"Why are you doing this?" I asked him finally, facing him directly. "Roger didn't do anything to you. Why did you knock him out then?"
Chitral didn't even blink, or look ashamed as he answered me. "He threatened you. I told you I'd revenge the person who took you away from me."
I didn't answer, afraid to tell him I was starting to doubt the fact that Chitral was my father. It just didn't fit. But I was scared he'd kill me if I told him that. After what I'd seen him do to Chitral, I was being very, very careful. For him as well as for me.
The guy was smarter than I'd put him for. "You are beginning to doubt aren' t you?" I refused to answer, and refused to look at him. "You are," he whispered, and I shuddered, hearing the note of anger in his unearthly voice. I suddenly realized I had got myself into very big trouble. Trouble I may not be able to get myself out of ...
Chitral's form shifted again, from the winged ape I remembered from Lioness Rampant to a ... human form, not very like Jon, Numair or even Roger. And amazingly it freaked me out, which was rather strange considering the winged ape form hadn't disturbed me in the least. I suppose I always thought Chitral was more suited to inhuman forms, not normal ones. Or however you put it.
"This form more pleasing?" he enquired and I gulped. He grinned savagely, and I knew the why few except Alanna had return alive from trying to retrieve the Dominion Jewel. Underneath that gentle facade I had a feeling Chitral was ruthless.
I slowly took a dtep back, and another ... and another, and he came after me all the time. "If I'm supposed to be your daughter, then you can't kill me," I said, thinking fast.
Chitral chuckled, and I cringed. "Do you really think you're my daughter?" I shook my head. "You're right, you're not."
"What happened?" I asked, sensing there was a story behind it, eager to bide time.
"Your real father, after he supposdly 'died', everyone thought it was over, once and for all. But what no one knew, was that he had a wife - and a daughter. A little girl with black hair and unusual violet eyes, quite like Alanna the Lioness. Now the woman loved her husband very much, she and her daughter were the few things he genuinely loved. But she was blind, refusing to accept that through his own foolish actions, had he died. And she certainly didn't want her daughter to grow up without her real father. So she came up with a plan.
"She decided to come to me. As a young girl she had heard stories that there were many more powers in my possession, including the power to bring people back from the Black God's realm. So, taking a huge risk, this woman went to the Roof of the World and battled her way towards my Pass.
"She didn't get there immediately, obviously. It took her many months to find my Pass, I certainly wasn't going to make it easy for her after all, not after Alanna. But she reached it eventually.
"She explained her circumstances to me and begged that I would return her husband to life. But I was a bit critical as bringing people back from the dead is quite difficult you understand. It might have taken me at least a week to recover from the loss of Power. So I demanded something in return.
"Now this woman wasn't particularly bright or quick-thinking like her husband had been, and she was *desperate* to get him back. I didn't want wealth, jewels or anything of the sort. I wanted an heir. So she gave me the only thing she had. She gave me her daughter.
"She gave me you.
"Now, obviously she regretted it as soon as she had given you to me, but there was no turning back. The deal was done, and I began to process. When he had died her husband hadn't left a body, so it was even worse as I had to recreate his body as well. But I did it. It took a while to find his soul I can tell you, he was right in the darkest parts of the Realm. And she got her wish. Her husband was back.
"I knew immediately the woma had made a very bad mistake when he bent down to kiss his daughter first, and then greeted his wife. And when they turned to walk away, he waited expectantly for their daughter to follow. And then his wife had to hesitantly explain to him what she had done. He wasn't very happy ... to be clean.
"At first he thought she was joking. And then when he realized she wasn't, he tried reasoning with me. I refused, saying the deal was done, it was either have their daughter back and he would die once more. I had played a winning card, and there was no way out. And then he got mad.
"He tried to argue with me, even tried to blast me with his Gift, but it didn't work and then I lost my temper, disappearing both myself and the little girl into a different part of my Pass. I don't know what happened to them then. But I do know what happened to you.
"I knew he would search for days to get you back, so I decided to send yo to a different world. But to mark you as mine, I decided to give you one of my powers - that's your Element Magic and Telekinesis, that mixed with the Gift you got from your father and the Wild Magic you got from your Mother.
"And then I sent you to a different world, the one you grew up in. I had decided that if I couldn't have you, no one in Tortall could. But there was one catch I hadn't realized, that when you turned seventeen, you would be sent back to Tortall. That crash was no accident you know. I knew immediately when you arrived back. Unfortunately so did your father.
"I knew I had to awaken your magics, so I sent that assassin in, knowing powerful emotions would awaken it. And then I sent myself in. And invented the story that Roger had taken you from me, killing your mother. But he was smarter than I'd taken him for, and followed you, trying to protect you from me. I couldn't let that happen. So here we are."
Chitral stopped for breath and helplessly I looked at him, unable to believe someone couldn't feel any remorse after doing something like that. Taking me away from my real parents and giving me such troublesome magics ... sending me to a different world, presumably forever.
My real parents ... Suddenly I grew dizzy. The world started to spin crazily and I had to plant my feet firmly in the ground to prevent myself from falling. My real parents ... suddenly it became plainly obvious who my real father was ... How could it have taken me so long to figue it out?
"Roger," I whispered. "Roger is my father."
Chitral nodded. "Bravo, took you long enough to figure out."
That was why there had been love in his eyes when he had looked at me. It hadn't been the love I'd imagined, but fatherly love, pride. That was why he'd become so reasonabe. And Chitral had said the two things he'd really loved had been his wife and daughter ... me. And no one had known Roger had had a wife, never mind a daughter... Suddenly it all fitted. The hatred had probably been just an act.
And then Chitral had crackling fire in his hands, nothing like the soft Gift so many Tortallans possessed and was aiming it at Roger. "What are you doing?!" I gasped. Amazingly I could still talk normally to a person who had ruined my life so much.
"Killing him," he replied calmly. "He's a threat to me my dear. So he must be disposed of."
