Gregori located the Fates in the ruins of Ephesus near the Temple of Artemis, or as the Romans called it, The Temple of Diana. It appeared they preferred to remain in the city they once called home. They were even older than him and that was saying something. Perhaps they’d existed since the birth of time itself?
He was an immortal. Born, not made. Very few came into the world as he had done. He was ancient in years compared to those he had associated with before being cast in jade. Even so, he was but a mere toddler to these three women who played with his life so carelessly.
As if she wasn’t tall enough, Fate One, a pale woman with long hair and indistinguishable features apart from her long imperious nose looked down at him from her marble pedestal. “All is as it should be.”
“What kind of inane comment is that?”
Fate Two joined the fray, also perched upon her own pedestal. “We are never wrong.”
Fate Three floated down to his level. He felt her aura push against his own and the sudden rush of color in it shocked him to the core. Red. A dull, pulsating red with a hint of black. He tamed his tendrils of anger, soothed it back to a brilliant gold and he was satisfied to see Fate Three raise a hand to shield her eyes from his radiance. He smiled even though he still reeled inwardly from discovering his auric shield was not as strong as he had thought.
“You are right to shield yourself from my brilliance.” An arrogant comment, but it was true. His aura was the brightest of anyone in Marylebone. He was the strongest, oldest and most powerful. There was no one who could best him.
“And that,” Fate One told him and he realized all three Fates were in his head at the same time and could hear his thoughts, “is why the Bells were tolled for you. We have no control over your magic. Only what must be done in order to control you.”
“Then tell me how I may break down the barriers Alanna has erected around her mind and her heart?”
There was silence. Fate One turned to Fate Two and Three. He knew they communicated. His patience wore thin. It would be mid-afternoon at least in Raven’s Creek. Surely, Alanna would be awake by now.
Fate One turned to him. “We can tell you … ”
Fate Two continued, “ … just as a sculptor chips away at stone, you must chip your way in to her heart. Search carefully. There is a way in.”
“What way? Where?”
“That is for you to discover. We will not interfere.”
“Then why did you toll the Bells of Marylebone so early for me?”
“You already know the answer. Everything happens for a reason.” All three Fates whispered the words eerily in unison and before he could question them further, they faded away, leaving him standing in the ruins alone.
His skin crawled as the eerie sounds of unseen ghosts and spirits reached his ears. He felt them swirling about him, poking and prodding, as if testing for weaknesses, for a way out of their realm and into his.
Even Warlocks were spooked sometimes. He was out of there between one blink of an eye and the next.