Jessica Andersen - Magic Unchained

A dull red flush said he’d scored, but the winikin’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t go there. You have no right.”

“Maybe not, but nobody else is going to call you on it, are they?” Breakfast forgotten, Sven glared at the man who had raised him. “She’s your daughter, Carlos, your flesh and blood. If you don’t think you owe her some love—or at least some damn respect—because of that, then how about a little guilt for not giving her a choice, or, hell, some basic training, before you grabbed her, blooded her, and went, ‘Poof, there you go. Congratulations, I’ve made you into a servant!’”

“I made her into your servant, you fucking ingrate,” Carlos said through gritted teeth.

“I never asked you to. I didn’t want any of this, but I sure as hell didn’t want her waiting on me. For chrissake, that’s why I sent her away.”

“Bullshit. You sent her away because you were afraid you couldn’t keep your hands off her, but you knew damn well there was no place for that sort of a relationship here at Skywatch with war on the horizon. You still know it.”

“Then why the hell did you make her my winikin?” The question came out in an unintended roar. “Why did you warn me off her and then throw us together like that? Was it a test? Some sort of punishment? What? Jesus, Carlos.”

“Language,” the winikin reprimanded, and for a second Sven was ten years old again and headed for the naughty corner.

Only for a second, though. “Fuck my language and answer the question. Why did you do it?”

“Screw this.” Carlos grabbed the tray of uneaten food and headed for the door, sloshing coffee on the floor as he went. “I don’t answer to you.”

Sven didn’t point out the obvious contradiction. “Damn it, Carlos. If you didn’t want me around her, then why bind her to me?”

The winikin stopped, slammed the tray down on the side table next to the door, and spun back. “Because it was the only way to get you back here, godsdamn it. When Jox called us all back to Skywatch, I had to be sure you would come. I knew if I asked you would tell me you were on your way, and keep doing whatever you were doing in the first place. Sure, I could have had them send someone out after you, but that would’ve meant… Shit, I couldn’t do that.”

He hadn’t wanted to look bad, Sven realized. So he had sacrificed his daughter instead. He leaned back against the kitchen counter and felt the hard edge press into his kidneys while disgust coated his mouth. “You used her.”

“Desperate times.”

“You didn’t trust me to man up once I understood what was going on.”

“Do you blame me?” The winikin’s raised eyebrow reminded Sven of his big apology and all those good intentions. Granted, he hadn’t repeated his old mistakes by doing a vanishing act when things started getting complicated, but maybe that would’ve been the lesser sin.

“Yeah, damn it, I do blame you. I… Shit.” He paused, trying to rein in his bubbling temper, because he owed Carlos his life. But he didn’t owe him unquestioning acceptance, especially when it came to Cara. Not anymore. “You could’ve talked to me, told me the truth about the Nightkeepers and the situation. I would’ve come back with you.” He wanted to think he would have, at any rate. “You could’ve tried that first, at least, before using Cara.”

Carlos’s eyes flared. “Do you think it was easy for me? Do you think I wanted to do it that way? For fuck’s sake, we were finally starting to get along. With Essie gone, we were eating together sometimes, riding out together. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a start. And then Jox called, and I didn’t have a fucking choice.”

“There’s always a choice.”

“Fine.” The older man lifted his chin to glare. “Then I made the choice. I ruined things with Cara, maybe even ruined things for her, in order to guarantee that the Nightkeepers got their coyote mage. Live with it. I know I do.”

“You… Jesus, Carlos. Who does shit like that?”

“A blood-bound winikin, that’s who. From day one, I was taught that the war is coming and the magi are the only ones who can save us, and that it’s up to the winikin to do whatever it takes—anything and everything, even if it means sacrificing our lives and families—to help them.”

And he had sacrificed his family, Sven realized. Maybe not directly, but still. “Was it worth it?” The sudden twist in his gut said the answer mattered.

“As long as you don’t let infatuation taint your powers, then yes. It was worth it.” And the damn thing was, there wasn’t an ounce of apology in the winikin’s eyes.

Anger flared, roughening Sven’s voice. “How can you say that about your own daughter?”

“The truth isn’t always easy. If the First Father had meant for the Nightkeepers and winikin to mix, he wouldn’t have forbidden them from mating.”

“Did he? Seems to me that particular rule is a later addition.”

“You’d like to think that, wouldn’t you? It’s easier than admitting that you’re risking your magic, sniffing around her like you’re doing.” Some of Sven’s flinch must’ve shown, because Carlos’s eyes narrowed. “Yeah, I noticed. Everyone has. So how about you do the right thing and stay the hell away from her?”

The words echoed back across the years and left Sven staring. “That day. That summer… It wasn’t about her being too young. It was that you couldn’t stand the idea of a mage and a winikin together.”

“It’s against the writs!”

Sven didn’t bother arguing that one. “Jesus,” he said, shaking his head, “it wasn’t ever about her, was it? All along, I was the one you were trying to control. You couldn’t stand the fact that I cared about her. Still do,” he corrected. “And that’s driving you up a fucking wall.”

“There isn’t room for sentiment when you’re fighting a war,” the winikin said darkly. “That is in the writs. Your responsibility is to the gods and ancestors, mankind, and then your king and the rest of the Nightkeepers. Lovers don’t make the list. They’re replaceable.”

It seemed impossible that he could say that about his own daughter without blinking. “Are you really that heartless?”

“No. I’m that scared.”

“You’re… Wait. What?”

“I’m scared of what’s coming. Fucking terrified. You were too young to remember anything about the massacre, and I used to thank the gods for that. But these days I’m not so sure, because I can’t help thinking you’d be taking things more seriously if you remembered what it was like…” His expression turned inward; his voice lowered to nearly a whisper. “Gods help us, it was awful. All the blood and the bodies, the screams, the children crying, running, being trampled. I… I stepped on them, ran over them carrying you, skidding in their blood and thinking that if I could just get away, we’d be safe.”

Sven crossed the room to stand opposite the man who had rescued him that night, and who had raised him the best he knew how. That, of all of it, had never been in doubt. “I’ll never forget that you saved my life.”

Carlos’s eyes came up, and his hand shot out and clamped on Sven’s wrist. His fingers dug in and held. “Good. Because now it’s your turn. I need you to save my life. I need you to save all of our lives, including hers. And you can’t do that if you’re letting yourself be distracted. You need to focus on what really matters.”

And damned if he didn’t have a point, one that resonated deep inside Sven, tugging at his warrior’s magic. But at the same time, he couldn’t ignore the string of seeming coincidences that had put him and Cara together in the coyote cave, with the scene set for sex. More, he couldn’t ignore—didn’t want to ignore—the heat that flared through him at the thought of her. “What if she’s part of what really matters?”