Their Phoenix (Daughters of Olympus Book 3)

by Charlie Hart

  “You feel alone,” Arrow says, sitting down next to me. “You feel lost. And you’re scared.”

  I look at him, hating how right he is. He always seems to take everything in and find reason in the midst of a mess.

  “So, what? Because I’m sad, we can’t have sex?”

  “Lark,” he says. “Maybe instead of sex, what you really need is a good cry?”

  My face falls. “A cry?”

  Before anyone can say any more the doorbell rings.

  My eyebrows furrow. “Maybe it’s one of my mom’s clients.” I press a hand to my forehead. “Can one of you tell them what happened? I can’t bear to do it.”

  North nods and walks to the foyer, toward the front door.

  In his absence, Arrow finds a tissue and hands it to me while Vaughn stands, saying he is going to make me some tea.

  A few minutes later North returns with a frown.

  “They aren’t here for your mom. They’re here for you.”

  “Who are they?”

  North twists his lip together, and then claps his hands loudly, as if avoiding the answer.

  “What? Who is it? Mark? Someone from the show?”

  He shakes his head. “The woman says she’s family.”

  “I don’t have a family,” I say. But then I think about my mother’s story. I swallow, hard. “Is it my aunt?”

  North shakes his head again. “No. Maybe it’s best you meet them for yourself. Want me to have them come inside?”

  “Are they safe?”

  “To be determined.”

  I scowl, confused. “Fine, but if they turn out to be serial killers, you guys can deal with them.”

  At that North smiles, and heads back to the door. I sit, curled up on the couch, shredding the tissue in my hand and waiting for whoever is here for me.

  A minute later, Vaughn returns, delivering a hot cup of tea. I take it, cradling the mug in my hand. He made me my mom’s special blend of honey, lavender, and chamomile. I can’t deny the tears that spring to my eyes when I inhale the familiar scent. Maybe Arrow is right. Maybe what I need is a really good cry.

  “What did I miss?” he asks.

  “Her family is here,” Sawyer tells him.

  “Possibly,” I say. “We have no idea who they–”

  A group of four enters the living room, and I stop talking altogether.

  It’s the group from the desert. The woman who put the fire out, who shifted before our eyes and sent the eagle flying toward Gaia’s burst of wind.

  Seeing them here in my home is a shock. Up close I can see that the red-headed woman is pregnant; her belly is swollen and her tight black tee shirt stretches over it. The men with her are all wild, with shocks of hair and piercing eyes. Wolves. I set down my tea and stand, confused.

  “Who are you?” I ask. “And why are you here?”

  The woman steps toward me, in a leather jacket and torn jeans. She’s tall and looks practically feral. Unhinged. Like she lives on the road and hasn’t been inside a home in ages. Her eyes flicker around my mother’s house, taking it in the way Arrow takes in everything.

  Except this is different. She has tears in her eyes and desperation written on her face.

  “I’m here because I’m your sister,” she says.

  “That’s impossible.” I shake my head. “I had a sister, but she’s dead.”

  “Dead?” the woman asks, eyes wide, she turns to the men with her, all of them tensing at my words.

  I don’t know them. They are strangers and I want them gone. I just want to be with my hawks, to curl up in a bed and – fine, we don’t have to sleep together but they can hold me until my eyes close. Until I fall asleep.

  “How did she die?” the woman asks.

  I pull my shoulders back, feeling so small compared to the woman before me. We look the same age, but I’m so short and slender, and she is a woman with curves and height and eyes filled with experience.

  Still, I am the star of a Las Vegas show. I have a flock of men who have been sent to protect me. I am a woman who can fly.

  She doesn’t scare me.

  How?” she repeats, her hard edges have gone all soft, and it confuses me, the longing in her voice. “How did she die?”

  I lift an eyebrow, tilt my head to the side. “I killed her.”

  27

  Lark

  “What do you mean?” she asks, her hand on her mouth as if horrified.

  I’m exhausted. Suddenly I realize my hawks were right. I couldn’t have slept with them tonight. I need a hot shower and a warm bed. I need to cry my heart out.

  I can’t deal with this. With her. This stranger and the men with her. I just want to drink my tea in peace.

  “I need to understand, Lark,” she says. “I’m your sister, Remedy. And I’m not dead. But it’s not just you and me. There are four of us. At least there were.”

  That stops me cold. Whatever fatigue I felt a moment ago, seems to slip away as her words hit me. “Four of us?”

  She nods. “Harlow and me, and you and... Well, what was her name?”

  I shake my head. “Tennyson. Her name was Tennyson. But I don’t know anything else. I just...”

  I cover my face with my hands, the sobs escaping, and I don’t try to contain them. Vaughn’s arms wrap around me and Sawyer speaks on my behalf.

  “Her mom died today. Was struck by lightning. We think by that fucking eagle out in the desert. It’s a lot to take in already, and then with you guys coming here... I mean, how did you even know?”

  “Gaia told us,” Remedy says.

  That gets our attention. “Gaia?” I ask.

  She nods. “Yeah, I mean, we were nearby because of other fires in the area, but then Gaia showed up in the form of wind, and she told me to come, to find you. That you were close.”

  I sit down on the couch, my fingertips on my temples. “Do you know how insane that sounds?”

  “Has anything in the last few months been normal for you?” she asks, moving toward me. She kneels at my feet, looking into my eyes. They search deep inside me.

  “How do you know that things have been... different?”

  She gives me the saddest smile I’ve ever seen. “A few months ago, I was lost in the woods and met a pack of shifting wolves and they claimed me as their own.”

  She runs a hand through her long, thick hair, shrugging as if she is telling me the most basic story ever. My heart pounds in my chest as I think about my hawks. Only today, I am the one who has claimed them. The one who has decided I am not letting them go.

  Remedy keeps talking. “And then I met a bear who was actually Mother Earth, and then fought a Greek god and found out I’m actually the decedent of Ares. So, I mean, it’s been kinda intense ever since I put on the fucking ring.”

  “Ring?”

  She takes my hand in hers, clasping our hands together. She is wearing an ancient ring too, one with a wolf paw whereas mine has the embossing of a feather on the top. “It’s our rings that started it all. Same for Harlow. The ring is what tells your father where you are.”

  I pull my hand away, noticing that all my hawks have sat down, and so have her wolves. Everyone is watching, listening.

  “My father?”

  She nods. “The eagle. You must have put on the ring and it sent him to you. Let him know where you were.”

  I raise my eyebrows, wanting to scoff, rebuff. Throw her out.

  But another, deeper, more true part of me–the part below the surface knows there is truth in her words.

  Brecken speaks up. “If the ring brings him to her, then why isn’t he here now?”

  Arrow clears his throat. “I think it’s the house. Your mom must have put protective spells around this place the same way she did with you.”

  “Have you lived with her your entire life?” Remedy asks.

  I bite my bottom lip. “Not exactly. Tennyson and I were brought to our mothers–they were sisters too–when we were infants.”

 
Remedy nods. “I’m an orphan too. I was raised in foster homes, and so was Harlow. An orphan, I mean. She was adopted by a couple in Oahu.”

  “Who is Harlow?”

  “Our half-sister. She’s a shifting siren. And she has three sailors at her side. She’s the daughter of Poseidon.”

  I fall back on the couch, overwhelmed with information. Closing my eyes, I try to process it all. Sisters? Greek gods and shifters and magic rings? It’s too much.

  “Are you guys hungry?” one of the wolf-men asks.

  Sawyer moves into action. “Starved. Let’s get some pizza delivered.”

  The tension in the room is put on pause as all the men decide what to order and Remedy sits down on the couch next to me, staring at me as if in awe.

  I mostly trying to regulate my breathing to avoid hyperventilating.

  “The one with the beard is East,” Remedy tells me. “And Callum is the tall one, with the cocky grin, and River, he’s the one with ice blue eyes.”

  Some of the guys leave to get beer, some others move to the kitchen for plates and napkins. They get to work, and I notice Arrow flipping through my mom’s record collection, choosing something to play.

  I listen to Remedy, trying to memorize the names, trying to take it all in. She asks about my hawks and I tell her about them.

  “What’s crazy is Gaia sent them to watch over me,” I say. “Like she knew I needed help. Did she send your wolves?”

  Remedy shakes her head. “No, she was looking for me, though. In the woods in Alaska. But I don’t think she’s well. She said something, when she told me to find you here, about not having the strength to finish what our fathers started. I tried to ask more, but she was gone.”

  “What does she need to finish?”

  Remedy shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s like there is a barrier keeping her from telling us everything.”

  “Ever since this started, since the hawks came a few months ago, my world has been turned on its axis. Spinning out of control,” I tell her. “I keep waiting for answers, some clarity. But it just gets more confusing.”

  “Are you confused about your hawks?”

  I shake my head. “No. That’s one thing I’m absolutely certain about. They are mine. Gaia may be holding a lot back, but she gave me them, and right now, that is everything.”

  “I saw a billboard when we came into town. Your face was on it. They were on it too.”

  I feel the heat rising to my face, still uncomfortable with the reality of starring in a Vegas show. “Yeah, SOAR opens tomorrow. But, after everything today, with my Mom... I don’t know if that will happen.”

  Remedy listens, then exhales. “I’m so sorry about your Mom, but wow, Lark, you must be so talented.”

  “Yeah, except I’m only talented because of some magic. I’m nothing special, otherwise.”

  Remedy raises her eyebrows knowingly. “Hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but you are certainly not nothing. You’re the daughter of Zeus.”

  Her words are confusing on so many levels. I don’t even know where to start. She must notice because she continues to fill in the gaps.

  We have different fathers. Our mother is the connection between us. We’re the same age, at least pretty much. Since we were all orphaned as babies, we don’t know our actual birth dates. For some reason, we have fathers who are out to get us. But we don’t know why.”

  “And we’re half-sisters?” I ask in a whisper.

  “Yeah, but that’s the thing Lark. Gaia said I need to find my other three sisters.”

  “Except one is already dead.”

  “Are you sure?” she asks.

  I sigh. “I think so. I remember Tennyson and I had this ring with us, and then the next thing I remember is her dead in the grass. A storm was overhead. And then a gust of wind–which must have been Gaia, came and took her away.” “

  “Shit, it must have been Zeus, finding you because of the ring acting as a signal to him,” Remedy says with shock.

  We sit in silence processing it all. “And before that, you were raised together?” Remedy asks.

  “Kind of. My mom and her sister each took one of us, so her story goes. After my sister died, my mom and I came here, to the desert, and she put protective spells all around me so no one would find me again.”

  “So, your aunt. Do you know her?”

  I shake my head.

  “We have to find her, Lark,” Remedy says.

  I raise my hands. “No way, I have a show in Vegas and everyone is counting on me.”

  “But you said all you want is answers. We need to see if she knows something. Something that can help us.”

  I shake my head. “No. I don’t want to dig up pieces of my past that my mom left buried.”

  “That’s not how it works,” Remedy says annoyed. “We’re family, Lark. You have to help me.”

  “No, I don’t. I mean, maybe in some weird alternate reality what you’re saying is true, but not in my reality.” I point to her wolfmen who are carrying in twelve-packs and boxes of pizza. “They are your family now. Not me.”

  She shakes her head. “But I’m your flesh and blood. Don’t you want to find our mother?” she asks, pressing her hand to mine. Desperate for me to agree.

  I see how lost she is. She never had a mother, a woman who nursed her when she was sick, who said I love you before she went to sleep each night.

  Remedy needs something different than I do.

  “No,” I tell her again. “I know who my mother was. I don’t need another one.”

  “But I need your help.”

  I squeeze her hand tight, not wanting to hurt her, but also knowing I’m not interested in her offer.

  “I’m glad we met,” I say. “I said I wanted answers, but I think I already have them.”

  Remedy’s eyes widen, they are filled with tears laced with frustration. “After everything I told you, about being a goddess and Mother Earth and everything, you’re just walking away from family?”

  “You’re not my family, Remedy. And I don’t need a new one.”

  28

  Sawyer

  When Lark tells Remedy no, that she doesn’t want to be a part of what she is asking, the guys and I exchange a look of concern.

  Shit.

  “You have to,” she says, standing. “I mean, Harlow and I are counting on you–”

  “I don’t owe you anything,” Lark says. She stands and walks to the kitchen. Remedy follows close behind, clearly pissed. She was expecting Lark to be one thing and she certainly isn’t.

  Though she be but small, she is fierce.

  “Just give me a sec, okay?” Lark says, raising her hands to let Remedy know she means it.

  Here is the thing about Lark that no one else in this room can really grasp: she had the love of a mother for her entire life.

  After spending a few minutes talking to the wolf shifters, it’s obvious they never did. Neither did Remedy, nor we hawks. Lark is singular in that.

  “Can I get you some pizza, dove?” I ask her. She’s facing the kitchen sink, looking out the window. I run a hand over her back, wanting to ease the pain.

  “Sure, I should eat. But first, can you make the wolves leave?”

  I wrap my arms around her waist, kissing her neck, inhaling her sweet scent and wrapping myself up in her hidden strength. “I love you, Lark,” I tell her. “Maybe the timing is off. God knows you’ve had a hell of a day. But I do.”

  She turns around, facing me. My cock is fucking hard and I know she feels it.

  “I love you too, Sawyer.”

  Her eyes are cast down, and I lift her chin, needing to see her. “You do?” I ask.

  She nods. “Yes, I do. Now, will you please tell those wild animals to leave so my hawks can put me to bed?”

  My lips turn up. “Your hawks?”

  She licks her lips. “Yes. My hawks.”

  Not much later, the wolves are gone. They are seriously pissed, but Lark was done with them for tod
ay. Everything they said may have been true, but Lark can’t deal with that tonight.

  Not after the day she has had.

  Arrow puts on another record, this one an old Etta James record. The lyrics, At last, my love has come along. My lonely days are over. And life is like a song, float through the house.

  North locks the door. Vaughn lights candles and Brecken turns off the lights. Someone finds old quilts in a closet and moves the coffee table, spreading them out on the floor.

  Pillows pile around the blankets, soft and thick, and we create the perfect place for Lark to rest. Here there is room for us all.

  “Come,” I whisper, taking her hand and leading her to the living room.

  When she sees what we’ve made for her, she blinks back tears. “You made a nest,” she whispers.

  “Yes,” I say, “a nest for our little bird.”

  “Not just for me,” she says. “For all of us.” Then she lifts the hem of her shirt and pulls it off. She slips off her pants, leaving on only her bra and panties. “You won’t let me sleep here all alone, will you?”

  I raise an eyebrow, knowing the guys and I are done telling Lark what she can and can’t do. This is her home, her night, her life.

  If she wants us naked in her nest, then we will oblige.

  I strip quickly, to nothing but my boxers. Stepping toward her, she raises a finger, shakes her head.

  “No entrance to this love nest unless you’re naked.”

  “Those are the rules?” I ask, a grin spreading across my face.

  “I’ve always lived by rules,” she says. “Without my mother here to make them up for me, I guess I’ll have to make up some of my own.”

  “And us being naked is one of them?” North asks with a smile.

  She shrugs, then reaches behind herself and unhooks her bra. “Yep. That’s rule number one.”

  “I feel like you’re making up the rules on the spot,” Brecken jokes, taking off his own clothes.

  Lark tosses her bra to the floor, so she and her perfect breasts are exposed in all their glory.