Oracle's Luck: Unraveled World Book 3 Page 17

  She’s been living as a wolf to survive, Ferrox chided. She knows how to stay alive.

  You have any good ideas then?

  Control her, Ferrox replied.

  What do you mean?

  I mean you’re the one not being smart. Use your satyr whistle.

  I can’t whistle.

  Goddess. Didn’t you think it was a good time to learn?

  I’ve tried, but I just blow spit everywhere.

  What else do you have in that magic pouch? Ferrox asked.

  My demas can sing up a monsoon. My nymph can weaponize plants, but this witch would suck the life out of them.

  Spider?

  Vera opened her mouth to argue and then closed it. That might be helpful, if completely horrifying.

  Kale? Can you not look by chance?

  Are you serious right now? Kale asked.

  Fine. But distract the wolf.

  Kale lunged. That wasn’t what she’d meant. He wrapped his arms around the wolf’s neck in a bear hug, holding her head still. Vera managed to tie the wolf’s legs with some webbing so she’d stop shredding Kale’s arms and torso.

  Now the mouth might be nice, said Ferrox.

  I can’t reach.

  “It’s too late,” mocked the witch-wolf as she melted back into her witch form. “I’ve won.”

  “It doesn’t look like it to me,” said Vera.

  “That’s because you still think I’m here to kill you.”

  Kale tensed, seeming to understanding something that Vera did not. “You were a distraction,” he said.

  Vera’s heart fell as the woman laughed. “And I was promised that my death would save my coven.”

  “We aren’t going to kill you,” said Vera.

  “Oh, yes,” promised the witch. “You are.”

  She whipped around, muzzle lengthening, and latched onto Kale’s throat. The skin beneath her teeth charred. It spread, and Kale cried out. Vera didn’t think twice before she speared the witch with her horn.

  Kale let the wolf slip to the ground. In moments, it looked like she’d been dead for days, and then even longer as she continued to decompose. Vera tried to check Kale’s wounds, but he waved her off.

  “We have to get back to the meadow,” he said.

  “You don’t think…” Only she could see in his eyes that he did. Being in Summartir right then was what Suzie had wanted. Meanwhile, everyone they cared about was back at the meadow.

  16

  “I can’t believe we didn’t know,” Vera said aloud.

  Mimi was gone. Addamas was gone—stolen away while Vera and Kale were distracted by another pawn. They’re gone, was playing in a loop in her head.

  “It doesn’t make any sense,” said Kale. “Marianna’s been helping us the whole time.”

  “Yeah, that’s what she wanted us to think.” Vera pressed her palms to the side of her head. “You’re sure it was her?”

  “It’s not every day that a house full of snakes pops through a gate,” said Braxas.

  “We met before too,” said Maiden-Mother. “It was the same woman from the meadow—the weaver you told me about.”

  “Did she say anything?” Vera asked.

  “No,” replied Maiden-Mother. “She simply opened her front door. Mimi and Addamas walked inside. Then they were gone.”

  “She took them into Heliopolis,” Braxas finished. “Pili, Seb, and I haven’t found a trace of them yet.”

  “But why?” Kale asked the question no one had an answer to.

  “She wants us to follow her there,” guessed Vera.

  “Are you going to?” Maiden-Mother asked.

  “Of course.” Vera shrugged. “She has Mimi and Addamas.”

  “Braxas and I will remain in the meadow,” said Maiden-Mother. “The locked gates didn’t stop her, and I’m afraid of what else they might not stop.”

  “What about Leah’s son?” asked Vera. “He has a world-thread. If she goes after him...” Vera felt sick.

  “He and his family are staying at the palace,” Maiden-Mother informed her. “They are surrounded by the most powerful witches of the coven.”

  “That won’t do any good if Marianna got to one of them,” Vera pointed out.

  “If she did, there’s not a lot we could do to stop her.” Maiden-Mother sagged into a chair around the makeshift conference table. “She knows how everything will play out. All our moves.”

  “Then don’t go after her,” Braxas said. “If you believe that’s what she wants, do the opposite.”

  Kale rounded on the dragon, eyes blazing red.

  Braxas hissed, “I will keep my promise.”

  “What promise?” Vera asked.

  Both men ignored her. Kale finally spun away, slamming a fist into the wall as he did. Jemma, who was sitting nearby, jumped with a squeak. Seb edged between the girl and Kale.

  Vera decided to ask what Braxas meant later, when Kale wasn’t losing his crap. She picked up the paper in front of her, crumpled from being passed into many hands, and read it again. Mimi, You and your unborn baby will die unless you follow these instructions exactly. Tell no one. And lie to no one—get creative, dear. It was signed, Marianna. Then there was a list of dates and things that had already happened. The first had happened the day after the meadow fell. It told Mimi to avoid Kale until a specific time that morning. Vera knew that was the moment he’d swapped places with Ferrox. There were other various days and times to return home and avoid him as well. Those were the times when Kale must have surfaced to check in. She’d made sure that he wouldn’t detect Mimi’s deception. The entire time they’d searched for Suzie’s network, Mimi had known it was Marianna.

  “But you never saw deception on Marianna,” Vera said.

  “That’s bothering me as well,” said Kale.

  According to the list, Mimi planted the idea of peeing in the nymph pool in Addamas’s head. The final two instructions were to show Addamas the note, and then a date and time to meet her in the parking lot. It explained why Mimi had been distant and awkward.

  “They packed bags and made their beds before they left,” said Pili. “They were ready to go.”

  That sounded off to Vera. “Mimi never made her bed. She liked it messy—said it was more comfortable that way.”

  “Okay,” said Kale, obviously not understanding why that mattered.

  “She decided she should make it for the first time, to celebrate being taken?” Vera shook her head. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  Kale shrugged, but Vera stood and headed down the hall.

  “Where are you going?” he called.

  “To check something.”

  Vera took the stairs two at a time up to their room. An entourage followed her. She and Mimi had decided to stay in their same room after everything went down, since it was already set up and home to them. Vera’s bed was made from the last time she’d actually slept. That was normal. Seeing Mimi’s bed made? That was eerie. Vera grabbed the comforter and pulled it back. Sketches littered the bed.

  “What are those?” she asked.

  Jemma peered over Vera’s shoulder. “Mimi asked if she could have some of the drawings I made from your trip to Zerzura.”

  Vera frowned at the drawings of her facing off against a league of beings she’d never seen before. They wore loose clothes and had geometric patterns on their cheeks and foreheads. “Anyone know what they are?”

  “Genies,” Kale said. “Look at the throne.”

  “What about it?”

  Seb and Pili shouldered through. “The beetle is gone.”

  “And that means?” prompted Vera.

  “It sits on the throne when Mimi is away, so no one can claim it in her absence,” Pili explained.

  “Then Mimi has to be at the palace,” Vera concluded.

  “Or she already was,” argued Seb.

  “That fight with the genies hasn’t happened yet,” Vera replied, “which means we know where Mimi will be.”

  “B
ut not when,” Kale finished.

  Vera turned to Jemma. “When will these happen?”

  “I thought they already had. I don’t see the future, just what’s happening at that moment. That’s what a daayan sees—the current. That’s what you said.” The girl seemed to be on the verge of breaking into tears.

  Vera laid a hand on her arm. “It’s okay. Maybe you’re an oracle too. Who knows, right?”

  She’d meant it to be reassuring. Jemma looked anything but. Pili tugged her back between him and Seb, as if they were ready to take on the world for her.

  Maiden-Mother sifted through the pictures, and Vera’s breath caught. “Look.” She dropped the other pictures. “Jemma, is this Kale?”

  Jemma bent close and squinted. “Huh, I didn’t even realize that was him when I was drawing it.” She assessed Kale. “I never saw him look like that before.” The drawing depicted Kale on two legs, surrounded by genies.

  “How did I lose my unnatural bindings?” Kale asked Jemma.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I saw these as flashes, not a movie. That’s why they aren’t so good.”

  “These are all the images you saw in flashes?” Maiden-Mother gestured at the pictures on Mimi’s bed.

  “Yeah. I didn’t understand why Mimi was so interested in them. It’s not my best work.”

  “It wasn’t the quality that interested her, it was the message,” said Vera. “We can separate Kale and Ferrox.”

  “Wait, Vera.” Maiden-Mother pulled out another sheet. It was the same image: Kale in the center of a swarm of genies. Only, he was still in his unnatural form.

  Vera’s throat tightened. “There are two possibilities. Oracles only see one.”

  Jemma retreated farther into the huddle of brothers. “I draw what I see. I have no idea how anything works. But my grandma always says there is more than one path that life could go, that it was up to us which we take.”

  “I bet she never went up against the Fates,” Vera said through gritted teeth.

  “The question is, which of these paths does Marianna want us to take?” Maiden-Mother wondered.

  “And how do we take the other one?” Kale added.

  Maiden-Mother pointed at something near Vera’s feet in one of the drawings. “You recognize that?”

  Vera hadn’t even noticed it. “That’s Professor Eldrid’s book from the library. The one that only I could read.” That book was important this whole time? She shuffled through until she found the two drawings of Kale. The book was also in the picture where Kale was on his own two feet.

  “If you have that book in the future where Kale is unbound….”

  “Then it’s time to go to the library,” Vera finished.

  “It’s closed,” Jemma piped up.

  “Why?”

  “Umm, because it’s summer break and they have an annual shut-down for maintenance.”

  “Perfect,” Vera grumbled.

  “It is,” Kale said, “because that means no one will be there to see us steal it.”

  Vera cringed, but at that point, it was the only way to get the thing. Not getting it wasn’t an option if it led to saving Kale.

  “Let’s go.” Kale started to back out of the room.

  “I think you should stay here,” Maiden-Mother intervened.

  “I think she’s right, Kale,” agreed Vera.

  “What if Marianna doesn’t want you to get that book? What if she sends someone to stop you? Or someone to kidnap you too?”

  “I don’t think so.” Vera gazed at the drawing. “Not if Jemma saw this battle twice. Marianna wants me in Heliopolis, not captured.”

  “I’ll go with her to the library,” Pili volunteered.

  “She doesn’t need you to go with her,” Kale protested. “I’m going.”

  Vera didn’t know how to tell the man that he was being irrational. “Someone could see you.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “You should,” she insisted.

  He clenched his hands into fists by his sides. “I’ll make sure that anyone who sees me doesn’t repeat what they see.”

  “Yeah, that sounds a lot like threatening anyone we happen across,” Vera said.

  “I figured you’d prefer that to me actually killing them all,” he replied.

  “Kale, I don’t know how to tell you this.” Vera winced. “You’re not coming with me.”

  “Who’s going to stop me?”

  “That pleasure is all mine,” announced a man lounging in the doorway. Vera had never seen him before. His eyes were slitted like a cat’s, but the smoke streaming from his mouth and bright red hair gave him away.

  Vera’s eyebrows flew up. “Braxas?”

  “You were supposed to check in almost an hour ago,” he told Maiden-Mother.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I got caught up.”

  “It’s fine now that I know you are well,” he said simply.

  “He can go with you,” Kale announced.

  Braxas frowned. “Where is it you think I’m going?”

  “To help Vera steal a book from the library,” Kale explained.

  “In Earth?” Braxas made a face.

  “It’s him or me,” Kale said to Vera and Maiden-Mother.

  “I’d suggest you find another candidate,” Braxas said.

  “Please?” Vera asked, knowing it would be so much simpler if he’d agree. She was quickly losing her patience, knowing that she could already be on her way if Kale weren’t being a butt. She told herself that her annoyance had nothing to do with her stinging pride from Kale’s reaction earlier. But that was a lie.

  Braxas glanced at Maiden-Mother and sighed. “Fine, but it better not take long. I don’t want to catch something.”

  “What, like human pox?” teased Maiden-Mother.

  “You never know.”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Jemma asked.

  “There’s not much that can stand against a dragon,” Braxas assured. “Even one masquerading as a two-legger.”

  “That’s not what I was worried about.” Jemma shrank back as she admitted it.

  “She has a point,” Vera said.

  “What’s the problem?” Kale asked irritably.

  “Oh, just that books are rather flammable, Kale,” Vera bit out. “If anything goes wrong, the whole place will go up.”

  “I’m flame-proof. I can shield you with my wings if there is trouble.”

  “See?” asked Kale. “Nothing to worry about.”

  “Braxas,” started Maiden-Mother.

  “I won’t burn down a library,” he promised. “My fire is not my only weapon.”

  “Are we ready to get this over with?” Kale didn’t seem to understand what everyone was so worried about. And that worried Vera. So much so, that her frustration at him mellowed, but she didn’t have the time or privacy to try to make sure he was hanging in there. Braxas was already headed down the stairs. Vera followed but overheard Kale tell Maiden-Mother, “When she gets back she needs sleep. Ferrox and I need to hunt.”

  “Where are you going?” Maiden asked. Vera slowed to hear the exchange.

  “Does it matter?” he asked sharply.

  Maiden’s words were measured. “I have to open a gate for you. They’re all locked.”

  “What if I said Summartir because I have a bone to pick with a wolf coven?”

  “I’d say I’ll open the gate to Shangri-la so it can dump you right into Avici, where you will not be tempted to take the life of someone still living.”

  “Then why’d you ask for my choice?” Kale asked.

  “I’d hoped you’d choose better.”

  “I’ll go as soon as she gets back,” Kale said.

  Vera skipped down the stairs before she got caught eavesdropping. She almost called on Ferrox, but the demon had been quiet recently. Plus, she was afraid Kale would not appreciate her checking up on him. She had no idea why she needed this book, but she hoped it was the way to fix Kale.

 
Campus was quiet. It was strange not to see students lounging in the grass or hustling to class. So much had happened since the spring semester. Vera felt like there were a thousand years between her and school, even though it had only been a few months. Braxas eyed everything with barely veiled disdain. She restrained the urge to jump and shout boo—mostly because her mind filled with images of burning alive in an inferno.

  “Hey Braxas,” Vera ventured. “Were you around during the Unraveling?”

  He gave her an appalled side-eye. “How old do I look to you?”

  “You look the same age as Kale,” she replied.

  He rumbled deep in his throat. “I am not that old. But my father was there for it.”

  Vera barely kept herself from rolling her eyes. He was offended because she had his lifespan off by one generation? “Why didn’t the dragons just kill the unnaturals?”

  “The horde was powered by the strongest Siphon Masters ever to walk the Earth. Our fire could not burn them. Not to mention, they outnumbered us a thousand to one. A new dragon is only born every few hundred years or so.”

  “Did anyone ever talk about an unnatural changing back?”

  “No, because none ever did.”

  “I think one did.” According to Kale’s vile ex, anyway.

  “It must have been a fluke,” he said dismissively.

  She traced the pattern of the brick sidewalk with her eyes. “What if it wasn’t?”

  “Mother said you are a magic collector.” He gave her a bored look. “Including a soul-eater. Summon him and ask.”

  “I don’t have a way to connect to him—whoever he is. No mementos, no name, nothing. And even if I could summon such a person, I don’t have a body lying around to stick his soul in.”