I take a slow breath and refocus on the present . . . more or less. The past never seems to be far when I’m with Bram. I still don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. “When my grandfather died, it was like the moment he passed, he took all the unforgivable shit with him. I barely recognized the man my family talked about in the aftermath. It didn’t make sense to me then, and it doesn’t make sense to me now. The pain people cause by being horrible and selfish and monstrous doesn’t magically disappear with them.”
“No. It doesn’t.” Bram sits back and holds out a hand. “Come here.”
I’ve never been one for cuddling and the like, but it seems that a lot of things I thought were true don’t hold up with this man. It’s the most natural thing in the world to take his hand and allow him to tug me down onto his lap and wrap his arms around me. I rest my head on his shoulder and allow the warmth of his skin to soothe me. “How do we move forward? Some days it feels like I’m drowning in the past and everything I’ve lost. I know what my family would want from me, but I’m so tired of fighting. I don’t want to do it anymore. I just . . . I don’t know who I am if I’m not what they created me to be.” It’s the first time I’ve spoken the words aloud. The truth of the sentence is so stark that it feels like I’ve reached into the very heart of me.
“You don’t have to decide now.” Bram runs his hand over my hair and down my back. “No matter what else is true, you have time. Whatever you decide will be the right choice.”
“Just like that?”
“Yes.” He kisses my temple. “You’re strong, you’re smart, and you’re driven. I have no doubt that you’ll conquer whatever you set your mind to, regardless of the arena.”
His confidence warms me just as much as his comfort. He believes it. I don’t have to check his aura to know it to be true. I press my hand to his chest, right over the steady thump of his heart. Would he have such confidence in me if he knew the truth of my past, my family? I might toe the line of being a true monster, but many in my family have crossed right over it happily.
I don’t believe that the sins of the people in your life bleed into you . . . normally.
He’s given me so much truth, so much vulnerability. Maybe I can return the favor without it blowing up in my face. I close my eyes and take what I hope is a fortifying breath. “When the realms separated, there were people and . . . things stranded in realms that weren’t their home.”
“I know the histories,” he says carefully.
“I don’t know what happened in the other realms, but humans have always been at the bottom of the food chain. We can breed with paranormals and gift our children powers, but if we don’t survive long enough to bear that child, to see them grow to adulthood . . . Well, either way, it doesn’t help the parent any.”
Bram has gone so still, he might as well have become stone like the gargoyles that haunt the dark high places of so many buildings. “Yes.”
“To some of the monsters left behind, it was the equivalent of an all-you-can-eat buffet. Most of the human population isn’t even aware paranormals exist or that monsters are real, which only makes them easier prey. Several families decided to do something about it. Mine was one of them.” I don’t know why this is so hard to say. Maybe because most of my family would consider Bram a monster to be exterminated on sight. “They—we—saved a lot of people over the generations, but . . . Gods, Bram, it’s no way to live. One of my first memories is of my father handing me a knife and drilling me on where to stab a body to ensure they bleed out before they can hurt me.”
His arms tighten around me, just a little. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m still alive. No one else is.” My breath shudders out. “But I’m the last one left. To continue the family legacy would mean having kids for the sole purpose of turning them into hunters. Of breaking them before the world can so they will be the most efficient killers possible. I . . . I can’t do it. I don’t want to do it. I think I want kids, but I’m so afraid some switch inside me will flip and I’ll turn into my parents. They loved me, but they hurt me and told me it would make me stronger.”
“Strength isn’t worth the cost of everything else,” he says softly. “But you are not your parents. You’re already making different choices than they did.”
That’s what’s so scary. My map for life has gone up in flames, and every step I take, I’m worried the ground will give out beneath me. “I don’t know how to be someone who isn’t a hunter. I don’t know how to deal with the toxic combination of guilt and relief that I feel when I think about leaving it all behind.” There are other families, and other hunters, but it’s always been drilled into my head that Jaegers were a cut above the rest. That no one else can compare.
“I don’t know how to be someone who isn’t cursed.” He brushes another kiss to my temple.
All my training, all my experience, screams that this is a terrible decision. I came to the demon realm with one purpose and one purpose only. But, as much as I don’t want to face it, Bram was right when he said that finding out the truth of my mother won’t ultimately change anything. It won’t bring her back. It won’t make me feel less alone.
I lean back, and Bram lets me. There’s nothing but open honesty on his face. His aura has a tentative thread of hope. He smiles briefly. “Why don’t we find out who we are without the shadow of our parents . . . together?”
Together. “This is too fast. You don’t know me. I don’t know you.” I’m grasping at straws, and yet, at the same time, these are perfectly reasonable statements.
“Maybe.” He shrugs. “I don’t know your favorite color. I don’t know your parents’ names or a number of relatively important details. But, Grace.” He cups my face with one large hand. “I know you. I’ve known you from the first.”
I lift my brows, instinctively striving to ease the moment. “The first?”
“Well, not the very first. But the moment you ran and then didn’t flinch at the anger I brought, when you met me at the line I drew in the sand and forced me to do the same . . . I knew you then.”
Part of me wants to push back against this knowing, to protect the inner soft parts of me that are far too easily bruised. No one has gotten as close as Bram, and he’s right—it’s not a matter of time. It’s a soul-deep recognition that feels like magic yet is something much more mundane but no less a gift. We’re two survivors, cast adrift in the choices those around us made. We can spend the rest of our lives being tossed to and fro in the waves of others’ making . . .
Or we can choose a different path.
“I suppose that’s how life works.” I speak slowly, feeling my way. “It’s filled with people making the best of each day, no matter what it brings.”
Bram’s smile warms. “That’s what I hear.”
“Are you done with the letters?”
“I just need to hand them off to be sent.”
I ease off his lap and take a careful step away. “You should do that. Right now.” I trail my hand over my collarbone and keep moving back. “In a hurry.”