Confessions (Part 1)
Kal POV
“Your aura has slipped mother!”, I said, venom lacing my words. I was ready to burst, I was ready to let the Beast out, even if it crumbled my sister’s kingdom. Her silver eyes looked at me knowingly and exchanged another short, fearful glance with Thalia. “ENOUGHT OF THIS!!! I need you to tell me the truth, Mother! Or is that something you are still incapable of doing after all this time???? So much for you telling me everything!”, I roared. I could not explain it – every fiber of my being was telling me that something was happening, that they were both hiding something. The Beast was screaming in my head, he wanted desperately to go to Makaha, and at this point I started believing that the answer to my questions and the reason for all this mystery was there. But none of it made sense, nothing made sense and I was never a man who liked ambiguity and things which did not add up.
“Are you planning to talk or should I simply go to Makaha? One of you better start talking!”, I yelled again, my claws coming out. My chest was heaving, my mind was buzzing, I was feeling as if something was suffocating me, as if the weight of the ocean somehow pressed on my chest and was not letting me breathe. “Kal, please”, Mother said, gently caressing my face. Elena and Thalia simply held each other, Elena crying softly while Thalia’s eyes were tearing too. “Kal.. please.. sit down.. I will tell you everything…. It is time”, she but whispered softly, her own eyes carrying sparkles of tears. Thalia just looked at me with her beautiful eyes, convening all her love and devotion though her glance. “Kal… we did this to help, please…. Please, Brother…”, Thalia pleaded, her beautiful face etched with worry.
All of this was making me uneasy. The pressure in my chest was not leaving and I felt that I would pass out any moment. Observing my obvious discomfort, Mother placed her hand on my chest. For a second it simply glowed, and a sudden warmth enveloped me, amber lights spreading around my skin and quickly absorbing within. My breathing cleared up and my vision came into focus. “That is better...”, Mother said, giving me a small smile. She sat down next to me, her frame slumped up, as if what she was about to share was weighing her down. She suddenly looked older and frail, and I felt guilty. However, I was determined to find out as to what they had been hiding from me. What was so important that even Thalia would hide it from me? Her betrayal stung, and at that point, I did not know how our relationship would be repaired.
“So where do I begin?” I heard Mother's soft voice, which echoed around the Crown Room, somehow bouncing around it like raindrops. “From the start. And no more hiding – no more lies, Mother!” I replied curtly. A part of me knew that whatever she was truly hiding was likely because she thought it best for me. However, my other part, including Beast, felt emotionally compromised and completely drained by her lies. “I never intended her to be your Mate, Kal. I really did not make her for that purpose, you know”, she began. This, of course, I knew, but reminding me about it all brought out new fresh pain when I thought of Catherine. “She chose you – and only you. She was the purest form of love, something to this day I do not know how I created. And she loved you, so very much. And she loved your children, your babies, more than life itself, more than even you… ”, mother’s voice trailed. I had to steady myself, head to listen without reacting or at least try to. Every word out of my mother’s mouth was like salt to my wounds. “It is a different kind of love… to be a mother Kal…. You were her first true love, but when your children came, her love for you and them became something different, something stronger and raw. She became a lioness of the jungle, willing to lay down her life for your children…. And for you”
“And you let them catch her!!! Your precious vermin of humans, your precious, pathetic little bastards!! You let them catch her and kill her!!” I roared, my heart pounding and breaking thinking of what happened to Catherine. The silver eyes of my mother locked onto mine, and a sudden calm overpowered me. I knew she was using her magic, but truth be told, I needed help, anyone’s help right now – I knew I needed to calm down and hear her out at least. “That is not exactly true, Kal. That is not exactly how it happened”, she elaborated. All my life I had been told a story that humans, in fact a secret military division of the U.S. Military headed by Colonel Slater captured her and killed her. That division knew about us, knew about the origins of Earth and all our kind. They hunted us, experimented on us, even before the Great War. The truce was made after the victories of the Great War, but I knew they still operated in the shadow. I knew members of many tribes were missing from time to time.
“Maybe I should listen to you for a change, Kal. I will start from the beginning, but I repeat, that is not exactly how it happened”, she continued, and hearing those words again sent shivers down my spine. I had a very bad feeling about this. Beast was quiet, but I could tell he was listening and was on edge.
“I know you missed the birth of your children. And I know you did not even know she was pregnant. Now that I have explained that I moved time, I am pretty sure that you can determine when they were conceived”, her melodic voice was saying. I simply nodded. I did not need a reminder that I was robbed of that, but if it played the part in the overall story, I guess I had to hear it again. “The Oracle had a prophecy, even before they were born. At first, Catherine started having dreams, vivid dreams and nightmares. They seemed like premonitions, and she was worried about it. In her dreams, the children, your children, the twin dragons, born of the First Dragon and the First Human, ended this world Kal. Eradicated the world, both humans and our kind. The visions of death, gore, and devastation plagued her. I know you must remember something about this”, she said softly.
I was stunned. I had so many questions and the more she talked, the more confused I became. I knew what she was talking about, well, at least I thought I knew. Shortly after our marriage, Catherine indeed started having nightmares and vivid dreams. She would never tell me the full details of them. She said she needed to do some research and that she would tell me everything after she figured it out. That lasted a couple of months, and then these nightmares stopped, or so I thought. A few months after that, she volunteered for a research and rescue mission – something that was supposed to be routine. And during said mission she was captured and killed. Or so the story went, but something was telling me that story was a tip of the iceberg. Catherine had secrets from me, her mate and husband, and I was naïve, blinded by love and happiness of her finally being mine. Why didn’t she tell me? Did she not love me anymore, I asked myself.
“On the other hand, Kal, the vivid dreams she had, which would come and go as well, showed your children as saviors of this world. Showed them holding the balance, and finally bringing everlasting peace to our kind. The Oracle had a prophecy, a prophecy about the balance of our world and the Three that would save it. However, combined with her dreams, the prophecy was unclear and confusing at best. And at that time, we did not realize that the prophecy involved a Tribrid too. When we found this out, Solomon suspected that Alma was the said Tribrid. Unfortunately, you know how she died, and we thought we made a mistake, that the Oracle made a mistake. However, Catherine was pregnant, and she did not know what to do. She was scared for you, for her children, for the future she had foreseen. She wanted to protect you, protect them, Kal”, Mother whispered again. I could not hold my tongue much longer. “Protect me???? Protect them??? She needed to tell me!! She could have told me. I would have done anything to protect her and my babies, prophecies be damned! I am the First Dragon, my very soul is tied to the Earth, my power, only second to yours mother. What could she have possibly been protecting me from???” I spat.
“That is just it, my son. She was protecting you from them”, she said, crashing my world into darkness. “From them????..... From who???” I asked, already knowing the answer, my chest tightening again. “From your children, my son. In the nightmares Catherine saw, you are the first to fall. Your children… It is them… They killed you, my son.”