Crown of Ashes

by Addison Moore

  “Then I want these two.” I knew my father wouldn’t do it, and for exactly that reason, but hey, a girl has got to try. Although, I feel copious amounts of guilt over risking Giselle’s second life at the moment.

  “Skyla.” Marshall comes shy of winking. “Perhaps you should tarry till the deadline.”

  “No. I’m emphatic about it. Giselle and Emerson live. I’m thrilled with my decision.” Besides, I know my mother. This is just another mind game she threw in at the last second because she can’t seem to come right out and say yes to me.

  “Yes to you,” she muses. “Emerson, behave.” She turns to Giselle. “And you. I did not return you from paradise only to have you turn your brain cells into a hallucinogenic playground. Be mindful of what you do. Actions bear consequences.”

  “That they do.” Marshall looks to the woods with that angry suspicious gaze of his. I bet it’s the Grim Reaper slinking off in disappointment because he lost one of his prospects for the night.

  My mother lifts a finger at someone in this sea of celestial socialites, and I stop her before she takes off. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” I pull her to the side, away from prying ears. “I sort of had a brainstorm the other day. When you get around to doing that whole hocus-pocus thing, would you mind taking them to Raven’s Eye first? Maybe catch the attention of a guard or two before zapping Pierce and Kate off the planet? Oh, I know! Make sure Kate’s head rolls off first! Better yet, leave the bodies behind and let them evaporate slowly—that will totally set them on edge.” Brilliant, if I do say so myself.

  “No.” She frowns in direct rebuttal to my enthusiasm. “It will lead them back to the Kraggers. Is that what you want? And haven’t the Winstons been through enough?”

  “Totally.” I shake the thought out of my head. “But Holden and Serena could simply fly away.” Raven’s Eye and Host are just a stone’s throw if they wanted to stop off somewhere quasi-exotic for the night. That is if you consider a college town exotic. Face it, the only things exotic about Host are the sexually transmitted diseases it breeds.

  She gives a slow blink as if my genius is trying her patience. “I’ll consider it.”

  “Good. One more thing. That seventeenth-century tramp that’s haunting this island? Why don’t you spring her and her demonic mother back, too? Better yet, send them to Raven’s Eye! I mean, what’s the point of allowing them to breach contract with the ages and show up on Paragon after all these years?”

  “What is the point, indeed?” She leans in. “That’s for you to figure out. What they believe they’re doing here is an entire other nefarious matter. Do keep tabs on those ninnies.” She takes up my hand and runs her finger over the blue stone that once belonged to the throne of God. “Keep an eye on this as well.” She reaches over and runs a finger along my bare neck. “Is the Eye of Refuse of no use to you, Skyla?” Her lips twitch like a threat. “Wear it in good health. You’ll need it.”

  “I didn’t think it went with the dress.”

  “Death lurks in the shadows, hungry for souls. Don’t feed the machine, Skyla.” She gives a little wink and laughs as if she very much planned on feeding the machine.

  A familiar face pops up over her shoulder. “Is this a private party?”

  “Daddy!” I lunge past her and latch onto him, taking in a full hearty embrace from the man I love with everything in me. I pull back and land my hands over his sturdy shoulders. He’s donned the requisite tux and his mask is flipped up over his forehead Tad Landon style, and that alone is about all Tad and my father will ever have in common—outside of my mother, of course, and I promise you that Tad doesn’t have half the affection my mother felt for my father. “Where’s Sage? Is she here?”

  He cuts a quiet glance to my mother. “I’m afraid the powers that be decided it would be too much for you.”

  “It wouldn’t. It would have been a pleasure—a treasure.” I wince at the thought of my daughter. “How is her…disposition? Does she seem okay to you?”

  He grimaces because he knows exactly what the hell I’m talking about. “She’s mentoring under your mother.”

  “I’ve a position I’m grooming her for in the League,” my mother snaps, and I don’t dare ask which league. It had better not be the Assholes League.

  “Skyla!” she barks.

  “Well, it better not be!” I bark right back.

  My father shakes his head. “Don’t you worry. I have that baby girl of yours wrapped in my love. She’ll be a model citizen before you know it.”

  “And my other baby girl? Angel?” I shake my head, unsure if he’s even met her.

  “Yes”—his voice grows alarmingly quiet—“I know who you speak of, Skyla.” But that’s all he says about that, and my heart shatters at what that might mean.

  “Daddy!” Mia screams as she trots on over in sky-high heels. Her little black dress looks more like a one-piece bathing suit than it does an evening gown appropriate for the Bastard’s Ball as it were. “Oh my God, I miss you!” She wraps her arms around him and swings him in a circle. “God, so many things have happened to me this year!” She holds out her left hand, only to display a scrappy piece of wire entwined around her ring finger. “Does this ring make me look engaged?”

  “What?” both my father and I cry out at the same time.

  Mia bares her fangs my way. “Oh, shut up, you. I’ve about had it with all your judgments about my love life.” She smacks my father a kiss on the cheek before darting into the woods. “Gotta run! I’m late for a date with my betrothed!”

  “Wait!” I cry after her. “You can’t get married! I forbid it!” What the hell is she thinking? “And that ring doesn’t make you look engaged, Mia!” I scream after her. “It makes you look like you displaced the twist tie for the wheat bread!” And don’t even get me started on the fact the twist tie for the wheat bread is exactly what Drake saw fit to bejewel Brielle’s finger with once upon a poverty-stricken time.

  My father groans at the void she left in her wake. “Promise me you’ll look after her extra hard during these teenage years. How I wish I could be there for her.”

  “I wish you could be here for her as well—to snap the neck of whoever saw fit to gift her that miniature tourniquet.”

  “Come, come”—my mother gathers my father into her arms and pulls him into the crowd—“we’ll seek you out later, my love. The time of the Bastard won’t last forever!”

  “Geez.” I take a step back and practically land in Marshall’s arms. “I hate that Mia has lost her virginity and her mind. At least Emerson gets a reprieve.”

  “Skyla.” He closes his eyes a moment. “You do realize it’s never as it seems with that woman.” A round of lightning flickers above. “Your Grace,” he says just past my shoulder.

  I turn around and spot a white flame of hair running this way, Kate Winston—and I catch her in an embrace as tears buck from the both of us. Here it is, our final earthly farewell.

  “Thank you for coming back,” I whisper into her ear. “I’m sorry I took you off the planet to begin with.”

  “It was fate.” She pulls back and takes me in as if she’s memorizing my features, and she might be. I’m memorizing hers. “Here’s a letter. It tells you everything you want to know about you-know-who.” She hands me a thin blue envelope just as Pierce comes up behind her. Wow, Kate is so creeped out by Emma she won’t even use her name.

  “It’s that time again.” Pierce slaps me five before pulling me into an embrace. “Thank you. My brother and Serena told me they should be back at your window later tonight.”

  “You might want to tell them I moved.” I bite down on a smile. “It was nice having you back. I hope you enjoyed your stay.”

  “Hell yes, I did. But heaven is best, and it happens to be where I belong.” He shoots me with his finger. “No Kragger jokes. You hear me?”

  Kate and I share a little laugh.

  “I suppose you’re proof we are all redeemable,” I say.

  �
��That we are, Skyla.” He pulls me into another hug. “Try to remember that.”

  I share another quick embrace with Kate and watch as they disappear into the woods. “It’s show time.” I wave the envelope at Marshall.

  “Do tell.” He leans in as my fingers work quickly to open it, and we’re greeted with the happy, loopy swirls of Kate Winston’s handwriting.

  Skyla,

  Forgive me for the length of time it took me to pen this. Truthfully, I was afraid to share it sooner. There are things happening here on earth that have been whispered in the heavenlies—but more so they are whispered on earth as well, and that’s where I gleaned this information to begin with. Back in junior year, a few days before we took off to go on that fated ski trip, I went shopping with my mother. I headed off on my own in search of the perfect ski pants (to match my jacket!) and I saw Emma Oliver there speaking with another woman—one I didn’t recognize. What I’m about to tell you, I learned in partial that day at the store while accidentally listening in on a conversation I wish I never heard. The rest I gleaned in heaven. As I drew closer, Emma discovered me. I’ve known Emma all my life, but I had never seen the wickedness in her eyes like I did that day. Later on, I would find out she was one of the only people who secretly cheered my death. In her heart, she thinks that killing me was the only thing you did right.

  What I heard Emma discuss that day was about Gage. This, Skyla, is how your husband came to be. Emma wanted to have power, to have control over not only her world, but the entire world. She knew Demetri was a powerful Fem. She sought him out and wanted to be with him for power, not love, but he outright rejected her. When she realized she couldn’t have him, she renewed her relationship with Barron, but not before leaving her mark. Demetri confided to her that he needed a child to meet his purposes, and Emma’s gift to Demetri was Gage. She wanted to be an instrument of benevolent importance. She wanted her child to be something special. Emma knew that she was putting the Factions in peril, but according to celestial rumors, they have never been important to her to begin with. There’s something else, something that she doesn’t want another soul on the planet to know. Emma believes that once her son is in power, she will be, too. However, she doesn’t realize what it’s going to take to get him there.

  Anyway, that’s all I know. It must be strange hearing all this from me, a human through and through, but you’re my friend, Skyla. And that’s what friends do. They help one another out.

  Emma is trouble. She always has been. She always will be. Her objective is to see Gage rise to be a great ruler. Her interest has always been in power—just not yours.

  Love always,

  Kate

  “Wow.” I can hardly breathe, let alone take it all in. “Emma really is trouble.” Truthfully, I’ve known it deep down in my bones—but only after I got together with Gage. “It all makes sense now. She adored me when I was with Logan, but for whatever reason saw me as a threat once Gage and I got together.”

  “A threat, indeed. You are inherently his enemy.”

  “No, I’m just hers.”

  “Nevertheless.” Marshall extends his elbow, and I’m quick to hook my arm through it. “It’s time to parade my bride past the royal gentry.”

  “There’s no time like the present.” I slip Kate’s letter back into the envelope and shove the whole thing down the front of my dress until the parchment warms across my ribs. There’s no way I’d risk losing it—here of all places. For tonight, I’m going to do my best to set it and its contents out of my mind. I’m sure I’ll scrutinize it once again come morning.

  Marshall takes us through a thick crowd of glorious beings, all too shining and beautiful to ever be real or human for that matter. We hit the end of the line and I spot Dominique Winters carousing with someone who looks suspiciously like Marlena, and I gasp once I see those familiar features.

  “I completely forgot to mention that debacle with Chloe to my mother. I’m sure there’s something she can do.”

  “She can, but I’m afraid she won’t. Or perhaps I should rephrase it. She already did.”

  “You mean?” I suck in another lungful of Paragon prime fog. “My mother set Chloe up?”

  His brows rise above his mask a moment. “Let’s just say that certain celestial beings may have colluded to procure a certain desired outcome—each for their own benefit.”

  “Wow.” Just the thought makes me lightheaded. “Is it at all possible that the CIA discovered her on their own? I mean, she was everywhere at once, reporting all sorts of asinine things that just so happened to pan out.” Chloe is right. I put her in harm’s way without realizing it.

  “I suppose anything is possible.”

  “Speaking of possibilities—” Logan steps between us, breathless, with his teeth gleaming under the duress of starlight, and he wastes no time in wrapping his arms around me. He’s shockingly gorgeous with that bright white mask that gives off an ethereal vibe as if it weren’t made of anything more than an illuminated mist. “I believe we haven’t shared a single dance.” He edges Marshall out of the way. “Dudley.” He whisks me away from the wary Sector. “I was given strict orders by Candace Messenger to two-step with her beautiful daughter, and I would be remiss to disobey.”

  A laugh trembles from my chest. “The last thing I would want is for you to be on Candace Messenger’s naughty list. You’re liable to have your head chopped off.”

  He gives a subtle wink. “Chloe beat her to it.”

  “That she did.” I cringe because I dread what I’m about to say next. “I really want to help Chloe.”

  “I know.” He leans in and bumps his nose to mine. “That’s because you’re a sweet soul.”

  “And I made a covenant with her.”

  “And that.” He averts his eyes to the woods. “I’ll help you.”

  “You will?” My spirit soars at the thought, and yet I can’t seem to digest the irony.

  “Yes. I thought about the terms of your union with her, and I think it’s brilliant. Keep her to the hip, gain her trust, use the shit out of her.” His grip over me intensifies. “Above all, be careful. She’s dangerous.”

  “And she’s pissed.”

  “And she’s pissed.” He shakes his head. “But I don’t want to talk about Chloe anymore. You look amazing. As soon as you stepped into that room tonight, you took my breath away.” His voice strains as if he were aching. “I am jealous for you.”

  My heart flops when he says it. “You are so special to me, Logan. You know I love you.” My voice is lost in the faintest whisper.

  His lips rise at the tips. “And—I am so thrilled for you and Gage. You did it. You’re finally in your own home.”

  “It only took a year of renovations.”

  “It was the right time,” he adds. “Things always seem to happen when they’re supposed to.” His chest fills solid with his next breath. “And that leads me to our baby girl.”

  I shake my head, my lips pressed white because I can’t do this.

  “We have to.” He gives my hand a squeeze. “Skyla, we have to come to terms with the fact that those few months may be all we will ever have with her.” His lips turn down hard as if he’s fighting back tears of his own.

  “I know.” My gaze fixates on the purple blooms dangling from a tree in the distance. “She was ours for a very short time. We may not even have eternity with her. She was a mind game, Logan. She was a very sophisticated form of manipulation that my mother heartlessly employed.” I glance skyward like a habit and wait for the thunder, but there is no celestial threat. “Maybe she will exist. Maybe she won’t. But my heart, my devotion, it all belongs to—”

  Logan presses a finger over my lips and nods.

  “So does mine, Skyla. I am in total agreement with you.”

  He might be, but he couldn’t bear to hear my husband’s name.

  “I get it.” The words come from me in a broken whisper. “Life just doesn’t relent, does it? The good book says we go from st
rength to strength until we end up before the throne of God, and yet it feels like fire to fire.”

  “Fire to fire.” He gives a single nod. “You said it, Skyla.” He relaxes his body to mine. “Angel came into our life like a comet, sweeping in and stealing hearts. I’d like to do something to commemorate her. A plaque, a charity, a donation. Anything.”

  “How about the bowling alley? It’s opening in a few weeks. The gym, too. Maybe we can dedicate the grounds to her?”

  “Yes.” He plants a kiss right over my lips, and my stomach tenses at that soft familiar feel. How I’ve missed Logan’s kisses. “You are brilliant.” His cheeks twitch with what appears to be remorse. “Sorry about that. It’s sort of a reflex. Plus, I couldn’t resist.” He takes a deep breath. “Have I mentioned how gorgeous you are? Let’s find that oaf you’re married to before I get myself into any more trouble.”

  “Deal.” I wrap my arm around him, and we make our way through the crowd. We finally come upon Gage speaking with Cooper by the fountain—fountain of youth knowing my nefarious father-in-law.

  “Hey, handsome.” My arms float effortlessly to my beloved. “What’s going on?” I can’t help but note the two of them look deep in thought, both of their masks clutched in their hands.

  Coop blows a breath toward the crowd. “I can’t find Laken. I guess I’m paranoid after what happened at Raven’s Eye.”

  “Totally understandable, but she’s safe now,” I’m quick to comfort him. “The only reason they took her was because Angel’s powers were misfiring.” I still feel bad about that.

  “Laken took the blame.” Coop loses his gaze deep in the forest. “They think it was Laken.”

  “What?” A little detail my friend managed to keep from me. I turn to Gage in a panic. “What if they took her?”

  Logan steps in. “She’s probably in the restroom or lost in the crowd busy looking for you.” He nods to Coop. “Let’s comb this place. I’ll help you find her.”

  “Thanks, man.” Coop and Logan take off, and it’s just Gage Oliver and me under the spray of a thousand freshly manufactured stars.