He closed his eyes as those words touched him deeply. "I know, baby. Just give Sin a little space and let him come to grips with himself and his past."
"And if he doesn't?"
"I'll take him outside and beat him for making my girl cry."
She laughed through her tears as she backed away from him.
"Really?"
"Absolutely. Forget medieval, I'll break Atlantean on his ass, and you've seen what a ticked-off Atlantean god can do. Makes Hannibal Lecter look like a crybaby."
Smiling, Kat sniffed back her tears. "I'm going to hold you to that, you know?"
"Feel free. I live to kick the snot out of people."
Kat really liked that thought. She could just see Ash doing that, too.
She wiped her eyes before she had a weird off-topic question. "What do you do when Mom leaves you alone like this?"
He shrugged. "I write romance novels."
His response was so quick, deadpan, and unexpected that she was stunned. "Really?"
"Nah." He winked at her. "I'm not that talented, and I know absolutely nothing about romance. I only wanted to see your reaction."
Ha ha. She wasn't sure if she'd ever get used to his humor. "So what do you do? Really?"
"Nothing. Really. It's boring as hell. Artemis won't allow me to bring anything here with me. No guitar. No Cartoon Network. Occasionally, I sneak a book in just to watch her wig out when she finds it."
That didn't make any sense to Kat. Why would her mother be so cruel? "Why doesn't she allow you to have anything here?"
"It's a distraction and she won't tolerate it. My part of the bargain is to be at her beck and call. So here I wait. It's another power trip... a small victory she can claim over me."
"Why do you tolerate it?"
The look in his swirling silver eyes sent a shiver down her spine. "The same reason Sin hasn't resigned himself to death. There are six billion people on earth who need someone to protect them from things that are scarier than the tax man or the knife-wielding stranger. Things that a gun won't stop. As long as their lives hang in the balance, what's a little humiliation for me? Besides, I'm used to it."
Maybe, but she wondered if she'd be so altruistic in his place. "Yeah, but you're a god of fate. Can't you change that?"
"You're thinking like a child, Katra. Things that appear simple very seldom are. It's like the mechanic who goes to fix the carburetor and in doing so accidentally puts a hole in the radiator and causes even more damage. Every person on this planet is connected. Sometimes those lines are easy to see, and others are more complex. You change one insignificant thing and you change the very core of humanity. Case in point, had I stopped you from taking Sin's powers he wouldn't have become what he is now. He'd have been just as cold as your mother."
"But his pantheon would have survived."
"Would it? Fate is never that simple. It doesn't go in a straight line, and the more you try to circumvent it, the worse you make it on yourself. Fate will not be denied. Sin would have lost his powers by another means, at another time and place. And whoever took them then might have killed him. Had he died, the world would have ended a long time ago or the gallu would have run free and taken over. There are infinite possibilities."
"But if fate won't be denied... if it's set, how could there be infinite possibilities?" That was a question she'd never fully understood.
"Only certain aspects are fated. The outcome isn't. It was fated that Sin would lose his godhood, the means and what followed were determined by free will. Free will is that one scary variable that sets so much into motion that no one, not even I, have control over."
"I don't understand."
He took a deep breath as he rubbed her arm comfortingly. "Here's an example. When I first met Nick Gautier it was fated that he was to get married at age thirty and have a dozen kids. As our friendship grew, I lost the ability to see how his future would play out. Then in one moment of anger, I changed his destiny by telling him he should kill himself. I didn't mean it, but as a god of fate, such proclamations when made by me are law. Fate realigned the circumstances around him that would lead him to make a decision to take his own life. The woman he was to marry ended up dead in her store. His mother's life was taken by a Daimon and Nick shot himself at her feet. My free will would have been to not lash out at him. Instead, I did. His free will would have been to seek revenge as a human against a Daimon and not kill himself. But because of who I am, my proclamation that he kill himself outweighed his will and he didn't really have any choice. I took his free will and I cost him everyone who was close to him. Do you understand?"
She was beginning to see, but there was still the matter of the original plan for Nick. "If fate won't be denied, then Nick could still find someone to marry and have a dozen kids, right?"
"That might have been true, but the moment I forced my will onto his life I altered that. His fate is no longer set and it's his free will now that leads him toward a destiny I can't see. But I know his future actions will touch the lives of people I love and whatever happens to them is ultimately my fault for being stupid. Don't be stupid, Katra. Never speak in anger and never try to force your will onto someone else. You'll never find peace in that."
Kat paused as she realized exactly what he meant. For centuries her mother had been trying to force her will on Kat's father. Her grandfather had tried to force his will onto her grandmother. And in each case the outcome had been disastrous for everyone involved. As much as Kat wanted to have Sin, unless he was willing, there would never be any happiness between them. "I understand."