CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Aphrodite
“I don’t trust her. At all,” were the first words Aphrodite said to Zoey as she led her group through the main entrance of the House of Night. She’d stopped her pacing and stood in front of Zoey, hands on hips, frowning at all of them and feeling a ball of stress stabbing between her shoulder blades. “And the next time you try to leave me behind to deal with a group of humans, I am going to quit. I’d rather face Neferet alone with no damn powers at all than explain to one more paranoid mommy that No, fledglings and vampyres are not all salivating at the thought of so many humans sleeping under their roof, no one is going to eat you or your snot-nosed offspring! Talk about annoying! Why would anyone want to eat any of them? Most of them are fat anyway. Eesh!”
“Aphrodite, you’re gonna have to slow down. I have no clue who the ‘her’ is, or why mommies would be asking you crazy questions,” Zoey said.
“The her is Lynette Witherspoon, supposed ex-minion of Neferet. And mommies are asking me questions because I am the only non-threatening, non-fledgling slash vampyre in sight.”
“They don’t know her very dang well if they think Aphrodite is non-threatening,” Stevie Rae said.
Aphrodite skewered her with her eyes. “Zip it, bumpkin.”
“Did you say Lynette Witherspoon? As in the owner of Everlasting Expressions?” Damien asked.
“Yes and yes,” Aphrodite said. “And how the hell do you know that?”
Damien grinned. “I simply adore Brides of Oklahoma magazine, and Everlasting Expressions is the event planner for the most spectacular of the magnificent weddings.”
“You are so gay,” Aphrodite told him.
“Good, you have finally returned,” Kalona said, striding into the foyer.
“That’s what I was saying. Are you going to fill them in or am I?” Aphrodite said.
“I am going to relieve Darius and Stark at the perimeter. You brief Zoey and the rest of them.” Kalona hesitated. “I will bring our Warriors up to date. Detective Marx and Aurox, would you join me?”
The guys nodded and moved off with Kalona.
Aphrodite sighed, wishing she were going to meet Darius, even if that would mean she’d have to put up with Aurox and Kalona and Marx. It seemed like forever since she and her gorgeous Warrior had had one stress-free day.
“Earth to Aphrodite—hello? Anybody home?” Damien said.
“Yeah, you’re supposed to be briefin’ us, remember?” Stevie Rae said.
“Stand down, Herd of Nerds. I’m getting to it. Follow me to the infirmary. Lenobia is tucking Witherspoon away in one of the rooms there. I think she should be in the dungeon, but Lenobia and, shockingly, Kalona, outvoted me. Apparently, dealing with Neferet has the woman on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Whatever. Like we haven’t all been there before?” Aphrodite started marching away while we scrambled to keep up with her.
“Do we have a dungeon?” Shaylin asked.
“No, we don’t,” Damien assured her. “Don’t let Aphrodite get to you.” Then he reached out and plucked at Aphrodite’s sleeve. “Slow down, we’re all exhausted from the Protection Ritual.”
Aphrodite narrowed her eyes at Damien, but Z stepped in. “Damien’s right. Plus, none of us need to hear whatever Crazy Town you’re going to tell us about while we’re chasing after you. And there’s no point in updating us in front of the woman you’re talking about, especially if you don’t trust her. Let’s go to the cafeteria, get some more to eat so that we can start to feel normal again, and you can tell us about this Lynette Witherspoon person there.”
Aphrodite clued Z in, saying, “The cafeteria is full of humans. Loud, nervous, stress-eating, annoying humans.”
“All righty, then, let’s make it the professors’ dining hall instead,” Z said.
“Oooooh! I’ve never been up there! Are you sure it’s okay?” Stevie Rae chirped.
“I’m sure it is,” Zoey said before Aphrodite could answer her.
Aphrodite raised one brow, stepped aside, and motioned for Z to take over. “Well, then, lead on with your big girl panties.”
And Zoey did.
Zoey
A long, shocked silence followed Aphrodite’s retelling of everything the Witherspoon woman had reported.
Shaylin brushed a trembling hand over her face and said, “Dead Fish Eyes—that isn’t just the color of Neferet’s aura; it’s what she really is—dead inside.”
“All those people,” Damien said in a hushed voice. “She’s going to kill them all eventually.”
Aphrodite nodded. “When Lynette described everything that had happened, the puzzle pieces fell into place from my last vision. Goddess, I hate figurative language.” She looked at me and raised her brow. “You were too busy being a raving bitch, so I haven’t had a chance to tell you, but a pain-in-the-ass poem was my bonus prize.” She closed her eyes and recited:
With great power comes great responsibilities
Weigh the pleasure of leadership and luxury with the sword Damocles
When she believes the ancient is the key to all her needs
Then is when all will tumble down; then is when Light bleeds and bleeds.
Aphrodite opened her eyes and met my gaze. “I thought it was talking about you.” She held up her fingers, ticking off her points. “First, you have way more power than makes sense. Second, you sometimes do actually act like a leader, and we do actually follow you, which means you have access to all of this—” Aphrodite paused and gestured at the beautiful dining hall. “Then there’s the end part about ‘she’ believing the ancient is the key and Light bleeding because of it. Well, that sounds like you using your Seer Stone and messing up the balance of Light and Darkness.”
“That analysis does sound reasonable,” Damien said.
“Thank you, Queen Damien. Reasonable, yes. Correct, apparently not. I skipped the whole sword Damocles part because I didn’t want to look it up and because I seriously hate trying to figure out symbolism. But then we found out you didn’t kill those men, and Neferet slaughtered a shit ton of people and proclaimed the Mayo her Temple and herself Goddess. So I read the stupid story of Damocles.”
“That’s about, like, waiting for something awful to happen, right?” Stevie Rae said.
“Most people think so,” Damien said in his teacher voice. “Actually, the story is an ancient parable. Damocles was a courtier whose job was, basically, to do nothing but lie around and amuse and flatter his king. One day Damocles made some comment about how fabulous it would be to be king. Basically, his king said, ‘Hey, if you think it’s so great to be king, then go ahead, try out my throne.’ Naturally, Damocles took him up on the offer. He was having a gay old time—” Here Damien stopped to giggle and say, “Gay! Heehees!”
“Oh, for shit’s sake, tell the rest of the story or I will,” Aphrodite said.
Damien got himself under control and continued. “Anyway, Damocles was having such a good time that it took him awhile to notice it, but hanging above him, on a thread as thin as a horse hair, was a sword. All of a sudden being king didn’t seem so awesome to Damocles and he begged the king to let him go back to his own life.”
“Oh, so the moral isn’t that doom and gloom is lurking,” I said as my mental lightbulb lit up. “It’s that you should be happy with what you’ve been given.”
“Yeah, and—as the guy in the NPR story explained so that I could effing understand the metaphor—not covet what you haven’t been given because that other oh-so-awesome life has it’s own bad shit, usually in proportion to how much responsibility and luxury you have. In conclusion, I think the prophecy was more about Neferet than you,” Aphrodite finished.
“Which means we’re super screwed because it’s not Zoey,” Shaylin said.
“Huh?” I said.
“Zoey, if it was about you, you’d listen to the warning,” she continued. “You really already have. You know Old Magick is important, but you realize the key to that power is you and your intent, and not just hooking into the power. Right?”
“Absolutely,” I agreed, and my mental lightbulb got brighter. “Oh, I get it! It is a warning about what Neferet is up to. She’s messed up the balance of Light and Darkness by waking up Old Magick.”
“And she’s not going to stop,” Damien said.
“True,” I said. “So the answer is simple. We’re going to have to stop her. For good.”
“I’m hoping you have a plan for that,” Aphrodite said.
“Thanks to you guys, I have the beginning of one. We need to find Neferet’s Damocles sword,” I said.
Kalona
“At least the protective wall contains her.” Darius was the first to speak after Kalona had explained to him, Stark, Aurox, and the detective the full extent of the macabre charade Neferet was playing out in her “Temple.”
“Only temporarily,” Aurox said.
Marx nodded. “Yeah, Thanatos and Shaunee are giving it all they’ve got, but it’s taking a terrible toll on them. Even they don’t have any idea how long they can keep the spell going—especially since it’s not confined just to the Mayo. It’s got all of Tulsa in a protective bubble.”
“You realize that’s good, right?” Stark said. When the detective looked at him questioningly, the boy continued. “The last thing we need right now is national involvement. Look at it like this—the fewer people who actually witness Neferet’s insanity, the easier our cleanup is going to be once we stop her.”
“Do you still believe she can be stopped?” Marx asked.
“I do,” Kalona said, and he did believe it. “I fought Darkness in one form or another for eons in the Otherworld. The war against it was never won because there must be Darkness as long as there is also Light. But Light does win individual battles. Neferet is simply another individual battle in which Light must vanquish this one particularly tenacious and evil form of Darkness.”
“But the whole balance and battle versus war thing means that you lost sometimes, too,” Marx said.
“I did,” Kalona said grimly. “But the biggest losses I experienced were internal. I allowed Darkness to corrupt something that was pure and honest and true, and when that happened, Darkness won a battle.”
“What makes you think Darkness won’t get to you again and you’ll lose another battle? This time at our expense,” Stark said.
“You’ve lost a battle to Darkness yourself, boy,” Kalona shot at the arrogant youth. “What makes you think Darkness won’t get to you again and you’ll lose another battle?”
Stark bristled, but he answered with no hesitation, “Because I love Zoey and I’ve pledged myself to the path of Nyx.”
“And that is how I can assure you, and myself, that I will not lose this battle—because of love and because of the oath I have given. I know what it’s like to be forsworn. I will not do that again. Ever,” Kalona said. He ran his hand across his brow. It was still damp with sweat, the only outward evidence he couldn’t control that showed the wounds he’d received the night before had not yet fully healed and continued to pain him. I need to climb high—perhaps to the roof of Nyx’s Temple. There the immortal magick in my blood can call healing to it—I must make time … I must make time.
“Hey, big guy, are you sure you don’t need some rest?” Marx was asking him.
Kalona waved away his inquiry, avoiding the question with one of his own. “Detective, I’d like to ask a favor of you.”
“Sure, anything, especially if it’ll help get rid of Neferet.”
“I’d like you to interrogate Lynette. She appears to be no more than an utterly terrified human, who has just been through the most traumatic experience in her life. She has answered all of our questions readily—explained how Neferet’s creatures are possessing humans, given us precise counts of how many humans are trapped in the Mayo, what Neferet is doing with them, and how many of them are under her control.”
“Sounds like she’s cooperating well,” Marx said.
“Yes, it does appear that way. But two things about her bother me. First, she keeps asking questions about Neferet.”
“Questions, like what?” Marx asked.
“Like what happened to Neferet to make her insane, how did she attain her power, is she really a goddess, and if she is, how are we going to stop her.”
“I can’t blame her for asking any of those questions,” Stark said. “If Neferet had just held me hostage, I’d want some info about her, too.”
“Agreed,” Kalona said. “And it wouldn’t worry me as much except for the second thing: she hesitated when I asked her to escape and come with me.”
“She absolutely refused to come with me,” Marx said, and then added, “Which was understandable. There was no protective shield up and Neferet would never have allowed her to walk out of there.”
“Very true, but my intuition says there is more to Lynette than she’s presenting. She claims that tonight she was being forced to go on an errand for Neferet, and that she was being accompanied by the threads of Darkness and a possessed servant to ensure her compliance and return. Yet she was outside the Temple, cloaked in Neferet’s concealment, well before anyone else joined her.”
“What’s her explanation for that?” Marx asked.
“That Neferet was showing all the other hostages she was her favorite by allowing her to leave the building unaccompanied,” Kalona said.
“Actually, that’s not good. Could be Lynette is harboring some Stockholm syndrome symptoms.”
“What is that?” Stark asked.
“It’s a survival mechanism for hostages fighting for their lives,” Darius said.
“I’m impressed,” Marx told him.
Darius’s lips twitched up. “Detective, Warrior training includes much more than swords and knives and guns. It also includes psychology—both human and vampyre.”
“I didn’t have any Warrior training,” Aurox said.
“Neither did I. I was born a Warrior.” Kalona paused and glanced at Stark, adding, “And the boy hasn’t had enough training to know much of anything. Please explain the syndrome to us.”
“Basically, certain conditions must be met. Let’s see, it’s been awhile since the academy. First, there has to be a perceived threat to the hostage’s survival and the belief that the captor is willing to act on that threat,” Marx said.
“The Witherspoon woman meets that condition,” Kalona said.
“The next step is that the hostage’s perceptions of small kindnesses from the captor must come within an atmosphere of terror,” Darius added.
“I would definitely call watching tendrils of Darkness burst through sixty human bodies while Neferet gave her a nice glass of wine and then discussed event planning afterward meeting that criterion,” Stark said.
“Yeah, you can check that box off,” Marx said. “And the last step is that she has to have been isolated from everyone’s perspectives other than those of her captor, and have the perceived inability to escape.”
“Check and check,” Stark said.
“That could explain her curiosity about Neferet. She isn’t asking because she’s worried. She’s asking because she’s obsessed,” Darius said.
“I’ll talk to her,” Marx said grimly. “Keep her on lockdown, only be sure you do so in an unthreatening manner. And your gut is right, Kalona. Don’t trust her.”
Kalona
By the Goddess he was tired! Now that he was finally alone, Kalona could allow the extent of his weariness to show. His wings drooped, brushing the ground. His shoulders ached. Actually, his entire body ached!
The winged immortal looked up at the rooftop of Nyx’s Temple and blew out a long, exhausted breath. Just do it. Do not think it. Stark has to be relieved before dawn, so I must find a way to shake off the lingering pain of my wounds. He put his head down, took several long strides and, with a groan, leaped, forcing his wings to beat against the air and lift him far enough off the ground that he was able to grab the lip of the Temple’s pitched roof. He pulled himself up and lay on his stomach, trying to catch his breath.
When the blast of sunlight hit him, Kalona couldn’t control his weakened body’s automatic response to turn away and cringe. Gruffly, he said, “Dim your light, Erebus! You’ll draw the entire campus.”
The garish sunlight faded to the soft glow of the gloaming of twilight. “Brother, you do not look well.”
Kalona used the peak of the Temple’s roof to pull himself to a sitting position, leaning against the stone chimney with what he hoped was nonchalance. “And you look exactly as you look every time you appear near me—unwelcome.”
Instead of responding in anger, Erebus studied his brother and then said, “Something has happened to you.”
“Yes. I have changed sides. Though I have not changed the level of my patience. This is the second time today I have had to explain myself, which is two times too many. Why are you here, Erebus?”
“Nyx sent me to check on you. It appears she was right to be concerned.”
Kalona’s heartbeat increased. Nyx is concerned about me! But he was careful to keep his expression bland. Erebus might exploit any weakness he showed—emotional or physical. “Tell the Goddess that I appreciate her concern, but I am simply following her edict. Nyx commanded that I protect those in need from Neferet, and that is what I am doing. Nyx commanded that I take responsibility for my role in Neferet’s descent into madness, and that is what I am doing. As my human friend, Detective Marx would say, There’s nothing to see here—move along.”
“I remember well Nyx’s edict,” Erebus said. “I carried it to you. So I also remember that the Goddess proclaimed”—he made a sweeping gesture, and the night sky lit up with words burning with sunlight—“IF HIS HEART DOTH OPEN, BARED AGAIN, FORGIVENESS MAY CONQUER HATE AND LOVE WIN … WIN…”
Once more, the Goddess’s edict blazed into Kalona’s eyes and heart. He looked away from the glowing words and they disappeared.
“Like you, I remember well Nyx’s words,” Kalona said.
“And?”
“And my heart as well as Nyx’s forgiveness are none of your business, Erebus!”
Erebus shrugged. “I am just here in the place of a concerned Goddess.”
“Tell the Goddess if she is really so concerned, the next time she should check on me herself,” Kalona couldn’t stop himself from saying.
Erebus laughed. “As you would say, that is between you and Nyx, and none of my business. Tell her yourself—if you think she will hear you.”
“I’ll do that, after I win the battle against Neferet,” Kalona said. Surely Nyx will hear me then. Surely she will forgive me then.
“You sound quite certain of yourself, but you don’t look as if you’re ready to battle Darkness,” Erebus teased.
Kalona straightened and glared at his brother. “I look as if I just battled Darkness and won! Little wonder you don’t recognize a Warrior after battle. You have never been in a battle, have you?”
Erebus’s bantering tone turned serious. “You Fell, but I remained by her side. Who do you think has kept her safe for all these long, lonely years?”
Kalona almost responded with an insult and a retort, but the words died before they were given voice. Instead the winged immortal nodded his head wearily. “Yes, I know who has kept the Goddess safe. Has Darkness been difficult to battle?”
Erebus was visibly surprised, so much so that he took several moments to collect himself to answer. “It has. I am no true Warrior. That was your role, not mine. I think I have been a poor substitute for you.”
Kalona met his brother’s golden gaze. “And yet Nyx is safe.”
“She is.”
“Then you have been a true Warrior.”
Erebus blinked several times. “You leave me speechless with your compliment.”
Kalona’s smile was wry. “Then I accomplished my goal. I have shut you up. Now, go back to the Otherworld and continue to try to hold the spot I mistakenly vacated.”
“Always so arrogant. You barely have the strength to cling to the roof of this Temple, and yet still you order me about as if it was your right. Take heed, Kalona! Someday your arrogance will cost you dearly.”
“Brother, it already has. I lost my Goddess because of it,” Kalona said.
“Then why haven’t you learned to temper your arrogance? What are you doing here, Kalona? Why must you lord your power over these mortals?”
“You call me arrogant? Well, I call you a blind fool! What I do here isn’t because of arrogance or a desire to lord power over mortals. What I do here is my duty! And for some of us, that entails more than frolicking about in the sunshine with nothing more than lovemaking and butterflies on our minds. For me it means I will battle Neferet, and not just because my Goddess commands it, but because my Oath Sworn duty requires it of me.”
Erebus stared at him, with an expression Kalona couldn’t read. “Apparently, Brother, you have changed more than sides. Still, I am compelled to remind you that Nyx trusts you will be the means by which Neferet is vanquished, so have care. Your actions affect others than just yourself.”
“Yes, yes, I know. I am the Warrior. I will eternally be the Warrior. Begone, Sunshine. You make my head ache.” Kalona was gathering his waning strength to slap Erebus with a clap of moonshine, when his brother jumped from the rooftop. Showing off his untaxed strength and agility, he hovered in the air for a moment before disappearing in a burst of glittering gold.
Kalona shook his head and used the chimney as a handhold to pull himself to his feet, muttering, “How can we be twins? He is like a yapping dog who eternally makes so much noise protecting his bone that no one notices his lack of teeth.” Finally standing, Kalona sent an apologetic look upward. “Not that I meant to compare you to a bone, Goddess.”
As Kalona threw open his arms and back his head, embracing the immortal magick that hummed through the ether of the night sky, calling healing and power to his body, he was almost sure he heard her laughter in the wind.
Erebus
Invisible to Kalona, Erebus watched his brother call the divine energy from which they both had been formed. He looks tired. He looks lonely. But he also looks determined. Kalona has changed—he truly has.
Yes, Kalona was still insufferably arrogant, no matter what his brother said, but he had also paid him a compliment, given Erebus a measure of respect for the role he had been fulfilling in Kalona’s absence for many, many years.
Erebus smiled. He’d always believed there was a hero buried beneath that obnoxious and prickly exterior. He could not, would not, change the events that were playing out in the mortal realm. Nyx would never allow that, and Erebus understood all too well why, but he could well-wish his brother:
A brother’s blessing from me to thee
Allow the hidden hero to be free
Accept what should have been your destiny
Forsworn no more shall you ever be.
Erebus spoke the well-wish into the wind so that it was carried away from his brother’s ears. Kalona hadn’t changed so much that he would welcome his brother’s blessing—their past was too filled with misunderstanding, jealousy, and conflict. No, Kalona must not hear the blessing, but Nyx must hear it. And Darkness must hear it. Nyx should know that Kalona, her fallen Warrior, had taken one more step into the Light. And Darkness—Erebus smiled grimly—Darkness should know to beware the power of a winged hero.