The Helicon Muses Omnibus: Books 1-4

by V. J. Chambers

  Probably not, however. As satisfying as it would be to choke the life out of their idiot necks, afterward he would be left with the mess. He didn’t much like the smell of dead bodies.

  That evening, Owen was sitting inside the old house on the bed that he and his old foster father had brought in for him to sleep on. He was staring at the wall, which was still plastered with old photographs taken by whoever had lived in this house originally. Most of the old house was filled with piles of boxes. It’d been used as storage for years. Owen glared at the junk and waited. He did this every evening and some afternoons as well. He knew that he was an intelligent person. So he figured that if he just sat here waiting for long enough, the answer to how to get Nora would come to him. He didn’t know what else to do.

  There was a knock on his door.

  Owen looked up, completely confused. No one came to see him. Certainly, no one knocked on his door. His foster father and foster mother were the only people who knew he was here, and they had been warned severely in no uncertain terms never to bother him unless he asked them. He was sure it wasn’t them. So, who could be knocking on his door?

  He got up from the bed and made his way through the maze of boxes and junk—old appliances, bicycles, and books—to the door. He yanked it open.

  To his astonishment, she was standing there. Nora Sparrow. In the flesh. Sure, she was flanked by those stupid friends of hers, who Owen really couldn’t stand. But he couldn’t let her know that. She couldn’t believe that he was a threat, not until he used her to stop Nimue. So, he would have to pretend that he didn’t mind her friends.

  And sure, they were all wearing sunglasses which made them look like bugs.

  But the most important thing was that she was here. He had waited, and she had arrived.

  His face broke into a huge grin. “Nora. I knew you’d come.”

  * * *

  He was taller. That was the first thing that Nora thought. She’d been sure that he was done growing. But he was taller.

  Other than that, he looked the same. She had to admit that that smile on his face brought back so many memories. She remembered when seeing his face made her happier than anything else on earth. She and Owen had spent years together. For most of her life, he had been all she had. She’d loved him, and he had betrayed her. He had lied and manipulated and hurt everyone else that she cared about. Looking at him now, part of her wanted to hug him and part of her wanted to punch him.

  But she didn’t do either. Instead she folded her arms over her chest. “You had something you wanted to tell me?”

  Owen stepped out of the doorway, gesturing. “Won’t you come in, please?”

  Nora moved forward.

  “Hold on,” said Sawyer. “If we go in there, how do we know we’re coming back out?”

  Owen laughed. “I’m not going to kill you. Have I ever tried to kill any of you before?”

  “Um, well…” said Maddie.

  Owen flinched a little, then laughed it off. “Well, I’m not going to kill you now.”

  Nora hesitated. Her friends just stared at Owen.

  Owen’s grin widened. “I promise, okay?”

  Nora reached back for both of their hands. “If you hurt them, Owen, I will kill you.” She stared into his eyes, letting him see that she was serious.

  But Owen only laughed again. “I told you. I’m not going to hurt anyone.”

  Nora ducked into the house with her friends along behind her. “Actually, what you said it was that you weren’t going to kill them. Which isn’t exactly the same thing.”

  The house was cluttered and crowded. Nora, Sawyer, and Maddie stood together in a little space still clasping hands. Owen shut the door to the house and took the lead. He led them through a narrow path, amongst the clutter. On the other side of the stack of boxes, there was a table and four chairs.

  Owen pulled one of the chairs out. “Go ahead and sit down, then.”

  Nora did so, feeling wary. “Is this really necessary? If you have a message for me, can’t you just tell me what it is?”

  “Please,” said Owen, “sit down. All of you.”

  Maddie and Sawyer exchanged a glance, but they sat down too, each on one side of Nora.

  Owen sat down facing her.

  She was struck by how startlingly blue his eyes were. She remembered that Owen was attractive, but it had been a long time since she’d seen him. Self-consciously, she adjusted her sunglasses.

  “Why are you all wearing sunglasses at night, anyway?” said Owen. “You must not be able to see clearly.”

  We’re fine,” said Nora. “Now, do you have something to tell me or not?”

  Owen sat back in his chair. “Oh, I get it. You’re afraid that I’m going to get inside your head and make you do things that you don’t want to do.”

  Nora fidgeted. If worst came to worst, she knew it was possible for Owen to get the sunglasses off of her. They weren’t a piece of impervious protection. “What do you want to tell me?”

  Owen sighed. “Right down to business? You aren’t even going to ask about how I’ve been doing?”

  Nora glared at him. “You said that Helicon was in danger. How is Helicon in danger?”

  “Fine,” said Owen. “We’ll play it your way. I got in contact with you because Nimue is on the move, and she has plans for Helicon

  Maddie grimaced. “That’s it? Well, we already knew that.” She stood up from the table. “Come on, Nora. Let’s get out of here.”

  Nora held up a hand. “Hold on, Maddie.” She turned to Owen. “We thought it might be Nimue.”

  Sawyer curled his upper lip. “So, we are supposed to believe that you went to all the trouble to get Daryl back to Helicon and give us this message all out of the kindness of your heart?”

  “If that was the case,” said Maddie, “then why couldn’t you have just told Daryl everything?”

  Nora glared at the both of them. She didn’t need them antagonizing Owen. He didn’t like it when people were confrontational with him. She waited for him to lash out.

  But Owen just kept smiling. “I’ve changed, Nora. I really have. I know I did some very nasty things to you, but that was only because of the spell that Nimue had put on me. Now the spell is gone, and I don’t have any reason to try to hurt you.”

  Nora leaned across the table. “You have a plan, don’t you? A plan to stop Nimue?”

  “That’s my girl,” said Owen. “You were always just tad bit smarter than most of the other imbeciles that surround me.”

  “You need me for the plan,” said Nora. “That’s why you want me here. Not to warn me, not to help me. But because I need to help you.”

  Owen just kept smiling. “That going to be a problem?”

  * * *

  Agler had been looking for Maddie for over an hour now. She had gone to the bathroom and never come back. It didn’t take him long to realize that Sawyer and Nora were gone too. He’d gone back to the tweens and rebels enclave to see if the three of them were there, and he ran into Lute.

  “Looking for Sawyer?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” said Lute. “He said he was coming back to the tent, but I can’t find him anywhere. That was ages ago.”

  “Maddie’s gone too,” said Agler. “So’s Nora. They’re up to something.”

  “Sawyer’s been helping them out in the engineering enclave recently,” said Lute.

  “The engineering enclave? What the heck would they be doing there?” And then it dawned on Agler. “The dimension device. Those idiots left Helicon.” He couldn’t believe it. It was exactly like them, of course. It was the kind of thing that they did. But he couldn’t believe they’d left him behind. He took off across the enclave as fast as he could.

  “Wait, where are you going?” said Lute.

  Agler started to sprint.

  “I’m coming too!” Lute called from behind him.

  Agler didn’t wait for the other muse, but Lute caught up, and they ran all the way back to the ball
. They tore inside, through the dancing couples and between the elegant tables until they found Coeus and Phoebe, who were sitting together, their fingers entwined, gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes.

  Agler slammed his hand down on the table in between them. “We’ve got a situation.”

  Both Coeus and Phoebe looked up, startled.

  “Agler, what’s wrong?” said Coeus.

  “They were working on the dimension device, weren’t they?” said Agler.

  “Agler,” said Phoebe, standing up and putting a hand on his arm.

  He shook her off. “Weren’t they?” he asked Coeus.

  Lute looked confused. “What’s going on?”

  “They were,” admitted Coeus.

  “Well, they’re gone,” said Agler. “They’ve gone off someplace, probably after Nimue or something stupid. They always think they can fix things that are better left alone, and you have to do something about it.”

  “Me?” said Coeus.

  “Both of you,” said Agler.

  “They went after Nimue?” Lute was horrified. “Why would they do that?”

  “Phoebe, you’re in charge around here,” said Agler. “They’re tweens, and they’re in danger.”

  Coeus stroked his chin. “Well, how would we do something about it? If they’ve taken the dimension device, we can’t go after them, can we? And it’s not as if we have any idea where they are.”

  Agler glared at Phoebe and Coeus. “You already knew they were gone, didn’t you?”

  “No, we’re just as shocked as you,” said Phoebe. But she didn’t seem shocked.

  Agler dragged a hand over his face.

  “Where’s Sawyer?” said Lute.

  Phoebe patted Lute on the shoulder. “Now, now. They’ve always come back before.”

  Agler squeezed his eyes shut. Maddie was gone, and he couldn’t get to her. If anything happened to her…

  “Damn you,” he growled at Phoebe and Coeus. “You shouldn’t have let this happen.” And he stormed out of the tent.

  * * *

  “Well, I need you,” Owen was saying, “but I really have changed, and it’s important that you believe that. I did a lot of ridiculous things to try to keep you, but I wouldn’t do those things anymore, you understand? No stalking you. No hurting your friends to control you. I just don’t care anymore.”

  Nora chewed on her lip.

  “I haven’t bothered you, have I?” said Owen. “Believe me, if I was still hung up on you, I would have found some way to get to you.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “You did find some way to get to me.”

  “Yes, but not because I want us to be together or anything like that. I thought I loved you, Nora, but it was just a spell.”

  “You aren’t capable of loving anything,” she said.

  He made a face. “There’s no reason to insult me, is there?”

  She pushed her sunglasses up on her nose. No, there wasn’t any reason to get on his bad side. She cocked her head. “So, what do you need me for?”

  “It’s simple, actually,” said Owen. “You won’t have to do much at all. And if all goes well, that will be the end of Nimue, and she won’t be able to hurt Helicon ever again.”

  “You don’t care about Helicon,” said Maddie. “You don’t care about anything.”

  “I do care.” Owen turned to her. “You don’t know me at all, so don’t pretend that you do.” He turned back to Nora. “When did she slim down?”

  “Not the point,” said Nora. “I believe you care about Helicon. It’s the only place you were ever a little bit happy.”

  Owen laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous. I can be happy anywhere.”

  “You’re never happy,” said Nora. “But I also know that you hate Nimue, and you’ve tried to kill her before. And that’s what we’re doing here, right? Killing Nimue?”

  “Of course.” Owen’s mouth curved into a smile.

  “Hold on a second,” said Sawyer.

  Nora turned to look at her friends. “I know that in Helicon, no one would ever consider killing anyone.”

  “Killing is wrong,” said Maddie.

  “Nimue deserves it,” countered Nora.

  “But if you kill someone, you’ll be just as bad as her,” said Sawyer.

  “I’ll do the killing,” said Owen. “Don’t worry about your precious Nora’s innocence.”

  “If we all consent to kill her,” said Maddie, “it’s the same thing.”

  “She should have died a long time ago,” said Nora. “She should have been a human with a normal lifespan. She’s used power to steal life for herself. We’d be setting things right.”

  Maddie swallowed.

  Sawyer shook his head.

  “You don’t have to like it,” said Nora. “But you’re not going to stop me either. I’m sick of worrying about that woman. I want it over.”

  “Did you tell Phoebe you were doing this?” said Sawyer.

  “Of course not.” Nora turned back to Owen. “So, how do we do it?”

  “I don’t like this,” said Sawyer.

  “Me either,” said Maddie.

  “Too bad,” said Nora.

  Owen chuckled. “Oh, Nora, it’s good to have you back. I missed you.”

  She put a finger in his face. “This isn’t about you. It’s about getting something done that needs done. So, start talking. What do we do?”

  “Well, do you remember, years and years ago, right after Nimue took you captive, that she was trying to get you to drink a tea?” said Owen.

  “Hey, she did that to me in Nysa,” said Maddie.

  “You?” said Owen.

  Nora quickly explained to him what had happened to Maddie in Nysa with Nimue and the nymphs.

  Owen nodded slowly. “Well, that concoction that she’s tried to feed both of you is a powerful bit of magic. If you drink enough of it, the concoction ties you to Nimue, allowing her to siphon off all of your muse magic, which—as you know—means that she would have direct ties to Helicon. She could drain the whole of the muse world of magic.”

  Maddie’s face turned white. “When I think how close I was to drinking it…”

  “Well, you didn’t,” said Nora. “And I didn’t drink it either.”

  “But you will,” said Owen.

  “But you just said that it would allow Nimue to drain Helicon,” said Sawyer.

  “The connection will go both ways,” said Owen. “If you and Nimue are connected, we can do it the other way. We can siphon off all of her power. Deflate her like a balloon.”

  “You can do that?” said Nora.

  “It’s the same thing she was going to do,” said Owen. “Once you drink the tea, you and Nimue will be connected, and she’ll be drawn to us. I just have to make her drink the concoction as well. Once she’s done that, we’ll have her. She’ll be powerless.”

  * * *

  “I still don’t like this,” Sawyer was saying.

  The sun was struggling into the sky in the east, and Nora and the others were in the kitchen of her old foster parent’s house. Owen had awakened the foster parents and ordered them to leave the house and not to come back until nightfall. They had shuffled off like dead things, like they had lost their will and their humanity. Nora didn’t like seeing that, but Owen had been doing it to people their whole lives. She forced herself not to say anything. Sawyer, on the other hand, couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

  Owen ignored him. He was standing over the stove, stirring the tea. “It’s almost ready, Nora.”

  “Seriously, Nora.” Sawyer put his hand on her shoulder. “Nothing about this is a good idea.”

  She turned to him. “Look, what did you think we were going to do when we got here? Talk to Owen and then just leave?”

  “Kind of,” spoke up Maddie, who was sitting at the kitchen table, looking worried. “If we don’t stop you from killing Nimue, it’s like we did it. Like we’re murderers.”

  “You can’t murder something like her,” gr
owled Owen from the stove.

  They were all stunned to hear the raw emotion in his voice. Owen usually was disinterested and calm. They all turned to look at him.

  He sucked in air through his nose. “She only got pregnant with me so that she could drain Helicon’s magic. She wanted a muse child, and when I wasn’t connected to Helicon that way, she hated me. What kind of mother hates her own child?”

  Everyone was quiet.

  “Well, she sort of is trying to kill all of us,” said Maddie, as if she was trying to convince herself, “because Helicon can’t survive without magic. We saw that last year.”

  “Last year?” said Owen. “Oh, did Loki show up with that little toy I gave him?”

  Nora’s nostrils flared. “Toy?”

  Owen chuckled.

  “You’re the same as her,” said Nora. “You just want to take and take and—”

  “No.” Owen shook his head. “I am nothing like Nimue. Nothing.”

  “Anyway, if we don’t stop her,” said Maddie, “she’ll kill a lot of people.”

  “We don’t have to kill her to stop her,” said Sawyer.

  “Maybe we do.” Maddie hugged herself.

  Sawyer gaped at her.

  “I’m sorry, Sawyer, but if you’d met her—”

  “I have,” said Sawyer.

  “You watched her get shot and not die,” said Owen. “I hardly think that counts.” He took the tea off of the stove briskly and poured it into a mug. “Okay, Nora, drink up.”

  “Hold on,” said Sawyer. “I really don’t think—”

  “Sawyer, I’m doing it,” said Nora.

  “Well, does it have to be you?” said Sawyer. “We’re all muses. I could drink it.”

  “It’s better if it’s Nora,” said Owen. “She’s the one Nimue wanted originally, after all. It will make the bond stronger.”

  “It’s fine.” Nora patted Sawyer’s shoulder. “I can handle this.”

  Sawyer made a pained expression. “It’s only that we don’t even know what he’s giving you. Maybe it’s going to make you take off your sunglasses, and he’s going to force you to—”

  “I told you I’m not doing that anymore,” said Owen. “I don’t want Nora. I only want to kill Nimue.”

  Nora rolled her eyes. Sure, Owen wasn’t trustworthy, and she knew that. But that didn’t mean that he wasn’t telling the truth about this concoction. She believed him. She knew how much he despised Nimue. Nora snatched the mug up. She wrinkled her nose as she smelled it. “This is the same stuff that Nimue tried to give me years ago.”