She walked over to sit on what remained of the throne’s arm. “I am sorry this happened to you, Father.”
His hand fell upon her knee and patted it. “It was not your doing.”
“No,” she said softly, “but I understand your position. And I now understand the real meaning behind what you said earlier—about wanting to turn me on your sons. You wish for me to go after the warriors of the Patronus Ceteri.”
A light shone deep in his eyes at the thought. “Yes. Would you, Eos? Would you do that for me?”
She slipped her arm around his shoulders and pulled him in close. But I could feel the dissonance growing inside her. The contempt. The rage. I did all I could to fuel it further with what little energy I had left.
“I would do anything for you, Father,” she crooned. “There is no one I adore more.” He nestled against her shoulder, and she hugged him closer still. “But I cannot do anything if Phobos succeeds in making this vessel his, for you and I both know it will only be a matter of time before his anger eclipses his sense and I fall victim to his brutality.” He looked up at her with earnest eyes. “I must get to him first, Father. I must kill him before he can kill me. I know I can do this, especially with this body. I know where he is and what must be done, but I do not know how to get there. Will you help me, Father?”
“It won’t be easy. You will need Deimos to help you. Possibly others,” he said, pulling away. “And you must be certain you’ve mastered Khara’s abilities first. Without them, you cannot stop him.” The sadness in his eyes was plain and haunting. “Only one of you will survive this, Eos. Please make sure it is you.”
I could not stop him with my abilities, I thought. Eos startled, as though she had heard me.
“I already have them mastered,” she lied, her voice calm and placid to pacify the former god of war. “I just need to know how to reach him.”
Ares gave a tight nod. “When you said that Phobos’ mind had fractured, you did not realize how literal your words were. Because that is precisely what happened, and in the process, he created another realm. The one where he has hidden for the centuries following your death. The one he recently emerged from. The one he returns to when he cannot be found.”
Eos did her best to absorb the shock of his words. Unlike me, she had not already been alerted to this fact.
“How do I find it?” she asked softly.
“I don’t know,” he said, as though that answer would suffice.
She recoiled from him. “You don’t know? How can you know what it is and how it came to be but not know how to get there?”
Ares rose and shook his head, frustration clear in the set of his features and stiffness of his gait as he paced the ruins of Mount Olympus. “It is complicated—”
“Then do your best, Father, because I cannot destroy an enemy I cannot find.”
“I’m trying!” he shouted. “But this isn’t simple! That realm is attached to Phobos. He alone controls it!” He whirled around to pin her in place with wild, feral eyes. Sanity of a fashion worked its way back into that empty stare, but it took longer than it should have. Longer than could possibly bode well. That was the moment that two things became abundantly clear.
Ares was just as concerned about Phobos as the rest of us.
And he had lied about his ability to tell me how to defeat him.
“Are you saying that, without him, I cannot find this realm?” Eos asked, any hint of affection gone from her tone.
Ares hesitated. “Yes.”
Her anger rushed through my body—the one she had invaded and would not leave—and I wondered if flame or lightning would erupt from her at any moment in an attempt to smite her father. Our father.
Something niggled at the back of my mind.
I think I know how to get there, I whispered, the pieces of the puzzle still solidifying in my mind. In theory…
Eos went stiff.
I thought of the dream I had had the other night. The one with the tether linking me to the light in the darkness; the one that was slowly beginning to make so much more sense, if that link was indeed the one that Phobos and I shared. If it was, then it was not he who had invaded my dream.
It was I who had invaded his—or perhaps that fragment of his fractured mind.
The Always and Never.
I knew that there was still a lingering connection between Phobos and me. Aery had also spoken of seeing him in the darkness, as though she were in his dreams. Those tethers had remained after his mind had invaded ours, and though it was not tangible, it was a very real thing—a doorway, perhaps. A way to get to him should the need arise.
I knew he would never expect an attack from me.
All I needed was to get my body back—to usurp the usurper.
Ares is lying, I said in an attempt to set Eos off kilter. He lies and deceives. He does not want you to go after Phobos because he does not want him dead—he wants to control you, as he wanted to control me.
Ares was talking to Eos, his words meant to calm and appease her, but I could tell she was not listening to him. Though her focus appeared to be on our father, her attention was all mine.
Kill him, I thought as loudly as I could. Kill Ares now. I cannot do it, as my body is bound by the code and the magic that ties me to the PC, but you can. He will never help us, Eos. He deceived me about Phobos. He will deceive you, too…
The warm sensation of anger flared to blinding hot rage, just as it always had before I released the Dragon’s fire on an unwitting enemy. As she lunged forward, prepared to attack Ares, that binding magical bond of the PC renewed me, and I broke free from my glass cage. Ares looked at Eos with surprise as her mouth opened, an angry cavern filled with lava about to erupt. But before it could, I surged to the forefront, my duty to Ares eclipsing whatever power she held over me in that moment. I snapped my mouth shut and stared at Ares, who looked too shocked to even speak.
I did not know how long I had before she wrestled my soul into submission again, so I chose my words quickly.
“You will never see her again,” I said, leaning in close. Realization dawned in his eyes and he lunged for me, but I stepped out of reach. “And your secret lair is secret no more.” Using the last bit of energy I could muster, I channeled Trey’s power. The throne of Mount Olympus faded from sight, and Ares’ angry cry fell silent as darkened dizziness came over me.
I did not know where I would awaken, or if I even would.
But I found solace in the knowledge that I had outwitted both Eos and the former god of war.
21
I awoke at some point, bathed in a sense of warmth and comfort. My eyes were heavy with exhaustion, but I fought to open them despite my body’s desire to slumber for days. Perhaps it already had been.
At least I had not died.
The ground shifted beneath me, and instinct sounded the alarm. I shot up to find myself nose-to-nose with the Dark One, his arms encircling me like a cage. His deep brown eyes bored into mine.
“Welcome back to the land of the living,” he said without an ounce of humor. “I’ll give you a second to get your bearings before I lose my shit and start grilling you for answers. I’ve got time.”
“But do you have patience?” I countered as I attempted to climb off of his lap. The second I moved, his arms clamped around my waist. Again, his eyes searched mine in the most literal sense, as though he sought to break into my mind and rummage around for something. A moment later, the why behind his actions became clear.
“Where is she?” he asked.
It took only a moment to realize his meaning. “Eos is quiet.” I shifted in his lap to better face him. “For now.”
“I don’t like that qualifier, new girl.”
“And yet I must use it, for it is the truth.”
A low rumble emanated from his chest into mine as he leaned closer. “Where did your deadbeat dad take you?”
“Mount Olympus—or what remains of it. He wanted time with Eos. Watching him wit
h her…it was as if he were an entirely different being.”
“I’m sure,” he replied, tone sarcastic as ever.
“But she does not admire him. Her anger—it was a living thing within our shared body when she asked him about the one who killed her. I believe she blames Ares for what happened; holds him accountable in some way.”
Oz cocked his head. “Did she get answers from him?”
At that, I smiled. “She is a practiced deceiver, just as he is. She manipulated him into sharing what he knew about the one who murdered her, though it may not prove as helpful as any of us would like.”
I relayed the limited explanation Ares had given about the realm born of Phobos’ cleaved mind as best I could. Oz leaned back against the headboard and stared off into the distance, as though he could see far beyond the walls of his room at the Victorian. While he sat in silence, I took in the changes he had made in my absence—or since my return, depending on how long ago that had been.
My dresser from the basement sat along the wall near the window to the rooftop. A pile of my all-black clothing rested on top of the tattered velvet armchair in the corner. And my blades lay on the floor next to the bed, piled on top of my jacket and pants.
“I settled the living situation while I waited for you to wake up from your eight-hour nap—”
“Eight hours have passed?” I asked. When I moved to get up, the stiffness in my body dragged a groan from deep within. “Why did you not call the Healer?”
Oz’s eyes narrowed. “Because you should be able to heal yourself.”
And he was right. I should have been able to call upon those powers. Whether the issue was my unconsciousness or Eos, I did not know, but I needed to find out. The unpredictability of my powers was a problem.
“I must get up,” I said. The second my feet hit the floor, I swayed, dizziness plaguing my mind. I braced my legs against the mattress for stability before I fell. Then strong hands grabbed my shoulders and held me upright. “I want to see Mother. She needs to know I am all right.”
“You need to get back in bed and eat something.”
“Where is she?”
“She’s out with Kaine,” he said softly, “searching for you. She should be back soon enough to check in.”
He guided me back down onto the bed until I was flat on my back, staring up at his formidable silhouette rimmed by the sunlight cascading into the otherwise darkened room.
“You look like a Light One,” I mused as my hand reached out to trace the glowing outline.
“And you look half dead.” His tone was sobering, and my hand fell away to land at my side. “Stay here. I’m going to find something in the kitchen that isn’t so old that it will finish you off.”
“You were worried,” I said as I forced myself to sit up.
He stopped in the open doorway. “Wrong, new girl. I am worried. Present tense.”
Silence. “But I am fine now.”
He barked out a mirthless laugh. “You’re back and you’re alive, but you’re far from fine. The Khara I know couldn’t be overtaken that easily by anything, which leaves me with a grim conclusion I’ve been fighting until now.”
“Which is?” I dared to ask.
More silence. “That the soul you’ve taken in is even stronger than you are.” His gaze fell to the floor. “And she’s winning.”
He slipped into the hall and disappeared before my rebuttal could pass my lips. Then I heard him shout to my brothers that I was awake. Seconds later, a veritable herd of PC ascended the stairs until they appeared in my new room, a mix of emotions plain in their expressions.
“Jesus Christ, Khara,” Kierson sighed as he nearly dove across the room to hug me. “You scared the shit out of us.”
“Yeah, you did,” Casey agreed, his tone as gruff as ever but his expression stark. The second Kierson released me, I found his arms wrapped around me tightly. “We thought maybe…”
“We thought perhaps Ares had outsmarted us all and had the fear god waiting wherever he took you,” Pierson said, his voice even more sober than usual. “We thought that we would never see you again.”
Casey released me just as Drew walked in, looking pale even by his semi-ghostly standards. He approached slowly, myriad emotions in his eyes, until he sat down next to me on the bed and stared as though I were the dead soul in the room. As though he were the one staring at a ghost.
“When you appeared out of nowhere out front, and Cass came running in with your limp body…” he began, never letting his gaze leave mine, “we thought you were dead. That we’d failed you in every possible way.” He took my hand in his and squeezed it lightly. “But then you murmured something as he rushed you upstairs, and I thought that maybe all hope was not lost. That you’d be okay.”
I squeezed him back. “It must have been something most profound to have given you such peace.”
At that, he smiled. “You called for Oz.”
As though his name had conjured him, Oz stepped back into the room, carrying an armful of food.
“Did I?” I asked softly.
Drew looked back to the Dark One in question, then to me. “You did. Then Casey. Me. Kierson. Pierson…Sean. Your mother and Hades, too. You listed off everyone you care about, Khara. Wherever your mind was, I hoped it meant you were on your way back to us.”
“Of course I would come back to you,” I said, taking in their somber expressions. “It would be rude to leave without first saying goodbye.” My words were not taken well until I allowed a tiny smile to grace my countenance. “I see my absence has not improved your collective sense of humor.”
“Nah, Khara,” Kierson said with a smile. “We just keep forgetting that you have one.”
“Well, mine’s fucked right off at this point,” Oz said as he brushed past the others to reach me, “and I’m ready to have a little chat with the soul squatting inside you. She and I have things to discuss. Now.”
“I think she will be disinclined to accept your offer,” I replied as I scanned the void within me to locate her and found nothing but silence. No dissonant residue. Not a trace of anger.
“It’s not an offer,” he said, sitting down beside me, “it’s a fucking order.”
It was then that I felt a small stirring in the depths of my belly, a tentative swirling of energy that crept forward with trepidation at first, but grew bolder with every moment. Every inch.
“You cannot kill her, Oz,” I reminded him. “We may need her.”
He canted his head at me as though I had taken leave of my senses. “I won’t kill her because I’d have to kill you to do it. If that weren’t the case, she’d already be tits up.”
Anger that was not my own flickered through me. Seconds later, the soul I harbored slipped to the forefront with no resistance from me. She would answer for her actions, as I had to.
“If you choose to waste time by focusing your energy on my intentions—the intentions of an ally in this—then you are all fools,” she said. Her sentiment was received as well as one would have expected. My brothers bristled with anger, and Oz fought to remain where he stood. His desire to tear her from my body was apparent, from the muscles cording in his neck to his hands clenched into fists at his sides.
“An ally…that’s what you think you are?” he asked.
Eos, not catching the rhetorical nature of his question, answered. “I want what she wants—Phobos dead.”
“And then what?” he asked, taking a step closer. “Once that’s accomplished, what’s the plan?”
“There isn’t one.”
“Wrong answer,” Casey snarled. The glimmer of his blades reflected through the room.
Drew stepped forward to face off against the ancient soul and she stood to meet his challenge. “You will help Khara defeat your brother, and then you will leave.” The command in his voice reverberated through the room, and I felt it even from the depths of the void.
She smiled at him, and his eyes turned murderous. “You cannot control t
his vessel any longer, warrior, and therefore cannot control me, though your efforts were noble. I’m sure Khara appreciates them.”
“Fucking bitch,” Kierson growled as he lunged for her—for me. Pierson thwarted his efforts with an arm around the shoulders, but my emotional brother’s struggle was plain.
“You’ll do what Drew says or you will die,” Oz said.
Eos cocked her head at him and clasped her hands behind her back. “And how would you manage that without hurting your beloved, I wonder?”
“I wouldn’t. I’d take her out, too, if I had to, because I sure as fuck wouldn’t leave her to rot in there with you holding her hostage.”
Her head tipped to the other side. “You truly do love her, don’t you?”
He leaned in closer. “Push me and you’ll find out.”
She scoffed at what she perceived to be bravado, but I knew better. I knew he would absolutely kill me to take her out if he had to, because that is precisely what I would want. He knew me too well to think otherwise.
“You should all be focused on the problem at hand, or what happens afterward will not be an issue because it will never come to pass. Phobos will get what he wants, and your precious sister will be lost to you forever.”
“And you know how to stop him?” Oz asked, disbelief in his tone.
“Ares shared what he knew because he believed I was still his doting daughter. I kept up the charade, and information poured from him.”
“Information like what?”
“That the Always and Never is tied to Phobos...that where one is, so is the other.”
Oz’s brow quirked at her phrasing. “You mean literally…” She nodded. “So how do we use that to our advantage?”
“We don’t,” she replied, cutting them all a sharp look. “It will be up to your sister and me to find him and take him down there, but since we cannot go to him, we must draw him out.”
“That should be easy enough,” Oz muttered under his breath.
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