I snorted. “If you’re quoting that tired old idiom to me, then you don’t know me at all. I always eat my cake. Otherwise, why the hell is it there? I will keep the world safe and save the people I love. Because you can’t sacrifice one to have the other. I can’t destroy the world to save my brother because then there won’t be any world for him or me or anyone else to live in. Just as I won’t sacrifice my brother for the world because he is a crucial part of my world. Yeah, it’s tough and the solution is not always obvious. That’s why sometimes you just need to get a little creative to make everything work out. But turning to death and mass destruction? Come on, that’s just a cop out.”
“We’re just going to have to agree to disagree.”
“Another worn-out expression. You can do better, Faith.”
“Sit down, Leda.”
A rocking chair appeared behind me, and I fell back into it. Suddenly, a pair of needles were in my hands and I was knitting too. Not that I knew the first thing about how to knit. Even so, my hands were knitting away fast, creating…something. I wasn’t sure yet what it was.
“Stop it!” I growled at my hands.
But they didn’t stop. They just kept on knitting.
“That won’t work,” Faith told me.
“No, what you’re doing won’t work.”
“I expect you’ll fight me every step of the way.” She leaned forward and looped one knitted chain around my ankle, then another around the other ankle. “For what little good it will do you. You heard Damiel, and I’m sure you can feel it yourself. Your mind is as brittle as eggshells. My idea is stronger than all your willpower. You will play out the design I’ve set for you, just like everyone else infected with this ‘curse’ has.”
I gritted my teeth. “We’ll just see about that.” Despite my words of protest, I kept on knitting. “Your idea won’t work anyway. I don’t have enough magic to compel all the world’s monsters, all at once.”
“You are the Angel of the Plains of Monsters, aren’t you? The wilderness is your territory.”
“That’s just a title, Faith. It doesn’t mean all the world’s monsters obey my commands.”
“But they will.”
“I told you. I simply don’t have enough magic.”
She glanced at Angel. “Maybe your cat can help you.”
Some needles appeared in Angel’s front paws, and she began knitting too.
“What the hell? Leave my cat be,” I growled at Faith.
Angel meowed in protest, like all this knitting hadn’t been her idea, and she wasn’t happy that she’d been dragged into it.
“The Silver Shore was just the dress rehearsal, but this is the real deal. When you’re done knitting, you will take control over all the gods, demons, and monsters on Earth and send them running at the Magitech barriers,” Faith told me. “The impact will kill them all. Then, with the world’s magic finally silent, I can find my way to the Guardians.” Her eyes lifted in hope. “And rescue my brother.”
“And how is Angel a part of this insane plan?”
Damiel appeared beside me. “Your cat is special. Faith has realized that. Otherwise, Angel wouldn’t even be able to be here.”
“She is connected to you,” Cadence added. “She is your Companion, your partner animal.”
“My Companion? And how are you two suddenly here now?” I blinked a few times, but they didn’t disappear.
“We’re here to help,” Eva said as she and Jiro stepped toward me.
“Though we hate to interfere,” said Jiro.
“He hates to interfere,” Eva told me. “I love interfering.” She glanced at her husband and addressed him now. “Yes, Jiro, we all know you’re a stickler for the rules, but exceptions must be made now and again.”
He rolled his eyes. “Or all the time.”
Eva flashed him a grin. “Exactly.”
Eva was Cadence’s aunt, her mother’s sister, if I remembered that right. And Jiro was Damiel’s cousin. And, honestly, they were both really weird.
“This is a private party,” Faith declared. “None of you were invited.”
She waved her hand, like she was flicking away a fly.
Nothing happened. But Faith’s frown told me that something should have happened. And it told me that Damiel and the others were actually here; they weren’t just more of her illusions.
“That won’t work,” Nero told Faith, appearing now too.
Nyx was beside him. “You cannot keep us out,” she said.
“I take it Valora isn’t trying to control you,” I said to the First Angel.
“No.” A hint of amusement twinkled in her blue eyes. “But that was a good one. I could hardly keep a straight face as your mind came up with the idea.”
Nyx unfolded her arms, revealing a pair of bracers on them: silver metal with lines of set gemstones that swirled with magic. Damiel crossed his arms over his chest, showing off a pair of matching bracers. Cadence, Eva, and Jiro also wore the same bracers. And so did Nero. He held a pair in his hands too. He attached them to my forearms now.
“What are you doing?” Faith demanded, uncertainty creeping into her voice.
“Magic,” Nero replied coolly.
And then they all began chanting something. I recognized the language, if not the exact words. It was the ancient language of the original Immortals.
“When your mother Grace was pregnant with you, Leda, she performed a series of rituals on you to boost your telepathic magic,” Eva said to me as the others continued their chant.
That’s what the goddess Saphira’s bodyguard Calix had told me. Those rituals were aimed specifically at boosting my future-gazing powers within the telepathic spectrum. It was a power that had eluded the gods and demons, forcing them to depend on ghosts.
“Ancient Immortal rituals,” I said.
“Rituals even more ancient than I am.” Eva playfully nudged Jiro with her elbow.
He rolled his eyes at her lame joke.
Eva cleared her throat and continued, “But Grace did not complete the Last Ritual on you.”
“Why not?” I asked.
Jiro spoke now. “Partly because the Last Ritual is kept on a distant world, guarded by powerful magic.”
“Was kept on a distant world, guarded by powerful magic,” Eva corrected him. She glanced at me. “We took care of that.”
“That’s where you’ve all been,” I realized.
“We left several days ago, after our family dinner,” Cadence said.
Whenever one of them stopped chanting to speak to me, the others grew louder to compensate for the drop in volume.
“A few days ago, Eva and Jiro came to our family dinner to warn us that a great threat to you waited on the horizon, Leda,” Cadence told me.
“That great threat is Faith,” I said.
I looked at the young telepath. A look of total concentration had furrowed her brow. When Nero and the others had started chanting, my hands had slowed, then stopped. Faith was obviously trying to get my hands to start knitting again.
“Yes, Faith is that great threat,” Cadence confirmed.