Helios Oracles

Chapter 7: Kayden

I'm so absorbed in my thoughts, I miss the fact I have a visitor at my door, though when I look up I'm hardly surprised to find Kayden standing there yet again. He looks impatient before he spots me, charming smile smothering his true irritation as I slow my steps with a sigh heaved in his direction.

He's the last person I want to deal with right now. Why can't he just take the hint and leave me alone?

I'm accustomed to Kayden's typical attitude, the way he tries to touch me in seemingly innocent ways, how his hands tend to roam if he thinks he can get away with it. But when I stop at my door to unlock it, I'm not prepared for this more aggressive young sorcerer who maneuvers his body around me, blocking me between the heavy wood and the corridor. Both of his hands settle, palm down, on the stone frame of my doorway, head bowing over mine as he invades my space with his body and his power.

I'm so shocked by this sudden assault, I simply gape up at him as he grins, eyes sparking with something I can only call hunger.

"You and I need to have a serious conversation." There's a sultry tone to his voice I'm sure most of the other young Oracles would swoon over, but the way he speaks to me, how his sorcery slips over me like an oil slick, makes me want to throw up. "About our future together."

My anger recoils inside me before surging forward as my hands rise unbidden and slam against his chest. He steps back a pace, nostrils flaring, showing his own temper, as I clench my fingers around their trembling and face him down. Flames rise at my feet, dancing over the stones in answer to his unwelcome attention.

"I've been nice to you," I say, a little shocked at my bluntness, more used to taking the soft approach. But it seems he only understands forthrightness and anger. "I've been patient with you." The fire beneath me rises in time with my words, the scent of burning fabric reaching me. I let out a whisper of sorcery to devour the flames trying to set my robe on fire, while letting the surface ones live as a warning to Kayden. He looks down at them with a hint of nerves before meeting my eyes again. "But I'm done. It's time you understand, without question, we have no future." I snap my fingers in front of his eyes, show him the two of us, older, separate. No, it's not a true vision, just an illusion I've created, but hopefully it will do the trick. "You'd be best served finding an Oracle willing to pair with you," I say, allowing the fire to die though it takes some effort to hide my trembling from the rise in adrenaline. I hate confrontations. "This Oracle isn't interested."

Kayden's face sinks into bitterness and anger and I realize in the long, frightening moment he remains silent, staring, I've only made things worse by rejecting him.

A bulky figure crashes into Kayden just as the young sorcerer is about to strike out at me. Startled, I press my back against my door, fingers fumbling for flame to unlock it, while Kayden struggles a few feet away to regain his balance. I stare at Rupe, who twirls away from his attack with a big, dopey grin on his face. He tips a non-existent hat to me while Kayden roars in fury.

Rupe's eyes widen and he turns, scuttling off with Kayden on his heels as I watch, panting softly through my parted lips. Rupe is known for his crazy antics, his taunting of the young sorcerers and general madness. But it seems highly coincidental he would interrupt at exactly the moment I needed rescuing most. I shudder as I turn and push my door open, slipping inside. The wood is cool against my forehead as I lean against it, closing my eyes. I've always treated the insane half-wolf sorcerer with respect, if not kindness and pity. Perhaps, somewhere deep in his cracked mind, he acted from his lost humanity.

Or, more likely, he saw an opportunity to cause havoc and took it. I shake my head, turning toward my bedroom, hands pulling at my robe. I know better than to assign compassion to others. I've been too often disappointed.

A knock summons me back before I'm able to shed my robe. I hesitate as I approach, but only a moment. The magic on the other side is as bright and hot as mine and I recognize the touch of my aunt even before I turn the handle and open the door.

She grins at me, blonde hair tousled, eyes half-lidded, beautiful face tired and a little worse for wear in the makeup department. I reach for her, pull her inside, Aunt Ash embracing me in a wash of old alcohol and what smells like last night's w**d. No matter she's come to see me from another of her all-night benders, I'm happy to see her.

Her strong hands push me away, saucy grin on her face. "Zo," she says. "You look like crap."

I slap her arm with a laugh, pointing to her eyes where raccoon circles descend from where she intended her makeup to be. "One to talk, auntie."

Ash shrugs, stretches, her tight leather pants creaking softly, matching black jacket barely covering her exposed midriff. She saunters into my space, helping herself to a handful of grapes I keep near my reading chair, settling her long-legged form down with her foot resting on her knee, more masculine but alluringly feminine. There's a charisma about Aunt Ash I know normal men can't resist. I've witnessed her take over an entire bar with a single, smoldering look around a crowded room. She's the only one in our family who doesn't share the typical dark Greek hair and skin tone, her eyes as bright blue as any I've seen.

"Kayden giving you s**t again?" She tosses a grape at me, another passing her full lips. I sink into the couch across from her and shrug, trying to forget our last confrontation.

"I can handle it." I know I can. I just hate to resort to hurting him to make him back off. But if it comes down to a battle, I will do what I have to, no matter my dislike for fighting.

Aunt Ash drops her foot to the floor and leans forward. "Just kick his a*s and be done with it." Her long-fingered hands fold in front of her and I wonder then as I watch her, why she's never chosen a mate of her own. Or why Sibyl hasn't forced her to take one. Then again, as my aunt winks at me, I acknowledge no one would ever be able to make Ash do anything.

Maybe I should take notes.

"Missed you at service this morning." I shouldn't tease her, maybe, but she winks at me with a drawn out grin.

"Been a little busy." She hunts around in the zippered pocket over her right breast, fishing with long fingers.

"Can I ask you a question?" I sink back into the cushions, thinking of the twins and their cryptic conversation. I've held my doubts in for so long, it feels weird to consider sharing my worries, but if anyone will hear me out and not freak on me, it's Ash.

She shrugs, sitting back herself, narrowed eyes watching me carefully. She twirls the slim cigar she liberated from her jacket and lights it with a flick of her thumb, her gold-etched lighter slightly smaller than my bulky silver box. Smoke wafts up from the glowing tip as she inhales and breathes out a stream, making three "O" shapes with careful snaps of her jaw. "Can't say I'll have answers," she says, the thick scent of flavored tobacco filling the room. "But I'll do my best."

I nod, pulling my legs up under me, knowing I'm wrinkling my robe, but not really caring at the moment. "Have you ever wondered if your interpretation of a vision was the right one?"

Ash takes another drag, staring at me through the rising smoke. She seems relaxed, but I notice her free hand twitch, fingers tightening on the arm of the chair, and I know I've done the right thing bringing this to her at last.

If Bellanca and Thanos are right, if I have a choice to make, coming soon, I need all the support I can get and Ash has always been there for me.

"Kid," she says, "if I've learned anything in this life of mine," she leans forward and taps ashes into the fireplace before creaking her leather-clad way back to reclining, "it's that there is more than black and white. There are always shades of every other color."

I nod slowly, fingers toying with the satin edging of my robe, feeling a flush of color rise to my cheeks. "So our interpretations are suspect?"

"Always." She sighs out a plume of smoke. "Thing is, there are times we can tell, you get me? Times when the visions are simple, straightforward." She taps her free fingers on the arm of the chair. "Like, seeing someone step on an icy staircase and slip and fall. Right?"

"Right. So we would find that person and stop them from going down the stairs."

She grins at me through the mist of white hovering around her. "Except," she says, "maybe that person was supposed to fall."

I bite the inside of my cheek. "That's always been the fear," I say. "The one Grandmother won't talk about."

Ash snorts smoke out her nose, tapping her cigar into the coals again. "Sibyl doesn't like thinking outside the right and wrong trap she's got everyone tied up in." My aunt's voice is harsh, though from the cigar or from anger, it's hard to tell. "I'm done playing the Oracle game, Zo. Done playing Goddess. That what you're thinking?"

I look up at her, startled. "We can do that?" It never crossed my mind. My entire life I've been lectured on duty to the family, to the gift given me by Gaia. Could I give up being an Oracle?

Ash doesn't answer for a long moment, eyes lost in the distance. When she finally does speak, it's with a wistful sadness that rouses my guilt. "I don't know," she says. "I'm doing my damnedest." Her gaze finds mine again. "You've been having doubts." Not a question. "For a while now." Again, not a question. She sighs. "I should have talked to you before this, but I wanted you to come to me."

"You knew?" If I'm that obvious, does my grandmother and her sorcerer mate also see through me?

Ash's grin is fierce. "I know you," she says. "You've been off for quite some time. But I couldn't be sure and didn't want to stir the pot if you were doing okay."

Tears rise to my eyes, burning them almost like flames, my throat tight suddenly, chest constricting. I've needed this, to have this talk with her. Yes, the conversation I had with the twins was also necessary, but this is my aunt, my mother's youngest sister and the closest thing I've had to contact with my lost parent.

Ash rises from the chair, comes to my side, tossing her cigar in the coals before hugging me to her. I embrace her back, welcoming her steady comfort.

"Okay, kid," she says. "I may not be Leyea and Gaia knows your mother would have been a million times better at this than me. But I'm all you've got." Her own eyes are bright as she leans back and I wonder just how much of her real self Ash hides behind her powerful front. "So, tell all and not a word leaves this room."

I do so, sharing everything, including my talk with Bellanca and Thanos. She frowns at the mention of the twins, but doesn't interrupt, hawk-like focus on me while I stammer my way through two years of doubt. She prods me with one finger when I mention Piers, but her eyebrows shoot up when I tell her about Charlotte and her defense of the woman, Syd.

When I'm done, Ash crosses her arms over her chest, face unreadable.

"Any ideas why your grandmother would be lying to you?" Is that bitterness in her voice? Ash knows far more than she's saying just yet.

I fight a burst of hatred for the traitor in me even as I nod firmly. "Not entirely. But I mean to find out the truth, with or without help." I've never challenged my aunt before, but I hope she takes the hint, slightly fearful despite my determination she might try to stop me.

I'm not wrong in that regard. "Listen to me." Ash grasps my arm in one strong hand, face inches from mine, intensity so powerful I catch my breath. She's hurting me she's holding me so tight, but I don't try to pull away, lost in her blue eyes. "You don't breathe a word of this to anyone else, you hear me, Zo?"

I nod again, quickly this time, fearfully. When I speak, my voice whispers out of me. "Something's wrong here, isn't there?"

Ash lets me go, so quickly I rock back from her. She doesn't answer, just stands and turns to the door. I want to call her back, to beg her to tell me what's going on, but I hold my tongue. Just as well. She pauses with her hand on the knob and looks back at me.

"You've been in the fire too much," she says, voice gruff. "You may be the strongest Oracle born to this family since ancient times, but even you can only spend so much energy in the flames." She swallows, hesitates. "There are legends about Oracles who go too far into the fire, Zoe. Legends I'd rather you didn't prove right."

Even as I open my mouth to agree, I know I'm lying. "I'll be careful." The fire in me answers with a pleading whisper I have to bite my lip to ignore.

Ash, grim and dark-faced, seems to know I'm trying to deceive the both of us. But instead of arguing, she leaves me there, closing the door behind her.

I surge to my feet, rubbing my hands together as the skin begins to tingle. Just the mention of the flames seems to be enough to wake them, now. I need a distraction if I'm to follow my aunt's order. A quick change from my rumpled robe into jeans and a sweater and I'm slipping out of my room and down the hall to the travel hub, fingers locked around my lighter in my front pocket.

A few hours escape in the city should do the trick. Though I know the moment Piers's face passes in my mind's eye, I'm lying about my motives for this, too.

***