ravaged hearts

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE,

  "Who said I didn't accept you?"

  Io raised her head. "You barely knew I existed."

  "Oh, I knew you existed." He stood up, rubbing his hands together and sighing. "It just hadn't seemed all that important to me back then. We were fighting a rebellion, dealing with so many things. A child didn't seem like something on the top of my priority list."

  Io just threw her head back and laughed. She didn't bother hiding the bitterness, the rage. He didn't deserve her sugarcoating. She'd been a mistake, an unwanted child. She knew that. He did not need to lie about it now. It wouldn't make her feel better, it would make her feel worse. She did not want to feel sympathy for this monster.

  "You didn't care. At all."

  "I didn't. I was twenty-six, girl, I was stupid."

  "We all use that excuse. I use that excuse all the time for what I did when I was eighteen. But you weren't some stupid teenager. I'm one year younger than you were then and I wouldn't have done half the shit you did."

  "Would you really?" He tilted his head. "You're not looking at things from my direction."

  "I don't think I want to look at your shit from your direction. Doesn't seem very wise, considering where you are standing now."

  "No one can change the fate of a dynasty," he replied calmly, slowly sitting down. He wasn't what she expected. She was expecting him to be a lot more... volatile. Unpredictable, cruel, ruthless. A cunning villain, not a... guilt-ridden father. "I made mistakes. Many mistakes. I freely admit it."

  "Admitting it now does nothing. It does not bring my mother, my innocent mother back to life."

  "She was not innocent. She was a spy. I had to dispose of her. I gave her opportunities to turn away from her life, you know, I gave her choices. But after a while you run out of them and you're left with nothing else to do. I was fond of her."

  "Not enough to spare her life."

  Silence as daughter's eye met father's. One full of hate, one full of sadness. Fucking bastard. Zi zuo nie bu ke huo. All of these were the consequences of his own actions. He should have seen this coming. If he hadn't, that was his problem not hers.

  Io continued, "Not enough to take her as your official concubine or consort even though it would have been perfectly accepted then."

  He lowered his head.

  "Not enough to recognise me as your legitimate daughter even though you knew perfectly well I existed."

  His eyes shut. Io's voice was trembling slightly as she spat out, "Not enough to care for me when you killed my mother right in front of my eyes."

  "You weren't supposed to be there that night."

  "Were you going to have me discover her corpse, then? Rather than see your agents take her life with my own eyes?"

  "You were never supposed to know."

   And that's when Io got it. And it sickened her to the very core. "You were just going to kill her and adopt me as your child, weren't you? You weren't even going to let me know how she died. Or if she died at all. Were you going to adopt me as your child, or did you just want me to be a yahuan at your fu?"

  "I was going to say you were the daughter of a late friend."

  "Why not just take my mother in as your concubine? Or admit I was your own child? I'd just be your xu nv. You were high rank enough I'd still have been a duolun gege. I'd have been treated with respect."