Steven wasn't dead, just close to it. Rhaelgyr groaned softly, twitching on the floor. Kurlog stared at me, blood dripping from his beard.
Besedie took a strand of my hair, twining it between his fingers. The wounds inflicted by Rhaelgyr slowly closed, though the stains on his robe remained. "Why did you do this?"
I frowned at the non-sequitur. It was still hard to breathe, though the headache was fading. Unable to answer, I jerked my head back.
My father grabbed me by my hair, and threw me into a chair. "Show some respect. Do you have any idea what I'd had to go through? All because you wanted to play with the animals." Besedie paced away.
"What did you do?" Kurlog was eyeing me, hungrily, and I sneered at him. A shame I'd let him get me drunk.
"I did what any concerned father would do: I tried to remove the bad influence." Besedie removed his robes, standing in simple tunic and breeches. "Steven wouldn't leave you. He said over and over how he loved you."
Steven coughed, rolling to his side, though remaining unconscious. "So everything you just told me?"
"Was based in truth."
I speared my father with a glare. "Based in, but not actually?"
"He wasn't tractable," Besedie snarled through clenched teeth. "I gave him almost anything to leave you, to go back to his people. But he wouldn't. He thought the universe of you, thought maybe even soulmates."
"Mortals can't mate with Immortals," I said softly. Memories came back; a tragic scene of explaining it to Steven. We could be friends, but we'd never have the true love he asked for. He'd insisted it was possible, that there must be some way, as there'd been a way to make him to make him Immortal. "Poor child."
Besedie cried out, knocking a chair over. "Even with your memories gone, you support the animal. What is wrong with you? Why do you love him so much?"
His rage was stunning, overwhelming. I rose from my chair, shoulders back and feet spread, unflinching as he puffed. The air was heating back up, but breath still frosted. "Being mortal doesn't make him completely worthless."
A far cry from my reaction to Tessa. Derision and disgust, as if she were below me.
I paused, staring at my father. A reaction that had been implanted by him, in hopes I'd change. "You bastard," I hissed.
Besedie narrowed his eyes, puffing out his chest. "What now do you think I've done?"
"You erased my memories. Steven wasn't lying. There was no accident." I clenched my fists, stalking closer. "How could you do that to your own daughter?"
"How can you question me?" My father slapped me.
