Rinda Elliott - Foresworn

“Hold on,” she whispered. There was a clatter as she obviously set the phone down.

I waited, chewed on my fingernail, then grimaced when I couldn’t remember how long it had been since I washed my hands. Tapping my finger on the steering wheel instead, I took a deep breath and let it out slowly because the panic filling my chest made my lungs feel full.

A loud clatter on the other end made me wince. When my sister didn’t immediately speak, I wanted to climb through the phone and strangle her. “Raven! What is it? Hey, talk to me!”

“I think she killed a boy, Kat. I drove into a river—Vanir fished me out.” It was her turn to take a loud breath before more words spilled out of her. Fast. “He has wolves—can you believe it? But he had to leave me with them to find his friend, and when I caught up to him, it was only to find that his friend had been killed. Killed , Kat. Vanir brought me to his house and their sheriff questioned me. I didn’t know anything for sure, of course, but I think it could have been Mom.”

“I can’t believe that.” Again, the words had to be forced out. I didn’t trust our mother—hell, I didn’t even like Dru very much—but this was beyond my comprehension. Murder. I’d expected her to try some stupid spell that hurt them or made it impossible for them to get where they were supposed to be during the end of the world.

Not that I entirely wanted to accept that was what was happening.

“I don’t know for sure,” Raven answered. “But there wasn’t a mark on him, and it looked like he was killed with magic. Plus, I smelled the lavender.”

A diesel pickup pulled into the next space, and the driver leaned over to look at me through his passenger window. I frowned and turned away from him, still clutching the phone as if I was afraid I’d drop it again.

“Kat?”

It took several tries for me to get enough air to speak. “You know I’ve stayed mad at her, that I’ve always thought she was kind of loopy, but this? It doesn’t make sense. I don’t understand.” I didn’t want to be this far from Coral when she found out. Our middle sister was still too attached to our progenitor. “Oh gods, Coral! This will kill Coral.”

“She won’t believe it.” Raven lowered her voice. “I have to find Mom, Kat.”

I made a strangled sound. “No. You don’t. If she’s already crossed the line, you have to tell them! Why do you feel this need to protect her? I don’t get it! Look at how we grew up! All I ever wanted was a normal life and she made sure that didn’t happen. You should have just told them the truth last night. She’s killed someone, Raven.”

“We don’t know that for sure. And I have to be absolutely sure. Have to give her that. Anyway, have you been paying attention on your trip? On mine, nuts were coming out of the woodwork. It’s snowing at the equator, Kat! People are scared! We don’t know the situation here. What if this was something else?”

Of course she backtracked. Like I would have to. Literally. I’d have to turn around and drive to Oklahoma now. There was no choice. I loved my sister—both my sisters—fiercely, but I didn’t trust them at all when it came to Dru. “You sounded pretty certain a minute ago, Raven.”

She didn’t say anything for a long, long moment. “My rune tempus hit last night and the runes said ‘in violence conceived.’ What do you think that means?”

Stunned, I sat still and silent, gripping the phone as more trucks came into the restaurant parking lot. I glanced over, and the guy in the diesel truck was still in there, still watching me. Instead of thinking about the ramifications of what Raven had just said, I dug in my bag for my can of pepper spray. I really, really needed to not think about what she said. Not too deeply.

“I think my norn is trying to tell me something about our birth,” Raven said.

“No.” I clutched the can to my chest, stared straight out the windshield at the clumps of snow building on the hood. Then at the span of new dark clouds that looked like they had sprung from the mountain in the distance. “No. Dru doesn’t hold back. Innocent childhood isn’t a sacred thing in her world. It’s not her style. Gory bedtime stories are my first memories.” And they were. Stories of gods fighting, gods smearing herbs on talking severed heads...gods giving birth out of their freaking armpits. Nothing had been taboo for Dru. “She would have told us.”

“Maybe not.”

“What if it isn’t?” I groaned again, knowing it sounded more like a growl. “What if it’s something stupid from the past that has absolutely nothing to do with this? You could get in big trouble, Raven.” And I couldn’t handle that. Couldn’t handle anything happening to either of my sisters.

“I know.”

“Sounds like you’ve found the right guy. I’m calling Coral, and we’re coming to help. In the meantime, you know where to look.” I turned off my Jeep—thinking I’d grab breakfast in the restaurant.

“Not really. Campgrounds are out in this weather. She has to be in a hotel, but I can’t figure out how. She didn’t have much cash.” She paused. “How long do you think it’ll take you to get here? I have no car and I can’t waste the money to rent one. I still have to find a hotel, and I’m worried about the cost on that. Have you had trouble finding rooms? I did every single night. Spent a fortune to get here.”

“Yeah, I’ve had trouble, but it got easier up here. People are used to driving in snow, so they didn’t all stop immediately.” Okay, I lied. But just a little. She had enough to worry about. “Since Coral’s guy lived closer, she’s been driving around, trying to find him, but she told me last night every hotel in the area is packed. Our neighbors are taking people in.”

“Coral’s not, right?”

“Don’t think so.” I smirked because I knew exactly what she was thinking. That Coral trusted too easily and could let someone even worse than Dru into the house. Well, Raven probably wouldn’t use Dru as the comparison. It pissed me off that neither of my sisters could grasp how off our mother really was. And it pissed me off more that even I was surprised by the thought of her killing someone. I thought I’d given up on her years ago.

My stomach growled.

“Kat? I can’t let Mom hurt Vanir. He’s...well, he’s really cool.”

I liked this subject better. I shook my head. “I thought I detected heat. So, I guess you won’t end up in Gefjon’s hall, after all?” I’d always teased my sisters that they’d end up there because they’d die still virgins. Dru had kept a pretty close eye on us, so there hadn’t been any serious relationships yet, even though we were eighteen. Who was I kidding? Serious relationships. Ha! We hadn’t even experienced casual ones.

“Probably not.”

“Really?” I dropped the pepper spray. “Holy crap! I’m coming down there now. Get off this phone, call Coral and tell her you’re okay.”

“Bossy much?”

“I told you. She’s freaking .” Man, at this rate, my nose was going to start growing like Pinocchio’s. I stared at the light filling the sky, at the snow that was falling everywhere—not just here. When I’d left Florida, it had covered the ground there, too. The scariest part was it was still summer. Even this far north, I doubted they dealt with this much snow in August.

A plume of smoke rose into the sky from somewhere not that far away. It writhed and spread into the already dark clouds. Fear made my heart pick up. Stupid fire.

“Raven?” I whispered.

“What?”

“Do you have the feeling one of us isn’t making it through this? All the other stuff Dru told us is coming true.”