Chapter 21

"My daughter." I gaped at Arina as the disjointed visions sizzled out.

"Yes," she told me.

"But these are supposed to be memories, not visions from the future."

"I don't quite understand it myself," Arina admitted. "This is some very powerful, very unusual magic."

"How are the visions from the past linked to those of my daughter from the future?"

Arina shook her head. "I don't know. But we can find out."

"How?"

"The weapons of heaven and hell are channeling these visions, magnifying them, so you see them. Like a lens focusing the memories onto you," she explained.

"Someone is sending me the visions from the Vault, a secret place accessible from the Lost City."

"Who is sending them to you?"

I shrugged. "I don't know."

"Maybe we can figure that out too," Arina said. "I can help guide you through the visions stored in the Vault, Leda. But you must know that this journey won't be without risk."

"I have to do it," I said, determined. "The fate of my daughter might be at stake."

"And I'm coming with you," Nero added.

"I believe I can handle guiding the two of you through the visions," Arina said. "You will both need to stay focused—and close to me. It will be a narrow trail to follow these visions."

Nero took my hand. "We understand."

"One more thing," said Arina. "In order to make sense of the various visions, I will attempt to shape the narrative chronologically. I will not, however, be able to assist you in battle. I can only guide your path."

"Do you anticipate there will be fighting? It's all just visions. None of this is real. Right?" I asked her.

"Just because it's not happening now, that doesn't mean it's not real," she told me.

"Is this like time travel when you have to be careful not to ruin history or something?" I remembered once reading a novel like that.

"No. It's not time travel," Arina said. "What you do won't change the past, even as you interact with it. But just because you can't damage the past, that doesn't mean the past can't damage you. Be prepared."

"We are prepared." Nero's halo hummed with complete confidence; he was doing it to calm me…and it was working.

"Ok, then here goes nothing," Arina said.

A warmth rushed over my body, like a gentle ocean wave. I felt my consciousness melt into the Vault's memory stream.

* * *

The pale-haired angelhad lived many millennia ago on Earth. I didn't quite understand it, but I had a vague sense that she and her kind had been created by the Immortals. They were angels in all the tangible ways—and yet not really angels in some intangible ways.

I didn't dwell on this knowledge that had dripped into my mind, a mind that was feeling a bit foggy at the moment. My eyelids were heavy, weighed down by all of this new information.

"Careful, Pandora." Nero's hands flashed out, catching me as I swayed.

"Thanks." I offered him a smile. "This is all a lot to take in."

We stood in the Lost City, right in front of a small temple.

Then I felt a jolt, and we were suddenly inside the temple, as though we'd been teleported there.

Arina was there too, beside us. "Sorry for shaking you up. This magic trail we're following is very weird. I'm still getting the hang of it."

A couple stood at the altar, their hands joined. One was the pale-haired angel. The other was a man who looked a lot like Damiel.

"I think we're looking at your ancestors, Nero," I said. "Damiel's ancestors."

"Damiel does have Immortal blood," Nero replied. "Is this where it comes from?"

Some kind of priest was there. He was performing a wedding ceremony.

"It's a secret wedding. The pale-haired angel and the man had to hide their love because…" I shook my head, but I couldn't shake loose the answers that I sought. "I don't know why. The reason is there, but it's just out of my grasp."

"There is a lot of information stored in these visions," Arina said. "Don't get caught up in the details, Leda. They're not important. Focus on the larger narrative, on how this all connects together."

It was hard to ignore the little things because I was curious, and I could tell Nero was too. This was a rare glimpse into his past.

"You didn't see this when you read Nero's magic?" I asked Arina.

"Not these people in particular. When I read someone's magical history, I just intuitively focus on what's really important to understand them."

"This isn't important to understanding Nero?" I asked. "His ancestors lived thousands of years ago on Earth. That's pretty damn interesting."

"Interesting, yes. But is it important?" she posed.

"If it weren't important, why would someone have put these visions into the Vault for me? Why would someone be sending me any of them?"

"Without knowing who is sending you the visions, I cannot really speculate, Leda," replied Arina. "But if they are benevolent, I suppose they might have sent you these visions because they are important to your future survival, or maybe important to defeating a foe."

"A foe like the Guardians?"

"For instance. In any case, you should not ignore the possibility that the person who's sending you these visions is not benevolent at all, but is rather trying to manipulate you or even do you harm."

"We shall go through these visions and try to ascertain the senders' intentions." Nero was sensible like that.

"Ok," I agreed because it really was the best plan. "Let's see what they show us."

The priest had finished the ceremony. The love birds sealed their union with a kiss.

The temple's doors burst open. Legion soldiers stormed inside. No, not Legion soldiers, I reminded myself. The soldiers were dressed similarly, but they were not from the Legion. Their uniforms did not bear the Legion's rank symbols. And this had happened, after all, thousands of years before the Legion had even existed.

The soldiers didn't wait. They fired off their magic. When the smoke cleared, the priest was dead—and the pale-haired angel and her new husband had vanished.

* * *

They must have escaped—orat least the pale-haired angel had—because the next thing I saw was her walking across the scorched, blackened plains. It looked a lot like the Black Plains. And yet not quite like the Black Plains.

There seemed to be a lot of repeating, quite similar things in this visions—parallels between then and now. Some iteration of the Lost City. A place like the Black Plains. Angel-like beings. Legion-like soldiers.

The angel's wings drooped, low and heavy. She appeared to be injured. A trail of blood followed her as she entered the Lost City, a city now ravaged by war and destruction.

She stood in front of a wall, looking at the wings symbol carved into the stone surface. The gateway. I'd been there too, two years ago in the Lost City. She set her hands on the wings symbol to open the gateway, then she passed right through the wall.

A gold-framed door was before her now. Crouching over, she leaned against the door. A sparkling, magical tear fell from her eye. It splashed against the panel of symbols at the door, lighting up the letters of an old, now-forgotten language. An Immortal language.

The door opened. Inside, the angel found the weapons of heaven and hell. She put on the armor first; the silver pieces adjusted to fit her body perfectly. Then she grabbed the shield, the sword, and the gun. Thus equipped, she hurried outside to face the enemies who besieged her city.

I looked across the broken city, trying to see who those enemies were, but they were all just a big blur.

"Surely, that is important," I said to Arina.

She only frowned.

"Are you hiding things from us?" I asked her.

"It is not I who hides things, Leda. Someone else is hiding things from us. We've being shown only what they want us to see."

"The question is, who is they?" I wondered.

"Indeed." Nero's voice was dangerous. He didn't like when things were withheld from him. He didn't like being manipulated.

I looked across the battlefield. The pale-haired angel clashed with the mystery soldiers. Their movements blurred, and the memory blurred into another.

* * *

I sawmyself in the Lost City. I was inside the small room that had once held the weapons of heaven and hell. An angel stood behind me.

"Osiris," I said.

"It's an old magic," said Osiris—or, rather, Damiel when he'd pretended to be Osiris. "A magic to make you go through the motions of your memory, like you're in it."

Right, Damiel had performed a spell to send me into a trance. The memories had been so strong for me there and then in the Lost City that it must have been an easy spell for him to pull off.

I looked down at the big ‘x' that my past self had scratched in the sand while inside Damiel's trance. It was accompanied by symbols—letters—from the same language the pale-haired angel had seen on the gold-framed door.

I blinked, and I could see right through Damiel's disguise, right through the Osiris illusion he'd wrapped himself in.

"How do you even know that she's the one?" one of the soldiers in the room asked. A soldier who'd been hired by that crazy Pilgrim Valiant.

"The spell doesn't lie. It showed us the one the Guardians entrusted these memories to," said Damiel-Osiris.

"What spell?" my past self asked.

"The one I cast the first time you came to the Lost City, the one that unlocked the treasure trove of memories inside that precious little head of yours."

Another jolt shook me, sending me tumbling into the next memory.

* * *

I collided with Nero.

He caught me, folding his arms around me like a shield. "Are you all right?"

"Fine," I assured him with a smile, then looked at Arina.

"Like I said, this beast is hard to drive," she said. "I've tried to sort the memories in order, but it's a bit like trying to collect water with your hands. Things keep slipping by. This memory came before the last one we watched."

"I can see that," I replied.

I saw Damiel in hiding, spying on two of the Guardians' angels, the pair who'd captured Cadence. Their names were Taron and Giselle. He wore a suit of bright, silver armor. She wore a red, knee-length summer dress and a pair of brown boots. Both had long, beautiful hair that shimmered with an enchanting, eerie kind of magic.

"The Pilgrim Valiant has learned the weapons of heaven and hell are in the Lost City," Taron said. "He plans to use them to take his revenge on the gods and demons."

"Valiant will fail," Giselle said shrilly. "He doesn't have enough magic—or the right kind of magic—to wield those immortal artifacts."

"No, he does not," agreed Taron. "But the others think we can still use him."

The ‘others' must have been the Guardians. Taron and Giselle seemed to be more a part of the Guardians than they were merely two more of the people the Guardians had ‘rescued'.

"Valiant is trying to hire mercenaries to assist him," Taron said. "We are to ensure he finds the right mercenaries. To open the vault where the weapons of heaven and hell are kept, he will need someone who can perform a memory recall spell."

"An angel could perform that spell. And the rogue angel Osiris Wardbreaker is in the area right now."

Taron nodded. "Wardbreaker will do—if he can be enticed away from his favorite hobby of massacring villages. I will make sure Valiant hires Wardbreaker."

"I have been busy off-world this past month, Taron, so you're going to have to get me all caught up. Why do we really want Wardbreaker to perform the memory recall spell—and on whom?"

"On Leda Pierce." Taron said my name like he was whispering over my grave.

"The Pandora?"

"Yes. She has the perfect balance of light and dark magic to be the vessel for those visions stored in the Vault of the Lost City."

Comprehension dawned on her face. "Including the visions of our future."

"The Pandora is at the center of the Prophecy," said Taron. "Her actions will determine our fate. So we must see to it that she receives those visions in the Vault, visions channeled through the weapons of heaven and hell. Those visions will push her along the right path, the path we need her to take. The path that will end with the destruction of all gods and demons—and in the Guardians' rise to power."

"Then we'd best get started," Giselle said.

Then the Guardians' angels spread their wings and flew away.

From his hiding spot, Damiel watched their silhouettes in the sky grow ever more distant. "Yes, fly off to do your wicked masters' bidding. I'll be waiting." Damiel's smile was bitter, his eyes burning with hatred.

I could hear what he was thinking. He was planning to hijack their plan, to impersonate Wardbreaker and use the memory recall spell to tune me in to the Vault's memories, memories that would lead him to the weapons of heaven and hell, immortal artifacts that he would use to fight the Guardians. And kill them, every last one of them.

"But how am I connected to the weapons of heaven and hell?" I wondered aloud. "How can I use them so well?"

* * *

I felt another jolt,gentler this time. Arina was getting better at moving us between the visions. I looked around, trying to figure out where—and when—we were now.

I knew at once. I'd seen this memory before.

Faris stood in a room with weapons hanging on the walls. He was dressed in a dark tunic and silk pants, one of his famous battlefield-in-the-ballroom outfits. Around his neck, he wore a gold pendant. It was the same pendant Athan had used to reveal Faris's best-kept secret: this memory.

Constellations of glowing, magically-projected dots swirled around Faris, representations of the gods' and demons' armies and their endless, immortal war. For a few moments, Faris watched the battles play out across time and space, but he soon tired of what he saw. Growling in annoyance, he waved his hand to dissolve the magic maps into dust.

"Temper, temper."

It was the demon Grace who had spoken.

But Faris's next words weren't the ones I remembered. This scene must have come out of a different memory.

"How did you get in here, Grace?"

He spun around. Shock flashed in his eyes when he saw Grace leaning against the wall—or maybe his shock was caused by what she was wearing. The demon was dressed in a red chiffon dress that showed more skin than chiffon. It looked like a nightie. A naughty nightie.

"I have my ways," Grace said with a sly smile.

He lifted his hand. The early stages of a spell twinkled on his fingertips.

"You'll want to hear what I have to say, Faris."

"Why should I listen to you?" he demanded.

"Because I know all about your little Orchestra of supernatural delights. And what I'm offering is far more enticing."

Faris looked her up and down, then declared, "There is nothing enticing about you."

The flash of evanescent lust in his eyes as they panned down Grace's body said otherwise. Faris was intrigued by her. Of course, he hated her too. Just as the gods hated all demons. He probably hated himself even more for that brief, involuntary moment of desire, however short-lived that it was, when he looked upon her.

Grace brushed her long pale hair off her shoulders, then stepped toward him. "You're gathering power, piece by piece, step by step, supernatural by supernatural, century by century."

"So I may one day defeat the demons." He threw the words in her face.

Wow, she must have really gotten under his skin. Faris was usually so composed.

"And dispose of the other gods," Grace said with a smile.

Faris said nothing.

"Don't be coy, Faris. And don't be too proud to pass up a strategic alliance."

"With you?" He laughed. "I'd rather set myself on fire."

Grace licked her lips. "If that's what it takes." She lifted up her hand and flames burst out of her open palm.

He laughed with sardonic disbelief. "You really want to help me defeat the demons?"

She blew out the flames in her hand like it was a birthday candle. "And dispose of the other gods too."

Faris's eyes narrowed. "Why?"

"Because they are all so bothersome. This immortal war bores me, Faris. Just as I know it bores you. It needs to be over."

A sly smile twisted his lips. "Then convince the demons to surrender."

"And put myself at your mercy?" She laughed out loud. "I think not. But the war can be over. We can end it together, Faris. And together we can destroy the other gods and demons, those petty fools who've allowed their egos to run the show for far too long—and in so doing, have thrown the universe into chaos. We need order. A new order."

Faris stroked his chin thoughtfully. "And how do you suggest we take out all of the other gods and demons?"

"Not by collecting supernaturals one by one, century by century, that's for sure."

"I'm playing the long game," Faris said defensively.

"Good for you. Do you want a medal?" She gave her eyes a long, slow roll. "Honestly, Faris, who do you think you're talking to? We are all immortal. And we all play the long game. I'm offering you a chance to finally play the smart game."

"Go on." Faris was intrigued. He tried to hide it, but it was there, plain and obvious on his face.

"You've been concentrating entirely on collecting the individual members of your Orchestra, but if you want to win this game, you need to get one powerful conductor. One powerful weapon. Someone with all the magic of the gods and the demons," Grace told him.

"The Immortals are long gone. There is no such person anymore."

"No, there isn't," she agreed. "Which is why we can't find this conductor. We have to make it."

"How?"

Grace put her hands on her hips. "You're pretty dense, aren't you? If you want to make someone with the powers of a god and a demon, you need to make someone with the powers of a god and a demon."

Faris blinked. "You wish to have sex with me."

"No, I don't. Not really. But, unfortunately for both of us, that's how babies are made, Faris."

Suspicion crinkled his brow. "Why come to me? Why not another god?"

"Because you have the right combination of magic and motivation to make this strategic partnership work."

"It is an intriguing idea. So now that you've given it to me, why do I need you?" Faris was thinking strategically all right.

Chains shot out of the walls, grabbing Grace by her wrists and ankles.

"Because I have the right combination of magic and motivation too," she said calmly, even as the chains pulled her toward the wall.

A slow, wicked smile twisted Faris's lips.

The chains clamped down hard on Grace's wrists and ankles. It must have hurt like hell, but she didn't even flinch. "I have magic no other demon has. Or any god, for that matter."

He watched the chains twist around her, amused. "And what magic is that?"

"Magic that has eluded gods and demons since the beginning," she said. "Power the Immortals kept from us."

"The power to see into the future," he said quietly.

"Yes."

"I've been collecting telepaths for centuries, hoping to find one with that rare gift." Faris paced before her. "But even the ones I've found with the gift, had only a very weak form of it."

"I know." Grace's eyes twinkled. "The weapon we create will have that power in its true form and more. The weapon will be a perfect balance of light and dark magic."

Faris waved his hand, and the chains binding Grace dissolved into smoke. She must have found the winning argument.

"Mixing of light and dark, a power beyond anything either gods or demons can wield." Faris met her eyes. "They will call it blasphemy."

Grace shook out her wrists as she stepped toward him. "Then we'd better make sure they don't find out."

"Yes." He was almost drooling at the idea of such a powerful weapon.

Grace kicked off her sandals. "Look, if we're going to do this, we'll share the weapon. Fifty-fifty."

"Deal," he said instantly.

She smiled at him. He smiled back. It was downright eerie. They were probably already both thinking up ways to steal this future weapon—me—all for themselves.

"So, enough small talk," Grace said pleasantly. "Shall we begin?"

Her hand darted to the string closure of her dress and she gave it a soft tug. The layers of chiffon peeled off of her, leaving her completely naked.

"We shall," Faris agreed, hardly looking at her. He must have still been thinking about the weapon they were going to create.

Thankfully, Arina chose that moment to pan away to the next memory. I really didn't need to witness my parents getting down and dirty.

* * *

We were inside a dark room,lit only by the flickering wax candles on the wooden floor. They were positioned all around Grace, filling the air with a mixed perfume of cherry blossoms, orange blooms, and rose petals.

The demon sat on the ground, barefoot and crosslegged. She wore a sports bra and a pair of lightweight, baggy shorts. Her hands rested on her tummy, which was still flat—but not as flat as it had been when we'd seen her proposition Faris. So she hadn't been pregnant for very long.

Her eyes closed, Grace chanted in an old, forgotten tongue.

"This is one of the rituals that your mother performed on you while you were still in her womb," Arina told me.

"She was trying to get stronger telepathic magic into me," I said.

The goddess Saphira's bodyguard Calix had told me these rituals were designed to boost my future-gazing powers, a power that had eluded the gods and demons, except Grace.

"Do I possess the power of future-gazing?" I asked Arina.

"Don't you know?"

"Well, I've seen flashes of the future. Of my daughter. But that's the Vault projecting into me, right?"

"Perhaps you're seeing the visions of the future through the artifacts," Arina said. "Or perhaps the artifacts are using your magic to allow you to see."

"Can't you read my magic and tell me what it is?" I asked her.

Arina looked at me for a long while. Finally, she said, "I don't know. Your magic is very powerful right now. It's like staring straight into a bright light; it's blinding. I can't separate your magic from your unborn child's magic."

I patted my belly. "She has the power. She got it from absorbing Faith's magic. Grace made sure of that."

"Your mother sounds like a real treat," Arina told me.

"Just wait until you meet her."

Arina cringed. "I hope that I never do."

"Leda, look at Grace," Nero said.

So I looked—and blinked in surprise when I saw what Grace was doing. She now had the weapons of heaven and hell set out on the floor before her. The gun Shooting Star. The silver-and-red Shield of Protection. The long Vortex Blade, whose bright blue flames could kill a deity. And Fortitude, the set of silver armor.

"What is Grace doing?" I wondered.

"I believe she is performing a spell to bind them to you," Nero told me.

"Yes." Arina nodded. "That's exactly what she's doing."

"But why?" I wondered. "And how does she even have the artifacts? At this point in time, they were stashed away in the Lost City, locked away behind many magical protections."

"Grace must have found a way to recover them. And now she's binding them to you." Nero frowned. "So that when you find them in the Lost City approximately twenty-three years later, they will remember you, and you'll be able to wield them immediately and effectively. She's performing this ritual to make sure you have a higher compatibility with the artifacts."

"But she can't possibly know that I will be there and find them."

"Grace can see the future, or at least fragments of it," said Nero. "She could see enough to know what she must do to set you on the path she intends for you to follow."

I scowled at the Grace from the past. "Wow, planning out my whole life before I'm even born. Nice."

"Actually, as we just saw, she planned out your whole life before you were even conceived," Arina pointed out.

Even better. I knew there was a reason that Grace gave me the creeps.

"Let's fast-forward a bit." Then Arina brought us to the next stop along the Road of Time.

* * *

Arina was definitely getting betterat directing this memory bus. She switched scenes so smoothly that I didn't even fall into Nero this time.

Grace was talking to a woman whose face was covered in a dark purple veil. "I need you to return these to the Lost City on Earth." She waved her hand toward the weapons of heaven and hell, which lay spread across the desk beside her.

"So soon?" said the woman in the purple veil.

"I need nothing more from them," Grace said. "At least not for the time being."

The purple-veiled woman took the sword, turning the blade around slowly. "These weapons can kill a deity."

"I am aware," said Grace. "But that doesn't help me just yet."

"I wish I could have a look under that woman's veil," I said to Nero. "Her voice sounds kind of familiar."

I reached for the veil, but of course my hand went right through the woman's head. Too bad. I had a nagging suspicion that this was important.

The woman gathered the artifacts into her bag, then she turned and left the room.

* * *

The doorto the meditation room opened, and Grace looked up into the face of her sister Sonja, the Demon of the Dark Force.

Arina had brought us to the next stop on the Road of Time so smoothly that I'd hardly noticed the change of scene.

Sonja's eyes dropped to Grace's belly, which was considerably rounder than it had been in the last memory. Grace cast a spell that had her fully dressed at the snap of her fingers.

"You conceived a child with that self-righteous peacock Faris," Sonja snarled at Grace.

"Stay out of my business, Sonja."

"Your business is my business, sister."

"How did you find out?"

"The how is not important," replied Sonja. "What's important is why. Why did you do this? Are you smitten with the god?"

Grace rolled her eyes. "Of course not."

"Good. Because then I really would have had to kill you. The gods are so…" Sonja's beautiful, immortal face scrunched up "…vile."

"What do you want?" Grace demanded.

"Don't take that tone with me, Grace. I'm here to help you. If the other demons on the council found out about your indiscretion…" Sonja clicked her tongue. "They would not be pleased. They'd strip you of your positions and titles. They'd likely kill you too," she added breezily.

"The only way the others on the council will find out is if you tell them." Grace shot her sister a hard, accusatory glare.

"Don't be so naive. You're really starting to show." Sonja pulled up the bottom of Grace's tunic, revealing the bump her clothes had done a decent job of concealing.

Grace knocked Sonja's hand away and pulled the bottom of her tunic back down over her belly. "I'm not seeing any visitors right now. I'm engaged in meditation."

"That story won't keep the others away for long."

"I don't have to keep them away for long," said Grace. "Only for another three months."

"I don't know why you're even bothering with a full pregnancy when you could just have it sped up. Especially, when you want to keep this a secret."

"I told you to stay out of it, Sonja. I have my reasons."

"You do realize that I will find out what you're up to, right? You can't keep secrets from me, Grace. You've never been able to. I always find out. And the others will find out too."

"Unlike you, the other members of the council have better things to do than barge into my meditation room," Grace said flippantly.

Sonja ignored her. "And when they do come, they will demand answers. I demand answers."

"You can demand all you want." Grace pointed to the door. "From out there. Go away. I'm busy meditating."

Sonja's eyes panned across the candles. "This isn't some spiritual reflection you've undertaken. This is ancient magic."

"Congratulations, you've stated the obvious." Grace planted her hands on her hips. "Now go away."

Sonja's eyes narrowed. "What are you really trying to do?"

"Cure heartburn," Grace quipped.

Sonja frowned. "This is no time for your jokes, Grace."

"I'm not joking. Pregnancy causes heartburn."

Sonja scoffed at the idea. "You are a deity."

"We both know that doesn't mean we're all-powerful. If I were, I'd kill you with a single thought."

Sonja's voice dropped to a low, blistering hiss. "You wouldn't dare."

"Oh, I would dare a lot of things. Pregnancy has made me cranky. And hungry." Grace flashed Sonja her fangs. "Now leave me alone before I bite you."

But Sonja was unfazed by her sister's show of fang. "You seduced Faris."

"You say that like it's a hard thing. That god had clearly not been laid in centuries."

"Why?"

"Because he's an insufferable ass, and no one wants to sleep with him."

"No," Sonja growled. "I don't care why no one wants to sleep with Faris. I care why you chose to sleep with him."

Grace favored her with a sunny smile. "Sometimes even I get an itch that needs scratching."

"You would have chosen someone less wretched. No, you chose Faris for a reason." Gold light flashed in Sonja's eyes. "You wanted to conceive a child with Faris. You wanted to create a child with the powers of dark and light. But why?"

Grace opened her mouth to speak.

Sonja cut her off first. "I don't need any more of your flippant remarks, little sister. You're trying to distract me from the truth, that you have created a living weapon," she hissed. "You acted in error, but what's done is done. We can use this."

"We?"

"Of course you're going to share your new weapon with your big sister. There has never before been a child with demon and god magic. We must train it properly if it's going to serve its purpose." Sonja's smile widened. "But first, I have to kill the priests just outside the door. They've been peeking through a crack in the door and listening to every word that we've said. And, after all, what good is a secret weapon if it's not a secret?"

* * *

After we leftGrace and Sonja in the meditation chamber, Arina brought us further down the road of memories, to Faris. The god stood in a room of martial decor, flipping through his cosmic maps. Outside his window, winter had covered the lands in a thick blanket of snow.

"Sonja knows."

Faris looked up to find Grace in his castle, right in front of him. She wore a fur-trimmed red velvet cloak that did a good job of hiding her baby bump.

He brushed the battle maps away. "What does Sonja know?"

Grace flicked her hand to cast a gust of magic wind that flung her cloak away.

Faris's gaze dropped to her baby bump, clearly visible under her tight red gown. "When did this happen?"

"Don't play coy, Faris. You were there."

"Six months ago. You sure waited a long time to tell me," he said. "Besides your sister, who else knows?"

"No one. I have been in solitude for the past several months, engaged in the Magic of the Faith rituals. Sonja showed up unannounced at the temple and barged into the Room of Solitude. She saw the fruit of our labor." Grace's hand slid over her belly. "Some of the priests were close enough to see inside the room. Sonja killed them so they couldn't spread the word."

"How kind of her to protect your secret."

"Sonja wants the child for herself," Grace growled. "There has never been a child conceived with demon and god magic. Sonja wants to weaponize the child."

"Sonja cannot be allowed to wield such a weapon, to groom it, train it, control it."

"Agreed. But I'm not giving you such a weapon either, Faris."

A twisted smile curled his lips. "You already have."

He grabbed for her, but Grace was quicker. She vanished in a cloud of black smoke.

And so did we.

* * *

We watchedGrace give birth to me in a hidden place, far from the eyes of demons and gods.

I winced. "I didn't realize childbirth involved so much screaming," I said to Nero.

He took my hand and squeezed it as Grace howled in agony once more. A psychic blast wave shot out of her, shattering all of the windows.

I slammed my eyes shut. My birth wasn't a pretty sight, and I made every effort to forget everything I'd just seen.

* * *

I watcheda baby sleeping in a large wooden crib. Baby Leda. Me.

Grace was in the next room, pouring herself a glass of Venom. She looked so pale, so tired. I wondered how long she'd been hiding here, wherever here was.

My quick glance out the window offered no answers. The view was obscured by a snowstorm. Ok, so we were somewhere totally inhospitable.

"Grace is in hiding," Nero said.

"Yeah," I agreed. "She's hiding from the other demons. And from Faris."

"She didn't hide well enough." Nero pointed out the masked figure who'd just lifted me out of my crib and then snuck out of the room.

Grace was still sitting in the other room, slowly sipping her Venom. She was so drained of magic, so tired, that she hadn't noticed a thing.

"Who was that masked person?" I wondered. "Who took me?"

"Let's find out," Arina said.

* * *

"It's called Purgatory."

The woman who'd stolen baby Leda sat on an old park bench, surrounded by wild grass. This must have once been a well-maintained city garden, but nature had reclaimed this piece from civilization. I could see the glow of a Magitech wall in the distance. She was casually sitting with a baby on the plains of monsters, totally unafraid of the monsters.

The man who'd spoken sat next to her. I recognized him instantly as Gaius Knight. Calli had shown me a picture of him. That messy black hair and long, crooked nose were unmistakable.

"I know all about Purgatory," the woman replied.

The baby thief had ditched the mask, so now I could see her real face. And I recognized her too. Those big blue eyes. That long red hair. Those well-toned arms that were strong enough to move large pieces of furniture all by herself.

Back when she'd been my foster mother, I'd known her as Julianna Mather. I'd later learned that Julianna Mather had been just an alias, and that her real name was Aradia Redwood. Major Redwood had been a soldier in the Legion of Angels, but she'd supposedly died in battle around the time I was born. Yeah, there were a lot of things that didn't quite add up here.

"You took this baby from the demon Grace," Gaius said.

Wow, he knew a lot.

Aradia seemed to be just as surprised. "How do you know about that?"

Gaius smiled. He didn't answer the question, but his next words demonstrated that he knew much more. "You work for Sonja. Or, rather, you did work for Sonja. You were the demon's eyes and ears inside the Legion."

So Aradia had been a spy for Sonja.

Aradia grew very still. "Are we going to have a problem?"

"Oh, I don't care about the gods or demons," Gaius said lightly. "Or about their politics."

"Then what do you care about?"

"Larger issues," Gaius said with a casual wave of his hand. "You're loyal to Sonja, and yet you've run away—and with the child she ordered you to steal for her, no less."

"I thought you didn't care about demon and god politics," Aradia said shrewdly.

Gaius chuckled.

"Sonja is the reason that Thea is dead." Aradia's voice teetered with emotion. "Sonja set her up to die."

"The dark angel Thea was your friend."

"My best friend," Aradia declared.

"Then I can understand why you would not wish to serve Sonja anymore."

"I'm not going to allow Sonja to use and abuse this child as she did Thea. I will keep her hidden from Sonja." Aradia sighed. "I'm not sure why I'm even telling you this, except, well, Thea once told me you could be trusted. I hope she was right about you. Or this will be a very short-lived escape. For both me and the child."

"I will not betray your secret," Gaius assured her. "You've asked me to find you a safe place to hide with the child, and Purgatory is it. It's an overlooked, out-of-the-way town at the edge of Earth's Frontier, the safest place there is for you both." He opened his hand to reveal a very old-looking key. "This is the key to your new life in Purgatory."

Aradia reached over to take it.

He held back the key for a moment. "I said Purgatory is the safest place there is for you both, hidden beneath the deities' radar, in this old, insignificant town. But be warned. There is no truly safe place in all the worlds for the child."

Aradia looked down at the baby in her arms. "What is she?"

"One of a kind."

"You know more than you're saying," Aradia accused him.

Gaius smiled. He handed her the key. Then he stood up and walked slowly away.

"Wait," Aradia called out.

He turned around to look at her.

"You don't wish to be paid?"

"You have saved this child from a terrible fate. There is no greater payment," he told her.

The baby cried. Aradia looked down and rearranged the blanket bundled around her. One of the tucked corners had come loose and fallen away from the baby's head.

When Aradia looked up again, Gaius was gone.

I glanced at Nero. "So Gaius Knight led Aradia to Earth. He led me to Earth. Where I would be outside of the demons' reach."

"He clearly knew what you are," replied Nero.

"But what is he?"

"Hard to say, but he clearly does not serve the interests of either the gods or the demons."

"Guardians?" I wondered.

"Perhaps. We need to see more."

* * *

The memory dissolvedinto the next.

I saw Aradia in the kitchen of the tiny house where she'd raised me. She wore an apron over a stylish summer dress. Her red hair was braided over the top of her head, like a headband. She looked exactly as I remembered her.

A fire was lit below the large black cauldron that she stood over. A thick, blue liquid bubbled inside. She gave the potion three slow stirs with a long, metallic spoon. Then she filled up a small glass and carried it over to the ten-year-old girl seated at the small kitchen table.

I knew that girl. I had been that girl. I looked at young Leda's pale hair, divided into two messy braids. My clothes were full of holes, my knees scuffed, and my head bleeding. I looked so out of place next to Aradia's stylish, witchy wardrobe and the immaculate house.

Aradia set the glass down on the table.

The girl frowned at the potion before her. "It looks like cooler fluid." She sniffed it, and her nose scrunched up in disgust. "It smells like cooler fluid too."

"All actions have consequences, Leda," Aradia said. "The consequence of picking a fight with children bigger and stronger than you—well, that happens to be injuries which require an unpalatable remedy."

"You could have at least tried to make it palatable," young Leda said.

"And you could have at least tried to not get into a fight. Again."

"Hey, they started it. I just finished it."

"Finished it indeed." Aradia tapped a wet cloth to the deep cut on the girl's forehead. "A few more hits like this to the head, and you would have been finished."

"You should see the other guys." Young Leda flashed Aradia a smile. "They look much worse. In fact, they're probably still unconscious."

"Do you mean to tell me that you fought two fourteen-year-olds and won?"

"Try not to sound so surprised, Julianna." The girl used the name I'd known Aradia by.

"But how did you do it?"

"They jumped me," young Leda said. "My head hit the ground. It really hurt, but I knew that I had to fight back, or it would hurt even more. They weren't going to stop hitting me. I was on the ground. When they moved in closer to kick me, I grabbed two fistfuls of dirt and threw them in their faces. That blinded them for a while, long enough for me to get up. My head was ringing pretty badly."

Aradia frowned. "You probably have a concussion." She put her hand in front of the girl's face. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Twelve," young Leda said flippantly.

"Concussions are no joke, Leda."

"You asked what happened, and I'm telling you."

"At least drink some of your medicine."

Young Leda lifted the glass to her mouth and took a sip. "This tastes like cooler fluid too!" she exclaimed.

"Don't spit it out, or it won't heal you."

Young Leda took another sip, shook herself, then continued her story. "So my head was ringing, and I was getting real dizzy. Luckily, the two bullies were rubbing their eyes, trying to get the dirt out of them. They were shouting bad words at me so loudly that they didn't hear me throw a few rocks in front of them. They tripped over the rocks and hit the ground."

"That wasn't very sporting of you, Leda."

"And it wasn't very sporting of them to gang up on someone so much younger and smaller than they are," young Leda pointed out. "I had to take every advantage I could get."

"Why did they attack you anyway?"

"They found me after school to torment me with insults."

"Such as?"

Young Leda shrugged. "The usual. They called me a dirty orphan. Said my parents were monster-blood-drinking freaks and that's why when I was born, I was cast out by the Pilgrims for being a dark, evil child. They said the Pilgrims banished me to the Black Plains, where a pack of wild wolves raised me until you found me."

"That is nonsense."

Young Leda looked up into Aradia's eyes. "What did happen to my parents?"

"They died shortly after you were born. They were friends of mine. And they certainly did not consume monster blood."

"How did they die?" young Leda asked.

"It's an unpleasant story, one you don't need to hear at your age. Someday, perhaps, I'll tell you. But rest assured, they were not evil people."

Nice how she twisted the truth to avoid lying. Yeah, my parents weren't evil people. They were evil, power-hungry deities who'd made me in order to create a powerful living weapon.

Young Leda blinked her big, wide eyes at Aradia. "I've always wanted to know more about my parents."

Maybe my first foster mother would have indeed told me the truth someday, but if so, she'd never gotten a chance. She did not long outlive this conversation.

"You shouldn't allow the other children to goad you," she told my younger self. "They're only looking to make themselves feel strong by pushing down the weak."

"I am not weak. And I showed them that today. I showed them they cannot insult me. As you said, actions have consequences."

"You threw the first punch?"

"No. After they called me all those names, I informed one of the bullies that his real father is actually his next door neighbor. And I told the other bully that I knew his mother had actually shoplifted everything they had in their house."

"How could you possibly know all of that?" Aradia said in surprise.

"It's obvious. Anyone with eyes could have figured it out. The first bully looks nothing like his ‘father'—and exactly like his next door neighbor. And I regularly see the second bully's mother walking around town in the middle of the day, so she obviously doesn't work. And she's always wearing a big and bulky coat, even in summertime. She could fit a lot of stolen merchandise under that coat."

Aradia looked her over for a moment, then declared, "You're too smart for your own good, Leda."

"Hey, I didn't tell them anything until they insulted me. They just wouldn't stop. I had to make them shut up. And they were pretty silent for a few moments after I told them their family secrets."

"Until they attacked you," Aradia pointed out.

"Right." Young Leda frowned. "I really thought they'd run straight home and confront their parents."

"Not everyone wants to know their past like you do, Leda. Most people are content to ignore all the dirty little secrets in their family tree. They really don't want to know these kinds of things about themselves. And they will do anything to not face reality. That's why those boys attacked you. To distract themselves from the truth—and to punish the one who'd delivered that unwelcome truth to them."

"People are dumb," Young Leda declared.

"What happened after you tripped the boys with the rocks?"

"They were pretty upset. They got up and ran at me, but I was ready for them. I'd moved behind a bunch of clothes lines. The fall must have mixed up their heads because they didn't even see the lines. They ran right into them and got all tangled up like in a spider web. They might still be stuck in them."

"You're supposed to be keeping a low profile, not attracting attention to yourself," Aradia sighed.

"But why do I need to keep a low profile?" Young Leda asked her. "It's because of who my parents were, isn't it? And because of who you used to be?"

Aradia shook her head.

"I know you had to have been someone important, Juliana," I told her. "You can do magic. Anyone who can do magic in this world is important. Magic is power. And witches are in high demand."

"You're too smart for your own good," Aradia said again.

"Tell me." Young Leda pressed her palms together in a pleading gesture. "You can trust me."

"You picked a fight with two bigger and stronger opponents, Leda. Do you know what that demonstrates?"

"Great skill," the girl answered proudly. "I won."

"You won this time, but only through unscrupulous means. No, your actions demonstrate that you still have a lot to learn."

"Julianna, I—"

Aradia's hand shot up, silencing young Leda. "Someone is outside," she whispered quietly.

"How do you know?" young Leda whispered back.

Aradia didn't answer. She grabbed young Leda and pulled her into one of the bedrooms. She had only just closed the girl inside the room and cast a spell over it when the front door of the house flew open. Two men in black uniforms marched inside.

"Those are Dark Force uniforms," Nero commented.

I recognized them too by the symbol of the Dark Force on their uniforms. That symbol consisted of the nine signs of magic—vampire, witch, siren, elemental, shifter, telekinetic, fairy, angel, ghost—all surrounded by the emblem of hell.

"So that's who killed her," I said. "I always thought it was monsters."

One of the Dark Force soldiers spoke, a big, muscular man with legs as thick as tree trunks and shoulders so wide that they nearly scrapped the doorway as he stepped through. "Aradia Redwood. It's been a long time."

"You didn't honestly believe you could hide from Sonja, the great and powerful Demon of the Dark Force," the second man added.

He was even bigger and wider than the other soldier. His shoulders actually did scrape the doorway as he stepped through, just as his head brushed against the wooden frame.

"And yet Sonja couldn't find me, Harrows," Aradia said, her stance confident. "For ten whole years."

Harrows glowered at her. "Hiding on Earth was a dirty trick."

"So was Sonja killing Thea!"

"Enough." Harrows had a voice that scraped like shifting gravel. "There can be no excuse for your treachery. Sonja is your deity. You were sworn to obey her. You broke that vow, and now Chambers and I will punish you in Sonja's name."

"If Sonja wanted me punished, she should have sent a few more soldiers." Aradia drew her sword. Bright orange flames flashed across the blade.

Harrows and Chambers moved in from either side. They were much bigger than Aradia, and they had her surrounded. That didn't seem to bother her. She spun like a tornado, flames engulfing her entire body. Harrows tried to grab her but quickly drew his hand away, repelled by the flaming tornado. And when Chambers shot a telekinetic spell at her, it bounced right off the storm she'd swaddled herself in.

The fight continued, even as my younger self remained trapped behind the bedroom door. I remembered that day. Loud as the battle was, I hadn't heard a thing that had gone on outside the bedroom. Aradia's spell must have muffled the sounds, as well as trapped me in and everyone else out.

Aradia had the two Dark Force soldiers on the retreat. Harrows grabbed a device from his belt. It looked like a communication device.

Aradia knocked it out of his hand with a telekinetic punch. "You won't be reporting back to Sonja." She crushed the device with her boot.

"Sonja already knows we're here," Harrows said.

"No, she doesn't," Aradia shot back. "You had to be sure you'd actually found me this time. You didn't want another false alarm. Sonja wasn't pleased with the last one."

Surprise flashed across his face. "How did you know?"

"The scars on your arm." Aradia pointed at his scarred arm. "Those were made by Sonja's famous chains. She punished you. And she coated the chains in a powerful poison to do it. That's why your wounds haven't healed; that's why they scarred over. I bet it was Nectar, which is poison to soldiers of the Dark Force. Sonja would consider that an appropriate punishment. The irony of hurting you with what gave me, once a Legion soldier, power, would appeal to her. That's how I know she punished you for failing to find me. Because I understand Sonja much better than you do."

Harrows knocked the sword out of her hand. "You've always been too smart for your own good, Aradia."

His statement echoed Aradia's earlier words to me.

He grabbed her by the neck, hefting her off the ground.

"I'm certainly smarter than you," she ground out tightly.

Her hand flashed out and she stabbed him through the chest with a knife. He fell dead to the ground. She must have poured a lot of light magic down her blade.

Chambers didn't give her a chance to catch her breath. He was already running at her. "Harrows and I have worked together since the day we joined the Dark Force!" he shouted. "And you killed him! I'm going to kill you!"

Chambers had gone berserk. He grabbed large pieces of furniture and began throwing them at her. Aradia was flicking them away with her magic, but she was having a hard time keeping up with his fury.

When Chambers ran out of furniture to throw, he started ripping kitchen appliances out of the wall. And when those were gone, he tore the kitchen counter off its legs and hurled it at her. He had her so busy casting defensive spells that she didn't have time to attack him.

Soon Chambers ran out of obvious things to throw, so he grabbed the knob on my bedroom door, but he retracted his hands when he was dealt a shock.

Aradia took advantage of his shock. She launched a fireball into the bubbling cauldron. It exploded all over Chambers, splattering him with blue potion that began to hiss and burn the moment it touched his skin. There must have been too much light magic in that potion.

Covered in burning boils, Chambers ran blindly at Aradia like an enraged bull. He knocked her right through the wall, out into the back yard. Bricks showered down on both of their bodies. The spell on the bedroom door flickered out.

Only a few moments later, young Leda emerged from her room. Her eyes took in the destroyed furniture. They grew wider when they saw the large monster on the floor, where Harrows was supposed to be. Aradia must have transformed his dead body into that of a dagger-clawed wolf. My younger self should have remembered that no monsters could exist on this side of the wall, but emotion must have won out over reason.

Young Leda moved toward the gaping hole in the wall. She climbed through it. That's where she found Aradia and Chambers, whom she'd also transformed into another dagger-clawed wolf. Both she and the transformed soldier were half-buried in debris. Young Leda began pulling bricks off of her foster mother, trying to unbury her.

Aradia caught her hand. "Stop." Her bleeding lips barely moved.

"Julianna, I have to get you out of there," young Leda said, her eyes trembling. "I have to get you to a healer."

"It's too late for that," Aradia croaked.

"I'm not giving up on you!"

"Don't give up on yourself, Leda. You can take care of yourself. Just don't pick any more fights."

Tears streamed down the young girl's face.

Aradia smiled. "I am so proud to have known you." Her hand dropped. She was dead.

Young Leda stood there for a moment, shaking. Then she wiped away her tears. She kissed her foster mother's cheek and walked away, disappearing into the shadows of Purgatory.

"After that, I lived alone, on the streets," I said. "Until Calli found me two years later."

* * *

We'd moved forwardin time two years. Young Leda was now twelve years old—and so filthy that she was hardly recognizable. I watched my younger self steal a bun off a baker's cart in the Bazaar, Purgatory's outdoor open shopping area.

Young Leda snuck away, her dirty body blending into the shadows. She moved toward a side alley but changed directions when a man in a purple suit walked out of that alley to enter the Bazaar.

"Leda, look at his face," Nero said.

So I did. "It's Gaius Knight. He walked there on purpose to make me go somewhere else."

I watched young Leda slip away, moving down another narrow street that led away from the Bazaar. Nero and I followed her. We came around the corner to find young Leda standing face-to-face with Calli.

"Now I remember this day," I said.

"Ah, so you so often stole buns from the baker's stand that the days all blended together?" Nero pretended to be lecturing me, but I recognized that teasing spark in his eyes.

"Not always buns," I told him. "Sometimes it was a muffin or a croissant. A few times, I was lucky enough to nab a whole loaf of bread. That kept me well-fed the whole day."

"You led a hard life," he observed.

"That changed this day. The day I met Calli."

Calli was talking to my younger self. "That's a tasty treat you have there."

Young Leda hugged the bun tightly to her body.

"What's your name?" Calli asked her.

Young Leda pressed her lips together and didn't answer.

"When's the last time you had something hot to eat?" Calli said kindly.

"Sometimes the bread is hot."

Calli smiled at her. "How old are you? Twelve? I have a girl about your age."

Young Leda looked her up and down. "You look too young to have a daughter my age."

"Are you always so blunt?" Calli laughed.

"Yes," young Leda said defiantly. "Are you trying to kidnap me?"

"Goodness, no. Do I look like that kind of person?"

"Not really, but you were using the promise of a hot meal to try to lure me home with you."

"Not to kidnap you. To help you. But you're right," Calli chuckled. "I guess I did come across as suspicious. What if I took you to the Jolly Joint for lunch? That's a very public place."

Young Leda's eyes narrowed with suspicion. "You could be hoping to feed me into an overstuffed stupor. And then kidnap me."

"You're a smart girl."

Young Leda sighed. "Too smart, some people say."

"Who says that?"

Young Leda shook her head. "It doesn't matter." She gave Calli a long, assessing stare. "You don't look like a kidnapper."

"I'm not. In fact, I've been hired to find whoever has been kidnapping children off the streets of Purgatory."

"You're a bounty hunter."

"I am."

"Cool," young Leda cooed.

"Some of us are. And some bounty hunters would sell out their own family for a tidy profit."

"You're not one of those bounty hunters," young Leda decided.

"Glad we've agreed on that."

"Do you think you'll catch the bad guys?"

"I usually do," Calli said. "Though at the moment, I'm still trying to figure out how they're nabbing kids and disappearing without anyone seeing a thing."

"I bet they're using the underground tunnels," young Leda told her.

"Purgatory has underground tunnels?"

Young Leda nodded. "I discovered them two years ago when I was running away from the baker I'd stol—um, a baker who was chasing me. There's like a whole city down there. I think the city sank long ago and Purgatory was built on top of it. I sometimes use those tunnels to hide from the others."

"The other kids on the streets?"

"Yes. A lot of the other kids are very mean. They're monsters."

"Could you show me to these underground tunnels?" Calli asked her.

"All right. But if I help you, you'll owe me much more than a meal at the Jolly Joint."

"How do you figure?"

"This gig of yours…finding missing children," young Leda said. "That has to be worth at least ten thousand dollars."

"Twenty thousand. The sheriff wants this sorted quickly, so the Legion doesn't come into town."

"The Legion of Angels." Young Leda's voice was full of awe—and something else.

"Right."

"The angels are pretty, but there's something weird about them," the young girl observed.

"Oh?"

"The angels always follow the rules," young Leda said. "Even when it's the wrong thing to do. People should always do the right thing. Otherwise, what's the point of life?"

"You are wise beyond your years," Calli told her.

Young Leda looked her over. "So are you."

Calli laughed.

"Leda." She pointed at herself. "That's my name."

"Nice to meet you, Leda. I'm Calli." She extended her hand to young Leda, and the girl shook it. "So, Leda, how about you show me to those underground tunnels?"

"I will. After we agree on my reward."

"Ah, so you haven't forgotten about that."

Young Leda gave her a stern look. "You hoped that I would."

"No. I'm glad that you're as shrewd of a businesswoman as I am."

Young Leda stood a bit taller.

"What happened to your family?" Calli asked her.

"Dead. All of them."

Calli set a comforting hand on the girl's shoulder. "I'm sorry."

Young Leda shook her head and cleared her throat. "It happened a long time ago."

"I was wrong," Calli said. "You need more than a hot meal. You need a new family."

"You want me to come live with you?" Young Leda didn't look too opposed to the idea actually.

"It wouldn't be the first time I took in a child in need," Calli told her.

"How many children have you taken in?"

"Four."

Young Leda thought that over for a moment, then declared, "If you weren't such a softy, you'd be able to afford better boots from all that money you make on bounties."

Calli laughed. "Likely so. But someone wise once told me that people should always do the right thing. Otherwise, what's the point of life?"

"I like you, Calli," young Leda told her. "You don't treat me like I'm stupid just because I'm a kid."

"So you want to come live with me?"

"I haven't decided yet. Ask me again when the job's done."

"What job?"

"Your job. I'm not just going to lead you to those underground tunnels. I'm going to help you catch the kidnappers too."

"We will face many dangers," Calli warned her.

"I live on the streets. For me, just fetching breakfast means facing many dangers."

Calli and young Leda walked off together down the street.

"Calli told me one of the jobs Gaius had gotten her led her to me," I said to Nero. "This job. Gaius got Calli the job. And he was waiting in that alley to head me off, to make me change direction so I'd cross paths with Calli. I'd once thought we'd met by chance, but nothing was by chance. It was all meticulously arranged. Nero?"

Nero looked away from Calli and my younger self. "Sorry, Pandora. I was distracted."

I smirked at him. "Curious to know what I was like as a child?"

"You didn't have a handle on your mouth back then either," he scolded me. "Mouthing off to a stranger, an adult who was much bigger than you, and who was armed. What were you thinking? How could you be so reckless?"

"You're chastising me for my recklessness twelve years ago? Seriously?"

"With that mouth of yours, it was a wonder you survived long enough for us to meet."

I snorted.

"Leda, this is no laughing matter."

"Of course not, General Killjoy, but laughter makes me keep a grip as I watch my past unravel before me—and realize that my whole life was completely manipulated. I never had a choice in anything."

Nero set his hands on my shoulders. "You did have a choice. You chose to help Calli."

"Gaius had probably been watching me and knew what kind of person I was. Hell, he'd made me into that person by having me grow up with Aradia. He knew where Aradia's house was. Where I was. He could have told the gods or demons at any point where I was living, but he had me grow up with Aradia. And then he made sure Calli took me in. He also made sure that Calli took in Zane, Gin, Tessa, and Bella. Why? Who is Gaius Knight? And what does he want?"

I looked at Arina. "Can't you tell who he is? Isn't that information kept somewhere inside the Vault?"

"I can't tell," Arina replied, and she looked frustrated. "Whenever I try to figure it out, I'm blocked. In fact, whenever I try to find out anything more about you, Calli, or your foster siblings, my magic is blocked. Whoever is blocking me understands my magic extremely well. That's the most unsettling thing of all."

Indeed. Arina's magic was on the passive magic spectrum. There weren't a whole lot of people around here who knew much about that kind of magic.

"Whoever is doing this, whoever put these visions into the Vault, they're only letting us see what they want us to see," Arina said. "And no more."

Then, suddenly, I felt a rough jerk, and the three of us were ripped from the streets of Purgatory and thrown off the Road of Time.