“Tove told me about them. He said they’re very strong, but I’m not strong.” I remembered all the fights I’d been in throughout my illustrious school career, and how I’d taken a beating as often as I’d given one. “I’m not like that.”
“Some are physically strong, yes,” Elora clarified. “That Loki Staad, I believe, is very strong. If I recall correctly, he could lift a grand piano by the time he could walk.”
“Yeah, I can’t do that.”
“Oren isn’t that way. He is…” She trailed off, thinking. “You met him. How old do you think he is?”
“I don’t know.” I shrugged. “A few years younger than you, maybe.”
“When I married him, he was seventy-six, and that was twenty years ago,” Elora said.
“Whoa. What?” I stood up. “You’re telling me that he’s nearly a hundred? He’s over twice your age? So you look older, and he looks younger? How?”
“He’s something like immortal.”
“He’s immortal?” I gaped at her.
“No, Princess, I said he’s something like immortal,” Elora said carefully. “Oren ages, but at a much slower rate, and he heals very quickly. It’s hard for him to be hurt. He’s one of the last pure-blooded Vittra to be born.”
“That’s what makes me so special, and that’s why you weren’t worried when I told you that my host mother almost killed me.” I rested my hands on the back of the chair, supporting myself with it. “You think I’m like him.”
“The hope is that you’re like us both,” Elora said. “You’ll have the Trylle abilities to move and control things, and the Vittra abilities to heal and be strong enough to handle them.”
“Holy hell.” My hands trembled, and I sat down. “Now I know how a racehorse feels. I wasn’t conceived. I was bred.”
Elora bristled a bit at the accusation. “That’s not exactly how it was.”
“Really?” I looked over at her. “That’s why you married my father, wasn’t it? So you could make me—your perfect little biological weapon. Once you did, you left him and tried to keep me all for yourself. That’s what this whole feud is about now, isn’t it? Who can control me?”
“No, that’s not right.” Elora shook her head. “I married your father because I was eighteen and my parents told me to. Oren seemed kind at first, and everyone told me it was the only way we could stop the fighting. I could stop the bloodshed if I would only marry him, so I agreed to it.”
“What bloodshed?” I asked. “What were the Trylle and the Vittra fighting over?”
“The Vittra are dying. Their abilities are fading, they’re running out of money, and Oren’s always believed that he’s entitled to anything he wants.” Elora took a breath. “What he wanted was everything we had. Our wealth, our population.
“But what he wanted most was my power,” she went on. “My mother’s, originally. When she refused his advances, he waged endless battles against us. We used to be a great people with cities all over the world, but now he’s left us with a few isolated pockets.”
“And you married that? A man who killed your people because your mother wouldn’t have him?” I asked.
“They didn’t explain it all to me when we became engaged, but Oren agreed to peace in exchange for my hand in marriage,” Elora said. “My parents believed they didn’t have a choice, and Oren turned on the charm. He might not have telekinesis, but Oren can be very persuasive when he wants.”
“So you married him and united the people. What went wrong?” I asked.
“Some of the cities revolted, refusing to mix with the Vittra,” Elora said. “My parents were still King and Queen, and they wanted to reason with them. They sent Oren and me as ambassadors, to sway them to our way of thinking.
“In the very first city, people questioned us. Him in particular,” Elora continued. “He managed to charm them, and using some of my own persuasion, we convinced even the most ardent doubter to join the Vittra alliance. Later, this would prove to be a fatal mistake.
“I never loved Oren, but in the beginning of our marriage, I cared for him. I thought I might one day grow to love him. What I didn’t realize was how hard he had to work to be that way, and as we went on our tour, his mask began to slip.
“We stopped in a village in Canada, and we had a town hall meeting with all the Trylle, the way we had in the other cities.” Elora paused, staring out the window at the icy weather. “Everyone was there. Even the m?nsklig children, all the trackers and their families.
“Someone asked Oren what he hoped to gain from all this, and for some reason, it was more than Oren could bear.” She let out a deep breath and lowered her eyes. “He began yelling and attacking them, and the villagers began fighting back. So … Oren killed them all. We were the only two survivors.