Archangel's Sun (Guild Hunter #13) - Nalini Singh Page 0,114
in pinpoint strikes—she’d gotten much better at it since her first strike what felt like a lifetime ago and it didn’t take her long to create an effective moat around the reborn. The creatures fell into the hollow she’d created, and immediately began to try to climb out.
But her action had given the ground teams enough backup that they were able to move in and use their weapons to pick off the creatures. Sharine stayed high, and when she saw an angel fly too low and a reborn grab their wing to pull them down, she slammed a bolt into the reborn that evaporated its frame.
Peace be with you, she thought, for all these creatures had once been someone’s child, with dreams and hopes that would never now come to fruition.
The angel who’d gone down dusted himself off and waved to her in thanks.
And the battle continued.
44
Titus fought himself to near exhaustion in the days that followed, going further and further from Sharine. In desperation, he asked Tzadiq to get him a phone device, and he began to learn to use it so that he could see her face when they spoke.
His second said nothing to the request, but his eyes did plenty of talking.
Titus cared little; he wasn’t a man to hide his emotions even if he knew the future held rejection and a terrible hurt. Sharine had been crystal clear that she didn’t wish to be tied to any man.
Titus couldn’t blame her for her stance.
His heart twisted, the pain more difficult to bear than any battle wound he’d ever taken. She’d flown inside him, had Sharine, and the idea of not having her there always . . . it was brutal.
“Some would say it serves you right,” Tanae said with a distinct lack of sympathy in her tone when she came upon him muttering imprecations at the phone device when it wouldn’t do as he ordered. “To fall so hard for a lover who doesn’t see you as the sun in her sky.”
Titus glared at her. “Gloating doesn’t become you, Tanae.”
“I said ‘some,’ sire.” Her gaze grew distant, his troop trainer focused on a secret inner landscape. “I’m happy for you, that you’ve finally come to know the depth and passion of your own heart and the intensity with which it can feel.”
She glanced down at the ground, her flaming hair in a braid. “I’ve kept my heart confined for centuries upon centuries, my fears old enemies, and now I have a son who is my pride—but to whom I can barely speak. When I do, I say all the wrong things and I see him move even further from me.”
Stunned speechless by this unforeseen and startling show of emotion, Titus watched Tanae in silence as she carried on past him. She’d never been particularly maternal with her son, but this was the first evidence he’d ever seen that the distance between them was a wound that bled.
Perhaps, after the world had settled into some semblance of sanity, he’d speak to Galen, see if his former protégé wished to fly home for a visit. Or would that simply lead to more pain for both parties? Fact was that Tanae could be a hard mother—Titus had thought that even when Galen was a babe, hungry for his mother’s approval.
He knew the gentle and pampered flitterbies—a particular group of orphans raised in his court—had tried to baby the boy, but Galen had been stubborn and resolute even then. That didn’t mean the boy’s brave heart hadn’t bruised each time Tanae withheld her approval. Tzadiq had done his best, but he was more warrior than father. Titus had spent more time with the boy than either parent, but even an archangel’s approbation couldn’t erase the hurt caused by a mother or father.
He sighed; he could appreciate Tanae and Tzadiq as warriors while disagreeing with their parenting strategy. Titus had been raised with discipline tempered by overwhelming love, and that was his template for how he dealt with children. To withhold affection from a child . . . no, he couldn’t agree with it.
He’d ask Sharine her opinion on the matter when he got this blasted device working and they spoke. At least he’d worked out how to send a message.
His fingers felt too big and fat on the sleek screen of the device, but he missed Sharine too much not to persevere. He wrote: I broke the original device by hitting too hard at the screen.