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“You won’t,” she told me, setting down her teacup.
Welp, I guess we were doing this.
“Okay, here’s the deal,” I told her. “I want you to know that I’m very happy with you and extremely pleased that you are a part of this court—”
“But?” She smiled gently.
“But. We need to talk about what happened on the drag.”
I thought back to how I’d felt, seeing her trapped against that dark mage’s chest. It reminded me of how I’d felt tonight, when I’d thought that creature had killed Caedmon—only worse. I wasn’t responsible for Caedmon.
Some dark mages had lured Rhea outside by pretending to be from her old coven, who had some girls who wanted to join my court. The ruse was one of the things that had prompted my visit today; I’d been thinking about it ever since. But, unfortunately, it hadn’t been a bunch of little girls waiting for Rhea. The Black Knights, as they liked to style themselves, had grabbed her to force me to give up a prisoner they wanted.
Elizabeth Warrender, or Lizzie, as she was better known, was the last of Agnes’ rogue acolytes left alive. I’d taken her captive after she tried to kill me, but I hadn’t kept her. I’d turned her over to the Circle’s hands for safekeeping, so I couldn’t have given the dark mages Lizzie even if I’d wanted to.
But they hadn’t known that, and wouldn’t have believed me if I’d told them. They’d been hopped up on stolen magic, almost drunk with it, manic and fuzzy-brained and eager to use the power buzzing in their veins. I wasn’t even sure that they wanted me to agree; they wanted a fight, and if I didn’t give them what they wanted, the first casualty was going to be Rhea.
I’d stood there, trying to formulate a plan to save her while battling a tide of unusually strong emotions. The tie between a Pythia and her court is strong, and right then, I’d wanted to rip the leader’s freaking head off. I’d wanted to feel his blood on my hands. I’d wanted to hear him scream in anguish as I—
“Cassie?” Rhea was looking seriously freaked-out now, so I made an effort to moderate whatever was on my face.
“I wanted to kill him,” I told her honestly. “That dark knight who grabbed you. I wanted to do a vamp thing and pull his heart out of his chest, or at least shift it out and watch him twitch and jerk and die. But he had you, and a couple hundred guys to back him up, and I was running on empty. I had to think it out, not fight, but I wanted him dead so damned bad.”
“You’re Pythia,” she told me, a little hoarsely. “You’re the head of your own coven. That’s what the Pythian Court is, whatever some may say. And a coven leader . . .” She stopped, swallowing. “The old title was Great Mother. It’s still used sometimes. It came into being as a result of the bond between coven members and their leader. At its best, it is like a family, and you feel that here.” She touched her breast.
And yes, I did. I had ever since they first came to me, all those bewildered, frightened little girls. They’d already lost one family when their gift caused them to be sent away from their homes for training, and then they’d lost another with Agnes’ death and the subsequent chaos it had brought to the court. They hadn’t known what to do or where to go, and bad men had been trying to kill them, and the very people supposed to be protecting them—the acolytes—had sided with their enemies!
The acolytes had fallen, one by one, as the gods used threats and promises of power and immortality to lure them away, while their Pythia lay dying, too weak to oppose them. The war had started a long time before the first shot had been fired, inside the Pythian Court itself. And Agnes had fought it, all alone.
Yet while she couldn’t save her acolytes, she had saved the court by locating me, a new successor far from the gods’ influence. One whose mother had been one of them, and who was therefore not so susceptible to their lies. She had thereafter died defending her court, as a Pythia should, her last act being to get rid of Myra, her former heir, buying me some much-needed time to grow into my office.
She’d been my hero for a long time, the shining example of what a Pythia should be. But, as I’d recently learned, she’d also been a flawed human woman who’d made mistakes. Maybe that was why I liked her so much: I could relate.
But Rhea didn’t seem to see it that way.
“My mother did not complete that bond,” she said quietly, looking at the picture on the mantel. “She wasn’t a coven witch, but it wouldn’t have mattered if she had been. She didn’t win her court as you did; it was gifted to her. A true coven bond requires blood, not that of others but of yours. Or at least the willingness to spill yours, to sacrifice everything, for the coven you represent. You did that! Not her!”
“Rhea—”
“I saw you that night,” she said, looking back at me, her voice shaking. “The night they came for the court, for the children. You held them off while we escaped. You had nothing left; you knew you didn’t. You’d die if you stayed, yet you stayed anyway! While I ran with the others, while I ran—”
“I told you to,” I said, because I didn’t know where all this had come from. “You couldn’t have helped me—”
She laughed suddenly, and it was bitter. “Oh, I know that! I knew it then. Like my mother, I could never—” She broke off, biting her lip, and then looked at me seriously. “I’m sorry for what happened on the drag. Another battle, and I was as useless as before—worse, because I didn’t listen to you. You told me not to do anything, to let you handle it, but I was so afraid—”
“It’s all right—”
“It’s not all right! I should have listened. You’re my Pythia, and I should have listened! Like I should have stayed with you in London; I should have stayed to help you get out.”
“There was nothing you could have done. And the demon council pulled me out.”
As much as they’d hated and feared my mother, who had decimated their population, hunting them for sport and for the power boost they gave her, they’d also realized that a new war was coming, and that I was the closest thing to a goddess they had left. And while that wasn’t really all that close at all, they’d proven to be remarkably pragmatic beings who would take what they could get.
So I’d been rescued at the last second, with a burning bolt of magical energy literally inches away from my face.
“But you didn’t know they would,” Rhea said vehemently. “You didn’t know they’d been watching you, and neither did I! Yet I ran . . .”
I stared at her. I’d never known that Rhea had been this bothered about that night in London. We’d won; the kids had gotten away, with the coven leaders and Rhea hurrying them from the building while I used what power I had left to slow down our attackers. It had been a close shave, but it had worked. I counted that as a victory.
