Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter Colletion_ Books 11-15 - Laurell K. Hamilton [702]
“What is wrong, ma petite?”
“Sorry, thinking too hard. Maybe I’ve never seen master vamps talk about honesty and friendship. Takes some getting used to.”
Samuel smiled at me. “I suppose for the Executioner, it would be a very alien concept.”
I shook my head. “No, as Jean-Claude’s human servant, that is where it gets weird. As the Executioner I just kill people, I don’t talk to them.”
He looked at me with those brown-green eyes, a long, considering look. He turned the look back to Jean-Claude. “I think we can help each other, Jean-Claude. I will begin.” He gave a long sigh. “When Sampson said that Thea does not think like a human, he is quite right. She is the last of the sirens, and it preys upon her mind. She sees the promise of power in our boys, and she is determined that it be brought out.” Samuel hesitated, and even through centuries of control he seemed uncomfortable. “Thea comes from a time and a people where close family relationships were not a hindrance to sex, or even marriage. Her people were worshipped as gods and goddesses. Are you familiar with the Greek mythos?”
“Anyone who is classically educated is familiar with the myths,” Jean-Claude said.
“You’re making this a long story, Father.”
Samuel looked at him. “I admit that now that the time has come to be honest, I am having second thoughts.”
Sampson touched his father’s hand. “Let me, then.”
He shook his head. “No, I am master, and father, and I will do it.” He looked back at Jean-Claude. “Thea tried to bring Sampson into his powers as a siren.”
Jean-Claude and I just blinked at him. Richard was lost, because we hadn’t given him the whole story about how sirens come into their power. Or had we? I couldn’t remember anymore. I was the one who said, “Do you mean that your wife tried to seduce your son?”
He nodded. “Sampson came to me, and I told her, in no uncertain terms, that if she ever tried to do it again I would kill her. When the twins began to exhibit faint signs of power, I gave her the talk again.”
“Would you truly slay her?” Jean-Claude asked.
The polite mask dropped, and Samuel’s eyes blazed for a second, before he lowered his eyes, and hid the anger. “I love my wife, but I love my sons, and they are children and cannot protect themselves against her.”
“In my mother’s defense,” Sampson said, “when I said no, she took no for an answer. She didn’t have to. I’m her son, but I’m not a siren yet; if she’d pushed her powers, then I wouldn’t have had a choice. She stopped when she realized I was horrified. She didn’t understand why it bothered me, but she accepted it.”
Richard and I exchanged glances, and for the first time I think we were both thinking, Gee, it could be worse. That there was a vampire out there sexually more disturbing than Jean-Claude and Belle Morte. EEEK!
“I fear,” Samuel said, “that Thea’s restraint will not be perfect. The twins are seventeen, old enough to marry, old enough for much. I fear that she will be tempted to push with them, and they are not as strong of will as Sampson. It might take less to cloud their minds and lusts.”
“And would you do as you threatened?” Jean-Claude asked. “Even if the sex were to make them full sirens?” His face and voice were back to being very neutral.
“They would come into their powers, but I am not certain that their sanity would survive it. Can you imagine someone with Thea’s powers, or even more powerful because of my bloodline, but mad, completely broken in the mind? I do not wish to be forced to either imprison or kill my own child, Jean-Claude, and that is what we might have to do.” He shook his head, and the worry on his face was like scars, so deep, as if he had carried this burden for a very long time.
“It would be a terrible choice,” Jean-Claude said.
Samuel gathered himself, and his face was back to being neutral, hail-fellow-well-met,