The end always comes at a price. . . To save his cousin Claire, Nyx Fortuna was forced to release the goddess Hecate. Free and bent on destroying the world, Hecate will kill anyone that gets in her way. . . starting with every member of the Wyrd family. Now, Nyx and company must join forces with the Fates and fight to return Hecate to her underworld prison. Magical and mortals alike must take sides to survive, but no war is without its casualties. . .
Release date:
August 12, 2014
Publisher:
Orbit
Print pages:
294
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Mortality was overrated. I’d wanted to be able to die for over two hundred years, but when I finally did, someone had brought me back. Instead of facing death, I was tucked into bed in my apartment above the Eternity Road Pawn Shop. I wanted to know who and why, but first I had to stop throwing up.
I leaned over and heaved into a conveniently placed bucket.
“You’re awake,” Talbot observed. My best friend had dragged a chair from the living room and had apparently slept in it. Talbot didn’t look like his usual immaculate self. His auburn hair, normally tortured into submission with high-end hair products, was a jungle of tangled curls. There was a pungent odor in the room, a hint of unwashed body, but that was probably me. I resisted the urge to sniff my armpits.
“How long have I been out?” I felt like someone had beaten me with a bag of rusty nails. I was shivering, sweaty. The blue walls of my bedroom reassured me that I was safe, at least for the time being.
“Two days,” he answered flatly.
“Where’s my jacket?” The events of the past few days came flooding back. I’d made a deal with Hecate and she’d screwed me over, which was why I was in my current condition. It felt worse than any hangover I’d experienced.
I’d strangle Wren with my bare hands if she’d taken the jacket. Or my mother’s charms. My hand went to my neck, but the silver chain was still there. She’d taken what she needed, Hecate’s Eye, right before she stabbed me.
I felt more like myself once Talbot helped me slip on my World War II fighter pilot jacket.
“Any word on where Hecate is?”
He shook his head. “It’s been quiet. Too quiet.”
It had been forty-eight hours since I’d set Hecate free and she’d double-crossed me. In my defense, I had been desperate to save Willow.
“Willow?” I managed to ask. She’d been possessed by Hecate. Danvers had sacrificed his own wife as a vessel for the goddess he served. I was praying that she still needed her or the naiad would already be dead.
He shrugged helplessly.
“What about Naomi?” My cousin was the only person in the Wyrd family I cared about.
“She was safe, last I heard,” Talbot said. He was trying and failing to sound casual. He’d been in love with my cousin practically since they met. I’d thought she felt the same way.
To avoid my eyes, he crossed to the window and opened the shades. Late afternoon sunlight flooded the room and I put up my hand to shield my eyes.
He adjusted the shades so only a trickle of light shone through.
“Last you heard? What does that mean?” Dating a Fate couldn’t have been easy, but Talbot was devoted to my cousin. If they’d broken up, it was probably my fault.
Before Talbot could reply, Ambrose appeared in the doorway. He was a big man, with a wolfish grin that was noticeably absent. He looked grimmer than I’d ever seen him. “It’s started. We have to go.”
I nabbed a flask and filled it with a little of the green fairy. Ambrose and Talbot exchanged looks, but didn’t say anything. Strangers often didn’t realize the two of them were father and son, but their exasperated expressions were identical.
We headed out of downtown Minneapolis in the Eternity Road van. Ambrose gripped the steering wheel tightly as he drove.
He turned suddenly and a sign caught my eye.
“We’re going to a park?” I asked, but Ambrose didn’t comment.
Ambrose turned into a long driveway and parked in front of a sign that read PAN CONFERENCE CENTER.
“That means we’re here,” Ambrose announced, but he didn’t sound particularly happy about it.
“Emergency pawnshop retreat?” I joked, but it still hurt to breathe, so I avoided any more smart-assed comments.
He gave me a grave look. “Be prepared.”
Black flies buzzed above our heads as we walked. Another sign, this one reading ASPEN ROOM. I flinched when I remembered the naiad Hecate had killed in her attempt to escape the underworld.
The door to the Aspen room was ajar, letting out the putrid odors of decaying flesh, something like rotten eggs, congealed blood, and sour milk.
There was a long table in the center of the room and a fire burned in the stone fireplace. The rotten-egg smell was identified by the picnic lunch slowly spoiling in the summer heat. Against one wall, piled high like logs for a fire, were bodies. So many bodies.
There was a strange plonking noise. “Is it raining?” But the source of the sound was the large galvanized tub in one corner of the room. Something was hanging directly above the tub, fastened to the oak beam by a rope.
It was a forest nymph and blood and honey dripped from her body in equal parts. There was a low hum in my ears and I thought I might faint, but I realized it was the mournful sound of honeybees that had gathered around her broken body.
The walls dripped with blood and vomit and other substances I couldn’t identify. I tried not to gag as I surveyed the scene. It was something out of the nightmares I’d had as a child, stealing into my sleep. The sight of blood could bring me back to that time like nothing else. I battled the urge to flee.
Ambrose was stoic, but Talbot’s skin had a green cast. He rushed outside and then we heard the unmistakable sounds of his retching.
Tria Prima symbols were smeared onto the once white walls. Hecate’s own brand of graffiti.
“It looks like she took a bath in their blood,” I commented. I had set a monster loose upon the world.
“Bathing in the blood of her enemies was her trademark in the old days,” Ambrose replied. “Hecate draws power from it.”
“So she chose these people from the House of Zeus randomly?”
He shook his head. “Never randomly. She’s sending us a message.”
“I got the message when Wren stabbed me.”
“That was just a love tap compared to what Hecate has planned,” Talbot said from the doorway.
“What message, anyway?” I asked. “I don’t know any of these people. I’m not from this House.” Why had Hecate started here instead of attacking the House of Fates?
She thought she’d killed me, the sole member of the House of Fortune, but my aunts were still alive. At least I thought they were. The Fates had defeated Hecate once before, but they’d been at full-strength then. Long ago, the Fates took Hecate’s items of power and imprisoned her in the underworld. Hecate had never forgiven them.
We’d managed to determine that the victims were all members of the House of Zeus. Three brothers, the gods Poseidon, Hades, and Zeus, had divided the world into three. Poseidon had taken the sea, Zeus the sky, and Hades got stuck with the underworld. Eventually, the magical world divided into four Houses: the House of Zeus, the House of Poseidon, the House of Hades, and the one that everyone feared, the House of Fates, which was my family House.
“She’s declaring war on the world,” Ambrose said. “These are her first casualties.”
“Yeah, but why all the fuss?” I asked.
Talbot winced and then shot me a dirty look. “Show a little respect for the dead.”
“I meant, why hasn’t she let loose the full force of her power?”
Ambrose stared at me. “I think this is quite bad enough without asking for trouble,” he said.
“I think Hecate doesn’t have all her power back,” I explained.
“But she has the bead,” Talbot said.
The bead of power I’d practically handed to her on a fucking platter, because I’d been thinking with the wrong part of my anatomy.
“Then why hasn’t she released Willow?” I didn’t want to think about what Danvers would do to her once he’d recovered.
Ambrose looked at his shoes. He didn’t want to tell me Willow was most likely dead.
“She’s not dead,” I said. “She can’t be.”
Ambrose put a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s hope you’re right.”
“What should we do with the bodies?” Talbot asked.
“I’ll make a call,” Ambrose said. “The House will send someone to identify the victims.”
“The sooner we get out of here, the better,” Talbot said.
I agreed. It wasn’t a night to linger among the dead.
“Shh!” Ambrose put a finger to his lips. “I hear something.”
Silence. And then, a small moan.
“Someone’s alive,” Talbot said. “Over there.”
We ran toward the faint sound. A satyr lay on the ground, almost obscured beneath a pile of dead bodies. We pulled him out of his grisly prison. He had been blinded and blood still dripped from his mutilated eyes, but he was alive.
“Jesus,” Talbot exhaled.
“We should have checked,” I said.
“There were so many victims,” Ambrose replied.
I tried to do a healing spell, but the satyr shook his head. “First I must deliver a message to the son of Fortuna,” he said.
The message had already been received. Hecate had just declared war.
“I’m here,” I said.
“The world will burn and you will not be able to stop her,” he said before he passed out.
“Is he still breathing?” Talbot asked.
I checked. “Yes, but he needs more help than I can give him. We need Doc.”
“Doc won’t come,” Ambrose said, “but Trey is on his way.”
“Trey Marin?” I stiffened. Willow’s uncle had let her marry that psycho Danvers.
“I know you don’t like him,” Ambrose said. “But we have to get the Houses to unite if we have any chance of defeating Hecate.”
Trey was the head of the House of Poseidon, which meant I’d have to tolerate him.
I had assumed that getting the Houses to unite against Hecate would be the easy part. Apparently, I was wrong.
“That satyr is missing a limb,” he pointed out. “And half the bodies looked like something gnawed on them.”
“Or someone,” I said.
“Baxter?” Talbot suggested. “You think Hecate kidnapped him for this?”
“Baxter Lamos hasn’t harmed a living thing in over five hundred years,” Ambrose said.
“He may not have had a choice. Hecate can be very persuasive,” I said.
The blinded satyr died before Trey arrived. Willow’s uncle brought two assistants, who carried shovels. Trey’s sun-bleached hair held more gray than the last time I’d seen him. He still held himself with the precise posture of a soldier, but his blue eyes were weary.
“Still no sign of Baxter?” I asked him. The flesh eater had been Trey’s go-to guy for cleanups like this one.
He shook his head. “He’s probably dead by now,” he said flatly. “If Hecate took him, she did it for a reason.”
There was a copse of trees about a hundred yards from the conference center. We dragged the bodies there and started to work.
“Nyx, you should rest,” Ambrose said. “You’re bleeding again.”
Despite the warm summer night, I was shivering, but I refused to stop. “No rest until they’re all buried.”
“At least use a healing amulet,” Talbot said. “Here, try this.” He handed me a tiny blue crystal and watched me until I’d said the words.
“Can we get back to work now?”
He nodded and returned to digging.
When we finished burying the bodies, the sky was the color of clay. I stretched and yawned.
Trey held out a hand. “Good work tonight, Nyx.”
I didn’t take his hand. “My hands are bloody.”
“Mine, too,” he said. His hands were immaculate, but I understood his meaning. We both had blood on our hands.
“Ambrose, I’ll be in touch with the heads of the other Houses,” Trey said. “I am hoping we can work together to defeat the goddess.”
Funny, he didn’t sound very hopeful.
I fell asleep on the way back to Minneapolis, but my slumber was full of dark dreams, shadowy figures, and the sound of baying hounds.
I woke to catch the last bit of news on the radio. Dogs in animal shelters all over the county had chewed or clawed their paws bloody to get out of their pens.
“Hecate,” Ambrose said before he reached over and turned off the radio. Nobody said anything else the rest of the way home.
By the time we reached Eternity Road, I could barely hold my head up and the bandage at my throat was spotted with blood.
Talbot and his father lived in the other apartment above the pawnshop. Instead of going to his place across the hall, Talbot followed me home.
“I don’t need a babysitter,” I said.
But he was stubborn. “I’m not leaving you alone,” he said. “You almost died.”
I reached into the fridge for a couple of beers. “Suit yourself.”
I tried to hand him a bottle, but he waved it away. “One of us should stay sober.”
I was halfway through my first beer when there was a knock at the door. I reached for my athame.
“Who is it?” Talbot called out.
“It’s Doc.”
Talbot and I stared at each other. Doc, the mysterious man with the scarred face. He was the last person I expected. Talbot let him in and Doc skittered his way into my apartment.
It was summer, but he still wore his ratty trench coat. Doc spent a lot of time on the streets and the coat looked like he often used it as a blanket.
“How’s the patient?” Doc asked.
“As much of a pain in the ass as always,” Talbot said, but there was affection in his voice.
“He should be in bed,” Doc scolded.
“Will you two quit talking about me like I’m not even here?”
“You’ll never heal if you drink yourself silly,” he scolded.
I studied him. There was a little more salt and less pepper to his graying hair than when I first met him. The left side of his face was scarred, but he was still handsome. I didn’t see a resemblance. Deci had told me Doc was my father, right before I killed her, but it was possible she had lied. It was also possible she’d told me the truth.
“Doc, we need to talk.” I had a few hundred questions for him, but I’d settle for learning the most important one.
Talbot took a look at my face. “I just remembered, I need to ask my dad… something.” He left, but I was sure he’d be back to check on me.
Doc shifted uneasily, but stayed put.
“Are you a necromancer?”
Long pause. “Yes.”
“Are you the one who called me back from death?”
Another one. “Yes.”
“Are you my father?” I asked.
Long, uncomfortable pause this time. He looked at the door like he wanted to leap through it, but settled for the jittery tapping of his foot that was his constant habit.
“If you have to think about it, then I guess the answer is no.” Silence. “It isn’t a no?”
“Not much of a father, am I?”
“Honestly, no. At first, I thought Ambrose might be my father, but then I realized he was too decent to abandon us.” My mother’s words rang in my brain: “Please do not have any illusions about that man. Believe me, he would kill us as soon as help us.”
“You hoped it was Ambrose,” Doc said softly.
He was right. “Yes.”
“You had no suspicion I was your father?”
“Hell, no,” I answered him.
“I had no intention of ever telling you,” he replied.
“What changed your mind?”
“Your eyes,” he said. “They’re just like hers.”
“I know.”
“I had Fortune’s favor,” Doc said. “And I threw it away.” His habitual agitation grew worse. He touched his scarred cheek repeatedly as he stared at the door. He was going to bolt.
It was hard to believe we shared the same blood. The thought reminded me of something. Wren had taken some of my blood after she cut my throat.
“Any reason Hecate would want my blood?”
His gaze sharpened. “Why do you ask?”
“I just remembered that she had Danvers collect my blood after Wren… after Wren slit my throat.”
He frowned. “There is magic in your blood,” he said. “Stronger than most. You need to be careful.”
“You missed my childhood by a few hundred years,” I snapped. “So quit treating me like a child.”
“Then quit acting like one.”
Something in his face made me take a deep breath. My father was skittish at the best of times, and this was definitely not one of those times. He’d clam up if I pushed too hard. “I’m sorry. I spent the night burying Hecate’s latest victims,” I said.
“Death takes a toll on your soul,” he replied.
“Isn’t that what being a necromancer is all about? Death?”
“Exactly,” he said.
I went to the fridge and grabbed another beer. When I turned around, he was gone.
“I wish he’d quit doing that,” I muttered.
Talbot opened my front door a few minutes after Doc left. “Is it safe to come in?” he asked from the doorway.
“He’s gone,” I said.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“I know,” I said. “Want a beer?”
“Nyx, it’s breakfast time.”
“Breakfast of champions.” At his prissy look, I added, “I could use the company.”
We sat in the living room in silence for a few minutes, until the entire conversation I’d had with Doc poured out of me.
“That’s rough,” Talbot said when I finished. “Do you think Dad knew that Doc is your dad?”
“Yes.” Ambrose was Doc’s only friend.
“He is just chock-full of secrets,” Talbot said, but he didn’t elaborate and I didn’t ask.
I didn’t want to talk about my deadbeat dad any longer. “The Book of Fates is missing.”
“Maybe the Fates took it,” he said.
“It’s a possibility,” I replied. “They weren’t thrilled with the idea of me being the keeper of all the secrets, anyway.”
My head ached. Talbot was bug-eyed from lack of sleep. We were both too tired to think clearly.
“We should try to catch a few hours of sleep,” I said. I tossed him a blanket and retreated to my room.
I looked for the Book of Fates. It was supposed to hold all my aunts’ secrets, but it was gone.
The Book of Fates was the Custos’s responsibility. Deci had passed the title on to me when she died, but what happened when I died? I’d only been dead for a little while and I hadn’t transferred the book like Deci had transferred it to me.
Had Wren taken the Book of Fates, too? Or did Morta take it back into her icy bosom? I hadn’t wanted to be the Custos, but a peek at how they’d trapped Hecate would have been useful right now. She’d kill more people, unless I found a way to stop her.
I couldn’t sleep. The faces of the people I’d buried wouldn’t let me.
I awoke to the sound of Talbot banging on my bedroom door. “Nyx, I know you’re in there,” he yelled.
“I’m coming,” I said. I opened the door with a theatrical flourish. “Give me a minute.”
“Someone has to make sure you don’t drink yourself into a coma.”
I ignored him. I’d cut down on my drinking. Mostly.
“Let’s go to Hell’s Belles. There’s no food in my apartment and I’m starving,” I said.
“What you really mean is you’re out of absinthe.” There was a definite tone in his voice.
“. . .
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