Chapter 198
~ ROWAN
I knew emotions. I’d learned them, I’d created them in others and I knew how to spot them.
That was how I knew that the look in Allister’s eyes was pure fear and worry, and I knew that he would run.
I grabbed the hem of shirt just as he turned to leave. "You’re not going anywhere until you explain."
"Let me go," he hissed. "If she has done what I think she has done then I cannot help you anymore. You have meddled with things you do not understand." He turned to her, eyes sharp. "Why could you not do as you were asked?"
I jerked him closer, teeth bared. "Do not speak to her in that manner. You did not explain anything to her. How the hell was she to know?"
He threw his hands up in defeat. "Perhaps I thought she would exercise self-restraint. I thought that because of her wolf, she—oh fuck."
"You are speaking in riddles," Aria cut in. "What the hell is going on? Who is her father? Why should we be scared of him? There are too many questions and not enough answers."
Allister exhaled deeply. "Fine, I will answer your questions. Unhand me."
I hesitated for a moment, searching his eyes for any sign that he would run. Once I was sure that he wouldn’t, I released him.
He took a step back, brushing his clothes off with a deep frown on his face as his nostrils flared. "What do you want to know?"
"First of all who the fuck is her father?" Aria asked. "What is his name?"
"You will not know his name even if I tell you. Even I do not know his name. It has been long lost."
Nyssa’s brows furrowed in confusion. "That makes no sense. How can a name be lost?"
"Time," he answered cryptically.
His evasive answers infuriated me. I wanted nothing more than to rip his fucking tongue from his mouth but he still had the answers and we had questions.
I took a step closer to him. "Stop beating about the bush and tell us the truth plainly. Why the hell did you give her blood? What is going on?"
"Don’t you know?" he asked, head cocking to the side. "You smell like one of us. I thought you called me here because you already knew the truth. You have one in your midst already."
"One of what?"
"A vampire."
For a moment, everything stopped.
His words echoed through the stillness, sending a cool wave down my spine.
I knew vampires existed, I was not foolish enough to believe otherwise, but I had never seen one. They preferred to live in the rocky mountains, far away from the rest of civilization to avoid exposure.
As children we were taught to avoid their home base. Vampires did not attack humans on their own but they would not hesitate to kill a straggler or imprison them as a slave.
"You must be joking," Nyssa spoke, voice shaky but amused. "Are you saying that my father is a vampire? That I’m one too? I have a wolf."
"Have you ever heard of a hybrid?" Allister asked. "Your mother was a wolf although he never knew because she never shifted. If he had known, I do not think he would have kept her as a slave."
Nyssa scoffed, her eyes flashing with different emotions. "This is some kind of a joke I’m sure. This is stupid and I am walking away –"
"Walking away will not change the truth," he said simply. "I gave you that mixture because a few drops a day keeps it sated but does not awake it. You are not the first I have helped. I have spent my entire life finding his bastards and making sure that he does not know that they exist. You just had to mess it up, didn’t you?"
"I..." she trailed off, eyes wide. "Oh... fuck."
Her emotions flooded the bond, thick and warped, but before I had a chance to decipher it, her wall slammed down fiercely between us.
I’d deal with that later.
I stepped in front of my mate instantly, shielding her from view. "Who exactly is her father?"
"Like I said before, his name has been long forgotten. It is an echo in the fabric of time itself. They call him the Progenitor, the nameless King. He rules the covens brutally. There is no member of our kind that does not fear him and what he is capable of. If your kind knew the things he did... you would run for the hills."
"Why do we not know then?"
"Because anyone who comes close enough either dies or becomes one of his blood slaves. He is not a man to be messed with, and he does not want his heirs out in the world because they are a threat to his throne. He was wiped them all out, and the few who live in his palace live as slaves too. No one leaves him."
"And yet you are here," I said curtly. "How? If he is so great and so powerful and so feared, then how come you have managed to escape? Or did he let you out? How much have you not told us?"
Allister smiled wryly. "You do not trust me. I dare say that is the smartest thing you can do. The bloodsucker in her is waking, and if she does not feed it, then it will feed itself. You do not want that to happen."
He glanced over my shoulder for a moment before turning back to me.
"Animal blood does wonders. For now, a cup a day will suffice. Keep the bloodsucker sated or it will strike. The less she has to faze, the better. I wish you god speed and I pray for all our sakes that he does not find out about her. Goodbye, Nyssa, I hope we never have to meet again."
"You have not answered—"
He turned on his heels and in the blink of an eye, he was gone.