Chapter 24
Chapter
Twenty-Four
MOIRA
Watching a horseman of the apocalypse draw a blade across his forearm shouldn’t have been hot, but it was.
Listen, I’m not into him because, yuck, but he was so confident and focused, I couldn’t not appreciate him.
If he was that attentive to something like this, I bet he took excellent care of his woman in bed. Good for Merri.
“So, you just bleed on it and it’ll glow or float or something?” Asher asked. “Is that what happened with the bone, Asshole?”
The little dog yipped from his place on the other side of the portal before saying, “Nobody bled on that one, dumbass. But yeah, it got all glowy. No floating, though.”
Chaos held his arm out, and we all watched on, collectively holding our breath as his blood dripped across the weapon.
“Well, that was a disappointment,” Lilith said under her breath when nothing happened.
Remi snickered before elbowing Asher. “Not the first time a guy brandishing his weapon disappointed us, is it, babe?”
I held my laugh, but Remi was a constant source of entertainment.
Not for the first time, I wished he and I lived closer to each other.
I knew he gave a killer manicure, and Rosie said girls' night with Remi was always a good time.
Although I was pretty sure their definition of slumber party varied from mine.
Chaos glowered at them from his place at the front of the room. Sin slapped him on the shoulder, speaking on his behalf with a cocky air only these alphaholes could pull off. “I promise you Chaos and his weapons never disappoint. If you need a demonstration, War would love to give you one.”
Remi fluttered his lashes, but Asher slapped a hand over his mouth before he could insert his foot in it.
I was honestly surprised the euphemism was lost on Sin. You’d think an incubus would have gotten a dick joke. But after a second thought, I wondered if maybe Sin had stepped in to save Chaos the indignity of thinking they were insulting him. He didn’t seem like the joking type.
Watching the tension leave the big dude’s body, I realized that was exactly what happened. It was sort of cute. Their bromance, I mean. But I guess after a few centuries of rubbing elbows and a couple of months of sharing pussy, that was bound to happen.
Now it was my turn to snicker.
After several raised eyebrows, I waved a hand and cleared my throat. “Sorry. My thoughts wandered.”
“Why didn’t that work?” Chaos grumbled. “If the blood of War isn’t powerful enough to attune this, what else is?”
“What made you think it would be in the first place?” Malice asked.
The incredulity on Chaos’s face was impossible to miss. “Because I’m me.”
“Egomaniac,” Kingston said through a cough.
“My blood wasn’t the answer,” Grim pointed out.
Chaos blinked at him. “So?”
A massive shadow stretched behind Grim, rising like some kind of real-life nightmare.
“Jesus, they’re scary,” Rosie murmured.
I nodded my agreement. It didn’t seem to matter how many immortal beings we added to our army; the power was always intimidating. And the horsemen definitely topped that list.
“What do you suggest we try then, Grimsby?” Chaos snapped.
“I don’t know, Chaos, it’s not Death’s weapon.”
“Why are we asking him, anyway?” Kingston asked, jerking his thumb at Grim. “He wasn’t even the one with the bright ideas for his weapon. That was Hades.”
As one, every head in the room snapped to the god of the underworld.
He raised his hands in supplication. “Don’t look at me. I deal in souls, not war.”
Mmm, that man didn’t talk nearly enough. His voice was like warm honey. I wondered if I could pay him to record some bedtime stories for my future kid to listen to.
“Moira?” Sunday said, and I blinked a few times, realizing I’d let my mind wander again.
“Sorry, what?”
“Do you have any ideas?”
“Oh, no. Sorry, babycakes, but this is all way above my pay grade.”
Sunday frowned and wandered over to where Chaos had set the weapon back down so he could wipe the remaining blood off his hand . . . onto his pant leg. Classy.
A snort from Kingston drew my attention.
“What?”
“It’s just funny. You saying anything is above your pay grade. I thought you were the great and powerful Ozma.”
“Fuck off, fluffy. I’m entirely capa—” My words cut off as the world went white and my ears began to ring.
Shit, I was being thrown into a vision.
Not a bad thing, given the situation, but potentially inconvenient depending on what the universe wanted to show me.
I had no control over the whys or hows of what I saw.
It could be something significant, like when I saw Sunday in danger, or it could be as stupid as a snowfall warning.
Fate was fickle that way. Some may even call her a cunt. Not me, but some.
My visions weren’t always clear; they were snapshots of many different moments shoved into my brain all at once.
This one was no exception. I was assaulted with sights and sounds.
Decimated grass soaked in blood, hazy echoes of fallen soldiers dressed in uniforms of red, gray, and blue, the copper scent of blood permeating the air.
It was too much and not enough for me to lock onto all at once.
The scenes repeated, this time from different angles.
I caught the blast of a cannon, body after body strewn along the ground, weapons abandoned at their sides.
Before I could focus on any particular detail, I was tugged into something new.
A Tron meets Alice in Wonderland display of color and energy whirling all around me like one massive color tornado.
Lines of power shot out from the cyclone.
Magenta, blue, red, green, and even white formed a spiderweb of energy, the pulse stronger where they bisected.
I was drawn closer, a hand appearing in view holding the blade we’d been trying to attune.
It was shoved into the blazing lines, instantly absorbing the prismatic glow.
I could feel the energy building to a breaking point, the power coalescing into a tempest. If I didn’t get out of here, I feared I’d end up consumed.
The energy exploded outward, flinging me back and knocking me out of both the power field and the vision.
Just as quickly as it started, it was over. I swayed where I stood, a warm hand wrapped around my bicep, holding me up.
“Elphie? You okay?” Kingston asked, concern coating his words.
“Y-yeah,” I stuttered, my tongue thick in my mouth as my mind reconnected with my body.
“She’s back!” Thorne shouted, alerting the rest of the room. Everyone gathered closer, their attention locked on me as they waited for me to reveal what I’d seen.
I took a shuddering breath, blinking a few times to clear my vision. “It’s not blood. It's a battlefield.”
“A battlefield?” Chaos asked.
“Specifically a powerful one. Where ley lines converge.”
My vision was still swimming in and out of focus, and my temples pounded as I struggled to remain present. Not all visions affected me like this, but some did. It was like a migraine and motion sickness on steroids. My stomach rolled as I realized what was coming. “Someone get me a bucket.”
Alek manifested one in the nick of time, holding it in range as I tossed my cookies.
Kingston held my pink locks back and patted my back like the good dad he was. “It’s okay, buddy. Just let it out. You’ll feel a lot better in a minute.”
Using the back of my hand to wipe my mouth, I straightened with a grimace. “Sorry about that.”
Alek made the bucket and its contents vanish, while Kai held out a breath mint.
“Thanks, guys,” I said with a grateful smile.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me the witch had visions?” Lucifer asked. “That would’ve been a helpful little tidbit.”
I leveled a stare at him. “I have visions. Happy?”
“And you thought to use them now? Not . . . any other time?”
“I can’t control when they happen. I see when the goddess wants me to.”
“Inconvenient.”
“You’re telling me.”
Hades chuckled. “Isn’t that always the way with the gods?”
His voice was the best medicine. I think I swooned a little. Seriously, the guy could make up a song about a garbage truck, and I’d play it on repeat.
Chaos crossed the room, approaching me with a determined stride. “You said battlefield.”
“Yes.”
“Which one? There are thousands.”
“I dunno, man. I’m not the expert. There were lots of dead guys wearing different uniforms. Some were red, others were blue, then there was gray, I think, and some had old-timey facial hair.
You know, the crazy sideburns?” I recounted everything I’d seen to the best of my ability, hoping it might provide some kind of clue.
I could tell as soon as I finished that it was less than helpful, given his frown.
Surprisingly, or maybe it wasn’t at all, Asher was the most excited by my retelling.
“Hold on! I have a map for this!” he shouted as he darted out of the room.
Remi sighed. “He’s so cute when he gets to break out his nerd stuff.”
“He is,” Rosie agreed. “Especially when it's for real and not just role-play.”
“Sexy IT guy is fun though.” Then he dropped his voice and added in an over-the-top manner, straight out of an audio erotica, “Have you tried turning her off and on again?”
Rosie blushed and nuzzled into his side as Asher burst back into the room, breathing heavily with multiple rolled maps in his hands.
“You said everything I needed to know,” he said with a grin, as he used both hands to spread the first one out. Then he frowned and flung it to the ground before selecting a different one. “There we go.”
“What is this?” Sunday asked.
“A map of the ley lines in North America.”
I laughed, disbelief filling the sound. “You just happened to have this?”
“It’s important to know where the most powerful crossings are. Liminal spaces are fascinating, but in this environment we need all the help we can get.”
Malice surprised me by agreeing. “My chateau sits atop one.”
“You’ll have to invite me over if we survive. I have some spells I’ve been meaning to test out.”
His lips quirked in a small smile. “I do find myself in need of a new resident witch.”
“What do you mean?” Merri asked. “What happened to Christian?”
Malice’s expression grew confused. “You don’t know? Weren’t you there?”
“Know what, Malice?” she snapped, her panic making her eyes wide.
“You killed him, baby,” Sin said, wrapping a comforting arm around her shoulder. “We know you didn’t mean to.”
“What? No, I didn’t. I’d never hurt him. He was one of my only friends.”
She was so adamant that I knew she was telling the truth. The guilty can never manage that level of sincerity. Unless amnesia is involved.
Hades raised a hand and inserted himself into what was sure to turn into an argument. “It was Famine.”
“Sin! How could you!”
“Whoa, wait a damn second. I definitely didn’t do it.”
“Not him.” Hades leveled Merri a gentle look. “Your mother.”
Her mouth fell open as the bomb dropped. Damn, this was juicy.
“She possessed him. I’m not sure for how long, but I met him in the underworld. We had a long chat.”
A shattered expression crossed her face, and she swallowed hard before asking, “Is he okay?”
Hades smiled gently. “He’s happy. Not suffering. I swear it.”
She let out a shuddering breath. “At least there’s that, I guess.” Then anger took hold as the gravity of Famine’s manipulation became clear. “I don’t even know the woman, and I hate her more than anyone on the planet.”
“Join the club,” Sunday said with an empathetic smile. “Moms can be real cunts.”
Hey! Go bestie. Of course she was on the same wavelength as me.
“We can’t exact your revenge until we find all the weapons and attune them,” Lilith offered.
“Right. So about that map,” Merri said, her attention turning to Asher.
“It’s Gettysburg,” he said, looking up from the large swath of paper.
“How do you know?”
“Moira told us, and the map confirms it.”
“I did?”
Asher nodded. “The color of the uniforms, the mutton chops, it all tracks.”
“How did you miss that one, witch?” Lucifer asked.
I flipped him off, but also, how did I miss it? I was slipping.
“So we go to this battlefield, find where the ley lines converge, tap into them, and attune the weapon?” Chaos asked.
I nodded.
“You’re coming, witch.” The horseman wasn’t someone I was going to argue with. “You too,” he said, pointing to Asher.
“I’m going too,” Kingston said, throwing his arm around me. “I got your back, Elphie.”
On reflex, I rolled my eyes, but inside, my heart warmed because I loved the big idiot like a brother.
Chaos grunted. “Great. Let’s fucking go.”