Linda Robertson: Fatal Circle

“Yes.” Her features were alight as she said, “I grew up with the best tutors available and an amazing library at my disposal. What about your childhood?”

“Hmmm. What I had at my disposal growing up was a demanding grandmother.”

Seven didn’t laugh, as I had expected she might. Instead, she relaxed into her seat. “She must have made quite an impact to be the one thing you compare to my library and tutors.”

“She raised me.” I had an urge to check on Nana and find out if she and Beverley had stayed safely home and planned to continue staying at home until they heard from me tomorrow. But I had already asked her to; so she would. Right now seemed like an opportunity to find out more about the previous Lustrata. “Tell me about your library. What was your favorite book as a child?”

Seven became wistful. “My library is gone. And there were scrolls then, not books. So much knowledge was lost.”

“Lost?”

“Yes, but despite what legend may say, it was not destroyed by Caesar in my day. Nor did Mark give me the plundered library of Pergamon as a wedding gift.”

Wait. According to some accounts, Julius Caesar was responsible for burning the library at Alexandria. That was during the time of . . . that would mean that Seven was . . . No! She was the Lustrata? “You’re—you’re not—”

“But I am.”

“Cleopatra? And,” I pointed at the other section of the chamber though he was not here, “Mark is Mark Antony?” No wonder he was the one Menessos counted on for strategizing.

She conveyed a mixture of sadness and determination in her nod.

I was dumbfounded. My head was filled with so many questions and I could not speak one of them.

Finally she said, “The bite of an asp is not so different from the bite of a vampire.”

“An asp bite won’t transform you into an asp.”

“Neither will the mere bite of a vampire remake you into the same, but to someone in those times, physically the bites look much the same.” She was silent for a heartbeat longer, then, “If the bards and historians only knew how wrong they have been about so much.”

“But Mark Antony died on his w—”

She cut me off with an imperial—I realized now it came naturally—wave of her hand. “As I said: bards and historians are wrong about so much.” Seven stood. “They are also wrong about war. War is not romantic. It is brutal and ugly. Cities burn and the wind carries the stink of failure.” She closed the Codex and held it out to me. I was being dismissed. “Don’t fail.”

I stood and accepted the book.

As I left, she added, “Remember. You cannot shut the door until both fairies are dead. Only then will the bonds that are keeping the doorway open be severed. It cannot be shut until then, so make no attempt until you are certain they are both dead.”

I quietly closed the door of the last queen of Egypt.

Just before five A.M., I entered my chamber to get my coat. I had fifteen minutes until I was supposed to meet Menessos at the front entrance. We were going to take my car and leave for Headlands Beach. The rest of them had left an hour before.

The fairies knew I would show up with Menessos. WEC had sanctioned it. Of course, the fey had to have a plan ready in the event that we didn’t just easily surrender. But what kind of plan?

I had my coat in my hands and had started back to the door when I stopped short, captured somehow by the painting on the wall. I stared at The Charmer as if I’d never seen it before.

The lute-playing woman in the picture was peering down at the fish that were drawn to her by the music she played. Or was she? Far more intent on the water, she didn’t seem to see the fish. I could imagine her using the water to examine her emotions, as I had, but from the safety of the shore. Perhaps she was using the surface of the water to scry into her future.

I rushed to the closet and retrieved my suitcase. Throwing it open, I took out the shoe box with Nana’s scrying crystal. Shutting off all but the dome’s starlight, I drew a circle on the floor with my broom. I sat cross-legged within the circle, facing the closet to keep the light from reflecting on the surface of the crystal globe. While making my quarter calls, I used my T-shirt to wipe my fingerprints from the crystal.

Cradling the heavy ball in my hands, I grounded and centered. Gazing softly on the clear surface, I let my mind hit alpha. In seconds the crystal grew cloudy. Keeping my breathing even and steady, my mind receptive, I waited for the images.

Nana was more accomplished at this, but I was not entirely unskilled. I just preferred the stable symbolic images of Tarot. My interpretations seemed stronger with the cards than with the fluctuating fluidity of scrying.

I quickly settled my intention on seeing something to help me know if we were prepared for what would come to pass.

The murk within the crystal thickened and lathered into seafoam. It receded, showing me the wet sand. No, this was not the sea, it was a lakeshore. Another wave crashed, foam stretching . . . the splash of bodies falling into the water, screams.

My breath caught and held.

A flash of red. A lick of flames. The face of Fax Torris, the fire fairy, laughing. At her feet lay a man. Naked. His back . . . was that sand sticking to his skin, making patterns? She kicked him, rolling him over.

Johnny!

Menessos and I stood on the beach, shoulder to shoulder. With my hand up to block the wind, I watched for any sign of the fairies. Lake Erie was veiled in mist, yet the air was gusty onshore. Weather wasn’t supposed to work that way. “The fairies are creating this mist.”

“Yes. They wouldn’t dare arrive without making it a spectacle,” Menessos said.

Magic mist or not, it was chilly. I wore a tank and a tee under a hoodie and my blazer. A pair of thermal leggings under the jeans would’ve helped. Of course, I’d made sure Beau’s charm was on its long chain around my neck. I wished it would kick in and warm me up as it had when I’d first touched it.

“It wouldn’t surprise me,” Menessos added, “if the fairies painted the mist different colors just before they appeared.”

“I’m more worried that they’re hiding something in there, not just making a grand entrance.”

“You may be right,” he said, “but it is too late now for us to alter our position, our strategy, or our numbers.”

If the mist came ashore, the sniper in the lighthouse wouldn’t be able to see us. If everything we couldn’t see was going according to plan, then Johnny and the other waeres and Beholders were in the switchgrass, a disturbingly far distance behind us.

“Is this wind going to be a problem?”

“The conditions are not perfect for what our outlying friend does.”

It had been explained to me that snipers don’t aim directly at their targets, but have to calculate a height above the target based on distance and how the bullet will drop, as well as calculate a distance to the side of the target based on wind direction and speed. So snipers basically shot at nothing and hoped the bullet landed where the math said it would.

“So maybe once you call the fey we should prostrate ourselves like we’re worshipping them and let the guy get his shot off.”

Menessos touched me. “Persephone.”

My hand was visibly shaking. I let it fall to my side. I hadn’t told anyone that I’d gotten out the scrying crystal, or what I had seen. How could I? Uttering the words would make it more real. But I was ready. I had my own plan. I’ve never gotten a chance to tell Johnny that I love him. “What?”

“Do you know what it meant to me, the night you destroyed the stake, to take that walk alone?”