Praetorian Rising, стр. 12

the following months, two beautiful girls were born: one to Joana, and one to Nimeha. The pair of the girls were clear images of Fotrix. The mothers didn't want to forsake their newborn babes, but they realized at once what had happened. They waited for Buvona to step out of her underground home into the evening air that night and shared the news with her. Buvona, heartsick and anxious for her own child she was supposed to have birthed, looked upon these two baby girls and realized that her own pregnancy had also been a falsity.

"The girls were supposed to have been hers and Buvona, hating what Fotrix had done to her, snatched the newborn girls and pulled them down into the darkness of afterlife with both Nimeha and Joana helpless to stop her. Buvona, desperate to make Fotrix pay for his deceit, plagued the lovely daughters with an eternal curse of life and death. Eliza, born to Nimeha, was cursed to birth many children many times over in preparation of all battles. She alone would have the gift to birth an army of mass proportions. Morrighan, daughter of Joanna, was cursed with a touch of death to all living things. Buvona wanted nothing more than to end the life of her most hated enemy, and she spent her life using both Morrighan and Eliza to destroy Fotrix and kill him once and for all."

Camille frowned, but Peter winked at her. "Not all of our sacred stories are happy ones, Camille."

"Yes but, don't you think it's incredibly unfair for Buvona to have suffered so much when everyone around her was barely affected by the pain of loss and loneliness?"

Peter quirked a questioning brow at her. "You think she was the only one to suffer? The center of a storm isn't typically where the damage happens, it's only where the chaos begins, no?"

"Yes. Does she ever get him back for what he did to her?" Camille asked, her tea now completely gone, her hands gripping the empty mug with a bit more force than necessary.

Peter glared at her for a long and arduous moment, his milky eyes a depth of sorrow she couldn't even begin to untangle. His face, though devoid of emotion, ripped a cavernous hole inside Camille, and yet she was unable to pinpoint its origin digging against the lining of her flesh.

"Lunci, my boy, go wash up. It's time for bed."

Lunci's face crumpled into a heap of disappointment before Peter's stern eye found him, and the little boy scurried down the dividing hall toward the washroom.

Camille remained where she sat, back straight as an arrow, her heart thudding in her chest. She couldn't be sure where the impending sense of foreboding came from, but as Peter cleared away the plates and took a seat across from her once again, she knew without a doubt that Peter had a history she wanted no part of. It was evident in the broad lines of worry and stress running the length of his face, the downward angle of his lips and the heavy tinge of sadness that sat on his shoulders like a well-worn shroud.

"The stories aren't all good you know—the scriptures of our gods. They capture an embodiment of holiness, morality and wellbeing, but in truth, the stories are an outline of the death and cruelty to one another. They point out the truth of man and our many flaws."

Camille remained silent as Peter pushed the iron kettle onto the counter instead of back into the fire for another round of tea and headed to the shelves lining the right side of the kitchen wall. Reaching into the topmost shelf, Peter extracted a stone bottle corked with a waxed and wooden stopper. He grabbed two glasses from the sideboard and poured several inches of a thick caramel colored liquid into each cup.

Taking the glass he handed to her, Camille could smell the smoky notes of whiskey mixed with a woodsy tang of oak.

"Buvona spent her entire existence trying her best to defeat the trickster. Unfortunately," Peter said with a sad smile, "some monsters can't be killed, no matter how hard you try."

"Do you believe the stories, these scriptures of your faith?" Camille asked, taking a small sip from her cup and enjoying the sharp burn as the whiskey traveled down her throat.

"Oh, I do," Peter said, a resigned sigh escaping from between his lips. "Buvona may never see the end of her own internal torture, but she did give rise to another power, perhaps a stronger one."

Taking another sip of whiskey, Camille coughed slightly, the hint of burn sizzling the lining of her throat in a somewhat uncomfortable and yet pleasing fashion. "You think the High King is that stronger power fated to rule by the Gods?"

Peter laughed then, a deep belly laugh that brought a fluttering grin to Camille's lips. "No," Peter said with a certain finality. "Definitely not."

"Then what?"

"Hope," Peter replied easily, as though the single word had been resting on his tongue throughout the entire evening. "The Mother and her three daughters gave us hope."

Camille snorted in response. "Oh, come on, you can't be serious."

"I'm dead serious my dear. Buvona may have cursed her nieces but she left Aspera with two incredible protectors. A giver of unending life and an unstoppable warrior able to kill even the deadliest of all evils. She may not have saved her own life, but she sought the answers to help Aspera in need of protection against the trickster."

She couldn't tell if he was being completely serious or pulling her leg, but felt it best to remain silent, uncertain of what Peter was trying to say to her. If the sharp glint in his eye was anything to consider, Camille felt Peter was unloading a dark secret he thought it wasn't his place to keep any longer.

If she was truly honest with herself, she might admit that as much as Camille wanted answers from Peter about who she was and her past,