by Amber Lynn
“I’m sure his family is already on the way, but it will be good if they’re all coming here while we’re driving in the opposite direction.”
I was deposited in a dark sedan. I didn’t have a chance to really get a look at the outside. I only saw out of the corner of my eye that there were four doors. I tried to get out as he walked around the car to the driver’s side, but he continually hit the button to lock the door when I tried to escape.
There hadn’t been a time in my life when I required use of my magic when it hadn’t worked. I still had a couple tricks up my sleeve to get away from him, but pretty much everything ended with my death. I wasn’t ready to go to that extreme quite yet.
Eventually I’d use it if I couldn’t think of another way to kill him. He’d probably enjoy the fact that our deaths happened at the same time, as crazy as he was.
He managed to get in and keep me in at the same time. Once he was in the car, the chances of me getting out reduced even more.
“I’d ask where you thought we should go, but I have a feeling your answer would include Hell, and I’m not fond of climates that warm. I’m thinking Canada would be a good starting location. It’s big enough that we can probably find a nice little section to claim for ourselves.”
“I could care less where you take me. What I want to know is what right you think you have to claim me as yours. I didn’t miss you saying Jack touched what was yours.”
“We’ve got a long trip ahead of us, so we have plenty of time for stories. Let’s get on the highway, and then I can tell you all the things you missed not growing up when your mother was still alive. The world was a very different place back then, and freewill to choose who you mated with was rarely granted.”
I had no idea what the past had to do with anything. If he wanted to use it as an excuse for asserting I didn’t get to pick Jack as my husband, he was mistaken. His words did make me wonder if he somehow was raised when Artemis was alive.
He clearly had at least seen the past if he knew what things were like. My brief trip hadn’t revealed anything that backed up his statement.
“I hate to tell you this, but the past is the past, and there’s a reason why it isn’t the future. Whatever happened back then, doesn’t matter thousands of years in the future.”
I didn’t know why I bothered talking to him. I should’ve sat in my seat and plotted his death. There were still questions that I wanted answered, and if he felt like talking, I’d learn everything I could. Chances were that I’d be able to use the knowledge against him at some point.
I may not have had all the powers a goddess had, but I was going to show him that messing with a demigoddess wasn’t any smarter than messing with a full goddess. Before the day was over, I planned to have a dead satyr at my feet.
Chapter Twenty
We made it ten blocks before he spoke again. He could’ve talked the whole time, but I had focused in on Abbie in an attempt to see if Jack was okay. I’d never looked through someone else’s eyes before, but just wanting to see Jack had put me in her shoes.
Nikki and Vik had arrived. They didn’t have the kids with them, so I assumed Paul was watching them. I studied Nikki’s face, looking for any signs of sadness, but all I could see was anger. I didn’t have words to match their lip movements, so I couldn’t get a full picture.
All I needed to see to make me feel better was that they’d moved Jack to my couch and had propped his head up with a pillow from my bed. If they were making him comfortable, the chances of him eventually waking up seemed more probable.
“You do know I can feel it when you use magic, right? With how amped up I am right now, I could feel you lining your lips earlier.”
“Good for you. You only had to kill five people to get the power. I’m sure that makes you feel proud.”
I looked at the dashboard in front of me. It was black vinyl with a glove box and a large touchscreen that seemed to control most of the car’s functions. None of the icons I saw would help me escape, so I filed them away and tried to think of anything else that would be helpful.
“You pushed my hand. I wanted to go straight for you, to stop killing people and live off your energy. You’re the only person in the world I can siphon off of without taking years. Instead of letting me court you slowly, you met him and made it impossible for me not to hurt you. Even after I ensured you should hate him, you took him back.”
“How did you ensure I would hate him?”
I never hated Jack. I feared what the group of his family as a whole could do to me, and pushed them away for my safety. The fear didn’t lessen the attraction I felt, or the emotions brewing inside of me. If anything, pushing him away had only led me to believe I was a sleepless zombie without him.
“I know the wolves let you see into the past. I stole power from your witchy friend to ensure you saw it exactly how I wanted you to, not that what you saw wasn’t true. The wolves attacked and killed your family, and yet you were screwing one of them like there was no tomorrow. What do you think your mother would say if she knew that?”
“Since I never met her, I guess I can’t say for sure. You seem to have known her, what do you think she’d say?”
I didn’t think he needed to know what Jack had revealed. I figured he’d reveal more if he thought he could shape the way I saw things.
“I’m sure she’d point out there was a reason she cursed the wolves to not fall in love and that her mother’s curse was also there for a reason. Your whole family hated the wolves. Even your uncle, who wanted to make sure you were protected from them in the present time. The same day Artemis put you in the ground, Apollo did the same with me. It surprised me that he picked me for the responsibility, but I imagine he was just trying to get me out of his hair.
“He told me to find you and protect you. For some reason he didn’t plant me right next to you, so it took a little time. There were a couple of times I thought I was close to you, but you disappeared, and then stopped using your power. I finally found you, but it was only because the wolf was on my tail and you met with him.”
“So you were alive back then?”
His speech confused things a little. I hadn’t considered that he’d been alive back then. I thought maybe he was some kind of very distant descendant that had kept the abilities the satyrs had. That didn’t explain why he’d acted like he’d known Artemis, but it was hard to believe he’d really been alive that long.
“I was, so if you want to know anything about your mother, I met her personally and have some fun tales I could tell you.”
“Were you the satyr who caused the problems that took my mother away from her house that day?”
“What?”
He was confused by my question, and when he took his eyes off the road to look at me, he swerved into oncoming traffic. A horn blared, and he hurried to swerve back. The fact that he was caught off guard by my question made me believe I’d hit the nail on the head.
“During the view of the past that I saw, Apollo mentioned how sorry he was that he’d called Artemis over to help deal with a satyr. It’s the reason I thought you might be one, because they mentioned humans dying. Since you were alive back then, I was wondering if it was you.”
“No, of course not. I wasn’t aware that was the reason she wasn’t there. I just assumed she was off hunting.”
My lie detector went crazy from the word no. Every word out of his mouth was false, which opened up an entirely new line of questioning.
“Did you know that Jack’s brother-in-law is the reincarnation of the man Leto cursed into becoming a wolf, and that Nikki, Jack’s sister, was the reincarnation of the man’s wife?”
“I try to stay away from wolves whenever possible, so I didn’t know that, nor would I believe it if they told me that. Wolves have always been a lying bunch. They claimed Leto kept killing their kids, when it was just their crappy genetics at work. When a new species is created, there’s no guarantee they can expand their species.”
“I suppose that’s why she cursed her line not to be able to have kids with them. She wouldn’t want her own relatives to go through the pain of losing their children.”
“Maybe. It’s hard to keep track of why all the curses back then were created. I know I mentioned that I could tell you about your mom, but I was actually closer to Leto, if you have any questions about her. She was someone who understood how the way the world worked. I wish she was still around to teach you.”
Hearing my nutty grandmother would’ve made a terrific role model was the most horrifying thing I’d ever heard. It also said a lot about Helki’s state of mind.
“If you spent time with her, it’s obvious why you hated the wolves. Was it her plan or yours to turn my mother against them?”
The car swerved again, this time into the curb as he looked at me. If he kept driving the way he was, he was going to kill us both so I didn’t have to. I didn’t know how sturdy he was, but there was a big part of me that hoped it was a lot less than I was.
I’d never been in a car accident before, but I had to believe I’d more than likely survive unless it was an explosion. I wished I’d done a little experimenting over the years to see exactly what my body would take.
The fact that Nikki and Jack weren’t sure that he could be killed had me a little worried. That was before I’d told Jack he was a satyr, and according to him, my mother had killed a bunch of satyrs in her day. If she could do it, I certainly hoped I could.
“Why would you say something like that? No one had to do anything to make your mother hate the wolves. They brought it on themselves when they killed her husband and kids.”
Artemis had said she was friends with the wolves, and I had to believe that was the reason she didn’t go after them with anything more than a curse.
“Do you ever wonder why there are still werewolves in this world, but you’re the only satyr? I assume you haven’t been able to find any others like yourself.”
If he was sent around the same time I was, he didn’t know the evil plot had been foiled and Artemis had gone on a little hunting party. I wished I had her bow and arrow, so I could use them to kill him.
“Do you ever wonder why there aren’t any other gods or goddesses? Since the wolves were forced to only mate amongst themselves, their bloodlines didn’t get muddled like everyone else’s.”
Since he knew about the curse against the werewolves, I doubted Apollo immediately put him in the ground. I did have to wonder why in the world Apollo didn’t dig him up when they found out the satyrs were the real problem. I’d probably never know everything that was going through their minds back then, but it didn’t stop me from questioning logic.
“I’d imagine it was hard for the satyrs’ bloodlines to get muddled when my mother killed them all. Can we get back to my question about whether it was your idea or Leto’s to frame the wolves? You probably don’t know it, but the tracks weren’t as cleaned up as you thought. Artemis found out, and she wasn’t feeling generous enough to just curse the satyrs.”
“That’s a lie.”
He pulled the car on to an on ramp, and I was a little worried about everyone else on the road. The streets leading up to the highway had been relatively empty, but the highway during rush hour wasn’t. If he got distracted, other lives were going to be on the line.
Knowing that, I shouldn’t have gone ahead with my line of questions. I liked him being on edge. If I could catch him off guard, I could possibly hit him with something he didn’t have time to counter.
“Did you develop lie detecting skills since we got in the car? I know you didn’t have them when I lied about there being no possible way I was pregnant. Jack tried his hardest to plant a baby in me. I don’t think he was successful, but I definitely lied about not trying.”
Instead of swerving, Helki pressed down on the accelerator and took the speed up to eighty. I hoped we were far enough away that he couldn’t lash out at Jack for my admission.
To make sure his attention remained on me, I grabbed onto the wheel and steered it towards the median. I only wanted to take the car I was in out, not cause a major pile up, like I would’ve if I turned to the right.
Helki tried to counter, but he was a little late, and we hit the cement barrier with a decent amount of force. I hadn’t bothered to buckle in, so I was jarred a little. It wasn’t a heads-on collision, but it was enough to rattle some brain matter.
While he was preoccupied, I pushed the brake pedal down with my mind and unlocked the doors. He was quick enough to relock them, and while he was at it he strapped me into my seat with invisible restraints.
“If you pull a stunt like that again, I will open up the road behind us and laugh as the humans fall into it.”
The car wasn’t damaged enough that he had to stop driving. He was able to get back on the road quickly, since other cars had stopped to check on us.
“Were all satyrs as evil as you? I can’t believe you actually thought you were going to be able to live a life where you didn’t go around preying on humans.”
“We got by in a world where you did what you had to in order to survive. Did the wolves tell you that crap about Artemis killing the satyrs? You can’t believe it, especially coming from them. That kind of slaughter would’ve made it in a book somewhere.”
“You’d think, but there’s a lot of stuff that didn’t make it into any modern texts. I’m sure you’ve read about how my mother was supposedly chaste. Are you going to lie to me again and tell me you didn’t have anything to do with the death of my family members? Unlike you, I can tell when someone is lying.”
“Of course you can. You’re more like your mother than I thought you’d be. She was good about figuring out the truth of things, but when you have her mother on your side, you usually think you get the upper hand.”
As he babbled on, I tried to fight against his hold. I wished I had a timer to show how long his juice would last. The idea of taking us both out was becoming my only realistic option.
“What did either side gain from setting Artemis on the wolves? Hadn’t Leto done enough to those poor people?”
“They weren’t all dead, so no, she didn’t do enough. It was really too bad a part of her power ended up being shared with them. The beasties deserved to all die. They were, and still are, monsters.”
“Says the man who has killed at least seven people that I know of, and had a hand in murdering my family. I think we have different definitions of the word monster.”
“As I already said, in the time I’m from, you did what you had to in order to survive. I guess lying to you didn’t work, so you’re probably going to pester me until I spell it all out for you.”
I didn’t bother replying. I’d asked more than once about his connection to what happened, so if he was ready to talk, I was going to let him talk.
While he did, I paid attention to the motor of the car and picked apart the different pieces of it. He was protecting himself when I tried to work magic against him, but I doubted he’d bubble wrapped the components that were moving us down the road. Stopping them would’ve been lovely, if he hadn’t issued a threat against the humans.
That threat basically took away all my options of escape. I needed to find somewhere that I could cause an explosion without hurting people. Being able to do that without him figuring it out was still a work in progress.
“Your mother liked the wolves. In a way, they were her kindred spirits, both creations of her mother. She saw the things Leto did to them and offered one of her children in marriage to show that she sided with them. That move is what actually caused Leto to curse her line to not have wolf children.
“Things progressed quickly after that and Leto decided that just removing the ability to carry their children wasn’t enough. She wanted her line wiped out, and she wanted Artemis to think it was her precious wolves who did it. I told her we should wait until you were born, but Leto wasn’t known for her patience.”
“If what you’re say
ing is true, then why did Apollo send you here?”
I was still stuck on that point. I could see where the plan fell into place and the outcome. I just couldn’t understand why anyone would think Helki would be a good protector for me.
“I think you already know that he wanted me out of his hair. Leto worked it out to make it seem like I killed a couple wolves in retribution for what they’d done, and as was done back then, she promised I would get a demigoddess bride if I convinced him you needed protected.”
I threw up a little in my mouth at the thought of being married to him. I hoped he didn’t have any ideas about driving to a courthouse since I was already dressed like I was on the way to a wedding. The fact that we were getting towards the edge of town made me optimistic that his plans were solely focused on getting as far north as he could.
I’d had everything I cared to have confirmed gone over, so as traffic started to thin out, I was focused on killing the bastard. To minimize the impact for anyone outside the car, I put a barrier up. It would’ve been smart to put one up for me as well, but playing with multiple pieces meant I had to choose what was most important.
“What are you doing?”
I had put the fact that he said he could feel when I used magic in the back of my mind. Not exactly the brightest move when you were getting ready to pulverize him.
“Finishing what my mother started.”
I’d focused on the front of the engine, just in case his power boost made it easy to read my mind. My actual target for fire was the rear of the car, specifically the gas tank. There was three-quarters of a tank of fuel waiting for a spark, and I gave it to it.
Spark was probably a little mellow of a word for the amount of fire I sent towards the back of the car. Anyone watching us closely would’ve wondered where the fire-breathing dragon came from. Since I had to act so fast, I had to make sure my goal was accomplished.
Helki took his hands off the wheel as he looked at me in horror. As much as I’d fought him and argued about every little thing, he still thought I was going to settle down and be his prize for helping hurt my family.