“She’s not my friend,” I was quick to correct her. “She’s my sister.”
Easy to picture Josie flinging herself at a stranger out of gratitude.
Harder to picture this woman slicing open a finger and receiving the equivalent of two blue lines.
“Ah.” She appeared to think about it. “Vi mentioned you had adoptive siblings. I didn’t realize I had met them.” She tucked her hands between her knees again, linking her fingers until her weathered knuckles turned white. “I expected screaming, yelling, accusations. Something. I mean, obviously, you knew you had a mother even if I didn’t know I had a daughter.” She watched me like I was a land mine she was in danger of triggering. “Do you, uh, have any questions for me?”
“Josie, Matty, and I made a promise when we were kids not to look for our parents.” I offered her the unvarnished truth of us. “They dumped us, and they never looked back, so we vowed to forget them too.”
“I don’t blame you. Any of you. I would have done the same.”
“We were kids on our own, no one to depend on but each other. We did whatever it took to survive.”
“Did Ithas mention whether you had siblings?” She clasped and unclasped her hands, clearly uneasy with the segue after discussing my chosen family. “Bio ones?”
“He mentioned others had come before me,” I said slowly, hating to break it to her. “He’s worked up to me, the current protype, for centuries. I’m not sure if any of your other eggs were used, or if I’m the first, and he’s holding the rest in reserve.”
A slow, raspy exhale parted her lips, and Lucia shook her head as if that was the answer she expected but wished otherwise before snagging on me. “What do you mean by prototype?”
“Anunit was the last of the Alcheyvaha, the divine beasts.” I noted her surprise and was relieved she had never been sent to steal them. “Ithas took a piece of bone from her daughter’s skeleton and fused it to mine using osteokinesis. That was why he wanted your eggs, I’m sure. Your shifter genes, in addition to your fae and necromancer heritage, made you genetically malleable. He was able to splice in his DNA, add the bone, and create a key to access the power of the dead gods. He calls me a success. I take that to mean the ones before me failed in some way that convinced him it was easier to scrap them and start over. I’m the latest in a long line of experiments, all of us inheriting the same bone to test us. I’m just the first to actually pass.”
“Vi mentioned you’re the guardian of the Alcheyvaha.” She cut her eyes toward me. “Their bones are worth a fortune, but no one seems to know where to find them.”
Ah.
That made more sense. I was relieved she came right out with it instead of hiding her interest. Her earlier expression hadn’t been confusion but reflected shock at my intimate connection to the long-dead gods.
“I am their guardian,” I warned her, memories of Ithas’s articulated horrors too fresh for me to soften my tone. “I will defend them no matter the cost. That’s the bargain. If you’re wondering, I’ll tell you now no amount of mother/daughter bonding will earn you a trip to the burial grounds.”
“I don’t know anything about motherhood, but even I know you don’t extort your kids.”
“I figured you would portal away as soon as my feet hit the pavement outside, so thanks for sharing your story with me.” I couldn’t think of a delicate way to ask, so I blurted out, “When do you leave?”
“That depends on you.” Her lips curved. “Don’t panic.” She huffed a laugh. “I’m not going to force you to do any of that dreaded mother/daughter bonding.” She smacked her palms flat on her thighs, forcing herself still for once. “I want a shot at your father.”
“Okay.” I wet my lips. “What kind of shot are we talking about?”
“If I thought it would work, two right between the eyes.”
My to-do list of pending divine murders was growing longer by the day.
“I doubt that would do the trick, but you’re welcome to try.” I twisted my fingers on my lap, aware I was championing patricide right on the heels of meeting my father. “He’scommitted atrocities, and he should be stopped. I just don’t know how to do that.” I raised my eyebrows. “Do you?”
The one weapon that might have helped—Dinorah—would be worthless against him with his immunity.
“He’s a Titan, which makes him harder to kill than the average god, but I’ve collected a few relics over the years with provenance that might get the job done. If those fail, and he truly can’t be killed, I’ll have to settle for the next best thing. The Spear of Thebes.”
“I’m not familiar with it.”
“Plunge it into his heart, and he’ll be paralyzed until it’s removed.” Her smile turned deadly. “But only by the same person who skewered him in the first place. Needless to say, if I stick that giant pig, I won’t let him go no matter how loud he or his kin squeal for his release.”
“The other gods would hunt you.”
“Not if they can’t find him to verify he’s dead or who killed him.”
“You’re going to stash his body somewhere in Abaddon?”
“Hell, no. They’d find him in minutes. There’s too much power down there. He needs to be somewhere I can keep him weak, and that means this world, where the possibilities are endless. I could portal him to the moon. But humans are weirdly obsessed with it. Always mucking around craters in their tinfoil suits. All I need is for one to find him and bring him back here. The news coverage would make it impossible to conceal the truth of what I had done.”
