Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 90404 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 452(@200wpm)___ 362(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90404 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 452(@200wpm)___ 362(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Thing picks right up. “He taught us gaining more power was everything. We were meant only to be his tools, but he made us believe we were sons.”
Hannah-consort looks up from what she’s doing at that. “I’m sorry.”
“It was merely part of his clever manipulation tactics,” Romulus spits. “Having us call him Father. To have us love him when he never felt it for us in return. To him, it made us more malleable.”
Hannah-consort shudders. “He sounds like a cult-leader.”
“Well, yes,” Romulus says. “He had us call him God, though he was nothing of the sort.”
“What was he, then?” Hannah-consort asks as she sprinkles something green into each pan of eggs.
Romulus shakes his head. “A powerful being of some kind. This earth is old. Powerful creatures from other planes have occasionally roamed here in ages past. But for the most part, they quit this plane when it became poisoned by iron and when other metals began to be pulled from the depths and smelted together, to say nothing of the chemical compounds and combustibles humankind are now so fond of.”
Then he narrows his eyes. “Some, like our father, however, were able to adapt and managed—or I should say chose—to stay.”
Finally, I speak up, seeing that this history is determined to be told. “He gloried in being one of the last true powers, especially with us as his weapons. And so he amassed power—the only thing he ever truly cared about.”
“Or at least he tried to,” Romulus says. “Whatever he gained, he always eventually lost. He could only back one human despot at once or occasionally both sides. But eventually their armies were torn apart by us.”
“We were unruly,” Thing growls.
Romulus smiles. “Effective, but yes, unruly. Yet without us, Father was impotent.”
“Something we failed to see until too late,” I growl.
“Human rulers were ultimately fragile,” Romulus continues, ignoring me. “Not to mention, our father was so full of hate, he delighted in their destruction as much as he did their victories. Any who dealt with him were making a deal with the devil.”
Hannah-consort’s eyes widen as she shifts various pans around the burners. “Did they know who they were dealing with? The human leaders?”
Romulus shrugs. “Some did. Some didn’t. It just depended on what mood he was in. If he wanted to play with his food or not.”
Hannah-consort frowns. “So did it feed him in some way?” she asks as she flips the eggs in the pans over to make a pocket upon itself. “Why did he do it all? How did it give him power?”
My brothers and I pause and look at one another. Ah, the ultimate question: Why?
Why, dear God, why?
Why all the senseless destruction?
Why did we tear apart the world, again and again?
“Because he could.” My head snaps up, and it’s Remus’s wild eyes I’m staring into.
“He was a bully.” Remus grins, teeth sharp. “He could have retired from this plane like all the others. But retire to what? To a land of peaceful meditation amongst equals for eternity? What attraction would that have held for one such as him?”
Remus shakes his head. “No. He saw that if he stayed, he would be the most powerful. He saw that if he stayed, and stole the angel-fire to create us—an act which would keep him barred from the Great Hall forever—he could play.”
“Play by preying on those weaker than himself,” Thing adds, nodding.
Hannah-consort is silent as she slides the egg pockets—she’s made one for each of us—onto four plates.
“So what finally stopped him?”
“Layden.” Thing’s voice is quiet. “Our brother suffered more than any of us. The hunger… it was inside him, too.”
“And sweet Layden especially didn’t like it when Father murdered his own consort.” Remus grins, eyes flicking toward me.
I feel my fur stiffen. What is he inferring? I would never—
“The food is ready,” I growl. “We should eat.”
But, naturally, Remus isn’t done. “Our Father killed his consort,” he repeats, and I want to smash his face in when I see my Hannah-consort’s eyes go wide.
My impulse is to say: It was an accident. But then I am disgusted with myself, for Father did not accidently throw her down the stairs even if it was not his intent to kill her. He was not careful or gentle. He was violent, and she died. Those are the facts.
“Layden lost it,” I say quietly. “He attacked our father. It shocked all of us. For all the wrong he’d done us, none of us had ever…”
“He’d made us such faithful dogs, you see,” Remus says. “And we obeyed. It was only after our father struck Layden down after torturing him slowly as an example to us—” Remus flashes his teeth. “But it had the opposite effect. Or perhaps it might have worked. Had at the last moment, he pulled back. We thought him slicing off Layden’s wings and pouring burning hell-metal over his back so they’d never grow back would be as far as he would take it. Wasn’t it punishment enough, after all?”