"I had to do it. I have to protect my wife. I don't care what it costs."
"Your wife?" Ash shook his head. "Talon, look at me."
Talon did.
Ash stared at him intently, his gaze cold and unfeeling. "Your wife is dead. She died fifteen hundred years ago and was buried in your homeland. Sunshine isn't Nynia."
Talon roared with his anger and pain. It wasn't true. Sunshine was his wife. He felt it. He knew it. She was all that mattered to him.
All that mattered.
Before he could think twice, he attacked Acheron. He caught the Atlantean's throat between his hands and shook him, trying to make him understand.
"She's not dead!" he snarled. "Damn you, she's not dead."
Ash broke his hold and used his powers to immobilize him.
Talon hissed and snarled as he tried to break free, but it was useless.
And in that moment, he realized just how far gone he really was.
I've attacked Acheron.
The thought sobered him. Ash was right. If he didn't calm down and get a hold of himself, he could get them all killed.
All of them.
Ash took a deep breath and released him. "Talon, you have a decision to make. Dark-Hunters don't have wives. We don't have families. At the end of the day, we have no one but ourselves. Our responsibility, our only responsibility, is to the humans who can't protect themselves from the Daimons. You've got to get your head straight."
"I know." Talon breathed raggedly.
Ash nodded. Then his eyes turned a strange, deep silver.
"Tell me what you want to do. Do you want me to petition Artemis for your soul?"
Talon thought about it. Right now, he stood on a precipice that he had never thought to face. Not once in his entire Dark-Hunter existence had he ever dared to dream Nynia would be back.
That she would...
He closed his eyes and winced.
Nynia wasn't back. Acheron was right.
Nynia was dead.
The woman in his cabin right now wasn't his wife.
She was Sunshine. A vibrant, caring woman who had fire and spunk.
She might have his wife's soul, but she was someone else. Someone he didn't want to live without.
Someone he didn't dare keep.
He felt as if his heart were being shredded. Sunshine was human. In time, she could forget him and have another life. Someone else to love.
The thought pierced him, but he had to do this.
Either way, he would lose her. At least this way, she stood a chance for happiness that wouldn't kill her.