All it had taken to smash their lives apart was one independent trucker who had fallen asleep at the wheel and crossed over the median line into oncoming traffic. The accident killed Petra and Niko, and it had nearly killed Grace as well. If Chloe and Max had been in the car as originally planned, the last of the Andreas family could well have been wiped out in one freak crash, but Petra had decided she wanted dinner out without the children, so at the last minute she had arranged for a babysitter.
Grace didn’t remember the collision. She was glad. She didn’t want to remember.
When she had awakened in the hospital, she had been disoriented and groggy with painkillers. Even so, she had felt it immediately, that old Power nestling deep inside of her, and it was one of those things that you can’t unlearn once you know it. She knew her sister was dead and nothing would ever be the same again.
Now she had five incompletes from very understanding professors, no Bachelor’s degree and a load of student debt that would come crashing down on her shoulders at some point in the near future. She had accumulated a monstrous pile of bills from multiple surgeries on her knee, along with a hospital stay, a tangle of car and life insurance policies but no health insurance coverage, and she had received nothing at all from the dead trucker who had let his insurance coverage lapse. No matter how she wrangled the numbers, the assets she had were nowhere near enough to cover all the bills.
Somehow she had to create a life for herself and the kids. She had to try to finish those classes, get her degree and find a paying job that would cover both living and childcare expenses. And no matter how much she resisted the idea, it was becoming clear she was going to have to file for bankruptcy. Maybe she could qualify for a waiver for the court fees.
“Got everything you need, baby girl?” she mumbled to Chloe.
“Uh-huh,” Chloe said, her blue eyes glued to the television.
Sorry, Petra and Niko, she thought. I know you didn’t like using the TV as a babysitter, and I try, I really do. But my gods, I can’t keep my eyes open any longer.
She eased her sore body flat and fell into a black hole.
Grace dreamed she was running along a dark paved road. The night was full of shadows, the new moon hidden from the naked eye. The full moon at its zenith was a witch’s moon, a time for incantations and Power. The new moon at its darkest was the Oracle’s moon, a time when the veil between all the worlds and all the times thinned. A brilliant spray of stars like Djinns’ eyes pierced the dark purple sky, and the wind whispered secrets to the shadowed, swaying trees.
Her running shoes slapped the ground rhythmically. They struck a pagan tempo for the song in her coursing blood. She loved how her body felt, sleek and strong as it moved along the paved road. Perfect. She felt perfect.
A gigantic black panther ran along beside her. His broad shoulder was as high as hers, and his long, powerful body ate the distance with effortless, fluid grace. As soon as she became aware of him, the panther turned his head and looked at her with diamond eyes that were as piercing and shining as the stars. Shocked, she jerked and stumbled.…
And she slipped into another dream. This time she climbed the side of a steep rocky bluff. She had to use her hands, and the burn in her muscles felt good. The sun was perched high in the sky and beat down on her head, and she dripped with sweat.
An immense black dog climbed at her side. He was easily twice the size of a mastiff, all muscle and power, yet he climbed up the side of the bluff with impossible agility. As she stared, he turned to look at her with radiant diamond eyes that startled her so badly, she lost her grip on the rocks.
Gravity yanked. She fell, and the ground hurtled toward her.
She woke with a start, her heart hammering. Her clothes were clammy with sweat. The sun had shifted, and she was alone in the living room. The television was off. So many things were not right with the scene, but before she had a chance to panic, she heard Max and Chloe giggling in their bedroom.
“I want you to be a doggie now,” Chloe said.
A male voice said, “But at the moment I am a cat.”
Grace knew that voice. She had only heard it for a brief time, but she would never forget it. It was the voice of the Bane of Her Existence. It sounded deep and clear, with a kind of purity that somehow hurt the heart, and it held the power of a cyclone.
It belonged to a creature whose whirlwind arrival on her doorstep had heralded confrontation and violence.
And the killing.
And it was visiting with her kids.
She was off the couch and moving down the hall before she fully knew what she was doing.
Chloe said, “I want to ride the doggie!”
“I believe what you want would then be called a horse,” said the Bane.
Max shrieked, a happy sound that escalated so high it could shatter glass.
Sharp pain shot up her leg. Just as it threatened to give out from underneath her, she reached the children’s bedroom and grabbed on to the doorway as she looked inside.