But she was here, at a crossroads, and she had a decision to make because the cards had warned that the nebulous relationship was tempered by an overriding theme surrounding communication and how it could make—or break, if absent—whatever potential they were building. Grayson wasn’t the only one with a past full of broken family ties.
She drew in a bracing breath and made her choice. “Can I introduce you to someone?”
“Sure.”
He kept her hand in his as she led him over to the corner and under the canopy of leaves, where she stopped in front of an empty patch marred by two rectangular marble headstones set into the ground. The empty spaces between them made it clear that this plot was where the rest of the family would eventually find themselves. The one on the right belonged to her mother’s sister Cora, who had died when Cass was a toddler. But it was the marker to the left that she stopped near. It bore the name Athena Alcmene Ambrose and the inscription beloved daughter and sister above dates that reflected a life cut tragically short.
“Remember that story I promised to tell you?” She felt his fingers tighten on hers in a silent confirmation. “It starts here.” She inhaled deeply and stepped onto the path the Fates had shown her, sharing a story very few knew. “Once upon a time, there were three of us—Sofia, Thena, and me—and we were close. Not just because there were only a couple years between each of us, but also because we spent the majority of our lives knowing that our parents put Pythia before all else. As the oldest, I was determined to buffer Thena and Sofia from that reality as long as I could. Which was why, when I was sixteen, despite my grandmother’s objections, I interned at Pythia, hoping my involvement would keep them safe.”
Grayson frowned. “Isn’t that a little young to be doing that kind of work?”
She shrugged. “You’d think so, especially considering magic and hormones aren’t exactly a stable mix.” Add in her guilt for being the reason her parents had always been arguing with Yaya. “But my accuracy rate was enough to override whatever concerns, if any, they had. Yaya didn’t know, because I refused to tell her, that I had already been supplying predictions at my parents’ request for a couple years before that. I officially came on board as a deal with my mother to keep her from dragging Thena into Pythia.”
He studied the headstone. “And as the oldest, you wanted to protect them.”
“I did, but in the end, I failed them.” The pressure in her chest tightened. Yesterday’s confrontation with Sofia had left fissures in the walls she’d shoved the dark memories behind. Old wounds had reopened, as raw as the day they were created, but she held tight to her determination to see this through. “There was an especially problematic client at Pythia who required a guaranteed plan to ensure a hostile takeover. Due to the complex nature of the businesses and familial ties involved, creating a predetermined outcome would require every resource Pythia had, including their personal Oracle.”
“So why not tap the cousin on staff?”
“Because Yaya had told my parents to not take on this particular client. He’d hired Pythia before, and either she didn’t like him or she knew something was up, but in the end, it didn’t matter because my parents ignored her misgivings. She did the only thing she could to slow them down—she cut off their access to the cousin, since his contract was with her, thinking it would bring them to heel.”
“But it didn’t.”
“No. Instead, they came to me, which eventually led to a rip-roaring argument and Yaya walking away from the company.” Even now she could remember how she and Thena had hidden in the shadowed landing of the stairs, listening to her parents’ cold, cutting comments as her grandmother tried to appeal to whatever was left of their better natures, and when that hadn’t work, had made outright threats. “But at that point, between the exorbitantly high price the client was willing to pay and the fact that they were backed by the majority of the board, who couldn’t see past the profit margin, my parents were determined to see it through. That left my grandmother with few options other than throwing up as many obstacles as she could.”
“She didn’t know they were using you?”
“Not then, no. But that wasn’t the worst of it. I didn’t know they had already started in on Thena.” If she had, she never would have allowed Thena to eavesdrop with her that night.
“Why would they do that?”
Instead of answering, she circled around. “Have you heard of the derivative-lineage principle?”
His frown, which hadn’t really faded while she talked, came back with a vengeance. “It’s a theory that describes how the recessive abilities of two magical genetic lines could come together to create an altered version of the dominant ability.”
She had to admit to being impressed. Most people had no clue about the genetic theory because it wasn’t widely taught. “Thena wasn’t an Oracle—she was a Harbinger.”
He canted his head in question. “I don’t recognize that term, but something tells me that’s not a happy thing.”
“No, it’s not. It’s also not a generally acknowledged ability outside the family because it only turns up every few hundred years, and when that happens, families will lean toward hiding the Harbinger’s existence.” She finally let go of his hand so she could crouch by her sister’s grave. She brushed her fingers along the carved letters. “Harbingers are the darker twin of Oracles, and they rarely end up living happy lives.” At one point, she’d naively believed she could change that for Thena, but that was before the Fates had taught her otherwise. “Remember the tree analogy?”
He nodded.
“Right. Whereas Oracles can travel along all the future possibilities, Harbingers zero in on the one branch most likely to achieve the desired outcome, and then they prune all the other branches it to make it happen. And when you wield that kind of power, there are those who have no qualms about exploiting it.”
Grayson read between the lines. “Like your parents?”
“Exactly.” The familiar bite of bitter betrayal sank its poisonous fangs deep, and despite the press of summer’s heat, a phantom chill slid over her, forcing her to her feet. “I spent days following multiple futures for the client, but each ended the same, with the client in financial ruin and legal trouble, which did not go over well with either the client or my parents. However, using my magic for that long left me teetering on the edge of a cascade, which was the only reason my parents allowed me to stop.” Mainly because, as they flat out told her, they hadn’t wanted to endanger her future earning potential. “The client continued to push. They even went so far as to offer more money, enough to override whatever reservations my parents might have had. That’s when they decided to bring Thena in. At fourteen, she was still learning how to handle her wildly erratic magic, but that didn’t stop my parents from piling on the guilt until she agreed to do the job. Unfortunately, the client’s rival somehow found out about Thena and her ability, and before she could do what my parents wanted, she was kidnapped. Within hours of Thena being taken, the kidnappers made contact. They demanded that my parents pay a five-million-dollar ransom, drop the client, and provide proof of the client’s illegal dealings.”
She stopped as memories crowded in, replacing her sister’s grave with the terrifying days after Thena disappeared. How Sofia had gone mute and silent, like a ghost. How Cass had decided to push her magic to its limits in a desperate search for answers. How her parents had refused to listen to what she saw, which drove her to scream at them until they decided to sedate her.
“I told them,” she said.
A warm hand wrapped around the nape of her neck in an offer of comfort. “Told them what?”
“That Thena would die if they didn’t give the kidnappers what they wanted.” That Thena’s blood was on their hands. That Cass would hate them forever. None of it made a difference. “They said Pythia couldn’t capitulate to threats. Instead, the board authorized bringing in a hostage-rescue team that specialized in Family disputes. When the team went in to get her, it was a clusterfuck of epic proportions. The kidnappers went balls to the wall, and in the ensuing fight, Thena got caught in a lethal cast. She was dead before the last kidnapper fell.”
And when Cass finally clawed her way free of the forced sedation and heard what happened, part of her followed Thena. In the hole her sister’s death had created, a bitter brew of resentment, hate, and guilt stewed until it finally boiled over, searing away whatever fragile threads tied her to her parents and damaging the ones connecting her to Sofia and Yaya. “Afterward, I shut everyone out. The only time I spoke to my parents was when we argued, which generally led to me telling them to fuck off. I avoided Yaya and barely looked at Sofia.” Because the guilt was suffocating.
