I groaned in agony.
“If I give him back, what do I get in exchange?” she said.
“I’ll kill you,” I croaked.
“And cross King?” She laughed. “Doubtful. He and I have a deal, and you won’t break it. I heard your thoughts. You’re in love with him.”
I fell to the ground, clawing at my neck, choking. I want my dad back.
“I think I’ll keep him.” She laughed out her words. “Just in case you decide to pull any tricks. Besides, he’s very handy around the yard.”
The room filled with a dark presence, pushing the others—the dead Seers—away. The air got colder, and the lights flickered.
It was here. Death.
The two times before, I hadn’t been able to see what it was, because it had been nighttime. In my memories, it was a shadow and nothing more. But this time was different. The moment it entered the room, I saw it clearly. Every feature—the curve of its lips, the definition of the jaw, the thick black hair.
Serina released her hold on me and stood shell-shocked next to the front door.
I righted myself in the middle of the room just a few feet away from it, trying to make sense of what my eyes were registering.
King waltzed into the room and stopped. I could tell by the look on his face that he was just as surprised as we were.
The dark shadow was no longer some unknown entity. It was King. Or at least, it was a shadow that looked exactly like him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
KING
I had led an extraordinary life filled with more impossible events than I could ever count or recount. I traveled the world, collecting knowledge and power from the ancient Egyptians, the Druids, the Maya, and a hundred other lost civilizations. All because I wanted to live. An ancient Minoan king fighting to stay alive so that he might someday find the woman he was meant to be with yet hadn’t been born: Mia. She was a Seer who traveled from her time to mine. And before returning home, three thousand years in the future, she changed everything—the fate of my people and brother, the future that awaited her, and my cold heart.
I did not want her to leave, but circumstances demanded it. And when I vowed to find a way to see her again, I intended to keep it.
But, as with everything in this world, our reunion would come with a price. And now I was paying it.
In my three thousand years walking this earth, enduring torment, loss, and rage, I had never seen such a thing so dark: my soul. And it was staring back at me.
The shadow shook its head and extended its hand, reaching straight for my heart. It wrapped its ice-cold fingers around my organ and squeezed. The pain sent me to my knees.
In an instant, Serina and Jeni faded away. The room melted into a circle of faces. So many souls I’d trapped inside this house—most of them Seers from the time of the Minoans, from when I was a true king who cared for his people above all else.
“What do you want?” I growled at the faces.
The women said nothing, but I knew. I knew what they wanted. I knew why this was happening, why I felt so empty and hollow inside.
It seemed they too had taken measures, just as I had when I brought them back from the dead to serve me. I had taken out insurance to secure their obedience, and so had they.
“I did it for Mia,” I said, rising to my feet despite the agony. “You all know that.” When my son came along, I did it for him, too. And then my daughter. I had lived for three thousand years and watched the greed of men destroy countless tribes, villages, and civilizations. Their hunger for power never stopped. And those with it ultimately fed on the goodness of the weak.
So who would protect my Mia?
Not a saint.
Not even a man with means.
The only option was to be at the top of the food chain. The man everyone feared. Then and only then could I keep those I loved safe.
But everything comes with a price, the women said without speaking.
“I paid it. I lost her. I lost my children.”
Yes, but all that power, all the evil you brought into this world must be punished.
“I am going to make things right. I am going to end Ten Club.”
It wasn’t enough, they said. The cancer I’d created had taken on a life of its own. Corruption, the hunger for power, the darkness in people’s minds. I had planted the seed, and that seed was Ten Club. And now the roots had taken hold, souring everything around us.
And as fate would have it, the woman who could have fixed it was gone. Mia. She had been the most powerful Seer ever to be born, with the ability to travel through time, but she gave up her gift to be with me. She was gone because of me.
So now you see, they said.
“No. I do not. What is it that you want?” I asked.
The circle opened up. A young woman with large brown eyes and dirty blonde hair appeared. I knew right away who she was. My daughter.
“You’re still here?” I could hardly speak. She was so beautiful.
“Yes. Thanks to you.”
She even sounded like Mia.
“How? How is this possible?” I was told that Seers, their souls, never left the earth, but Ariadna hadn’t been born yet. I thought perhaps that changed things.
She smiled, and her lips were just like her mother’s. I had not realized how much I missed that smile.
“Why are you here? In this house?” Why wasn’t her soul free to join their ancestors? This house was filled with the Seers who betrayed me, which led to the murder of her mother and brother.
“Our family’s blood is on your hands,” Ariadna said. “Every choice you made, every action, every lie and broken vow to my mother. And when we died, she knew she wouldn’t be able to return. She knew she would have to cross over with Arch. So she sent me with a message.”
I understood right away what that meant. I had executed all the Seers in my employ and bound them to this house. “You were here, too, weren’t you?”
She nodded.
“I am sorry. I did not know.”
“Father, I am here to tell you that you must set things right. And until you do, your soul will not be allowed to cross over.”
“This was your doing? I cannot die because of you?” They’d been contained here for over twenty-five years.
“We might not have been able to leave, but these walls and your wards could never keep us from speaking with our ancestors whose souls still roam free. That is why you will remain here. Every misdeed, every thread of the tapestry, every footprint must be erased.
“You were never meant to live for three thousand years, Father. Rules were broken. And because of that, this world is changed. Because of you, because of your choices, and because of Ten Club.”
As she spoke, I realized her words were something I already knew. It was why I’d cursed myself to forget. After all my sins, I did not deserve the happy memories of my wife and children. I wanted to punish myself.
“Your suffering is not enough. This is why we bound you to Jeni,” Ariadna continued. “The last living Seer, whose gifts are befitting of a man like yourself.”
Jeni was the last. I’d suspected as much given how many Seers I had personally killed, all for reasons I did not care to rehash.
What was her gift? It wasn’t summoning death, as I had believed. That dark, sadistic creature had been me all along, my soul bound to Jeni instead of my own body. It was why I felt a massive dark void inside and could not cross over. No soul meant I was merely an empty shell—living, but not complete.