother says. “Magic was unpredictable. We didn’t know how to fight against it if the witches decided to overthrow us. One witch alone would be able to take down multiple vampires.”
“They weren’t trained for war. They focused on food and healing themselves.”
“But for how long?” she questions. “How long before they decided to harness their magic for battle? How do you fight against such power?”
“They were physically weaker than us. And they would need a significant increase in population to even come close to something we had to worry
about.”
Queen Agatha turns away, her face showing more emotion than I’m used to seeing on her. Her composure is breaking. “Do you remember when you were a child and you asked me where vampires originated from?”
You said we were created first before all the other species except for humans. The rest came after us.”
“That’s a lie.” She pauses, taking a sip from her goblet before continuing. “The humans came first. That’s true. That’s why there’re so many of them. They multiplied faster than all of us. From them, the witches came, humans that could harness magic.”
I keep quiet, trying to take all this in. This isn’t the story I’ve seen told my entire
“The shifters came later when the witches harnessed their magic to change their forms for battle and hunting,” she adds. “In their lore, they came from the Moon Goddess. We believe they came from witches. Either way, the shifters grew too strong, so the witches created a new species to fight the shifters.”
“Vampires.”
She nods. “That’s why Michael feared the witches. They made us, and they could unmake us. Those of us who can have our own children are directly descendants from the witches. The others are turned humans. It’s why he had to suppress their population. The less witches there were, the safer we would be.”
I sit in silence, centuries of propaganda being dismantled in my mind. We had turned on our creators. The witches had been the most powerful of us. They had created at least one of the most powerful species.
“And you let father do all of that?” I question. “To destroy so many lives in fear of what they could potentially do to us?”
“I never said it was right. Even I knew he was going too far, Michael was my king. His word was law.”
“He was a tyrant.”
“He did what he thought needed to be done,” she says. “Our kingdom has managed to be stable and flourishing due to all his years of hard work. Crimson Peak would not be what it is if he had not sacrificed so much.”
“And at what cost, Mother?” I demand. “I’m at war. I’m on the brink of losing
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my shot soup
causing dishes and cuttery to rate on the
want to hear your excuses. We did monstrous tires. There is
without timing back
W mother cals out for me
