Coercion
Page 17
The gym door opened, and Meredith stood there, her eyes glittering excitedly.
“Guys,” she breathed, “we got a response.”
Beth shot up and was out the door, but I lingered behind. Trey did also, as if sensing I had something to say.
“I felt something,” I said. “That moment when I blocked you. I felt it on the battlefield also.”
The triumph sparked in his eyes quickly before vanishing again. “The goddess in you is coming out.”
“So I’m remembering?”
“Some part of you is.”
“Jayne!” Meredith screeched from down the hall.
Trey clapped a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s see what Meredith’s got for us before she blows a gasket.”
*~*
I studied the text message for the twentieth time, even though we had already analyzed it to the full of our abilities. “So you’re sure he’s on our side?”
Melissa waved her hand impatiently, half a sandwich in her other hand. She and Amy had hiked out to the local grocery store and purchased a giant sub sandwich for all of us. Spirits were definitely higher now that we had received a positive response.
“That’s why he said he’s gathering reinforcements,” she said.
I read the text one more time.
Message received. Already aware of the problem. Gathering reinforcements. Await instructions.
“It kind of sounds like he’s taking over,” I said.
“He’s not,” Meredith said, consulting her spreadsheet. “Ursins’ the god of livestock and gives the power of observation and understanding. He’s gonna be all about reconciliation.”
“And reinforcements?” I said, trying to kill my doubts. “He’s aware of the problem?”
“They don’t live in separate universes, Jayne,” Trey said. “These guys know each other.”
“They’ve probably been watching the dilemma unfold with Samantha,” Amy said.
I chewed on my fingernails, still unconvinced. “Then why did we have to contact him? Why couldn’t he just find us?”
Trey made a noise of impatience. “Find us how? Who are you to them? Just one of Laima’s many minions with a tiny piece of Dekla’s soul.”
Ouch. “I’m sure they could’ve found a way,” I said stubbornly.
And suddenly, I was there again. There was no doubt in my mind that this was a battlefield as I walked barefoot through the ash-covered grass, a long robe or some kind of cloth twisting around my ankles. I was crying, gut-wrenching sobs as I stepped over the bodies of the fallen. Mortals. Kaukas and demigods who had aligned with us. Even godly brothers and sisters whose allegiance had cost them their immortality.
I lifted my eyes to Laima. Tears streaked down her face as well. Behind her, my sister Karta stepped forward. Her expression was grim, face stoic.
“It’s time,” Laima said.
I nodded, heart twisting within me. I’d be giving up so much. “And Jumis?” I managed to choke out. “What will become of us?”
Laima shook her head. “I’m sorry. The destiny of your love is not as important as the destiny of the human race.” She looked at Karta, the dark-haired one of the three of us. “Are you ready?” she asked.
Karta inhaled a deep breath and let it out slowly, and she nodded.
“Why?” The question left my lips before I could think twice. “Why are you not giving up as much as we are?”
The question hurt Laima, I could see that. But as quickly as the pain flashed through her eyes, it was gone. “Somebody has to remember everything. Somebody has to be the guide.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The vision faded, and I was back in the hotel room. The fear and desperation still enveloped me. These weren’t my feelings, but Dekla’s. And yet, they were mine. For the first time, it really dawned on me what that meant. Her feelings, her emotions, her memories, I carried these pieces with me.
“This has happened before,” I said. “And last time we—” I broke off. What had we done? Something desperate. Had it worked? Was that how we won?
“Keep going,” Trey urged, his fingers twitching like he wanted to pull the memories out of my head.
I shut my eyes and tried to see more. I willed myself to remember that moment. What were we deciding? But nothing came. I opened my eyes and shook my head in frustration. “I’m going to receive these memories by piecemeal.”
“It’s all right.” Trey gripped my shoulder. “It’s coming along.”
Amy’s gaze never left my face. “You won’t remember it all,” she said. “Only what is relevant to you. Sometimes I still remember memories I didn’t know I had.”
“And hers are different than yours will be,” Melissa said. “Since your line of descent is different.”
Melissa’s phone chimed, and we all turned to look at her as she read the text. She looked up and smiled. “Just my boss. Says tomorrow’s meeting has been rescheduled for Friday.” She lifted her eyebrows. “Which is good, because I don’t have tomorrow off. I really need to get these battles over with so I can get on with my normal life.”
She said it so calm and matter-of-factly. I stared at her, wondering how she balanced mortal life with these crazy responsibilities.
Of course, life wasn’t usually this busy. Usually my jobs as a goddess were a sidenote, background music to the rest of my life.
Right now the background music was trying to take center stage.
Melissa’s phone chimed again, and she texted back-and-forth with her boss for a bit. Trey turned on the television, scanning for the news, but I didn’t want to hear it. I couldn’t stand to think of how many more people were dying.
Melissa stood up, shoving her phone into her purse. “That last text was from Ursins. He said he’s got his regiment assembled.” She actually looked excited. “He knows where Samantha is and wants us to challenge her.”
“Do you have a location, Melissa?” Amy asked.
She waved her purse. “Follow me.”
Meredith sat still as the rest of us made for the door, and I paused.
“Are you okay?” I asked her.
“Yes.” But her face was stiff and pale, and she hadn’t moved from the bed.
“How’s the leg?” Trey asked her, placing a hand behind her shoulder blades and urging her to her feet.
“The leg’s fine.” She arched her shoulders just enough that he dropped his hand.
“What is it?” I asked.
Meredith bit down on her lower lip, tears filling her eyes. “What if that vision I saw is going to come true? What if all those humans under Samantha’s control are going to die?”
I exchanged a look with Trey, and then slipped my arm around her waist. “It’s not going to, okay? We don’t know where that vision came from. But even if you were seeing the future, remember it can be changed. We influence people’s lives so that something different happens. You don’t have to be a goddess to do that.”
“As long as they have two paths open,” she said. “What if they don’t? What if they only have one choice?”
“There’s always another choice,” Trey said.
Was there? Samantha had taken away their free will.
We followed Amy and Melissa in Trey’s truck for nearly an hour.
“Where are we going?” I asked after forty minutes.
“Maybe Samantha is taking her show out of town,” Meredith said. “So she can conquer the next city and build onto her army.”
“A thought, but I don’t think so,” Trey said.
“Why?” Meredith fired off at him, her voice testy. “Just because you want to disagree with me?”
“No,” he said. “Because Samantha wants to own you guys. So I don’t think she’ll move on just yet.”
“She knows we’ll follow her.”
“Guys,” I said. “You both raise excellent points. The fact is we don’t know what she’s doing because none of us are mind readers. That would be an excellent power, if any of you should develop
the ability. Let’s just follow Amy and Melissa and see where they’re taking us.”
“You’re the one who asked,” Meredith grumbled, crossing her arms over her chest and falling silent.
Amy finally pulled off the interstate and entered a suburban area. We drove through the blocks of houses for several minutes before her car pulled alongside the curb and stopped.
Trey stopped also, and I climbed out of the truck, gawking at the small single-story house with beige siding that looked like it hadn’t been washed since it was put on sixty years earlier. Identical houses dated the block all the way to the end of the street. Melissa and Amy walked back to join us.
“What are we doing here?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Amy said, voice soft. “This is where Ursins said to go.”
“Why?” I furrowed my brow. “Do some of the kaukas live here?” After our battle in the parking garage a few weeks ago, Laima had taken us to one of the sprite’s houses in the country. He lived just like a human, so it wasn’t an unreasonable assumption.
“Must be something like that,” Meredith said. “Certainly we wouldn’t be fighting the battle here.”
“No, of course not,” I said, even as I worried we were.
“And why not?” A man strode down the sidewalk toward us, his arms muscular beneath the sleeveless tunic he wore that concealed nothing. Weapons were strapped to his back and along a belt that cinched his tunic. Between that and his shoulder-length blond hair, he looked like Thor’s long-lost brother.
My jaw dropped. I nudged Meredith anxiously and hissed, “That’s not Thor, is it?”
She rolled her eyes and elbowed me to give herself some more space. “No, Jayne. Wrong pantheon.”
Of course. This must be the guy we’d been talking to. I frowned at him as his words caught up to me. “What do you mean, why not? We can’t have a battle in a suburb around all these houses. People will get hurt.”
He met my gaze with steely blue eyes. “Do you hear yourself? People will get hurt. People are already getting hurt. The time will come when the mortals must take a stand and join one side or the other.” He paused as if for dramatic effect. “But that day is not today. Unless the mortals choose it to be.”
The bodies. Mortals cut down before their expected ends. Destinies never realized.
“The humans will die if we involve them,” I said.
He strolled past me as if I hadn’t spoken. He rapped on the door of the aging house in front of us. A short man with crinkly eyes and wavy brown hair opened it. His nose was slightly too large for his face, and if he’d had pointed ears, his elfish appearance would have been complete. I recognized him immediately as a sprite, one of the kaukas.
“Gather your people,” the Thor-guy said. Ursins, I reminded myself.
The little man nodded and disappeared back into the house.
More cars pulled to the curb around us, and women and a few men piled out of them, some young, some older. I recognized a few familiar faces from our last battle. The others I didn’t know, but I deduced from their resolute, grim faces that they were part of our army.
Doors to houses up and down the street popped open, and kaukas streamed out of them. They came from around the block, filling up the sidewalks as they approached. At least three hundred, like too many clowns popping out of a circus car. They each brandished stoic, determined expressions.
Ursins turned to me. “Now is the time to get rebel girl here,” he said.
My stomach tightened. “Here? I thought we weren’t going to involve the mortals just yet.” Since when did I refer to humans as mortals? I had a heightened sense that they were different than me. Weaker, yes, but that didn’t make them inferior. If anything, it made me their protector. I glanced at the remaining houses around me, feeling the desire to check on the people inside, going about their business with no idea the Apocalypse was about to take place in their backyard. I wanted to look at their lines, make sure their lives still had a proper ending.
“Not here.” He pointed over my head. “There.”
I turned to see what he meant and spotted a wide-open field between two subdivisions. A sign out front listed, “For sale — 140 acres — sub-dividable.”
I shook my head. “We’re too close to the people.”
He met my eyes, and a flash of recognition jolted me.
“Like I said,” he said, “the mortals will have to pick a side soon.”
Déjà vu. He and I had had this argument before. Rather, he and Dekla. He was close to her, like a little brother. I glowered at him.
“Where is your ragana?” he asked me with a familiarity that both disturbed me and put me at ease. We knew each other. Our thoughts and our conversations moved in a familiar pattern, and my ire with him faded away.
“Ragana is here.” I gestured to Meredith.
“What is her element?”
If someone had asked me that question ten minutes earlier, I would’ve just given them a blank stare. But I didn’t hesitate when I responded, “Wind.”
Meredith gave a start and shot me a look of surprise. “What?”
I turned to her, explaining something I hadn’t even known I’d known. “Every ragana has mastery over a natural element. She can manipulate the other elements with help, but it’s a learned art. Only one will come easily to you, and yours is wind.”
“How do you know all of this?” she breathed, staring at me as if she didn’t know me.
Maybe she didn’t.
“She’s remembering.” Trey slapped his hands together and grinned like this was all his doing. “See? You don’t even realize when you’re remembering. The memories just become a part of you.”
“Yes,” I whispered, feeling a surge of triumph. I could do this. I was going to succeed without anyone’s interference. Without having to marry someone.
“So the whole time I was trying to make lightning bolts and fireballs, that’s just not something I can do?”
I shot Meredith a smile and took her arm. With my finger, I traced the symbol for fire. “Draw that symbol and try your fireball.”
Understanding lit her features. “Like when I healed my ankle with the symbol.” She retraced the rune, took a deep breath, and whispered a few words. From the middle of her palm, a tiny finger of flame erupted.
“Oh!” She closed her hand, immediately extinguishing the flame, but not before I saw her excited face.
“Can you get us a funnel cloud right above that field there?” Ursins asked, interrupting our excitement over the discovery.
I shot him an annoyed look, much like I would my younger brother—if I had a younger brother. “Give us a second.” I turned to Meredith. “Ready for this?”
“Why am I doing this? Calling a tornado down on these people?”
“We’re not just telling Jods we’re here. We’re issuing a challenge. You fought and lost your last battle. This one we will win,” Ursins said. He tapped his wrist and murmured to his arm. I tilted my head. Was he performing an incantation?
“Jods?” Meredith asked. “Not Samantha?”
I ground my teeth together. “Samantha is only a tool. This is Velns’ doing. He’s the mastermind behind Jods and Samantha. It’s always been Velns versus Perkons. We have fought this war many times, and it’s time to quiet his demons for a few more centuries.”
“Who are you?” Meredith said, staring at me.
“No kidding,” Beth said. “Are you still in there, Jayne?”
She sounded genuinely worried, so I flashed a smile. “I’m still here. I’m just understanding more and more of myself.”
“Of Dekla,” Ursins said.
“Am I going to start to remember a bunch of stuff too?” Beth asked.
“Yes,” Trey said. “And it will probably happen faster than with Jayne because you have two pieces of the soul.”
Ursins cleared his throat. “Funnel cloud?”
“Meredith?”
“I’m on it. I can do this?”
She whispered to herself and began to swirl her hands around each other. Beth elbowed me.
“Jayne, look.”
I turned my face toward the field and wasn’t surprised to see a black cloud forming into a funnel shape, just like the one Velu Mate had used to bring the demons from the underworld during the last battle. “This isn’t another portal to the underworld, is it?” I asked, getting nervous.
Ursins shook his head. “Not to the underworld. Ragana can open the gates to hell, but not this way.”
His answer begged another question, but before I could ask, he cleared his throat and looked out over the kaukas and people who had gathered.
“On me,” Ursins shouted, and he strode off with absolute arrogance and authority, presuming we would follow him.
Which we did, naturally.
But first we had to cross the street. We waited at the stoplight for our green signal, and we received more than a few stares from cars driving by. I imagined our Thor look-alike with his three hundred midgets garnered more attention than the rest of our motley crew.
“Is this our army?” one of the other women asked Ursins, and I heard the same disdain in her voice that I felt. “I thought you were gathering forces. This is all you could get?”
He turned and gave her a condescending look. “I only had a few hours. My brothers will come. I haven’t called the mortals yet. That’s your job.”
Her eyes rounded. “My job?”
“Aren’t you a goddess of fate? Plant the desire to fight for us in their minds and bring them here.”
I could read the thoughts flitting behind her eyes because they were the same as mine. Change the mortals’ destinies. Bring them to the battle, where most would die. For us.
Was I capable of that?
The light changed, and we crossed the street. As if sensing my eyes on her, she turned and faced me. Her gaze swept over me from head to foot. “So you’re Jayne.”