Then

True to her word, just days after their lunch at the diner, Lara brought Madeline's time in the House of Raith, as well as anyplace else, to an abrupt close.

She was awaiting Kevin when he returned home from cross country practice one evening. He thought he was alone, as his father usually didn't arrive from the sheriff's station until later, so it was a shock to walk into the kitchen and find Lara standing there, her sleek white business suit a sharp contrast to the rustic decor of their hunting cabin-style home. She was leaning against the marble counter, polishing one of her kukri knifes, as if she were a member of the household rather than an intruder.

"Lara!" Kevin exclaimed, thrown by her unexpected appearance. Instantly, unease ebbed through him, and he studied her warily. "What are you doing here?"

"Besides proving that the security at your home is in dire need of improvement, you mean?" Lara cast him an unimpressed glance, then pointed with the kukri at a tufted satin box that sat on the table. "I couldn't help but recall your interest in meeting your mother, and thus I decided to bring you something of hers."

A note in her voice put Kevin on edge, and he hesitated as he glanced at the box. An awful feeling was washing over him at Lara's uncharacteristic behavior.

"Go ahead." There was a tinge of viciousness in Lara's smile. "Open it."

Dread coiling in his stomach, Kevin approached the box cautiously, and slowly lifted its lid, his mind spinning with suspicions in regards to the possible contents. And when he looked down at the inside, a moment passed before he realized exactly what he was looking at: a woman's decapitated head.

Sickened, Kevin fumbled to put the lid back in place and turned to face Lara.

"Why?" he rasped.

Lara's features were perfectly relaxed, but her eyes were flinty. "Madeline sold out her family for her own gain. Truthfully, I'd predicted long ago that she would eventually betray us. With her lack of foresight or even intelligence, it was almost inevitable, so I planned her death accordingly."

Kevin could not speak; even if he'd had something to say, he seemed to have temporarily lost the ability to move his mouth. His hands were trembling, leading him to fold his arms over his chest in an attempt to give himself some support.

Lara gestured carelessly toward to the box. "Either consider it a warning or think of it as a blessing to know how highly I value the safety of the Raiths. But know this: I do not take kindly to those who would try to deceive me or put my family at risk. Your mother didn't consider the consequences of challenging me, and she suffered dearly for it." She fixed him with an unblinking stare, her eyes wide grey pools that seemed to pull him toward her. "Don't repeat her mistakes, Kevin."

"He won't," a new voice cut, and Kevin whirled around to find that his father had joined them.

Tom Keller meet Lara's gaze readily, looking at her with evident dislike. Without breaking eye contact, he grabbed the satin box off the table and roughly thrust it at her.

"Good of you to drop by, Lara," he said, his tone holding all the warmth of a nuclear winter. "But I'm going to cut this visit short."

As Kevin watched, Lara very briefly flinched when her fingers brushed against his father's to accept the box. The reaction occurred so quickly Kevin might not have noticed it if he hadn't been looking. But it was there, and as Lara swiftly slid her hand away from his father's Kevin thought he caught sight of blistering flesh.

"Let me walk you to your car," Tom said to her, and then turned to Kevin, his voice softening. "You stay here."

Lara let herself be escorted out by Tom, complying like cat that knew it could come back to kill the canary later. Kevin did as instructed and focused on making dinner for the next half hour until his father returned. The image of his mother's head in the box insistently flashed through his mind, but he kept trying to push it away and continue his normal routine.

He greeted Tom at the door with a cold beer, and returned to chopping vegetables as his father wordlessly walked to the stove and took over the dinner preparations there.

"I'm sorry," Tom said quietly, turning to look at Kevin. "I shouldn't have allowed her to become part of your life. But once your mother found you, I thought you could use all the protection you could get, so when Lara volunteered to teach you, I accepted." He sighed. "I knew Lara had her own angle, but I considered it worth the risks of engaging with the rest of the White Court in exchange for you understanding what you are. But I was a fool."

Without hesitation, Kevin crossed over to embrace his father, wrapping his arms around the solid, familiar figure.

"It's all right," he said sincerely, wanting to comfort the one person who had always cared for him. "I know you've been doing all that you can to help me."

For several minutes, he just clung to his father before asking, "Just before you left, what went on between you and Lara? I saw something happen to her fingers when she touched you."

Tom frowned. "Lara never told you?"

Kevin shook his head, puzzled.

"Each of family of the White Court has a weakness that's the opposite of whatever emotion that feeds them." Tom explained. "House Malvora feeds off of fear, so their weakness is true courage. House Skavis lives off of despair, so they're wounded by hope. And House Raith feeds from intimacy, so the touch of love burns their skin."

"Love?" Kevin repeated, remembering how Lara had only touched him once and then had moved away as quickly as possible. "But I'm not in love with anyone, and she still got hurt." He looked at his father. "Same thing with you."

Tom smiled softly. "It's not just romantic love that hurts them. Raiths are also vulnerable to love between friends or family as long as the love is both wholeheartedly given and returned."

His meaning dawned on Kevin, and he looked fondly at his father. "So, you're protecting me, then? That's why my skin burns her?"

"We're protecting each other, kiddo," Tom said, ruffling his hair. "It wouldn't work if it were one-sided."

"Wait a minute." Kevin recalled how Lara had presented him with the wedding ring during their lunch at Pop Tate's. "Lara had me hold this wedding ring one time. It didn't hurt me, but I think she expected it to."

Tom paused for several moments, and while Kevin saw the victory in his gaze, there was also something else he couldn't quite read.

"When you were born, I had hoped you would take after me rather than your mother," Tom said at last. "And when your Hunger surfaced, I thought those hopes were in vain. But now . . ." he looked at Kevin contemplatively. "I wonder if your inheritance from me somehow outweighs the weaknesses of the Raiths."

"You've never told me about what you are," Kevin prompted him gently.

"That's for another time," Tom replied, finishing with the saucepan he was stirring. "But keep in mind that the Raiths' aversion to love isn't just a physical weakness. It's an oversight that causes them to view mortals as nothing but pawns. If you can see past that idea, if you value mortals and the friendships you have with them, you'll have an advantage the rest of the Raiths never will."