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Malik threw his hands up in a fit of frustration. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Ha!” Vanna threw him a look of scorn. “Don’t you think I don’t know where this will end? We all know it. When she’s the rightful age, you’ll make her youreros—-”

“What’s aneros?” Kyria’s puzzled voice interrupted her tirade.

Altair choked, thinking it was the one word the little girl shouldn’t think of right now.

Hadwin’s face turned expressionless as he considered how the world would take it, if one day Kyria did become one for Malik.

Bride, Vanna thought, cringing as she realized what she had let slip.

And when she saw how Malik looked like he was seriously considering strangling her now, Vanna faked a yawn. “I think it’s time to go to bed. Oh, age is really catching up with me.” She sailed out of the room without even waiting for her husband.

“What’s aneros?” Kyria insisted, sitting up.

“I, err, need to go as well.” Altair swiftly turned away and left the room.

Hadwin clasped his younger son’s shoulder. “You’re on your own, son.”

And then Malik was alone.

Kyria was still looking at him questioningly.

Damn them. Damn all of them. Damn them.

He drew a chair next to the bed and took his phone out from his pocket. “How about I read you someStephen King?”

She let out a squeal of excitement, her quest for new vocabulary instantly forgotten. There would be hell to pay later. Stephen King was forbidden for good reason. The last time he read her one of King’s stories, Kyria hadn’t been able to sleep alone for an entire month, and Hadwin’s punishment for Malik was to be home by eight every evening and keep his little sister company until she fell asleep.

King would mean a month’s curfew yet again, but it was better than answering what ‘eros’ meant - to Kyria and him.

Outside Kyria’s bedroom, Vanna and Hadwin looked at each other, listening in silence as their younger son began to tell the story of a clown and a little boy.

She smiled wryly at her husband.This is going to be trouble in a couple of years.

He smiled back at her.Wouldn’t have it any other way.He touched her cheek.I love this family. I love our life. I love you.

She closed her eyes, thinking that she would never forget that look for as long as she lived. And though she knew it was impossible, she found herself hoping that this life of theirs could last. Forever and ever—-

But it was not to be.

Nine years ago

The world had lost a real-life hero.It was a dramatic headline, but it was also painfully apt and inadequate at the same time, and Malik had to blink his eyes several times before his gaze cleared and he was able to read the rest of the speech the palace’s staff had prepared for him.

Tomorrow marked the fortieth day following Hadwin’s death, and he and the rest of his family would make their first appearance in public. He had taken it upon himself to deliver the speech on his family’s behalf, but more and more he was finding it an impossible task. Two paragraphs of it concisely recounted the events that led to his death, and this Malik could only bear to skim.

A successful kidnapping attempt—-

Hadwin Mitropoulos, proving his mettle as a soldier—-

Heroic efforts that saved his son’s life at the cost of his own—-

Injuries too severe, lasting only several hours—-

Final words to the family have been kept private—-

The paper crumpled in his fist. His rage knew no bounds, but it was as impotent as it was violent. There was no one he could rage against. All of his brother’s kidnappers were dead, all of them. But even so, the rage continued to fester inside of him, and he simply didn’t know what to do.