125

125
Astella's POV

“Uncle Ryan,” I mumble as the man who forever screwed my early trauma walks towards our front door in the hesitant steps of a man who tells himself he's undeserving but prays to be proven wrong. Time has not done him well – his tall stature has succumbed to a life of bending over the sick and wounded, and what once would have been tidy short brown hair now flourishes with tingling needs of premature aging hair – his warm deep eyes hold an exhausted troubled look that suggests many sleepless nights and regret. I'd never seen him so… defeated I guess.

Because of our mate bond, I sense the protective anger, coupled with vague interest on Thane's part, as we watch Ryan and his small entourage get closer to our front entrance. This is different from Liam's very formal challenge, with no trappings of the ceremony of supernatural politics around it.

Ryan walks as though he bears an immense guilt on his shoulders and the wolves around him are not fighters awaiting battle but sentinels guarding a brittle Alpha.

My shaman-senses pick up details about his physical and mental condition that normal observation might easily miss—"He's lost weight," I remark, "His scent is wrong—he smells ill, or perhaps like someone on the cusp of illness, strained to the breaking point by some form of psychological stress."

"Whatever's brought him here, it's been harassing him for months." Thane agrees, his green eyes following Ryan as he draws near in a sharp focus that can only be described for an Alpha who has lived too long with the knowledge of what potential threats might mean.

Draco, cradled safely in my own arms, watches the group approach with a silent determination that is almost unbelievable for someone so young. Our nine month old son has no business being able to shoot the analytical dice I see in his bright green eyes, but he's never walked through a normal developmental door. Draco stretches out one fat hand, like he is reaching for something that only he can see.

"What is it, little one?" I whisper to our child, tracing Ryan with my eyes as he comes to a standstill in front of the door of our house, waiting politely without moving closer. “You tell me what you are seeing differently that we are missing?”

From one of my old enemies, none of the smug authority imbuing Ryan's voice. "Luna Astella." Except that he doesn't— not really, because frankly, what with everything else going on in his life, it seems like the gas is running out of the tank when it comes to trying to put one over on anyone anymore. "Alpha King Thane. I'm here to request a few minutes from you. To demand nothing, to ask for no rights or appeal to any tradition, just to... attempt to clarify a few aspects. To apologize to others."

“So why should we take any notice of what you say?” Thane's answer is delivered in a tone of restrained dominion, where he informs Ryan while giving him just enough room for dialogue but not enough to persuade or mislead. "The last we seen you, you tried to Rape my pregnant mate here and Claim war with our territory."

Ryan twists the knife of brutal honesty, a sharp edge trying to slam through every remaining defensive wall I've constructed against him."I'm dying. The healers say I might have six more months, or it might be less. A wasting disease of some kind, related to... to the guilt I so deserve. And I have to bite the bullet, stop all of this crazy-making behavior and make amends with the injured before I say my final goodbye.”

The realization suddenly knocked me like a punch in the gut, flooding my thoughts with competing emotions. This is the man who seduced me, led me into an affair that ended my marriage, who had disowned our son when I sought his help;the man who physically assaulted me while I was pregnant with Thane's child. Yet he's also my uncle, the last of my blood after both my parents died; He was helping with knowing how to use what shamanistic stuff I have, even if that later turned out as manipulation.

“Dying,” I whisper, tasting the syllables in my mouth to see how they feel against all the emotions that just now become complex. "Are you sure?” I asked, "have you tried low end magic healers, midlevel vampire doctors, maybe an optioner and a questionable alternative?”

The weary resignation in his voice is indicative of this depression, when he confirms “I have tried everything. The ailment is not so much physical — it's spiritual, emotional. The healers tell me that my body won't stop breaking because my soul can't hold the weight of what I've done. Guilt manifested as disease.”

All that sincerity is even surprising Thane through our mate bond. The man before us looks nothing like the cocky soulless asshole who thought he could plot his way to a spot at the top of the food chain. This Ryan is the one who finally knows what he has done and approaches it with the modest desperation of a man comprehending in hushed, middle-aged horror his final bill.

"What do you want from us?" I start, trying to keep my voice even though I can feel a storm of emotions inside me. What kind of Janes are we that could give you anything at all at this point.

“Nothing,” he admits, and it is an honest one. “I do not anticipate pardon, nor merit it, and would lack the acuity to understand it for what it was if you proffered me the same. I..just...I needed to tell you that I get it. What I stole from you, what I crushed and caused you to bear because of my greed and ambition.”

"What do you know? Somebody like you, Ryan.” Thane answers before asking,because everything after this question from Alpha sounds no less than a fess up conversation and not his manipulations half-truths motive his earlier interactions with us.

“Just that I…ruined any chance the family you belonged to should have been able to protect you. I was supposed to be the one whose loyalty could never be questioned, who'd stand by you through it all. Instead, I am why you are traumatized, the reason that you had to leave your home and start all over from scratch.”

His words break something inside my chest, emotions that I have held in for so long, They finally let them flow out of me. Fury, betrayal and hurt, but also a twisted kind of relief at him finally understanding the impact of what he did.

“Remember, I took advantage of you when you were vulnerable and didn't even want to be married anymore,” he goes on mercilessly as though he's ticking off a list kept deep in his pocket for each time he needs to recount the exact ways in which he fucked up. “I made you believe we were loving, not using. I led you to believe I would have your back if there were repercussions and then as soon as it became politically inconvenient for me, I cut and ran.”

I just respond with “Yes” because there is no reason to avoid the obvious. "You did all of that."

"And then when you got to know true love, along with a real partnership along with family and I tried tearing that down as well," he said, his voice already drippy. “I raped you while you were with child and most vulnerable, tried to rape you into submission, had your baby used as a pawn in an attempt to level against the man who truly loved you like I never would.”

Draco stirs in my hold, quiet noises that are almost as if he's acknowledging Ryan's revelation. My son feels my uncle's emotions before I do then reaches out once more to hug my uncle and for the first time I can comprehend what he senses, not danger but, a deep sadness that comes when one truly realizes the errors of their ways.

“Ah, but no,” Thane says with deliberate restraint, “the question is what you think we should do with that admission. How do you want people to react?”

There is a weight in this moment that pulls me to Ryan, so when he says again, firm enough to make me believe it, "Nothing," I have no choice but to trust him. “ I needed you to know that what really occurred had finally come to light. That the one who hurt you most recognizes the extent of that hurt. That your pain wasn't hidden or small, even if it took me a long time to realize that.”

And I think of how I stand there, two stories to the biggest source of trauma and pain in my life, and realize that even if it does not make up for it, it does close some part of the hole I did not even know existed in me.