Talbot had managed to set up a meeting with my aunts, but only because they’d heard about the slaughter. Morta probably wanted to spit at me, too.
“Will Naomi be there?”
“She’s still pretty pissed,” he replied.
“Deci was evil, working with Danvers, and possibly even Hecate, and Naomi’s mad that I killed her?”
“Evil or not, she was still her aunt.” Couldn’t argue with that.
The meeting was set to take place at Hell’s Belles at midnight. Not exactly neutral territory, since I’d found out that the Fates owned it. But they owned half of Minneapolis, so I couldn’t really complain. And the food was fantastic.
“Are you coming with me?” I asked.
“Nope,” Talbot replied. “Family only or no meeting. Fates’ orders.”
I snorted. “Some family.”
“It’s the only one you have.”
“I miss her, you know.” Naomi was the only member of my family I wanted to claim.
“I miss her, too,” Talbot replied.
“She’s talking to you at least,” I replied glumly. “And she didn’t break up with you.” The “yet” hung unspoken in the air.
“Nyx,” Talbot said, “you know they might try to kill you.”
“And now they can,” I said. After over two hundred years, I was no longer immortal, which took some getting used to. You’d think my aunts would stop snipping threads of fate, since we were trying to save the world, but you’d be wrong. Morta’s scissors were busier than ever.
He was right. I could be walking into a trap, but I needed to convince my aunts we should join forces, at least long enough to stop Hecate.
I decided to get there early. The restaurant was empty, except for Bernie and a stranger who sat at my favorite booth. Her back was to the entrance, and she didn’t even look up when I entered.
She had long dark hair, which she’d shoved up into a messy bun and secured with a pair of takeout chopsticks. She wore jeans and a tee and a pile of textbooks were spread out in front of her. I dismissed her as a grad student looking for a quiet place to study.
I sat in the booth next to her, but facing the door. Bernie took my order, the blue plate special, and then stood there like she wanted to say something. The grad student held up an empty mug and Bernie left to fill it.
I waited, but the Fates didn’t show up. They were probably still too angry to talk to me, Or it was a setup.
Bernie set my order in front of me and the delicious aroma of chicken and biscuits wafted up. Hell’s Belles made the best food in town. At least my last meal would be a delicious one.
“It’s nice to see a murderer with a hearty appetite,” the grad student said.
I stopped mid-chew. “What did you say?”
“You’re a murderer.”
Before I could react, she was practically on top of me. She whipped out one of the chopsticks, which, I realized too late, made a handy weapon. She held it to my throat. “You killed my mother.”
The stranger’s glare now made sense. I’d only ever killed one woman, and that was my aunt Deci. I was looking at Deci’s absent daughter, a pissed-off Fate-in-training.
I matched her stare. “She deserved it.”
Our face-off was interrupted by my aunt. “Rebecca, I see you’ve met Nyx,” Morta said. “Take a seat.” Rebecca’s chopstick pressed tighter against my throat. “You can try to kill him later,” Morta snapped. “Right now we have bigger problems.”
The pressure against my throat lessened, but my neck still throbbed. Rebecca wanted to kill me, but hadn’t. Why?
The entire Wyrd clan had arrived while I was occupied with Rebecca—my two aunts, the remaining Fates, and Fates-in-training Claire and Naomi. There were always three of them—always exceptionally powerful, always female, and always from our bloodline. The Fates were not immortal. Every few hundred years, the old Fate would step down and her daughter would take her place.
They were down to two Fates, which was why they’d sent for the black sheep, Rebecca. One of the Fates-in-training would have to join the big leagues. I studied my three cousins. Which one would it be?
They took seats at a neutral table and Rebecca and I grabbed our stuff and moved to opposite ends. Morta gave Bernie a curt nod and Bernie turned the OPEN sign to CLOSED and dimmed the lights.
I tried to give Naomi a hug, but she stiff-armed me. Rebecca didn’t even try to stifle her snicker.
“What happened to your arm?” Nona asked.
“Something bit it,” I replied blandly.
“It’s a wonder you have any blood left,” Naomi said. It was the first time she’d spoken to me since she’d arrived.
I smiled at her, but she looked away.
While the rest of the family exchanged pleasantries, I was stuck on Rebecca’s appearance.
“You don’t look anything like Deci,” I said casually. Before she’d died, Deci had mentioned the loss of a child. I’d thought she’d meant her child had died, but after meeting Rebecca, I realized it was a different kind of loss.
Everyone at the table fell silent.
“Don’t be an ass, Nyx,” Naomi said.
“I’m told I resemble my father,” Rebecca said through gritted teeth.
Another long pause. What was the big deal?
“No one ever talks about you,” I continued to charm her. Her gaze turned to acid.
“Rebecca is the oldest child in the Fates’ line,” Morta said. “She’s been away.”
“Except for me,” I said cockily. “Technically, I’m the oldest.”
Morta’s slow headshake took a while to sink in.
I looked closer at Rebecca. “There’s no way. You’re older than me?”
“Apparently, smarter, too,” she said snidely.
“What?”
“What everyone is tiptoeing around,” she said, slowly, like she was speaking to a not–particularly bright child, “is that we’re siblings.”
“Siblings?” I had a sister? I was gaping like a trout. My family closet was full of secrets, and I never knew when another one would come spilling out.
“Half siblings,” she emphasized.
“But we’re cousins.”
“That, too.” She waited several beats for it to sink in. “Yes, our father was doin’ sisters.”
“Rebecca, language,” Morta rebuked.
“Ever met him?” I asked.
Rebecca shook her head. “Never wanted to.”
“Your mother didn’t handle rejection well, which is why half of his face is melted off.”
“He probably deserved it,” she snarled.
Couldn’t argue with that. “So where have you been?” I asked, but the other part of my brain was still grappling with the fact that I had a sister. One about as friendly as a feral cat, but still a sister.
For some reason, the question upset everyone at the table. “Why do you ask?” Rebecca replied.
“Why all the mystery?” I asked. “What did you do? Embezzle company funds? Murder someone?”
There was a long silence. I stared at Rebecca in awe. “You stole money from the Fates? You are your mother’s daughter.”
“You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,” she snarled.
“Children, quit quarreling or I’ll send you to bed without any supper,” Nona said.
There was an unmistakable note of amusement in her voice. I’d been so busy exchanging barbs with Rebecca that I hadn’t noticed my aunt watching us closely.
I snuck looks at my sister when I didn’t think she was looking. Had my mother known about her?
“Give me a reason I shouldn’t kill him,” Rebecca said.
“He is your brother.”
Her expression didn’t change. “So?”
“He’s the Custos,” Naomi blurted out.
If anything, the news made Rebecca angrier. “I was supposed to be the Custos.”
“You weren’t around,” I said. “So Deci gave the Book of Fates to me.” I wasn’t going to admit I didn’t have the Book of Fates any longer.
She sneered. “You must have made her.”
“Rebecca, you know it doesn’t work like that,” Nona rebuked her gently.
Morta cleared her throat. “Technically, Nyx is no longer the Custos.”
I glared at her. “Is that why the Book of Fates is missing?”
“It’s not missing,” Claire said. “I have it.” She flipped her blond hair triumphantly.
“You have it? But I thought there had to be some formal ceremony or something. Isn’t that why Deci was willing to hand it over to me? Because she had no other choice?”
“We are Fates,” Morta replied. “We always have other choices.”
“My mother was doing you a favor,” Rebecca said. “Being the Custos is an honor.”
Being the Custos sucked, so why was I pissed that Claire had taken over? Maybe because it had made me feel like part of the family. The thought sickened me. Had I forgotten what this family had done to my mother?
“Your mother was evil,” I said.
“Because she tried to kill you?”
“No, because she was working with a necromancer to free Hecate,” I said. “And dabbling in dark magic.” And she killed her own sister, my mother, Lady Fortuna.
“She wouldn’t do that,” Rebecca said.
“She did.”
My sister looked at her aunts for confirmation. After a long moment, Morta nodded. Rebecca’s eyes welled with tears of sadness or maybe anger, but she shook them away. “You didn’t have to kill her,” she said in a whisper.
“I did.” I wasn’t winning any points in the good brother category, but I wasn’t going to sit there and pretend Deci was a saint just because she was dead. Just because I’d killed her.
“So what now?” Rebecca asked, after she got her emotions back into check. “What am I supposed to do?”
“Rebecca, you will be trained as the Atropos,” Morta said crisply.
“What’s an Atropos?” I asked.
Rebecca gave me a scornful look and then made a scissoring motion with her hands.
“You get to be a mini-Morta,” I said sarcastically. “Murdering friends and family alike.”
“You really don’t get the Fates at all,” Claire said. “It’s not murder. Someone has to do it. The Atropos is called and must obey.”
“Enough quarreling,” Nona said. She stared at me. “It is done. Nyx has fulfilled the prophecy.” He, born of Fortune, shall let loose the barking dogs as the Fates fall and Hecate shall rise.
“And?”
“And now we have to fix it,” she replied. “That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” I said. It still hurt to talk, and my sister’s chopstick hadn’t helped. I put a hand up to my throat.
“But what about the rules?” Rebecca said. “He shouldn’t even be alive.”
“Screw the rules,” the normally elegant Morta said. “We are at war. We need him. We will settle all debts after it’s over.”
My sister’s stare let me know she planned to collect her debts: probably by slicing off my fingers one by one.
“We’ll all help you,” Naomi said. “Even if it means killing Wren.”
I couldn’t let my cousin kill her sister. If it had to be done, I would be the one to do it. I leaned back against my chair and closed my eyes, suddenly weary. It was a near-impossible task.
“Don’t get too comfortable, son of Fortuna,” Morta said. “We have work to do.”
“Hecate has won,” Nona said. “We can’t defeat her, not without three Fates.”
“Then get Claire up to speed,” I said. “You concentrate on that and I’ll concentrate on getting Hecate back into the underworld.”
“Not the underworld,” Morta said. “This time we must discover a more permanent solution.”
“You mean kill her?”
She snorted. “Killing a goddess is not an easy task, Nyx. I don’t mean killing her. I mean immobilizing her for a few thousand years or so.”
“Say I find a way to immobilize her,” I said. “Where would we keep her?”
“Don’t worry about that,” she said. “You find a way to trap her and we will take care of the rest. Agreed?”
I didn’t really care what they did with Hecate, as long as she was out of the way.
She looked from her sister to me and back again. “I have been wrong about many things,” she said. “But I was not wrong about you. You are my sister’s son.”
“Then help me,” I said. “We’ll defeat her together. Or at least tell me how you contained her last time. It was the three tasks, wasn’t it?”
“There were three items necessary to hold Hecate in the underworld,” Morta said. “But we scattered them into the wind. We each took one of the items. D-Deci…” She stopped for a moment to regain her composure. “Deci was in charge of Hecate’s Eye.”
“Which is why Wren knew exactly where to find it,” I said. “I had it in my hand and let it slip away.” I’d handed it over to save Willow.
They ignored my dig at Deci. My aunts didn’t want to admit Deci had been in league with Hecate.
“Find them and you will be able to trap her again,” Claire said.
“She already has the bead,” I admitted. “I traded the harpies for Claire, but I think it’s the harpy’s silver feather she really wanted.” My cousin had been trapped in the underworld with Hecate, and I had freed her.
“We already know that,” Morta said. “But the harpies will not help Hecate as much as she thinks.”
“Why did you give her the bead?” Rebecca asked.
“I gave it to her in exchange for Willow, but Hecate screwed me over.” They didn’t have to say it aloud. I knew what an arrogant idiot I’d been.
“How’d that work out for you?” Rebecca asked sarcastically.
“If she gets the third item, there will be no stopping her,” Nona said.
“What exactly is the third item?”
“Medusa’s mirror,” Nona said. “There’s no way she will get her hands on it.”
“Where is it?”
“Please don’t be offended, Nyx, but perhaps it is better you don’t know,” Morta said.
She had a point.
“We can’t kill Hecate, anyway,” I said. “At least not while she’s still walking around in Willow’s body.”
“Why not?” Rebecca asked.
I glared at her. “If anyone at this table touches Willow, I will hunt you down and make you suffer.”
“Jeez, touchy,” Rebecca said.
“I like Willow, although Nyx usually has terrible taste in women,” Naomi said.
Claire gave a snort of laughter. “So true.” Her blond hair shone in the dim light.
“I wasn’t the one getting all chummy with Hecate in the underworld,” I snarled.
“I agree. Willow’s off-limits,” Naomi continued, as if we hadn’t interrupted her.
I gave her a grateful look, but she ignored me.
“Hecate has Hecate’s Eye, but I don’t know how she intends to use it,” I said.
“Get it back,” Morta said.
“I’ll try,” I said, “but the Houses are getting nervous. They might decide to align with Hecate.”
“I doubt they fear her more than they fear us,” Morta said.
“Maybe,” I said. “But you have to admit the Fates are at their weakest right now.”
Morta glared at me, but I glared back.
“We are temporarily hampered,” Nona admitted. “But Rebecca’s home and Claire has taken over as Custos. We’ll be back to full strength soon.”
“In the meantime, it might not hurt to make a few overtures,” I said.
“Anything else?” Nona said. “You should rest.”
“No time for that,” I said. “I’ll start talking to the Houses as soon as I can.”
Our little family meeting broke up not long after. Rebecca looked like she wanted to kick me in the balls as a good-bye, but instead, she whispered something to Claire, who laughed.
Naomi didn’t even bother to look at me before she left. Instead, she made a beeline for the door, ignoring everybody else.
I was weary, not just because I was now mortal, residing in a two-hundred-and-twenty-year-old body. Sometimes, the sheer enormity of what I had to do would overwhelm me. Then I’d want to give up, but I knew I couldn’t. Knew I wouldn’t. I had to succeed.