“Can we see it? Just see it?” Jo’s voice bordered on desperation, but she didn’t care in the slightest. “Please?”
Samson’s eyes darted between them for what seemed like forever, until he finally nodded. “Okay.”
Jo’s heart was in her ears as she watched him shuffle around the table. Along the wall of windows that overlooked Yorkton there sat a pile of heavy-looking crates, one of which Samson approached and opened. It was an odd contrast: the modern city illuminated behind the trunks that could have been from the set of an old fantasy film.
“It was a gift,” Samson said, straightening, a quiver in both of his hands. His knuckles had gone pale with how tightly he was clutching it. “A gift . . . that’s all I remember.” When he returned to them, he placed the quiver on the table. Samson opened his mouth to speak, but was stunned into silence as Takako walked right up to it.
As if in a trance, Jo watched the woman move with precision and certainty. She had never seen Takako be half as bold as she was about to be. Even Samson stared, slack jawed, his words forgotten.
“This,” Takako whispered, going right for the arrow Jo had been entranced by. It stood out from the others—slightly longer, with a slightly thicker shaft of pale wood, and a plume that seemed to sparkle with its own light.
“Taka—” Samson never finished whatever objection he was about to voice.
Right as he moved, Takako’s fingers closed around the end of the shaft. Pure white light overtook the arrow, blindingly bright. As she lifted it from the quiver, the light seemed to drip off like molten, white hot metal, fizzling and disappearing as it met the table. In its wake, as though it was fresh from the forge, was an arrow made of pure gold.
At the same moment, all of Jo’s past memories and discoveries finally clicked.
“A golden arrow,” she whispered. “A golden arrow!” Her voice seemed to dislodge the other two from their trance, if only slightly, as both of them turned in her direction with yet-gaping mouths. Jo was quick to try to explain, though the thoughts seemed to whizz through her head as though they were arrows themselves, impossible to pluck from the air in any kind of order. “My research. Don’t you remember, Takako?”
“You asked me about archer deities.”
“Yes! It came up, across mythologies and timelines. It was even in Eslar’s story book.” At that, Samson gave a small nod of affirmation. “I remember . . . The Goddess of the Hunt, back in a time of gods. She was working with other gods to try to fight against Oblivion. But . . . it wasn’t going their way. Pan killed her. That was when Snow and I—our past selves—decided to try to reboot the world to kill Chaos.”
“Did a goddess give this to you?” Takako asked Samson.
“I think I’d remember.” Samson shook his head almost violently.
“Can I see it?” Jo held out a hand.
Takako extended her arm, holding out the golden arrow toward Jo.
“Thanks.” Jo reached for it, and the moment her fingertips brushed the gold, memories that did not belong to her flooded her sight.
Hunt, swathed in the furs of her kills and with dirt on her face, bestowing the arrow on a man she called Champion, so that none of the other gods would know of its whereabouts. The man was to kill Pan, but then . . .
The world shifted, and the man was without memory of the gods. As he lay dying, he passed it on to his son, who sold it to a collector. The collector’s home was ransacked by thieves, who pawned everything off but the arrow. They held onto it, revering it for power and luck, before their hideout was burned down and the arrow was hidden in a bed of ash.
. . . Until a farmer discovered it while tilling the land. The farmer gave it to his daughter, and it was she who ultimately gave it to Samson as thanks for a night spent in his home during a storm.
“Josephina?” Takako asked. Instantly, Jo knew it wasn’t the first time her friend had tried to get her attention.
The visions faded and Jo shook her head. She’d barely touched the weapon, but her hand fell from it. She felt heavy, weary from the onslaught of memories. “It’s Hunt’s arrow.”
“You’re sure?”
“No doubt,” Jo affirmed.
“Let me see it?” Samson asked.
A brief look of uncertainty shadowed Takako’s face but she quickly held it out to Samson. He ran his own fingers up and down the projectile.
“Please don’t disassemble it,” Takako cautioned uncertainly.
“I don’t think I could if I tried. The craftsmanship is just . . .”
“Divine?” Jo finished with a small if tired grin.
“If it is something designed to bring down Pan—Oblivion—then why didn’t Pan destroy it while she could in the Age of Magic, or the Society?” Takako asked.
