Tempt the Stars

Epilogue

I opened them again in bed, with a blond demon sitting nearby.

I bolted upright and grabbed him, before my eyes focused on the three-piece gray business suit, the thin blond hair, and the cleft he’d added to the chin. The one distinguishing feature in a bland mask to make it easier to pretend that’s what he really looked like. Adra, I thought, staring into calm gray eyes.

“So I ended up in hell, after all?” I croaked in disgust.

He smiled. And then apparently decided it deserved better, and laughed. “I think you’re safe,” he confided as I flopped back against the bed. “I don’t know of too many that would volunteer to take you.”

I swallowed, because my tongue felt fuzzy. And blinked around at what was either a damned fine illusion, right down to the pinkish stain on the carpet from a glass of wine I’d spilled a week ago, or was my room in Vegas. And I didn’t know why anybody would waste an illusion that good on me.

“Why are you here?” I demanded. “Why am I here?”

“You are here due to us pulling you out at the moment your spell collapsed. It was quite close. For a moment, I did not think we were going to manage.”

“You pulled me out,” I repeated, because that didn’t make a lot of sense.

He nodded.

“But . . ” I frowned, trying to think past a massive migraine. “How did you know . . ”

“That you needed assistance?” he asked, leaning back and crossing his legs. “That would have to do with the Seidr spell your mother cast.”

“What?”

“The spell that she used to speak with us is one the gods used to communicate with each other. It creates an illusion that many minds can inhabit, similar to what you would term a conference call. Admittedly, I do not think it has been used to dial across time before, but then . . . she was always clever.”

“Yes, so?” I asked harshly. Because I’d decided I didn’t care.

“Well, it is a very old spell. A very rare spell, since the gods are now gone. Few people these days know how to cast it . . . or how to end it.”

That took me a minute, but I got it. “You were spying on me.”

“Essentially.” At least he didn’t try to sugarcoat it. “When you were in council chambers, we noticed the existence of several other Seidr links in your mind. Neither of which you seemed to be aware of, and neither of which you had bothered to close.”

“Several—” I stopped, because suddenly a couple of things made sense. “Mircea and Jules.”

“I do not know about the vampire. The first bond was tightly closed off; even we could not explore it without risking injury to you.”

Mircea, I thought grimly. He had mental gifts he didn’t talk about, but which were kind of hard not to notice. I wasn’t sure how far they extended, but maybe . . . maybe they’d been enough for him to hang up on his own. Maybe that’s also why he’d suddenly gone incommunicado. Finding out your girlfriend was half goddess would be bad enough, without having her suddenly start spying on your brain.

I freaked Mircea out, I thought dizzily.

“But the second,” Adra was saying. “Yes, it is to a human named Jules. He has been having rather uncomfortable dreams, of late, thanks to you.”

I bet. “So between the time my mother laid the first spell on me at her house, until I actually got to the council, there was a period when I was making other calls on my own, not knowing that’s what I was doing?”

“So it would seem. I would wonder why your mother did not better inform you about the spell she planned to use, but . . . I think I know. In any case, we hardly thought someone would deliberately choose to keep open three distinct lines, when even one is somewhat debilitating. It therefore occurred to us that there was a chance you had not been taught about the workings of the spell, and that you would not know to close ours, either.”

“But I felt it close. I felt relief—”

“From your mother and most of the council leaving. Only a few of us stayed ‘online’ with you. The burden was still there, but it was less with fewer minds communicating. After the power you had been forced to channel before, it seemed like relief.”

I scowled at him. “So you hoped to do what? Discover what kind of revenge I was planning?”

He sighed. “Cassandra—may I call you Cassandra?”

“No!”

He sighed again. “We have, it would appear, gotten off on—the wrong foot? Is that the term?”

“The wrong—” I just stared at him.

“I’m sure that’s right,” he said, looking up as if referencing something. “Yes, yes, that is the phrase.”

“That is not the—”

“But you have to understand our dilemma. Ares and the other gods are actively working to return to earth, something a few of us have been at pains to keep quiet, to avoid a general panic. But you not only made that impossible, but appeared before the entire council demanding an army.”

“My mother wanted the—”

“Yes, and that was the point, was it not? Frankly, if our only choice is between Ares and Artemis, we would prefer the former. His skills are formidable, but his movements through the hells are restricted. His return would allow us time to consider . . . extreme measures. Your mother’s would not.”

“So you killed Pritkin.”

“It seemed prudent. Whether you intended to return your mother to her former glory, or to rule in her stead, you would need the incubus. Few are able to transmit power as his line can, and Lord Rosier’s antipathy for your mother is well known. I believe he would die before he would help her to regain her strength. But his son . . . we were not so sure of him. Or of you.”

“So you spied on me.”

“We wanted to know what you would do, once you were deprived of him. Some on the council were pushing for your death as well. But to others of us, that seemed . . . imprudent . . . with the gods attempting to return and your record of opposing them in the past. We required more information.”

“Like what?”

“We wished to know what you would do without the incubus. Would you try to find another strong enough to replace him? Would you visit your mother again, and formulate a new plan with her? Would you go to some heretofore unknown accomplice and strategize? What would you do?”

“You know what I did!”

“Yes. We know. And, for the first time in more years than I can count, I admit to a feeling of . . . astonishment.”

I didn’t say anything. I just wished he’d go away. But apparently, ancient demons leave when they want to.

“At first, we did not understand,” he told me, still sounding faintly surprised. “We thought you would shift out when the witches had gone. We thought you were . . . grandstanding? Is that the word?”

“Look it up,” I told him harshly, and swung my legs out of bed.

“But then, when you did not . . . when we realized you would not, even to save yourself . . . it occurred to us that perhaps it is possible to be too cynical. To forget that not everyone thinks as we do.”

And he couldn’t have had that epiphany yesterday, I thought, pain twisting in my gut. I felt dizzy with it, aching. As if part of me had been carved out and left gasping on the floor. I wanted to scream, to rant, to throw things. I wanted to cry and never stop. I wanted him gone so I could curl around my hurt.

“You said several reasons?” I rasped.

“Yes. I wished, we wished, to give you this,” he said, taking out what looked like an eel-skin wallet, but probably wasn’t. And handing me something from inside.

It was a piece of paper. A lined bit of notebook paper, which seemed kind of chintzy for an ancient demon, but I didn’t care. Because all it had on it were a bunch of meaningless squiggles.

“What is this?” I demanded, thinking about tearing it up.

“The counterspell.”

I looked at it blankly for a moment, and then up at him. I don’t know what was on my face, but he searched it for a long time. And then smiled slightly.

“That is what I meant. This is what I had . . . forgotten.”

That meant exactly nothing to me. “Why . . ” I cleared my throat. “Why are you doing this?”

“The council believes that it is unlikely that someone who aspired to world-altering power would so easily give up not only her quest, but her life,” he told me gently. “And for creatures who could be of no use to her.”

“Then . . . this is real.” I looked back down at it, my heart starting to beat.

“Yes, it is real. If you can find him before the curse concludes, you can save him. But I warn you—it will not be easy. The spell we used was specifically designed to thwart your power. His soul will pass through each year of his life only once and then never again. Afterward, you can use your abilities to return to the same moment again and again, but you will not find it there.”

I clutched the paper in one fist, hearing it crinkle. “But . . . I can’t read this.”

“It is an ancient tongue; there are few who can. Fortunately, one of them is pleased to accompany you.”

“Pleased is not the word I would use,” came a scathing voice. Right before something hit me in the solar plexus.

It was a backpack. And holding an identical one was—

“Oh, shit.”

“My feelings exactly,” Rosier hissed. “Now get dressed. We’re running out of time.”

“Are there clothes in here?” I demanded.

“Yes—”

“Then I’ll dress when we get there. When are we going?”

“Eighteen eighty. And you’d better damned well hope we catch him there.”

“Why there?”

“The curse gets progressively faster as it goes on, girl! And I’ve no desire to go larking around some barbaric era with the likes of—”

Yeah, I thought. He still liked to talk. This was going to be hell.

So why was a smile breaking out over my face?

I clutched the spell in one hand, threw the pack over my back, and grabbed Rosier.

“Shut up,” I told him.

And I shifted.