“Omira freaked out when she learned she was pregnant, and left him. She couldn’t handle the fear of having a hybrid baby and being responsible for the hatred that would follow it all of its life.”

Before he could stop himself, he laughed out loud at the most ridiculous lie he’d ever heard concocted. “Is that what she told you?”

“Yes,” she said between clenched teeth.

He couldn’t believe what a lying whore Omira had been. It disgusted him that she would tell such a myth to her family. “Do you know what Fain’s wedding present was for your sister?”

She shook her head.

“He was sterilized.”

Sumi froze at the last thing she’d expected to come out of his mouth. No. It wasn’t possible. She couldn’t breathe as she heard those three little words that carried a heavy significance. “What?”

“Yeah,” Dancer said bitterly. “He knew going into the marriage how terrified she was of being pregnant by him. So, for her, he had a vasectomy before they ever slept together.”

Her head spun over this little nugget. Omira had never said a word about that to her. “Are you sure?”

“Positive. I was the one who went with him for the surgery and I did my best to talk him out of it. He refused. The last thing he wanted was to hurt her. In any way. He told me that he didn’t care about kids. That they could adopt later if she changed her mind.”

No, no, no. None of this made sense. Dancer was wrong. He had to be.

There was no way Fain was sterile.

“But she was pregnant when she returned.”

“Yeah,” he breathed. “She was. By a human Fain almost beat to death when he came home early and found them in his bed together.” Bitterness and hatred flared in his eyes. “Fain gave up his name. His family. His military rank and future. His fertility. And Omira paid him back by betraying him in a way no one should ever know.”

Sumi sat down hard on the cold ground as those words hit her harder than a physical blow. Over and over, she played the events of Omira’s return in her mind. Strangely, what Hauk said made sense.

Complete sense.

It explained why Omira had been so terrified. Why she’d locked herself in her room and had refused to come out for days. A month later, Omira had aborted the baby and told her that Fain had wanted the child while she didn’t. That he would kill her if he learned what she’d done.

That had made sense to her at the time. But not Omira’s continued fear after their divorce.

But this…

This answered a lot of questions Sumi had always had about it. And Dancer was right. It was a wonder Fain hadn’t hunted her down for what she’d done to him.

Sumi would have.