The boy remained silent, staring at Maxwell.
"I'm your father, and you're my son, and that's how it's going to be, forever. I love you like I've never loved anyone else in my life, and I'd take a bullet for you, but I'm not the one who planted your little seed in your mother's belly... You're the most like me of all my children, you obey the same sense of morality as I do, and we're very similar in character, we have the same blood, too, but..."
"But my daddy, it's Uncle Adam." The boy finished without surprise, when he saw that his father was struggling to finish the sentence.
"You don't seem upset." Anna said, arching her eyebrow suspiciously.
"I already know that, it's been a long time. But I agreed with Uncle Adam that I wouldn't call him Dad, so as not to hurt my father."
Maxwell and Anna exchanged a look, before turning to Ian.
"And that's fine with you? Is there anything you want to say about that? Do you have any doubts?" Maxwell asked, disguising his anger at Adam. But then, realizing that Adam would only hear Ian call him father if he told him the truth himself, he forgave his brother. It was as if he had freed Ian to stop acting in a theater.
"I'm happy to have two dads, who I love, and who love me, and who I can always count on. Not everyone is that lucky."
Anna smiled.
"Yes. You're the luckiest little boy in the world." Anna said, standing up, and Maxwell stood up too.
Ian looked to the side where the brothers came jumping out.
"I want my brothers to know about this. Will I be able to tell them? They'll be so jealous!"
Maxwell ruffled Ian's hair with a smile.
"Yes, my son. They're waiting for their grandmothers in the garden for ice cream. Why don't you go with them?"
Ian didn't answer and ran off.
Anna and Maxwell followed him to the living room window as Ian went after his siblings. They hugged each other and stared out of the open window at the children running and playing in the garden. Maxwell's mother and Anna's father no longer lived with them, and the landscape they saw in front of them was the family scene that both Anna and Maxwell had always dreamed of seeing and experiencing. It was the perfect picture of a perfect family.
Maxwell's mothers arrived and the children got into the cars and drove off. Anna turned away from Maxwell and stared at him.
"We need to establish routines for our children. Routines, obligations and rules. I want them to be good men."
"They will be. What do you propose?"
"I don't know yet. We... We'll have to sort it out when I get back."
"Come back from where?"
"I'm going to Avallon. I feel like I need to go to that place."
"I understand, but before you make too many plans about it, I'd ask you to talk to Jasmine first."
"Jasmine will tell me things I don't want to hear."
"You can't live in denial, Anna. Why do you reject your vampire side so much?"
"I... I'm sorry, Max, but I'm still having trouble accepting that I'm a monster!"
"You've always been a monster, Anna. What you did to Sarah is not something a person with intact humanity would do." Max said sternly.
Anna knew he was right.
"Why don't you tell me what I need to know about vampires?"
Maxwell looked away.
"Because I'm a coward, Anna. I don't want to see the contempt in your eyes."
"I'll never despise you, Max."
"I'll know that after you've learned all about vampires."
"Call your mother, Max. I'll listen to what she has to say."
"I don't need to call her, Anna."
She looked at him, understanding everything.
"Can you communicate by telepathy, like Adam does with werewolves?"
"Yes. We're different monsters, Anna. But we have many similarities in terms of what we can do, and what can kill us."
Anna thought for a few moments.
"Can't I reverse the vampire blood inside me?"
Maxwell looked grim.
"Yes. You're a Bruma. You have the power to remove all traces of vampire from within you, but you'll remove the benefits it brought, too."
"When you talk about the benefits..."
"Life."
Anna took a step back. How important was her life to herself? She had already made sure that the Mists didn't die out, because she had Tayme. Maxwell and Adam would take care of her children, they were good men when it came to children. Why cling to a life where she would probably still do a lot of bad things? She could feel the thirst inside her. And it was bothering her, because she couldn't think straight, her thoughts always taking her to the memory of the trickle of blood on the nurse's neck. If she died, that thirst would end.
Maxwell looked at her, without Anna realizing it, reading all her thoughts and waited patiently. Her reaction was normal. But every vampire was happy with his condition. He expected the barrage of questions that everyone asked after discovering his new condition, but she only asked something. Something he didn't read in her thoughts, and that's why it surprised him so much.
"Is the nurse still in the car?"
Maxwell looked at her suspiciously and read her mind.
'I need to quench my thirst so I can think straight.
He smiled.
"No, Anna. But you can choose one of the maids."
"Do I have to kill her afterwards?"
Maxwell looked into Anna's eyes. She didn't really care about her victim's life. She was just trying to make herself feel better.
"No, Anna. You don't have to kill, but..."
Maxwell felt only the wind and Anna was gone. He closed his eyes and heard the wail of one of the cooks as Anna sucked his blood.
He smiled, and reaching into his trouser pockets, he made his way to where they were. Not being a monster was no longer an option in his Anna's life.