Chapter 8

"Melody!" Ian nearly jumped out of his chair in alarm. I had meant to watch from afar at first, but the fallen leaves cracked under my heels. Here. In the quiet shade of the South Garden, without the sound of the river, I had forgotten to conceal my movement. Now, he saw me, and the tender moment was shattered.

Fear. He was afraid of me.

It wasn't the kind of fear that I was used to seeing in strangers. No, he wasn't afraid that I would burn him alive. Rather, he was afraid of something quite different.

He was afraid I still thought of him as my son, that I wanted to embrace him as my child and make him one of us. As though I didn't know by now that he had spent the last eighteen years running away from his father and me.

I raised my hand for the boy to sit back down. Ian had a bandage wrapped around his entire neck, but I could tell the worst of it on the right side. I saw that his right arm was in a sling even though the staff had draped a jacket over his shoulders to conceal it. Ian used the wheelchair for support as he stood up because he was still weak from his wounds. As I studied him, he backed away and seemed to push the chair between us as though to use it as a buffer.

It wasn't unusual for people to flinch as they glazed into my pale eyes. However, I wished my long-lost son would greet me with an emotion other than fear. I would have preferred his anger or even his hatred. No, it seemed that the dread of this encounter dwarfed all those other emotions.

"I'm s-sorry," I started but didn't know if my words were any use. I should have left so he could return to enjoying the sight of the tangled vines and the chirping birds. He was practically cowering behind that wheelchair like a scared animal.

"I'm going to go," I looked away. "I didn't come to hurt you. A friend told me you were here."

"Wait!" Ian yelled as I started to turn. "Stay."

I tentatively took another look at him. He had a mass of tangled black hair like mine. Yet the way he furrowed his eyebrows and seemed to command the space around him, those gifts came from his father. I wondered if seeing what was different from oneself was human nature. When I looked at him, I saw so much of Blake. He was almost the spitting image of his father when we first met in this very forest.

The silence stretched on and on between us. Ian slowly, unsteadily, lowered himself back into the wheelchair. He took care not to bang his injured arm against the armrest. It was more than the neck wound and the arm. He looked frail, pale, and unhealthy. I had seen blurry pictures of him from Nivarrin, taken from a great distance. He had been emaciated back then, and now somehow, he looked a little better. He was still skinny, but at least he didn't look like a strong gust of wind could knock him over.

Ian ran his fingers through his inky-black hair. It was strange looking at him, and I tried not to stare. As I continued studying him, I also saw bits of myself. Maybe it was his lack of weight, but he seemed to have my sharp chin, my deathly pale skin, and even my widow's peak. His eyebrows were thick and wolfish like his father's, but they were a stark raven black.

There were brief glimmers of auburn red when the sunlight beat down on his dark hair. He had a bit of his grandfather Sebastian's coloring. That was something my husband never had. Blake would have been amused.

This boy here was a splitting image of the two of us, yet, he was a stranger to me.

The minutes ticked by, and Ian did not attempt to start a conversation.

It was starting to dawn on me that I was an unwanted guest in my own home.

"I'll come back another time," I offered in my most chipper nothing-is-wrong-at-all voice. "Rest. I'm happy you're home."

"Home?" Ian asked and laughed.

"Yes, this is your home."

"This will never be my home!" Ian screamed and stood up from the wheelchair, nearly tripping in the process. "I might have lost my powers when Jaduerial left my body, but I haven't lost my common sense."

"Sit down," I advised trying to calm him. It was no use. Ian was turning red from fury. He had my pale skin. I could see the blood flow to his face quite easily.

"Why did he do it?"

"Do what?"

Ian waved my question away as though he thought I was pretending to be stupid.

"Why did you help him?"

"Are you talking about your father?"

"Tercel," Ian hissed. "Did he do it for you, Melody? Was all this for you?" Ian waved his hand before I could reply. "Forget I asked. Why are you here? Is this all part of a plan to destroy the world? Am I going to be a part of it now too?"

"No," I snapped, finally driven to the edge of my patience with this boy. How could it be that he resembled Blake and me but talked exactly like Alesandra and Julian? Perhaps, all my hopes had been in vain. Our son was dead to us. My hands were growing hot again, but I made them into fists to sequester my deadly rage. "I came here to see you. There wasn't any deception in it. I'm your mother! Not Alesandra!"

There, I said it, the words that had been on the edge of my lips ever since I returned. These were the words Blake told me to keep locked up deep inside. Ian needs to be treated with caution, Blake had said. To him, we are the villains.

"No, you are not, Melody," Ian hissed through clenched teeth. "I know what you and that man you married are plotting," Ian finally said, directing his eyes into the distance as though by doing so, he could distance himself from the two of us. "He thinks killing the Reaper can fix all the sins of the past. I believe that is only the beginning. Who brought you here? Let me guess. Was it Julian?"

Ian laughed as my silence indicated my assent.

"Did you hear what happened to Julian's parents? Will killing the Reaper bring them back?"

Oh, shut up!

I desperately wanted to roll my eyes, but for once, I kept myself in check. So Julian's parents were dead; what about my parents? What about the Menthes? What about half of Manna City? Were Blake and I really to blame for all of them? Did one small company named Tercel that distributed Black Waters under the guise of Nectar for ten years really bring about the end of the world?

What about Yagerin or Morendi, and Sylvirua? That was only naming the companies who were producing the substance legally. If he wanted someone to blame for the Blight Rain, he could blame humanity itself.

I clenched and reclenched my hands. I wanted to slap some sense into him. If he were anyone other than our long-lost son, I probably would have sent him exploding into a ball of blue fire right now.

Ian paused and pressed his palm to his forehead again as though talking to me gave him a headache.

"Your husband asked if you were okay. He didn't know he was talking to me. I only overheard a conversation between him and someone else. Maybe you should stop disappearing to do whatever it is that you Balans do."

I couldn't believe I was being lectured by a nineteen-year-old boy. I imagined the conversation he overheard was between Renat Rykov and my husband. Ian made a point to remind me that he hadn't spoken to his father face to face. I imagined he probably hated Blake even more than he hated me if that was possible.

Ian studied me with his bright green eyes. They seemed larger on his face than they had on his father's, even from my memories of back when we were young. It was probably because he was such a skinny creature.

"Things need to change. The world can't go on like this. You realize that, don't you?"

I suddenly understood why Ian was sharing this with me. He didn't want me to distract his father from his mission to kill Grismal. I thought being spoken down to by my adopted son Orion was bad enough. Now I was being lectured to by a teenager I barely knew.

"If you overhear another conversation, speak up and tell your father I've found the Reaper's lair. There is an entrance to it at the southern end of my father's property, where seven large caves overlook the cliff. Tell him to meet me there when he is ready."

I spun around to leave, but the path was blocked. I came face to face with a set of broad, muscular shoulders inside a beautifully tailored suit.

Orion.

Now was not the time. I only had enough rage inside me for one fight with a difficult teenager today. Orion approached me with a look of pure panic on his face. Once again, he had snuck up on me and heard everything. Great, I just told Orion, Blake's not-so-miniature version of himself, that I had been with the Reaper for the past couple of weeks.

"Mel-Mother," Orion exclaimed and seized me by my comparatively narrower shoulders. I felt like a small delicate swan inside his strong arms. It was hard to believe that out of the four of us in this family, Orion was the most vulnerable of us all. Blake, Ian, and I all had our gifts. We could survive under nearly all except the more dire of circumstances. On the other hand, despite all his beautifully sculpted muscles, Orion was the most fragile among us. Yet, standing there, I was grateful for his broad shoulders and muscles.

Orion was calling me mother now instead of Melody, which meant either of two things — he was pretending for Ian's sake that we were a normal family, or he was afraid his father was mad at him. Since Blake wasn't here, I assumed it was the former.

If there was one thing I could say in praise of Orion, it was that he could be counted on to always act in his family's interests when it mattered.

"Why aren't you with Lycenia?"

"What are you doing looking for the Reaper?"

Orion and I launched accusative questions at each other at the same time. Orion seemed to glower at me from his formidable height. He was a large boy, perhaps even a hair taller than his father.

"Do you know who the Reaper is?" I retorted accusatively and pressed my finger into the silken fabric of his shirt. Orion placed his hands on his hips and suddenly realized his slip. He had been spying on my conversation with his father for weeks. I just wished he hadn't worked up the courage to confront me about it.

"Is he the God of the Damned?" Orion asked, taking a wild guess. Yes, he had been listening to everything. I bet he even knew about the Girl from Windflower. So much for our attempt at being good parents. "What are you doing anywhere near him?"

I thought about reassuring Orion that this was all part of his father's plans, but then I realized he must have been listening to the better part of my conversation with Ian too. The time for lies was long past.

"Stay in River Way," I reached over and squeezed Orion's shoulder in that authoritative way I had seen Blake do in the past. It didn't work. Orion's shoulder was too muscular for my little fingers. He barely felt anything. A fly settling on his shoulder would have made more of an impact. He wasn't going to bow down to my show of parental power just like that. "It's safe here. Orienne protects these grounds, or so your father used to say."

"Wait, Melody!" Orion exclaimed and blocked my path again. "Let me go with you."

"Absolutely not. Don't you dare even think of it," I snapped, feeling my palms grow hot with anger again. Yes, I couldn't force Orion to back down with a slight change in my tone of voice like his father could. But I still have my ability to set things afire in a very threatening fashion.

No, I wasn't going to set one of my sons on fire. But, if I singed his arm hair a little, he'll understand I meant what I said.

"Father left me in charge," Orion explained helplessly. "He would never let you go off looking for the Reaper alone. Let me go with you."

"Your brother needs you," I decided to attack this matter from another vantage point. Orion needed purpose. That was why he chased after Angela Liang because he was trying to consolidate our empires. Orion was good at thinking about practical matters. I suppose that was why he could keep River Way running even while Manna City turned into a mountain of burning rubble. "Your father would want you to stay here and care for him. Please, Orion. We need to do this. He needs you."

Orion opened his mouth to say something, but as I touched his arm with my unnaturally hot palms, he finally decided to shut up. He understood the message. I had powers he did not. He was better off back here with his brother.

"I'll watch over my brother, Sebastian," Orion said with a broad smile that didn't reach his eyes. For once, I didn't think it was because of his complicated relationship with his brother but rather his concern for my safety. How did he mature so quickly in a matter of months? Perhaps, his father allowing him to have his adventures with that girl from Yagerin had indeed served him well. "But, Mother, you know you can trust me to do anything. Anything at all."

"I know," I whispered and patted his cheek. His face wasn't completely smooth anymore, but his growing hair was barely more than peach fuzz compared to the other males whose company I had been in recently. Orion bounded over to Ian's side and took ahold of his wheelchair. He wheeled his brother closer to me. Ian shook his head exasperatedly but didn't stop Orion from moving him from place to place. "Don't worry. I know what I am doing."

I most certainly had no clue what I was doing with Grismal. But I was lucky that young people tended to look at old people like us and assume we had it all figured out.