Chapter 54 Fathers request
Chapter 054
RAVENNA
I scoffed at his audacity. "You must be joking. I have not heard from you in the last fifteen years of my life. Fifteen years and suddenly you resurface, claiming you want me back?"
"I am serious about being your father," he responded, his expression remaining calm. "And I am sorry I walked out of your life. But the real truth is that the wolves came for me. They were going to kill you and your mother if I did not surrender to them. I had no choice but to walk away with them."
"You are lying," I countered immediately. "Aunt Lyra said the wolves came for you. But before they arrived, you were already gone."
He shook his head slowly. "That is a version of the story I told your mother to tell anyone who asked about my whereabouts. I needed to protect you both. If people thought I had simply run away, there would be no reason for the wolves to come after you."
I wanted to believe him. Part of me desperately wanted to believe that my father had not just abandoned us.
But fifteen years of believing he was dead or gone made it hard to accept his words.
"I have been held hostage for the last twelve years," he continued, leaning forward slightly. "And I have been searching for you, tracing any leads I could find, for the past three years since I escaped. Then I heard rumours about an exceptionally talented girl with red hair at the wolves' academy, The Midnight Academy. I began digging into it, investigating. And that is when I found out she was my daughter. The daughter I had been searching for all these years."
I felt lost, completely and utterly lost in what he was saying. My mind was spinning, trying to process everything.
"What did you do?" I finally managed to ask. "What did you do that made the wolves come after you? And who kept you hostage?"
He was quiet for a long moment. His expression shifted, becoming more serious and pained.
"I am a werewolf," he stated simply.
"What?"
To prove his point, he partially shifted right there in front of me. His features changed, his eyes glowed golden, furs sprouted along his arms and his canines extended.
Then he shifted back to his human form, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
I sat there, stunned, unable to speak.
"There is a rule in the wolf packs," he continued, his voice heavy. "Werewolf must never mate with humans. They are considered weak. But I fell in love with your mother. Jane. And she happened to be my mate."
"Your mate?"
"It is a bond. Something wolves feel with their destined partner. And Jane was mine. Human or not, she was mine."
I tried to process this. Tried to understand what he was telling me.
"As expected, my father wanted me to reject her," he went on. "To choose a wolf mate instead. Someone appropriate but I refused. My position as Alpha heir was revoked. I was the first son which means I was next in line for the throne. But they took it all away because I would not reject Jane."
His hands clenched into fists on the table.
"I was sent out of the pack. Told I could return only if I came to my senses and rejected your mother. But I would never do that. Never, because Jane was already pregnant with you by then."
My breath caught in my throat.
"So I accepted my fate," he breathed. "I was banished. I became rogue after your birth. We tried to make a life together away from the pack and from politics and the rules. Just the three of us."
"What happened?" I whispered.
"My father died mysteriously two years after you were born. And my brother, who was always power-hungry, took the Alpha throne forcefully as the next in line. He was the one who abducted me. He felt I was a threat and I might try to reclaim what should have been mine."
Damon stood up and walked to the window, staring out into the darkness.
"I was locked up. Made to work as a slave under heavy drugs that dragged my memory away. But even through all of that, I never forgot the loves of my life, Jane and Ravenna. Never."
I could hear the emotion in his voice. Raw and real.
"Eventually, I gathered intelligence, gained trust among some of the elders who had forgotten what I had done. They wanted my brother out. He had become a tyrant. A king who ruled through fear rather than respect. With their support, I gathered loyal youth. Young wolves who would fight for the truth and we overtook the throne."
He turned back to face me.
"Since then, I have been searching for you both. Hoping and praying that you were still alive. That I would find you."
I sat in silence for a long moment, trying to absorb everything he had just told me. Trying to make sense of it all.
"The rogue attacks," I finally ventured. "At the academy. Were they all because of me?"
He nodded. "Yes. I had my men trying to get close to you. But the academy's wards were strong. And there were complications."
"The first time," I breathed, the memory coming back to me. "In the woods when the rogue attacked me, Darius had intervened."
"That rogue was my son," Damon confirmed quietly. "Your half-brother. I sent him to come get you. But when Darius attacked, he had to escape to save his life. I could not afford to lose him."
My eyes bulged. I remembered that scene vividly. It was the first time I had seen Darius shift into his wolf form. The violence. The savagery. The protection.
"All this while," I murmured, my voice shaking, "they accused me of being the reason rogues invaded the school wards. They said I was involved, I let them in and I could not understand why they would think that. But now you are saying it to my face. It was all because of me. It is so overwhelming."
Damon leaned forward and took my hand, squeezing it gently. "It is not your fault. None of this is your fault. You did not choose this. You did not ask for any of this."
"What is your name?" I asked suddenly. "Your full name?"
He smiled. "Damon. Damon Casmir."
"Casmir. Like me."
"Like you."
I took a breath. "Tell me about mother. About Jane."
His expression softened. "What is there to tell? She was beautiful, kind, strong. Everything I could have ever wanted. How is she? Where is she?"
The words stuck in my throat. "She passed away two years ago. She left me with my younger sister, Asteria."
Damon went completely still. His face drained of colour. "She is gone?"
"Yes."
He was silent for a long while. Just sitting there, processing. When he finally spoke, his voice was thick with emotion. "I regret not finding you in time. I should have searched harder. I should have—"
"It is not your fault," I interrupted, echoing his words back to him. "You should not blame yourself. You did what you could."
He straightened slightly, composing himself. "I know why you are at the academy," he stated, changing the subject abruptly.
"You do?"
"It is because of Darius Pike. I do not know exactly what he did to you. But I know he is the reason you are there."
I said nothing. Just watched him carefully.
"I need your help with something," he continued, his expression becoming serious again.
My heart raced faster. "What is it?"
"I need your help with infiltrating Richard Pike's world." Damon looked at me directly. "I need you to help me make it all crumble."
My eyes bulged. "What the hell?"