Page 162 of Revels on an Angel’s Grave

A medley of fog consumed them, spiraling thicker into the sky with each oil she passed. Luckily, the later it got, the more Starsearchers expected to see recreational clouds of incense blooming across the city. No one would think anything of them.

Emmeline inhaled. The new concoction mixed with the countless, strong incense blends they’d lit around the vineyards. All her Fates screamed, the vastly different readings they communicated to all the Starsearchers in attendance blending.

Be careful tapping into more than one Fate at a time, her mother’s voice warned from twenty years ago. They are volatile and competitive. When combined, their strength is unmatched.

“Sorry, Mother,” Emmeline whispered, her heart still stuck on the broken stare in Roremar’s eyes.

And she fell into the Fates.

Star’s Reign

Fire floods the Skulls of Deadlands

Gold paints the purple skies

Star’s Ruin

Two hearts staked through with malice

A sacrifice proclaimed by the balance

The voices slammed into Emmeline as if she was the center of the universe, the point at which all stars and beings orbited. As if she was a goddess herself, a commander of Angels and Fates in a tunnel of starfire.

And now for all revenge rejoice

Prophecy dictates a promised choice

Emmeline employed the tactics of joint readings she’d researched, mentally reaching out for Desmond and Myrella first, latching on to their unique Fate ties as they ebbed through the air around her. Desmond’s, a flaming, gold-tipped streak of sky. Myrella’s, a calm and peaceful ripple, as it had been in the pottery studio.

Him to fall

Her to bleed

Fortunes sped every which way, shooting to Starsearchers all around the vineyards.

In a typical joint reading, she would only have to let the session occur with those she was reading with—as she and Desmond had—but they were trying to manipulate this one. To crack open windows to the Fates through their combined power. To force the answers that had been blocked to the surface.

She envisioned each fortune as a rope of starlight and wrapped them around her fist, gripping tight to the words of the Fates so she could make sense of them while the deluge they’d caused with their incense rained upon the city, unbeknownst to anyone but them. Even Desmond and Myrella wouldn’t see it—not as strongly as she did.

Cross with bloodied footsteps faring

And somewhere beyond the veil

Spins an utter star-crossed tale

To tempt the Fates and realms have wrest

Touch of Realmspinners and Angelblessed

These words—she’d heard so many of them before. The same phrases, jotted down in her journal. She tucked each away in her memory to make sense of later.

Realmspinners, one of the Fates cheered again and again, hungrier with each word, like they were lunging out to something nearby, but Emmeline didn’t know what the cult had to do with this.

Somewhere, glass shattered.

Faces flickered in the haze of starfire surrounding this plane, all the Starsearchers tapping into the joint reading filtering in and out.

Desmond and Myrella materialized beside her, determination clear in their awestruck expressions as magic swirled around her. Ebbed into her like it had flowed from Valyrie and into her Fates all those centuries ago.