Sanctuary

Chapter 16

Luke

The door to my apartment opened, and I heard the male voices as they entered. Dad and Grant. It figured. Dad was one of the few people who would walk in without knocking. They found me in the lounge room looking at some photos that Mum had given me for my sixteenth birthday. It was an album full of pictures of my birth sire, and some biographical information about him. I had appreciated the gift. It had come at a time when I had been desperate for anything I could get about the man who had given me life.

Dad had encouraged me to talk to Grant. It helped a little. Grant was my sire's brother and could tell me about their childhood. Some things I had noticed made more sense after talking to him. It allowed me to understand my birth sire more. But, it made the hollow I felt more noticeable. Vampires had killed my birth sire before I was born, so I never got to know him. Talking with Grant had filled in some gaps, but there were things that even he couldn't tell me.

"Ben would be proud of you. You're remind me of him. When I look at you, I see the same fire, the same stubbornness and the same drive he had." I looked up from the photo album to see that Grant's face had hardened as he thought of some memory of his brother. "But, I also see the same pig-headed refusal to see sense when you have decided on a course of action."

"I guess this means you're both here to tell me I made the right decision, Even though I they ambushed me." I stood from the lounge and moved to the kitchen. Dad and Grant watched me as I put the water on to make coffee for us all. I turned around to face them both and stopped still. Why hadn't I noticed earlier that I was on the same eye level as the two most important men in my life? My eyes widened as I realised that I no longer had to look up at Dad or Grant to look them in the eye. When did that happen?

Dad shook his head, a sad look on his face. "No, I'm not. I don't have to. Your own memories will do that for me." He walked over and picked up the album. His fingers traced the cover, and the sadness deepened as he turned to the front page. Mum had written a note to the sixteen year old me and placed it at the start of the album. "I remember the hours Claire sat up working on this. No matter how tired she was from work, she always found time to put in an hour or two on this after you went to bed. The one time I asked her about why she did it, her only reply was that you needed to know who your birth sire was so you could know who you were. That family history was important for humans as it helped them understand themselves and their place in the world better."

I turned towards the coffee maker just as it was finishing its cycle. Preparing coffees for all of us gave me a few, much needed minutes to pull myself together before I turned to face them again. Grant gave me a sad smile as he took his mug. "Do you remember what you said the day after your sixteenth birthday when I took you riding? You said you feel like –."

"– like a part of me was missing because I didn't know my birth sire. I get it. Aside from dredging up some painful memories, is there a point to all this?" I snapped then hung my head as what I said hit me. Dad and Grant had lost people close to them and knew the pain that memories of them could cause. Neither man would dredge up the past if it wasn't necessary.

"I knew when I married Claire that I could never replace your sire Luke. No one could ever fill that spot he left in your heart. I did what I could. As did Grant. But the Ben shaped hole is something that only he could fill. I know you don't want your daughter to go through life with a similar hole. Especially when her mother died such a short time ago."

I sighed as I looked at them both and shook my head. They were right. I couldn't do that to Tami. But that didn't mean I had to like the decision. My demon howled at the thought of not being able to protect its mate, and I didn't like the idea much either. "No, I don't. I can't seem to make my Mori understand that my mate is more than capable of looking after herself."