“Gideon, your son had a question for you,” she said, smoothly changing the topic of conversation. Seth was very relieved at the segue. He really hoped Leah appreciated his sticking his neck out for her. Manipulating either of his parents was no easy trick.
He shifted his shoulders and tried to appear casual.
“Actually, it was something Leah was asking about. Let me go get her and we’ll come find you. It’s kind of a history thing.”
“History is crucial to understanding the present and forming a better future. I am glad you are taking an interest,” Gideon said. Then he nodded permission to his son, sending the adolescent hurrying to find his playmate.
“Why would you ask about Enforcers aligned before your father?” Gideon asked some time later. It wasn’t as though he was especially curious; he was simply gathering information.
“Uh ... well, odds are I might become Enforcer one day,” Leah said quickly. “Shouldn’t I be well versed on the lineage and the methods they were known for using?” She shot Seth a look and he gave her a shielded thumbs-up.
“This is true,” Gideon said. “But you are young, and time has a way of unfolding in ways we least expect. It could be that Kane and Corrine will have children and one of them will be heir to Kane’s present position.”
“It isn’t very logical to live my life on groundless supposition. I have to assume the truth of the moment is the truth of the future.”
Gideon turned to look at her, one of his silvery brows lifting in surprise. Gideon’s silver hair and eyes were often unnerving to Leah, but in that moment she thought he was looking at her with a sense of pride. Suddenly it felt like something very special to her. She glanced at Seth again and knew by the look on his face that he felt it, too. The jealousy in his eyes said it all. He wanted more than anything for his father to look at him in that way.
“You are your father’s daughter,” Gideon said gently to her. “He was a man of practical logic. It was one of his greatest strengths.”
Leah very often heard about how she looked, talked, or sounded like one of her parents, but this was something very different. She had never heard Gideon say anything like it before, and there was a peculiar intimacy to the speech that made it exceptional.
“Your father’s approach to being Enforcer was very different from his predecessor’s. And it changed even more when your mother came on the scene. It was softened, you might say. When your mother became an Enforcer, she made many efforts and changes to see that it became less of a shameful process to be enforced. Your mother was not a part of your father’s life when he enforced me. His approach then was very like a—”
“Jacob enforced you?” Seth blurted out in utter shock, tacking on a laugh.
Gideon raised a brow at his son’s outburst, and somehow it was a completely different expression from the one he had given Leah. Seth immediately closed his mouth and lowered his eyes.
“Very like a parent drawing his wayward child in line,” Gideon finished. “Adam, Jacob’s immediate predecessor as Enforcer, was more like a brutal taskmaster. He was powerful, sometimes tempestuous. Like Kane and Jacob, he was not even an Elder yet when he inherited the mantle of Enforcer. But make no mistake, he was good at what he did. He was a warrior like no other I have seen. Perhaps if Elijah had less of an ego, your Siddah might admit that Adam was a better warrior than he.”
“Better than Elijah?” Leah breathed. “Wow.” Then she remembered herself. “So what exactly happened to him? And when did it happen?”
“I think it was about ... well, 1601. Samhain. No, wait ... it was Beltane. He just failed to report in one night and that was the end of it.”
“Are you sure it was Beltane?” Leah pressed.
“Yes. Your father refused to step into his brother’s shoes at first, searching high and low for him. Grieving terribly. He did not accept the mantle of Enforcer until Samhain so I mistook the dates, using your father’s ascension to Enforcer as the time of Adam’s disappearance. But I am quite positive it was Beltane.”
“And no one knows what happened to him?”
“It was assumed he was Summoned. When a Demon is Summoned by a necromancer, pulled out of his life and held prisoner in a pentagram until he is Transformed into a monster, it is often an unwitnessed event. The unexplained disappearance of a Demon is not uncommon. Though perhaps it is felt more sharply when it is a high-standing member of our society.”
“I bet an Enforcer like Adam would have caught and destroyed Ruth long ago,” Leah said bitterly, her fists clenching in anger.
“Actually, that is not an unfair statement,” Gideon mused. “Your father was much distracted by other things while Ruth was growing in power and wickedness. Adam was far more dogged in his ways. He would have taken all manner of risks to attain victory.”
“Do you think he was better than Daddy was?” she asked quietly.
Gideon immediately shook his head. “Jacob had wisdom and age and the power that comes with both on his side. There has never been a more powerful Enforcer than your father, Leah.” He took a breath. “But I would hesitate to pick sides in a head-to-head battle of the brothers.”
Leah hurried away from Gideon and Legna’s quarters, Seth scurrying along in her wake.
“I know what you’re planning to do!”
Leah came to a screeching halt and about-faced, glaring at Seth and shushing him fiercely. She grabbed him by his shirtfront and yanked him into the privacy of a nearby alcove, hoping to cut their conversation away from the natural echo of the caverns.
“You don’t know anything! Just keep your mouth shut!”
“You’re insane, Leah. You don’t even have the power to do it. So what, so you accidentally were able to jump through time once. You were two years old! It was a raging accident. Since then what have you been able to do? Send a stopwatch five minutes into the future?” Seth scoffed at the feat. “The great and magnificent child of Time, ladies and gentlemen!”
“You don’t know anything!” she hissed at him again. “I’m so sick of you thinking you know so much and being such a jerk to me because I have powers and you don’t. The great and magnificent child of Space, ladies and gentlemen, who can—gee, what can you do besides whine like a little brat?”
“Shut up! Why don’t you just give it up, Leah? Your parents got their asses kicked and now they’re dead. Dead, dead, dead! And there’s nothing you can do about it!”
Leah swung out her hand and smacked him right across the mouth. The action shocked them both. Leah nursed her smarting hand and Seth nursed his bruised lip. Leah felt the need to cry stinging across her sinuses and burning in her eyes. She felt unable to contain the painful emotions flooding over her. She refused to let Seth have the satisfaction of seeing her hurt, so she ran. She kept running until she couldn’t see her way anymore and couldn’t breathe. Finally she fell to a stop beside an underground pool, one of many in the castle and the caverns. She knelt down and grabbed up a handful of the always cold water, splashing it over her face. Slowly she got herself under control, drew her sobs in until they were hard sniffles. She swiped at her eyes, blinked and looked up to see a beautiful brunette standing next to her. Her hair was loose, a black cape all around her shoulders that reminded Leah of her mother. Her legs were encased in shiny tights of an opaque white and a short black miniskirt that barely covered her butt. Her pierced navel was exposed by the short navy blue tank she was wearing. It was her boots that dominated her outfit, though. They were soft black leather with brass buttons climbing the backs of her legs in a nice steady row all the way up to her thighs. It was as though they alone were announcing her presence, and they were saying she was way too fine to mess with.
Leah had only glimpsed her from a distance over the past ten years, but she would never forget who the Vampire was. It immediately disturbed Leah that Jasmine should see her like this. Weak and out of sorts. She didn’t know why it should matter, but it did.
She stood up and faced the Vampir
e, smoothing her own simple T-shirt down over her favorite pair of jeans. Still, she suddenly felt like it wasn’t enough. Like she ought to be wearing something better. Like she ought to be something more. It was a moment Seth must experience every single day he woke up to his father’s magnificence and stood in his shadow without anything to show for her parents’ expectations of him.
Leah supposed it was because this woman had been her rescuer. Her hero, really. Jasmine was strong and powerful, had a real reputation for being a badass, and dressed with such confidence and panache. You couldn’t miss her if you tried.
But there was something in her eyes right then, something Leah would never have thought to attribute to Jasmine.
Vulnerabiity.
“Can you do it?” Jasmine asked.
“C-can I do what?”
“You know what!” she said impatiently. She reached out and took hold of Leah’s face by her chin. “If I could go back in time and change one thing, I would see to it that Prince Damien never met the Princess Syreena.” She took a deep breath and closed her eyes as she slowly exhaled. “But that would be a selfish thing. A thing designed only to help him and myself. Perhaps even her as well, when you think about it. But you ...” Jasmine stared hard into Leah’s eyes, and Leah felt the soft coaxing power of the Vampire’s influence. It felt like being wrapped in a strange sort of warmth, something safe and caring. “Can you do this thing? Do you have the power?”
Leah simply nodded in reply.
“No,” Jasmine breathed, an expression of unbelievable pain lancing across her features. “The past must stay in the past where it belongs. Do you understand me, little half-breed? You cannot play with time in such ways! You will destroy people and you will torment others. You could make things a thousand times worse than they are now! Do not meddle with the past!”
Leah was afraid as the powerful Vampire raged fiercely at her. This was no moralistic scolding like her other mentors had given. They had frequently hammered at her about the massive responsibilities that would come with her element. There was no other Demon of Time in the world and had never been one in history. She was the groundbreaker. But Elijah was very fond of telling her that just because she could do something didn’t mean that she should. He told her he could become a category four hurricane that would destroy everything around him, but that didn’t mean he should do it. In fact, the damage path would be a very obvious reason why he shouldn’t.
Messing with Time could potentially create horrible damage paths. Some would be immediately visible, and others would not show themselves for years.
“I just thought ...” Leah argued weakly. “Maybe if I could borrow ... for just a minute ...”
The young girl teared up and immediately tried to hide her weakness from Jasmine. The Vampire softened a little, understanding very clearly why the teenaged Demon would want to change her history. As Jasmine herself had said, there were things she wished she could change as well, people she would save—people she would protect. But it wasn’t her place to try to go back to fashion the world in a way she thought it ought to be.
“There is danger in the idea that we can create a designer life for ourselves by manipulating this thing or that thing in our past,” Jasmine said gently. “You might save your parents with one act, but that same act could end up killing Elijah, destroying the political stability of the Nightwalkers, or—I don’t know—any number of variables. I understand you have been given these powers for a reason, and perhaps that reason is to alter moments in time to create a better future, but you are too young to be making these decisions now. And you certainly shouldn’t be making them on your own. Your power is new yet. You don’t know all of what you will be able to do one day. At the very least I must beg you to wait. See how time unfolds. Have patience.”
It wasn’t an unreasonable request.
Just an unbearable one.
Leah nodded in agreement, her face full of color and tracked with tears. Jasmine could feel the young girl’s frustration. It eddied into her psychically like a powerful, stormy ocean tide. It churned wildly with her emotions as all of the plans Leah had been forming were now suddenly dashed upon the rocks of responsibility and morality.
Strange that it had been Jasmine to lecture about restraint and responsibility. Vampires were not known for coloring inside the lines and fully behaving themselves. But Jasmine had seen too much damage done with out-of-control Nightwalker power. The rogue members of her own society who thought they could go around picking up powers by drinking the blood of innocent Nightwalkers disgusted her. It was one thing to dance along the edges of morality and quite something else to dive over the line again and again, leaving a path of damage. This young girl was a prime example of the harm that could be done when power wasn’t properly tempered or respectfully held in check.
“I promise I ... I won’t do anything ... unless I know for certain ...” Leah stammered around her words, and Jasmine could appreciate how hard it was for her to rein herself in.
“Look, kiddo, only you can know in your heart what is right and what is wrong, what is selfishly motivated and what is truly for the greater good.” Jasmine rolled her eyes. “Great, now I sound like Noah and Damien. But if you really want the best guidance around, go see Noah. He has walked both edges of the line you are teetering on. And he used you to do it. Ask him how he feels about it. Ask him why he hasn’t thought about doing what you want to do.” Jasmine lifted a shoulder. “Or better yet, ask him why he has thought about it but never approached you with the idea, because I promise you, the first person this would have occurred to is Noah.”
With that instruction and a gentle tug on a curl at Leah’s temple, Jasmine turned to leave the young girl to her own conscience and devices. But at the last moment, the girl grabbed her by the hand and made her turn back. She waited until their eyes met, her gaze earnest and fierce.
“Is that true? What you said? Is the moment Damien met Syreena truly the one moment you would change if you could? Is that where you think all of this went wrong?” She opened a hand to indicate the screwed-up world they were living in.
“If Damien had never met her ... or if he had never followed her the night she’d been kidnapped ... Vampires would not be drinking the blood of Nightwalkers. Before the moment Damien drank Syreena’s blood, the act had been taboo—” Jasmine stopped, took a breath. “But I lie. Because the Exchange, the act of taking other Nightwalker blood and then those Nightwalkers taking our blood, was in books in the library we discovered after Elijah mated with Siena. We would have discovered it eventually. So perhaps I would go further back and keep the library from ever being found. That would perhaps mean keeping Ruth from looking for it, which drew our attention to it. So perhaps it’s all about Ruth.” Jasmine shook her head. “You see? You see how I could play this game? How do you choose? What gives you the right to choose? You believe in Destiny, don’t you?”
“Yes,” Leah said quietly.
“Then you have to believe that things happen for a reason, and even if you change something, Destiny will find a way to fulfill her needs.”
“You mean that even if I kept my parents from dying in that cavern, Destiny would find a way to claim their lives regardless?”
“Possibly. Like I said, talk to Noah. He defied Destiny to take his mate. See what he says about the whole thing.”
Leah nodded and this time it was she who turned away, hurrying off, perhaps to find a way to do exactly that.
Leah could easily have gone to her female Siddah and asked her to teleport her right into Noah’s living room, but the young Time Demon needed to think . . . or perhaps was dragging her feet. So she was wandering less-traveled caverns, giving herself the time she needed to be alone with everything swirling through her mind.
It was a war between desires and responsibilities.
From the moment the idea had entered her head that perhaps she could redeem herself in the eyes of all those around her who must count her responsible f
or the deaths of her parents, she had been moving headlong into the possibility. Or so it seemed. She had actually toyed with the concept over and over again through the years, but it seemed every time it entered her mind, her Siddah would come up with some kind of lecture about the responsibility of power. It was almost as though they had read her mind, sensed her intentions, and were warning her off the path she wanted to travel. That might be a bit of paranoia, because although Legna was a strong empath, she wasn’t a telepath, and neither was Elijah. So she had to assume it was Destiny herself dropping very strong hints in her lap, warning her to leave well enough alone; that she would only make bad situations worse if she meddled in the way things had unfolded.
But Leah watched the world around her quietly and carefully and continually came to the same conclusion. Things would be very different if only Jacob and Bella had not died that day while trying to protect her from Ruth and Nicodemous. What if, she continually asked, someone had come to their aid? What if that someone had been strong enough to defeat Ruth and Nico once and for all?
The question had then always been who? Who would be strong enough to do something like that? Noah? Leah couldn’t take that risk. What if he wasn’t? What if Noah was killed along with her parents? Then what would become of them all under the heavy loss of their King?
But now, suddenly, she had her candidate. Someone who, if taken at the moment of his death, would never be missed throughout time. Someone as powerful as her father. Someone who had it in his blood to fight and defeat a lawbreaking Demon. Someone whose death, should he die alongside her parents, simply would not matter in the grand scheme of things.
But just when she was ready to act, all these warning signs were being flung up in her face again. Jasmine, of all people, being one of them. What were the odds that the Vampire would be there, in that moment, overhearing her and Seth arguing? In Lycanthrope territory? They were infinitesimal.