“But if you don’t kill Nix, then you won’t be free,” Veda pointed out. “Either he owns you or we do.”
I licked dried lips and tried not to scream. I hated that she had a point. “I’ll run again. There are places even the god of the sea can’t go.” The words were Hera’s but I hoped they were true.
“And your mother?” Enid goaded. “What of her?”
Damn. They had me there. “Why can’t you give me my mother and just trust that I will do everything in my power to end Poseidon. I don’t want to be his anymore than I want to be yours.”
“Think of our offer as motivation,” Isadora offered. “We want to ensure Poseidon can’t find a loophole. We want to disband this ridiculous idea entirely.”
“And if I say no?”
“Your sister-”
I couldn’t listen to this, “She’s too young. Smith will never let her out of his sight.”
“We don’t want your sister,” Enid hissed. “She’s worthless to us.”
“Worthless? But you said-”
“She can’t do what you do, Siren. Her set of skills is… different.” Isadora shifted in her seat. “I was going to say that if you don’t kill Nix and you stay with him, she dies. She will try to save you and we will have to cut her thread. It’s her fate.”
“No.” The word burned in my throat, searing a trail from my mouth to my stomach.
“Your mother will die too,” Isadora continued.
Enid gave her a sidelong glance. “But I think that’s our fault. Isn’t it?”
Isadora didn’t respond. I felt sick to my stomach. “This is blackmail.”
“You sought us out,” Isadora reminded me. Her milky eyes cleared for a moment and she hit me with an accusatory glare. “You came to us. You could have stayed with the messenger and left your mother alone. You requested an audience. We are responding.”
“This is very clever,” Ryder growled. “You take her mother, knowing she would come after her. And now you’ve trapped her.”
They didn’t have anything to say to that. They didn’t need to.
“Do it, Ivy,” Ryder grunted. “Take their deal.”
“Ryder?” I gasped his name, shocked that he took their side.
He turned to me, taking my hands in his. He squeezed tightly and I felt something change in him, something profound and unrelenting. “We’ll kill Nix. No one is going to own you. Not Nix, and certainly not these witches. Notanyone. You’re free, Red. You will always be free. And I’ll do anything… I’ll doeverythingto make sure that doesn’t change. We take this deal. We kill Nix. We get your mom back. Then we go home. In that order. No amendments. No changes. No modifications. That’s how it goes. That’s howwe make sureit goes.”
The Fates disappeared, the garish room buried in the middle of a cave vanished… the world faded into starlit nothing until there was only Ryder and me, until there was only the two of us and the promises between us. With an emotional whisper I asked, “You really think it’s possible?”
“It’s theonlything that’s possible,” he swore and squeezed my hands again. “We kill him. Then we go home.”
I held his granite eyes that promised hope and certainty, that promised what we needed to happen would happen, that promised survival and freedom and a future. Finally, I let the ugly reality of the Fates and their den of iniquity back in and said, “Okay.” I turned to the Fates. “Okay. When I kill Nix, you let me go, you let my mother go and I never see you again.Not ever.”
Isadora didn’t immediately respond. Her chalky eyes flashed with streaks of gold light and her sharp fingernails clacked impatiently on a thin strip of wood adorning the back of the settee. Finally, after agonizing minutes, she sighed, “We can’t promise forever. But we will refrain from meddling in your life unnecessarily.”
I slid forward on the velvet couch and leveled her with my glare. “Not good enough. You’re already meddling in my life unnecessarily. If we’re bargaining, these are my conditions.”
“What if you need us, Siren? Have you thought of that?” Enid asked haughtily.
“I won’t.”
“You might,” she returned. Her patience thinned quickly when faced with my obstinacy. Not even the gods would stand up to the Fates. Who did I think I was to challenge them?
Desperate.
