Daughter of Destiny (28 page)

The hologram blinked
out.

Naia met the multitude of
eyes focused on her. "See? I told you it was magic."

Katarina checked on Zane
after her call to Earth. He slept deeply as his body continued to
heal. Despite the lack of caffeine, she felt no urge to go back to
sleep. Zane looked a great deal better, but one day of care did not
make up for weeks of torture and starvation. His face held a gaunt
look and she could see every rib. She feared he might try to join
the fighting if she took them straight back to Earth, but where
else could they go?

Katarina sighed and
wandered out into the corridor.
What do I do about my latest
problem?
She said nothing to the military about the Fae as she
had no proof. Besides, if they accepted the counsel of the
Dedanaan, they would have been warned about the Fae.

She paced up and down until
the narrow space grated on her nerves and then she returned to the
bunk area. Katarina gained a new respect for Zane and any soldier
who travelled regularly in such close confines with nothing to do
and nowhere to do it. The troubling message from the vision played
in her head over and over. She expected Torin to show up at any
second.

"What am I thinking? Why
should I wait for him to show up?"

Katarina perched on the
edge of the bunk and closed her eyes. She let her breathing slow
and relaxed her body as awareness of the physical realm melted
away. She pulled from the depths of memory the psychic imprint of
the faerie she met in the woods. She held that in her mind, but
finding the words to say proved far more difficult.

"I know who you
are..
.
Father."

A whole host of demands and
questions formed in her head, but she kept it simple and to the
point. As she pulled her mind back to her physical form, she
recalled the faerie's gentle touch on her shoulder, the loving
embrace, and his show of affection.
Why? Why leave me if you
cared?

In juxtaposition to the
emotions she felt from the faeries that day the lore her mother
taught her clashed like an out of tune piano.
"The Mages fear
them for good reason, Kat. The Fae don't love. They don't
empathize. They are cold and selfless creatures who take what they
want, be it your body for their pleasure of your life to extend
theirs. Never, ever trust the Fae."
Her mother's voice rang
clear in her mind. Her mother spoke directly of the Fae a total of
perhaps half a dozen times. Katarina still did not understand her
mother's obsession with proving their existence. On one side she
feared them and refused to reveal her father's identity, and yet
she continued the pursue them.
Perhaps the pursuit was nothing
but a ruse, a trick to keep me from guessing at the
truth.

"That's precisely what the
bitch was doing. You thought she was trying to identify Mages; she
was, but not to reveal their identity. No, she was warning them
about us, or rather more precisely, about me."

Katarina's eyes snapped
open. Towering over her, less than two feet away, stood the very
same faerie she met in the woods. They eyed each other in silence,
he with a glare as hot and fiery as a volcano, while she showed
nothing but a mask of icy reserve.

"Good to know that not all
of you play oracle."

"What?"

"Your friend, Torin. The
best I got from him was a damn phone number to a pub in
Ireland."

The faerie grinned. "Ah,
Torin. If he had a middle name, it would be cryptic. I sympathize
with your frustration. However, it seems you did figure it all out
on your own." He scowled in an almost identical expression to
Torin, and Katarina noticed a strong resemblance between the men.
"It took you bloody long enough."

Katarina cursed her current
girth, because it did not lend to haughty, graceful movements.
Instead of standing in one smooth motion, she lurched to her feet.
"You owe me an explanation."

The faerie closed his eyes
and his face took on a pinched expression. "This isn't at all going
as I meant." He opened his eyes and looked at her with a sad
wistful gaze. "What happened to my beautiful, sweet little girl who
chatted and danced after butterflies?"

His question stole her
breath and unleashed so many emotions she gasped for air. Still,
she kept her mask in place. "I grew up." Katarina walked past the
faerie. She felt cornered and needed movement to help maintain her
grip on the emotions she held in check. "I was rejected by my own
parents and abandoned by the parent who gave me the powers the
others feared. That's what happened." She stared at her father's
back. The muscles in his shoulders tightened and his hands fisted
at his sides. The air took on an electric charge, but after a long
minute, he deflated as if whatever he felt just ceased.

"No matter how much I tell
myself otherwise, I did abandon you. True, I did not comprehend the
ramifications of the promise I made your human paternal surrogate,
but that does not change the result. Does it?" He turned to face
her. Lines etched into the corner of his eyes and marred the
otherwise perfect illusion of a youthful countenance. He executed a
deep bow. "Finn, of the Tuatha De’ Danann, and I am at your
service, my daughter."

The pain she sensed
mirrored her own. Katarina stepped forward and dropped the façade
of reserve. She reached out and touched his shoulder with a feather
light tap. He rose and caught the change in her expression and
something shifted in his face as well. The shadows lessened and a
trace of a smile curved his lips. "My gentle little one isn't gone,
is she?"

She hesitated, recalling
the pain of rejection as her mother stared at her with fear, but
then she thought of Zane and Naia who loved her in spite of
everything. She smiled at her father, "No, I'm still here, just
hiding in that fortress you showed me how to build."

In less than the blink of
her eyes she found herself swept up in strong arms and crushed
against a lithe body that rivaled Zane's in physique. She felt
something warm on her shoulder and realized her father wept. Her
last bit of reserve melted away and she shed tears locked away for
far too long. He held her for a long time, soothing her sobs with
words in a language she did not know before finally switching back
to English.

"Hush, little one. All is
well. What can I do to make you feel better? Ask for anything and I
will grant it."

Katarina hiccupped and
stepped back. "Really?"

He arched a brow.
"Yes."

Katarina’s lips twitched
and she gave into her mischievous streak. "In that case, I’ll take
a cup of coffee, light with a hint of sugar, scrambled eggs, toast,
a glass of juice, French toast, bacon, and I have a serious craving
for watermelon."

Finn grinned and then
stepped back. With a wave of his hand a table covered with a linen
tablecloth appeared, laden with all of the items she
requested.

"Impressive." Then the
aroma of the coffee hit her and she fell on it like a woman in a
desert dying of thirst. After a long sip and a sigh of satisfaction
she turned back to Finn. "I was kidding, but you have soothed my
caffeine addiction, so that makes you my hero." The faintest hint
of a blush colored her father's cheeks.

She looked back at the
table. There was no way she could eat all of that by herself.
Katarina lowered herself into the single chair. Its comfortable
cushions eased her aching muscles. She reviewed in her head the
pathways of energy he used to conjure everything before her. She
concentrated, picturing an exact replica of the chair upon which
she sat. She waved her hand and willed one into being. It shimmered
into existence next to Finn. "Pull up a chair and join
me."

Finn chuckled and sat down
next to her. They ate in companionable silence for a few
minutes.

"Are you and Torin
related?"

Finn nodded over a piece of
bacon. "He's my half-bother. He's the king of our house. You are
descended from a powerful and noble family, little one."

Katarina glanced down at
her waistline. "I don't think I qualify as a little
one."

Finn scowled. "You will
always be my little one. As for your current condition, how the
hell did that happen?"

Katarina took a sip of
juice. "The usual manner."

Finn rolled his eyes at her
flippant response. "You know what I mean. Not to mention, why are
you in a spaceship?"

"The father is in the med
bay. He's not from Earth."

"Are you
married?"

"Depends on who you
ask."

Finn set his fork down and
rubbed at a tic beside his eye. "Why do I feel like I'm having a
conversation with myself?"

Katarina laughed. "Torin
said we were a lot alike, although he didn't say it in a
particularly flattering way."

Finn waved a hand. "Torin's
too full of himself. Don't mind him."

Katarina grew quiet. She
didn't want to end the banter, but she needed to know what happened
to convince her father to abandon her for so many years. "I need
the truth, Finn."

He sat for a long minute
pushing a piece of French toast around on his plate. "Your mother
was a beautiful, vivacious woman. I didn't know it at the time and
neither did she, but she had Mage blood in her. Eons ago a number
of Mages intermarried with a species called the Dedanaan. That race
died out, but some of their DNA remains in a handful of Mage
lineages. It was that DNA which allowed her to get pregnant by me,
which was not something I had ever considered as a
possibility."

"She was married, wasn't
she?"

Finn sat back and sneered.
"Separated. The bastard lied to her. He couldn't keep it in his
pants and let her think she was the reason she couldn’t get
pregnant, but he knew he was sterile. I don't know what game he
played with her, but I despise that human." Some of the sternness
left his countenance as he continued his story. “I met Maureen on a
cruise. She was wrestling with the idea of divorcing him. I liked
what I saw and something in her drew me. I could certainly make her
feel passion and joy for at least a time. I enjoyed our time
together, but your mother had a fragility I found wearing. She was
like a beautiful orchid, wonderful to enjoy, but a pain to take
care of."

Katarina couldn't fault him
for his opinion. Her mother had been one of those high maintenance
types, always seeking reassurance of affection and complaining when
she felt she was being ignored. Yet no matter what anyone told her,
she never believed them.

"We both knew it was just
an affair. Then she discovered what I was."

"How did she find
out?"

"I was a damn fool." Finn
cleared his throat. "One night we were, uh, you know."

Katarina smirked. "Having
sex?"

Finn winced. "Yes." He
squirmed in his chair before continuing. "Fae males are slightly
different than human males. It is rare for us to actually ejaculate
during intercourse. We reach an extremely pleasurable climax of
course, but ejaculation itself is somewhat painful and only done to
create life. Another side effect, per se, is the wrenching away of
a portion of our life force."

"Ouch."

"Yes. Well, it didn't occur
to me that a human woman could be compatible, even if she was
fertile." He shrugged. "That sensation of attraction I couldn't
ignore was compatible biology demanding we procreate. It occurs so
rarely among the Fae anymore that I had no idea what I sensed."
Finn glanced at Katarina's rounded belly. "For the Fae, the drive
to mate can be an all-consuming need, most especially for females,
when in the presence of a suitable mate. It isn't something humans
understand."

Katarina thought back to
those first few days with Zane. They still shared an intense need
for each other, but mind blowing need definitely described the
initial attraction.

"The energy required for a
mating is immense, and even though I tried, I couldn't maintain my
glamour."

She examined a piece of
bacon, debating if she should risk heartburn and eat a third piece.
"Mom saw your eyes."

"Yes."

"I bet that was awkward.
Let me guess, she turned into a hysterical, screaming
woman?"

"You have no idea. She
struggled and fought, which made it worse for her, but I couldn’t
have released her even if I wanted to."

Katarina winced at that
image and decided against eating another piece of bacon. The image
her father painted killed the remainder of her appetite.
"Why?"

"I was hoping you wouldn’t
ask."

She waited.

Finn sighed. "A human
male’s sperm travels to the egg. We, however, contort and expand to
completely fill the womb so that the sperm and egg are ensured to
meet. It hastens the implantation process and the energy we imbue
onto the fertilized egg draws forth some of the female's energy as
well, like a magnet. It is not a short process, and she was human,
not Fae. Our females are physiologically designed to allow us
passage, whereas a human woman's body isn't."