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Through every syllable, I order my sights not to veer from the confidence across the goddess’s face. If I flick even one glance to the area past her, where her sacred grimoire is carefully hidden under a leaf of the dining table, she’ll surely detect what I’m up to. Her certainty will matchmine: the knowledge I hold, deep and defining, that she must be kept apart from that book.
Another hateful wall I’m erecting against her—it’s the compilation ofherspells, after all—but my belief is as blinding as it is illogical. Maximus and I haven’t survived the last three weeks because oflogic. If anything, it’s been the exact opposite.
And it won’t be forever.
My soul repeats it to my needy heart, another two then four then six times. I believe it because I need to. Because I have to hope that I haven’t been wrong about the goddess all this time. That everything I sensed in her at the start, all her earnest peace and passionate integrity, weren’t just a sorceress’s sham.
That somehow, in some way, she’ll see that truth again.
For the sake of the realms.
For the hope of the life I’m bringing into this one… “Hecate?” I prompt again, helped by Maximus’s firm hold around my middle. In the space of those two seconds, I fall twice as in love with him as before. I never thought it possible, but just one vision of our baby’s hand, one day grabbing his outstretched pinky, and I’m emotional mincemeat.
Our baby.
As soon as the words slam my brain, I banish them—along with the urge to flatten a protective hand against my belly.
Hecate can’t know. Shewon’tknow. Certainly not by looking at you. Get it together, Kara.Keepit together.
“Oh, sweet one. The size of your heart…” The goddess flows her arms out as if inviting me over for a hug. “By all of Pan’s nymphs, it continues to dazzle me.”
I force myself to step over and into her embrace. It’s so tight and warm and authentic that I know—I know—not everything about her is a ruse.
Not everything. But not nothing either.
How do I tell it all apart?
How much of her affection, care, and pride have been real? And what part has been just her dazzling cover story? The façade for her real spell, beneath everything she’s done and said, from the beginning?
You’re a bridge now, Kara. The bridge between worlds. And so much more.
How much ofthatwas real? Because I believed her. All of it. Every serene syllable delivered from her magical aura atop the whitecaps on my family’s swimming pool.
But why not? Right or wrong, the statements themselves were true. For better or worse, Iama bridge. A crazy crossover of DNA that’ll probably open a lot of doors for her.
So which one of us is making the bigger mistake right now?
She sang the song, but I bought the melody and lyrics. The kindness and inclusiveness of her tone, which dug all the way into my spirit. I was so desperate for someone to just understand my confusion, to help me make sense of what had happened in Hades’s dark cage, that I believedherperformance from the start.
What part of it did she mean? Or was the whole thing just another pretty show, luring me into becoming her war machine headliner? And if that’s the case, what will she do with my child? Will my pregnancy buy us some time to thwart her plans, or fuel her ambitions in new and strange ways?
Suddenly, I don’twantto learn any of the answers. It’s all I can do not to shove her away with a scream. Instead, I maintain a calm but concerned stare while forcing a steady reply to my lips.
“Iremia,” I prompt once more. “Everything’s all right there? And everyone? Circe?”
The sorceress’s name is my selfish addition. Circe’s exceeded the boundaries of grace since we met, becoming a fast friend when Maximus and I stayed at the hidden witch enclave in Trabuco Canyon. In her hands, my insecurities and fears became gentle quips and uplifting atta-girls.
But most importantly—and alarmingly—she was a needed accomplice yesterday when Maximus and I had to sneak out of Iremia. She twisted the truth to Hecate so the two of us could make a clean getaway and race to Rerek’s house. Though Hecate eventually found out and all seemed okay between them, there’s no telling how the winds have changed since then. If so, would Hecate even be forthcoming about it?
“Circe is fine,” she swiftly stresses. “Probably catching up on the last few episodes ofHathaway Harboras we speak.”
I let my concern tighten into confusion. “Then why…andhow…did you…”
“My dear one.” She flows a hand up, fingers playing the air with balletic boldness. “I always know how to find my most precious treasures.”
I jolt. Not a lot, thankfully. But enough to scramble for a wobbly smile as a fast masquerade.
“Ummm…treasures? Like what?”
