Chapter 70 – The One True Mate Prophecy
Sage blinked at what Canyon had in his hands as he came back through the front door: a carton of eggs, a pack of bacon, and a container of orange juice. She was starving but refused to eat anything he cooked.
She gathered her courage and said, “You need to leave,” all in one breath.
He shook his head and continued into the kitchen, dropping everything on the counter, then he pulled a small jar of oil and a canvas packet out of his pocket and put them with the food.
“We can’t go. You’ll never be without a wolven guard again.” He opened the packet and it was full of tiny spice bottles. He chose three and put them near the stove.
Sage almost blurted out, “Anyone but you,” but she stopped herself, thinking that wasn’t quite true. She considered, then said, “I'll go with you. We’ve got to go somewhere else. If my aunts show up and find you inside the house…” She shook her head. She didn’t even want to think about it.
“Because we're vod,” Canyon said, grinning while putting a pan on the stove and pouring oil in it.
She looked at him carefully, cocking her head, not sure how much he knew.
“Vodvod, even,” he said.
She crossed her arms and scowled at him.
He held his hands up. “I know the words, but not quite what they mean.”
She didn’t respond, only shook her head, looking at the door, thinking if she just left maybe he would follow.
“Do your aunts know there’s a One True Mate prophecy?” he asked.
She nodded her head once, curtly.
“You can explain.”
Sage shook her head. There was no justification for inviting two vodvod inside a foxen house. “Where'd you hear the word vod?” she asked.
“At the Crimstone Academy,” he said, his expression guarded. He pointed at Timber and said, “We found it. Me and my brother. We went inside, read some things.”
Sage felt like crying. She paced around the room. “Why'd you do that? Now it'll be shut down!”
“Just because a couple of vod found it?”
“Yes! You destroy everything you touch!”
She left the room, through the kitchen, grabbing a coat on her way out the back door. Cold air hit her in the face, and the stars stared down from overhead. She bundled warmer in the coat and dropped onto the steps.
The robot was there where she'd left it. His screen was lit, with words streaming by.
She sat down to read.
“In twenty-five years, half-angel, half-human mates will be discovered living among you.
This is how you will rebuild. Warriors, all, with names like flora.
Save them from themselves, for they will not know their foreordination.
They will not be bound by shiften law, but their destinies entwine so strongly with their fated mates, that any not mated by their 30th year will be moonstruck. Those who are lost may be dangerous.
A pledged female will have free will that shiften know not.
Never forget this or it will cause grave trouble.
Her body may respond to any, until she is mated in a ceremony of her choosing, then she will acknowledge only one male, as he becomes her One True Mate, and she, his One True Mate.
He shall be sworn to her in her life's purpose, to rebuild the shiften race, so that they may fight the evil Matchitehew and protect the humans from him, until the day he draws his last breath.”
“The One True Mate Prophecy,” Sage breathed. She’d never read the words before. Maybe the Vvyndicate knew the entire prophecy, but the rest of them only knew bits and pieces gleaned from rumor and gossip.
The prophecy disappeared and words appeared, also spoken out loud.
:Yes, Miss June—
Sage did not know what to think of this thing. Could it see her? Did it know who she was? Nobody called her ‘Miss June’ except maybe someone in a dream once.
“I’m Sage.”
:Yes, Sage. This is the One True Mate Prophecy—
The prophecy reappeared on the screen. Sage ran up the steps to the workstation, grabbing a plant pot label and a pen, then ran back and copied out the entire prophecy.
She read the prophecy from beginning to end, then folded it and stuck it in her pocket, a warm flush filling her from the inside.
“Pocket the knowledge to keep it safe,” she whispered.
She took the paper right back out again, unfolded it and read the entire thing, top to bottom, her brain sticking on one word.
In twenty-five years, half-angel, half-human mates will be discovered living among you.
“Human!” she shouted, holding the paper up and running back inside. “Human!”
Canyon stood at the stove with two pans going. The food smelled amazing and her mouth watered. She whapped the plant label in his direction. “The prophecy says the mates are human! I’m foxen, not human!”
Canyon nodded. “But you’ve got some human blood in you, right?”
Sage didn’t know what to say. Her mother was mostly foxen, and she’d never known her human father. She didn’t scent foxen at all because of White-Whittinger disease… but she sure as shit wasn’t telling Canyon any of that. He could fuck right off.
She pocketed the prophecy, then turned and stormed outside to sit down next to the robot. The words were still up on the screen, and she read through them again.
She shot to her feet and ran back in the house. “You think I’m a One True Mate because my name is like flora?”
“Also because Troy Burbank recently found his One True Mate, and she worked with you. She said you must be one, too. She had a hunch or a dream or something.”
Warmth spread in her chest as her friendship with Reed filled her mind.
She and Reed had become close friends the instant they’d met, feeling right at home with each other in a way that Sage had never known before.
Sage had watched Reed get together with Troy and had been surprised and interested when Reed said Troy had bitten her, and she’d wondered if that meant Reed was a One True Mate, but Sage hadn’t talked to Reed in over a week and hadn’t heard what had happened.
“Reed,” she whispered, happy tears coming to her eyes.
“She moved out to our Lieutenant’s place, or VF as we call it, with the rest of them.”
Sage didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “VF?”
“Village Fucktastic,” Canyon said, grinning at her, and for just a moment, Sage forgot she hated him. She smothered a laugh, because the foxen called the place something similar, but she wasn’t about to tell Canyon that.
She went back outside to sit on the steps near the robot and think, especially about the thing that had called her name from Nana White’s big cavern.
What if that had been a pendant? What if that had been her pendant?
Would her Nana really steal a pendant from her?
Sage thought maybe Nana would, if she thought she needed it to protect the family.
Sage dropped her face into her hands. It didn’t feel real.
Her Nana had stolen the pendant from some One True Mate, but not her.
Maybe.
“Nooooo,” she whispered. She didn’t like not knowing, and she didn’t like thinking these things about her own flesh and blood, especially someone who protected them all so fiercely.
If she could just see the magic again. She looked around, trying to concentrate, and saw nothing, but then she remembered something important. She’d put her number in Canyon’s phone… and she’d texted him, too! There could be proof that they’d met. She could have some proof that he was lying to her!
Sage shot to her feet and ran straight inside. The kitchen smelled heavenly and her mouth watered.
She stopped near the stove, her hand out. “Let me see your phone.”
“Spider ate it,” he said with an easy grin.
Sage shook her head and crossed her arms, her stomach falling at the loss of proof.
Canyon placed two eggs and two slices of bacon on a plate and offered it to Sage.
She looked at it for a long time, not taking it.
He didn’t say anything, he just watched her, while she looked from his face to the plate and back again.
Her stomach growled, betraying her. Canyon grinned.
Sage took the plate, grabbed a fork, and went to the table, muttering, “Thanks.” She was too hungry to stay mad right at that moment.
“Welcome,” he said.”
Sage sat, speared an egg and stuck it in her mouth, the food awakening the hunger she’d experienced the day before.
She thought of the WHIT-WHIT in the car, remembering she’d failed to finish it.
She decided not to drink it—it could have gone bad overnight.
She might tell the doctor next month, or she might not.
She speared the second egg and chewed and swallowed it as Canyon came to the table with his food.
She picked up her two pieces of bacon and quickly ate them.
“Damn girl, put that food away,” Canyon said.
She turned a hardened gaze on him, outraged. “Are you remarking on how much I’m eating?”
He shook his head. “Am I not supposed to do that?”
“No,” she snarled.
He took her plate and put his plate down in front of her. “Ok then, I’ll just sit over here and admire you silently.”
Sage held back a laugh, then shook her head inwardly. He wasn’t funny or charming. She did take the new plate and eat the food while he sat with a glass of orange juice, watching her, his face open and friendly.
He pissed her right the fuck off. She picked up her plate and took it in the front bedroom, then sat on the bed and finished it. Done, she went back out into the living area, passing by Canyon on her way to the kitchen.
“You've really never seen me before?” she asked, not looking at him, her voice tight.
“I saw your picture on your driver's license a few days ago.”
Sage stood at the sink, washing the plate. “What’s Reed’s power?” she asked, dying to know.
“She can talk to plants and understand them, and she can tell them what to do.”
Sage was dumbstruck, out of all the things she’d expected him to say, talking to plants just wasn’t one of them. Who knew that was even possible? She remembered Reed’s fear of cut flowers and thought maybe the phobia had been misunderstood indignation.
“I don't have any power,” Sage said.
“You do,” Canyon said. “You just don't know what it is yet. All the mates have had to learn to use their power.” In her peripheral vision, she saw him turning in his chair to face her. “Do you have a pendant?”
Sage opened her mouth to say maybe, but she didn't want to tell him any foxen secrets, so she closed her mouth and shook her head instead. She could feel him smelling that lie.
“I don't have a renqua,” she said softly.
He nodded, not seeming to care, and that floored her.
She’d thought renquas were all-important to the vod and anyone without one might as well be trash.
She finished washing the plate, thinking about it, then faced Canyon, with no stable footing underneath her.
She’d hated him for so long, and none of this made sense.
“So… who's my mate?” Sage asked, sarcasm in her voice. “Not you,” she added quickly.
“Not me.”
“Not him,” she said, pointing at Timber, sleeping comfortably as a wolf on the couch, feet curled toward the back of it.
Canyon shook his head. “Nope.”
“Then who?”
He shrugged. “Sebastian, maybe?”
Sage didn’t like that. Everyone knew Sebastian Breese was the scariest vodvod there was.