Jobi seemed average in size for his age. It would have helped his case if he’d sprouted earlier. It happened. Some kids grew faster than others, packing on height and muscle. Aveoth had been like that. He released Jill and stood. He moved slowly, so as not to frighten the child, and crouched down before him. The boy revealed his fear in his eyes but his body remained steady.
“I don’t hurt children.” Aveoth softened his tone. “Your father would try to attack me for getting this close to you if he wasn’t aware of that. You’re safe. Have flight drills become boring?”
“Yes, my lord.”
Aveoth cocked his head. “Why?”
“I don’t need Hawk to ever assist me. I can pull out of a straight dive without trouble and I mostly help the others. I’m stronger than I look, and fast.”
That was impressive it if was true. He glanced at Delbius for confirmation, trusting that he would have spoken to Hawk at length about Jobi’s proficiency. The instructor nodded.
“I saved Kob,” Jobi whispered.
Aveoth stared at the boy. “How?”
“He was playing and didn’t see how close he’d got to the cliffs. He slammed one wing into a jagged edge of rock and didn’t have time to shell since he didn’t see it. His wing crumpled. I dove after him and snatched him before he hit the ground. I got him to a ledge safe. He’s a year older.”
“It’s true, Lord Aveoth.”
He ignored the father, remembering hearing that one of the youths had broken a wing a few weeks before and had almost been killed. Hawk had assured him it would never happen again but hadn’t given him further details. “You understand that the other boys in training will be larger?”
“My father spars with me. He said I’m really fast on my feet.”
“It’s true, Lord Aveoth. He’s a quick learner and—”
Aveoth leveled a glare at the boy’s father and growled. Paltos instantly shut up and ducked his head. Aveoth peered back at the boy, hiding his anger at his father. It wasn’t the kid’s fault his parent didn’t know when to stay silent.
“Remove your shirt and show me your wings. I’d also like to take a look at your fighting shell.”
The kid leaned to the side a little, staring at Jill. Fear showed in his eyes again. Aveoth shifted his body in the same direction and blocked the boy’s view of her.
“It’s okay. She belongs to me and is aware of what we are. I need to know your wing strength and how fast you can react if you wish to train with weapons. It’s difficult to motion shell enough to avoid real harm from steel.”
“She smells and dresses funny. What is she?”
“Jobi!” Paltos thundered.
Aveoth glared at the father again. “Silence! Not another word.” He looked at Jobi and lowered his voice. “That was rude…but you’re young. She’s human, and she just arrived here. Those are the only garments she has until some can be made for her. Now remove your shirt and show me.”
Jobi had paled and trembled when his father had harshly reprimanded him but he seemed to recover fast. He took off his shirt and dropped it on the floor. His eyes closed and he eased his wings out, fully extending them. Aveoth smiled. He could see why the kid might excel at flying. He had a remarkable span for one so young. Aveoth rose up and walked behind the boy, studying his wings from the back.
“Motion shell for me,” he urged. “Now!”
The kid’s coloring changed fast, the softness of his wings disappearing and the grooves sharpening. Aveoth ran his fingers along the top edge of one wing, then pinched it hard. The boy didn’t flinch. He rounded the kid, sparing a glance to see how Jill reacted. Her eyes were wide but she hadn’t made a sound. He crouched in front of Jobi again and touched the boy’s chest. His shell was solid, no soft spots. Aveoth extended one claw and tapped at it. Jobi held still, not trying to retreat.
“I’m going to throw my right and left straight punches at you. Avoid them. On the count of three. One. Two. Three.”
He threw some easy punches at the boy but Jobi dodged each one, his little body moving swiftly from side to side. Aveoth stopped and lowered his hands.
He studied the boy again, looking for any softening around his rib cage and throat, but there were no signs of weakness. Those were the two places VampLycan children were the most vulnerable during training. “Revert.”
The boy closed his eyes, and Aveoth was impressed by how fast the six-year-old could skin and completely retract his wings. Jobi peered at him when he was done. Aveoth smiled.
“Your father has reason to be proud.” He winked and stood, returned to his throne and took a seat. “Put on your shirt, Jobi. Thank you. Go stand with your father.”
Aveoth reached out and curled his fingers around the back of Jill’s leg again, his gaze locking with Delbius’s. “Assign Jobi to someone for private instruction, see how he does, and we’ll reassess if you still feel reluctant to add him to your classes after a reasonable time frame. Let’s say one month. It would give him an advantage over the others if he has one-on-one weapons lessons from a scout. They are adults, so children a little larger than him shouldn’t be an issue at that point.”
Delbius grimaced. “Yes, my lord.”
“I’ll volunteer to work with Jobi,” Kelzeb offered. “I have some free time in the mornings. Will that work, Delbius? I know you hate to ask for assistance from any of the scouts. I’ll spend an hour with him, then drop him off with you. He can at least watch what you’re teaching your students. That way, he doesn’t come in blind.”
Surprise crossed the instructor’s face but he nodded. “That would work.”
“Good. It’s settled.” Aveoth released Jill, rose and took a few steps forward. “Let’s all get on with our day. We’re adjourned.”
He waited for the room to clear and Kelzeb to close the doors. Their gazes met.
“That’s one happy kid. He’s going to brag to his friends that the lead enforcer is his personal trainer. Why did you do that, Kelzeb?”
His friend shrugged. “I remember being that young, and the father isn’t a dick. He’s just very supportive of his son, which I find endearing. Jobi has promise, and one day he might become one of our best scouts.”
Aveoth turned, still smiling—until he saw that Jill had collapsed into his throne. “Are you okay?”
“I thought you said kids don’t have wings.”
“I said they aren’t birthed with them. Do human children walk, talk, and run right from the womb?”
She regarded him with narrowed eyes but didn’t speak.
“What is it, Jill?”
“Nothing.”
She was lying, but he decided to wait until they were alone to prompt her more to share her thoughts.
Chapter Seven
Jill stayed seated as Aveoth and Kelzeb removed their shirts. Her eyebrows arched when both of the men withdrew their swords. “What are you guys doing?”
“Training.” Aveoth didn’t spare her a glance. “We do this often. Just remain where you are.”
They faced each other, backed away, and then lunged forward, swinging their swords. The shocking sound of metal clashing made her wince the first few times until she adjusted to it. They fought, striking at each other, doing a dangerous dance. It was like seeing something out of some medieval movie. She adjusted in the big fancy chair and tried to get more comfortable.
With the men shirtless, it didn’t suck, noticing how their many muscles bunched and flexed as they battled. A fine sheen of sweat coated both of them after a while and it amazed her that they kept going at it for so long. She would have fallen to the floor from exhaustion after a few minutes.
She caught her breath when Kelzeb almost took a blow to his arm and shelled his body at the last instant, spinning away. The blade missed by a hair. Aveoth leaped back and both men stared at each other. Kelzeb unshelled, his skin turning tan again instead of light gray.
Aveoth chuckled. “Sorry.”
“My fault.” Kelzeb grinned. “I wa
s too slow that time to recover. Perhaps I should spar with you more often. I’d be a shitty lead enforcer if I couldn’t hold my own with you.”
“It’s my fault. I’ve sent you on a few missions lately and we’ve missed sessions.” He sheathed his sword.
Kelzeb did the same. “My wings are stronger though. Want to fly with me tonight?”
Aveoth turned his head, peering at Jill. “No.”
“I don’t blame you.” Kelzeb strode across the room and lifted two bottled waters from a table. He spun back around fast.
Jill was amazed when he chucked it hard about twenty feet at Aveoth, but he just caught it as if it hadn’t been hurled at his head. They both drank them down and Kelzeb returned to his friend, bent, and picked up his shirt, putting it back on.
“I’ll go guard the door so you can teach her some defensive moves. She may need them.” Kelzeb strode across the room to the closed door, opened it, and stepped out. He shut the door behind him.
Aveoth faced her and tossed the now-empty plastic bottle toward a corner. He used one hand to motion for her to come closer. “You need to learn how to defend yourself.”
“I’ve taken self-defense classes.”
“Show me.”
She didn’t budge from her seat. “I’m not going to sword fight with you.”
He unbuckled his weapon and laid it down. “No swords. Not yet. I need to see how you move and react first before we advance your training that far.”
“No thanks.” She glanced at the stone floor. It would hurt if he put her on her ass, and she knew he could. She’d just seen him fight with Kelzeb.
Aveoth advanced with a smile on his face. “I won’t hurt you, Jill.”
She leaned back in the chair and gripped the arms. “No.”
He reached her and bent, gripping her wrists. He pulled, easily yanking her out of the chair despite her bracing to keep him from doing so. She found herself being led by him to where he’d originally stood. He released her and his smile faded.
“I plan to keep you close and protected but there might be times where it’s paramount that you can get away from someone like me. Do you understand?”
“That’s just another reason you should return me to where I came from.”
“It’s not going to happen. Are you aware that when you bleed, you scent faintly of VampLycan? You get that from your father’s side. It would put a target on you from anything not human. It’s amazing you reached your age without being attacked.”
“Don’t call him that! He was just a sperm donor.”
“I apologize. I understand. I hated my father too.”
“At least you said yours is dead. I still dream about that day.”
She regretted saying that instantly when she swore she glimpsed pain in his eyes. She’d had a hard life, and tended not to understand when someone complained about things she couldn’t relate to.
“Sorry. It was tough growing up without a dad, and it made it worse knowing mine was such an asshole. I have some issues. It’s foreign for me to think of fathers as good things.”
“You were lucky he wasn’t a part of your life. Mine raised me. Lord Abotorus was cold and cruel.” Aveoth stepped closer, lowering his voice. “He limited the time I got to spend with my mother and ordered me to call her by her first name. I was a year old when he took me from her.”
Jill tried to understand what he was saying. His life seemed so strange to her. “They got divorced?”
“No. She lived here at the cliffs, and still does. They were mated but he kept her in separate quarters. He never would have allowed her to venture outside and leave him. He put me in his quarters. She wasn’t permitted to visit me there. I only saw her during social events.” He licked his lips and glanced away, then back at her. “I’d sneak away as I got older and visit her when I knew he was busy. She’d leave her bedroom balcony open and I’d fly in to see her.”
That was so sad. “Why would he do that?”
“She loved me. He considered that a weakness.”
It made her feel bad for Aveoth, trying to imagine such a childhood.
Aveoth cleared his throat. “Those are some of my best memories. I was four the first time I went to see her. I had so much curiosity. I always caught her watching me when my father assembled the clan. I feared she’d turn me in to her guards and want me punished for breaking the rules. That wasn’t the case. She welcomed me with a hug and tears when I figured out which room was hers and landed on her ledge. It was the first time I could remember when someone had embraced me with gentleness, instead of for battle training, to prove I wasn’t fast enough to avoid capture.”
Jill studied his handsome face and tried to imaging him that young. The boy she’d just met had been six. Aveoth had been flying at four. He’d have been smaller, and had only wanted to talk to his mom.
“Of course, she made me promise not to return. She was terrified someone would discover me there and I’d be severely punished. I realized she didn’t fear for herself, but for me. How could I not take the risk to see her again? Spending time with my mother was the only happy times I had as a child. She wanted to know everything about my life, and she always told me she loved me, how important I was to her.”
Aveoth was breaking Jill’s heart. “Why would your father keep you from her?”
His smile faded. “Gargoyles regard emotions as a weakness. Not all, but most. Lord Abotorus was very old.” He shrugged. “He had no empathy for anyone, especially for his own family. He felt forced to mate a GarLycan, and resented my mother, especially for birthing me. I was a disappointment.”
“Why?”
He hesitated. “I wasn’t able to hide my emotions from him at first. I learned to at a young age, but it was too late. He’d seen weakness in me as a baby. As I grew older, I also didn’t make him proud with acts of brutal rebellion like some of the other younglings did. It angered him.”
She hesitated. “I’m afraid to ask but…like what?”
“Bressor was my age, and my sparring partner for years. In our fifteenth year, he snuck out one night and went for a flight. The scouts caught him returning before dawn with blood on his clothing.” Anger harshened Aveoth’s expression and his tone. “He was taken before my father and forced to confess what he’d done. He had flown to a human town, grabbed a woman, and murdered her.”
The idea horrified Jill. “Why would he do that?”
Aveoth’s jaw clenched. “Women at the cliffs are off limits and protected. He was fifteen and wanted to have sex with one. So he kidnapped a human, abused her, and killed her when he was done to hide his crime. The scouts had to go out to find her body and dispose of it so it was never discovered. My father punished him for leaving the cliffs without permission…but not for the murder or abuse of that poor woman. She was just human, he said. As if they didn’t matter.”
Aveoth’s voice deepened even more, almost into a snarl. “Then my father pulled me aside and asked if I’d ever done anything similar before. Of course I hadn’t. I’m not a sick fuck who would rape and murder someone. He said I was a great disappointment, and actually encouraged me to do the same one night, because it would prove I was more like him. He just ordered me to be smarter about not getting caught the way Bressor had.”
Jill needed to sit down. She hesitated for a moment and then just took a seat on the floor. She had no words. “So this Bressor is here somewhere?” She was human, or at least mostly, according to Aveoth.
Aveoth crouched in front of her and sat on the floor. “I challenged my father a few years after that happened.”
“You fought him?”
“It was a fight to the death to see who would lead the clan. I won. Bressor was one of the clansmen who challenged me for leadership afterward. I killed him…and had no regret over doing so.”
She stared into his eyes, seeing the truth there. It didn’t break her up that Bressor was dead. He sounded like someone who more than deserved it.
It also sank in t
hat Aveoth was saying he’d killed his own father.
“Sometimes people need to die. They are too cruel and selfish to be allowed to live, Jill. There’s no telling how many other times Bressor snuck away and harmed women. Are you afraid of me because I’ve admitted to killing him and Lord Abotorus? The more I learned of my father, the deeper my sense of rage and hatred burned toward him. He encouraged some of the clan to do atrocious crimes, and to look down on other races. I took over the clan, and some of my people aren’t happy about it to this day because I won’t stand for that shit. Most of the full-blooded Gargoyles still here are as cruel as he was, and resent the laws I’ve written. It’s punishable by death if they murder for sick entertainment. But I still have to hide most of my emotions when I’m dealing with the clan. They see them as a weakness.”
Everything he said made sense, and she agreed. The world was a better place with some people not in it. “I understand. I’d kill my sperm donor if I could after everything he did to my mother. She died because she got sick and refused to go to a hospital because it would have cost money. By the time I realized how sick she really was, and called an ambulance, it was too late. The pneumonia had damaged her lungs and she was too weak to respond to treatment. We had a little savings at the time, but she knew he’d be sending assholes after us soon, and that money would help us go on the run again. I hate that son of a bitch.”
“I’m so sorry, Jill.”
“Me too.”
He slowly lifted his hand, holding it out to her. “You do need to learn how to fight. Aren’t you tired of running? I can teach you how to kill assholes like the two who kidnapped you.”
She hesitated then gave him her hand. He rose up and gently pulled her to her feet. “I’m not so sure this is a good idea.”
“I’m nothing like Lord Abotorus but sometimes I have to act that way. I never want you to fear me. I’ll never hurt you, Jill. Can you trust that?” He released her hand.