Alastair peeked around the door frame. “Are you having the baby?”
“I will soon, yes. Don’t worry, everything will be fine.”
“Don’t take the freeway.”
“I—” He sounded just like he always did. “We won’t.”
“Good.” He gave me a hug and ran off. I stared after him. Good warning. I could imagine being in active labor, stuck on the freeway and giving birth in the car.
Someone knocked on the front door and opened it without waiting for an invitation. “I hear someone is in need of a babysitter,” Viv said. “You all right?”
“That was fast,” I said, rising to greet her and Jeremiah. “Malcolm called you just minutes ago.”
“I had a feeling we would be needed.” Viv hugged me. Ever since receiving her aegis, she’d started having premonitions—nothing as specific as what Victor Crowson saw, but in combination with the perceptive powers of the glass aegis, they were unambiguous and one hundred percent accurate. Viv had taken it in stride the way she’d accepted everything about becoming a magus. It almost made me forget that she hadn’t been one her whole life.
Another contraction hit just then. It still wasn’t as strong as they would become, but it was closer to the previous one than I liked. “We were going on a picnic,” I said.
“We can handle that,” Jeremiah said. He called out, “Alastair, I brought you and Duncan something.”
Alastair shouted something in the distance, once more sounding like a five year old, and he and Duncan ran into the entryway and threw themselves at Jeremiah, who laughed. You’d never know he disliked children by the way he treated mine, but then he also always treated them like adults, and to my surprise, they responded well to that.
Malcolm appeared behind the boys, toting my bag. “Time to go,” he said. “You know where everything is?”
“Someone will,” Viv said. “Hurry. I’m looking forward to meeting my namesake.”
Malcolm helped me into the car, the Honda Accord he’d bought the minute he found out I was pregnant with Alastair. I didn’t think he missed the Mustang much. “Alastair said to avoid the freeway,” I told him as we backed down the driveway.
Malcolm shot me a look I had no trouble interpreting. “Just like that?”
“Malcolm—”
“Helena, we have to figure this out soon. He’ll be starting kindergarten in the fall. Bad enough he’s a genius, what happens when he starts prophesying on the playground?”
“I’ve taught them both to identify thoughts that are actually prophecies, and we’re working on learning what to do about them. He knows not to mention them to anyone. He can keep the secret.”
“And if the prophecy is to save someone’s life? Some other child?”
I sighed. The sigh turned into a gasp as a contraction hit. It took me a second or two to regain my breath to respond. “I don’t know the answer, Malcolm. I have a hard time figuring out what to do with spontaneous prophecies for non-Wardens myself. You know the alternative.”
Malcolm’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “I don’t want him homeschooled. You have enough to deal with without adding that burden. And a tutor is almost as bad. He needs to learn how to get along with other kids.”
“You know all the research says kids are better socialized when they’re around adults than other kids.”
Malcolm shook his head. “I’m not worried about his socialization. He’s like a tiny adult. That makes it even more important that he understands the way ordinary people his own age behave.”
Another contraction gripped me. “I don’t want to tell you to speed,” I said through gritted teeth, “but sooner is better.”
“We’re almost there.”
We pulled up under the hospital portico, and Malcolm got out and ran inside to find someone with a wheelchair. The contractions were hard enough now I didn’t think I could make it under my own power. Men and women passed our car and glanced at me incuriously. I didn’t try to smile. It would have come out as a grimace.
Malcolm returned, trotting beside an orderly pushing a wheelchair. “All right, let’s get you inside,” the man said with a cheery smile. I nodded, unable to speak as the biggest contraction so far hit me.
The rest of the time passed in a haze of pain. I remembered my doctor saying, “No epidural, Helena, you’ll give birth before it has time to kick in,” and then a lot of moaning, probably from me. Then Malcolm was gripping my hand and telling me to push, and I pushed, once, twice, and on the third time felt my belly go slack as the baby slipped out of me. I gasped with relief. Malcolm kissed my forehead. “She’s perfect,” he said.
He left me to help bathe her, and soon they brought her to me and tucked her into my arms. “Genevieve,” I whispered. “Little Jenny.”
She opened her eyes and looked at me. They were the same brownish-blue as my own. It breeds true, I thought, and cuddled her close to my heart.
Malcolm brought the boys to see their sister that evening, shortly after my mother and father stopped by. Duncan bounced until I reminded him he had to sit still if he wanted to hold her. Even so, Malcolm hovered nearby. Alastair watched everything in wide-eyed silence and held his sister gently when it was his turn. “She’s so small,” he said.
“You were even smaller than that when you were born,” I said.
“I spoke with Mother this afternoon,” Malcolm said. “She won’t be back from Vancouver for a few days, but I told her it would be all right for her to visit after that.”
“Send her lots of pictures,” I said. Sometimes it still struck me as strange that Madeleine and I weren’t at each other’s throats anymore. We would never be close, but she wasn’t my enemy.
Someone rapped on the door, and Judy poked her head inside. “We’re not intruding, are we?” she asked.
“No, come in. You didn’t bring Sophia, did you?”
Judy entered, followed by Mike. “She’s with Father,” Judy said. “I think he likes the excuse to eat fast food.”
“I don’t like Sophia,” Duncan said.
“Duncan, don’t be rude,” I warned him.
“You like Sophia,” Malcolm said, “right up until she outraces you.”
Duncan scowled. He and Judy’s daughter were the same age, and they were either going to kill each other or end up married.
Judy glanced at me for permission, then took Jenny into her arms. “She’s precious. And…she has the eyes.”
“All babies have eyes of an indeterminate color,” I said.
Judy shot me a narrow-eyed look. “You know better, though.”
“I know better.” I sighed. “Sometimes I wonder if I don’t have a duty to the world to bear as many oracles as I can.”
“You know better than that, too.” Judy’s expression went distant, and I felt like a jerk. Sophia had come along after seven miscarriages, and Judy and Mike had decided not to risk Judy’s health further. Judy refused to talk about it, and I would never push, but the look in her eyes told me everything she wouldn’t say.
“Yeah. Three is enough for me. We’re officially outnumbered.” I accepted Jenny from Judy and examined her, though I knew nothing bad had happened to her while she was away from me. The baby let out a tiny cry and waved a fist, tapping my nose and making me laugh.
“So are you taking a break?” Mike asked.
I nodded. “For a week. That’s assuming I don’t have any spontaneous revelations.”
“A week isn’t very long,” Judy said with a frown.
“That’s what I told her,” Malcolm said. “She has a weird concept of maternity leave.”
“It’s not like my calling is a burden,” I said. That wasn’t precisely true. Being an oracle meant seeing things I wished I hadn’t. But I’d never been able to explain to anyone, not Lucia, not my friends, not my husband, the swooping, beautiful feeling of a revelation unfolding inside me, even the devastating ones.
Just then, I felt it—a rush like diving into a deep pool, fo
llowed by bright images and knowledge I translated into words for the benefit of others. “Somebody tell Lucia her prey is holed up in the Bide-a-Wee Inn just outside Cardston,” I said. “Room 208.”
“He has a gun,” Duncan said. “A big gun.”
“And there’s a lady with him,” Alastair said.
Mike cleared his throat. Malcolm took out his phone and stepped into the hall. Judy said, “That never gets less disturbing.”
“I wonder if Jenny saw it too?” I said, brushing a wisp of pale hair away from her forehead. Jenny burped. “We almost never all get the same revelation at the same time, or even related ones.”
“Even so,” Judy said. “The boys—” She shut up. I could guess what she was thinking.
“They’ll learn,” I said. “They all will.”
Eight days later, I sat down to the computer in the office and opened my message program. I’d switched to this dedicated computer years before, when the Board of Neutralities and I had worked out the details of how the new oracle would work. The office gave me more privacy. Now that there were no more factions in the aftermath of the invaders’ attempted destruction of our reality, the Neutralities didn’t need to be neutral anymore, but it comforted people to know that some things, at least, hadn’t changed.
The oracle wasn’t one of those things.
I checked my personal message box first. That was overflowing with congratulations from people all over the world. Claude had sent a letter and a baby blanket rather than a message, but Abdel Fayed, custodian of the Well, had messaged to let me know he had made a wish on our behalf. That warmed my heart.
I decided to leave answering those messages until later and changed to the oracle’s box. That wasn’t nearly so full, but the messages took longer to handle. I closed my eyes and centered myself, then turned to the message with the earliest time stamp:
I think my boyfriend is cheating on me. I don’t know what to do.
No salutation, no signature. Not even really a question. The woman’s pain, however, rang through those two sentences. Even now that the oracle was a person rather than a bookstore, the questions were always the same: Does he/she love me? Am I being played for a fool? How do I make this devastating choice? And the oracle still cared.
I let my knowledge of the answer fill me, and typed You’re afraid of being alone, but as long as you’re with this cheating scumbag, you’ll never find true love. Have the courage to confront him, and see what happens.
I clicked Send, but didn’t go on to the next message. I’d heard someone coming down the hall. Soon, the door opened, and Alastair came in. “What are you doing?”
“Oracle business.” I hesitated, then said, “Do you want to watch?” Privacy was one thing, but my son was an oracle, too.
Alastair nodded and climbed into my lap. He had long, gawky legs that dangled and a very bony butt, but we found a comfortable position and I let him click open the next message.
I have the opportunity to take a new job, but it’s risky and I have a young family who would bear the burden of that risk. I need to know where I’ll be in five years if I take the new job.
Alastair reached the end of the message before I did. He ran his fingers along the frame of the keyboard.
“What do you think?” I said.
He turned his head to look at me. “Me?”
“This will be your job someday. Maybe someday soon. You already see the future…so what lies ahead for this woman?”
He turned back to regard the screen. “A big house, a nice car, but one of her children is gone,” he said. “Should we tell her that?”
“What do you think?”
He shrugged one shoulder. “You said not to tell people scary things.”
“That’s for when you see their future and they didn’t ask for it. This woman asked us a question. Don’t you think she deserves the truth?”
Alastair thought about it for a minute. “Yeah. I think she wants her family more than the big house.”
“Maybe. I agree. But the choice is up to her.” I typed up a response and sent it.
Alastair put his hand on the mouse. “Can I do the next one?”
“Sweetheart,” I said, “I know you can.”
Author’s Note
How it all started:
This series began as a writing exercise in description. I had a couple of concepts in mind: the disorganized bookstore I’d seen in the French Quarter in New Orleans, the idea of books as prophecies, and my own superpower of being able to find random literary treasures when I’m not searching for them. I had no intention of writing a book; contemporary fantasy is not my usual thing, and all I really wanted was to practice writing deep description, something I felt inadequate at.
Then something strange happened. I couldn’t find a stopping point, a place at which I was satisfied with the exercise. I wrote four chapters of The Book of Secrets before admitting to myself that I had at least a book in there somewhere, more likely a series.
This meant more serious planning. The original exercise was set in a generic city, but a real contemporary/urban fantasy needs a solid real-world anchor. Portland, Oregon is the only large city I both know well and was willing to set a story in—I was born in Gresham, and my grandparents still lived in Happy Valley (in a house that later became the model for Helena’s parents’ house). Helena, who had been a nebulous figure in the exercise, needed to be fleshed out. And I needed both a magic system and a conflict to provide a framework to hang a story on.
I’d written the first chapters while on vacation in Washington State, and on the drive back to Utah I asked my family for ideas about magic. It was my husband who came up with the idea for the aegis; the rest of us all said, “Ew, gross,” and then set about making it work. I can’t remember where the idea of invaders came from, but I know the factions were all mine. I loved the idea of pitting humans not only against monsters, but against each other.
I have a history of spitballing details that I later have to live with. Lucia Pontarelli’s habit of referring to people by surname came after I’d named her aides, for example, leading to poor Dave Henry and Martin Maxwell being the guys with two first names. (Martin was not meant to be a traitor; that was more spitballing in book five, because I didn’t know about the Mercy until I started writing book four.) Helena’s fondness for lasagna. Absolutely everything about glass magic—I think glass magic was my favorite thing to invent. It is a minor miracle that I managed never to contradict myself—or at least was able to cover up inconsistencies. I hope. I’m sure fans will be quick to correct me if I’m wrong.
Before the end of The Book of Secrets, I had a plan for much of what the series would cover that amounted to some details about each of the series arcs, specifically the end of the Long War and the way Malcolm and Helena’s relationship would play out. That left so much room for invention. Jeremiah Washburn, for example, was just a throwaway character in The Book of Mayhem, someone who could wear funny T-shirts and appear to be a stereotypical geek while actually being a badass fighter. That he would stick around never occurred to me. It’s thanks to Hallie O’Donovan that he is a reformed traitor and not an actual one. I think she said it would look bad to give Viv a serious boyfriend and then have him turn out to be evil. I like how it actually worked out way better.
Another thing that constantly surprises me is having the ability to accurately estimate how much space I’ll need to tell a story, or in this case, a series. I originally thought it would take ten books, but I hadn’t realized how compact the events of putative books eight and nine really were. So I guessed pretty close to what it ended up being. (And The Book of War remains one of my favorites of the series, so I feel combining the two potential books worked out great.)
It is always bittersweet, coming to the end of a long series. I remain deeply satisfied with how the whole thing worked out, and it’s wonderful to let the final book out into the world for others to read. But I was immersed in the world of The Last Oracle
for what works out to just over a year of writing (spread out over a couple of years) and then three years of publication, and that’s a lot of time to be absorbed in anything.
I feel extraordinarily grateful that the series’ rocky start with my former publisher, and the difficulties I had in getting the series re-released, did not result in the series disappearing. My thanks go out to all the readers who remained fans through the months during which The Book of Mayhem’s publication was repeatedly delayed for one thing and another.
I would also like to thank the many people who supported me and this unexpected series throughout its genesis and release. Alexandra Brandt did fantastic work not only with creating the covers, but researching other works in my odd genre before telling me that no, my idea was not crazy. We took a chance on not using people on the covers, and I think it paid off. (Anyone who remembers the original covers for the first two books—that was the same woman. Yes, I know she looks completely different in each. That inspired me to look for a different solution.)
First readers Jana Brown and Hallie O’Donovan patiently read each installment as I produced it and gave wonderful feedback. And, most importantly, my husband Jacob Proffitt was and is my greatest support and biggest fan, quick to laugh and quick to cry over Helena’s adventures. Thank you all.
And, finally, thanks again to you, the reader. Writers work more or less in isolation, and it isn’t until a book gets out into the world that we know if other people will love it like we do. You readers have made this series a tremendous success, and I cannot express how grateful and thrilled I am that you’ve embraced it. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share my imagination with you.
About the Author
In addition to The Last Oracle series, Melissa McShane is the author of The Extraordinaries series, beginning with BURNING BRIGHT, the Crown of Tremontane series, beginning with SERVANT OF THE CROWN, as well as COMPANY OF STRANGERS and many others.
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