Adam gasped softly. “It’s the Hekatian Oracle prayer.”
I frowned at him. “What?”
“Back in the day, when the Hekate Council didn’t exist and the race was ruled by the Oracles, they began each reading of the prophecy with this prayer to the goddess.”
I squinted at the screen and read the prayer quickly:
Hekate, Queen of the Night, Goddess of the Crossroad, Goddess of Magic and Protector of Spirits, we your humble servants implore you to guide your faithful Oracle to the true light of knowledge. Light Bringer, guide your servant’s hands to do good deeds, guide her eyes to see the path, guide her tongue to speak the truth. Blessed is your name on our lips, blessed is your favor on our people, blessed is your power in our hearts. In your name, we give thee thanks.
“Huh,” I said. “I’ve never heard that.”
Adam shrugged. “These days it’s used only by priestesses and Oracles. It was a particular favorite of—” He stopped short.
I realized he’d been about to say Maisie’s name. She had been the only Oracle for the Hekate Council. And now there was none.
Giguhl, noticing the tension, cleared his throat. “So I guess it’s a good bet that Tristan left this assuming you’d be familiar with it.”
“I guess so. But it doesn’t really tell us much, does it?”
“Not so fast. I just showed you the translation of the prayer. There’s more.” He pointed to a series of numbers under the prayer.
My eyes widened. “What is that?”
Erron smiled. “A phone number. Local, judging by the code.”
“I assume it’s a different one than Abel gave you last time you talked.”
Erron nodded. My stomach dipped. “Did you call it?”
He shook his head. “I just figured it out before you arrived. Plus, I thought you’d want to do the honors.”
My palms were suddenly sweaty. I quickly wiped them on my jeans. It was one thing to talk about finding my father. It was something else to face the prospect of chatting with him on the phone.
“Hold on,” Adam said. “Dicky told us Tristan left that clue a couple weeks ago, right?”
“And?”
“And I just don’t want you getting your hopes up in case the number doesn’t work or no one answers.”
“I think I can manage to not be destroyed if I get voice mail.” I shook my head at him and dialed. I knew he didn’t want me to be disappointed, but his patronizing tone put me on edge. Or maybe I was taking my nerves out on the mage. Either way, I hit the SEND button.
The phone rang once, twice, three times. My pulse hammered.
Click. Silence.
I frowned. “Hello?”
“Prego?” A male voice. Deep, unfamiliar.
“Tristan?” My voice shook a little.
A pause. “Depends. How did you get this number?”
“Pasquino gave it to me.”
The creak of a chair and the rustle of fabric reached me through the receiver. I had his attention now. “Spanish Steps tomorrow, eight p.m.”
“Oka—”
“Come alone.” Click.
I pulled the phone away from my face and grimaced at it for a few moments. Finally, I hit the END button and turned to face the eager gazes of my three cohorts.
“Well?” Giguhl prompted.
“I’m meeting him tomorrow night.”
“Where?” Adam asked.
“The Spanish Steps.”
“Did he say anything else?” Erron asked.
I nodded, knowing this wouldn’t go over well. “He said to come alone.”
An explosion of raised, masculine voices.
“I’ll be damned if I’m allowing you to go alone!” Adam yelled.
“Bullshit!” Giguhl shouted.
They then continued to rant, stomping around like Alpha males, ready to shout until I conceded.
I stood by with my arms crossed, waiting for them to settle down. Arguing at that point was a waste of breath. Meanwhile, Erron sat calmly by with his hands behind his head, watching the display with his lips curled into a smile.
Finally, Adam threw up his hands. “I can’t believe you’d even consider going without us!”
He paused to take a deep breath; his face was red and a vein throbbed on his neck. Next to him, Giguhl was all puffed up like an adder looking for a fight.
“Are you finished?” I said in a very calm, rational tone.
Two sets of narrowed eyes glared at me, but they both nodded.
“I never said I planned on going alone.”
“But—” Giguhl started.
I shot him a look that shut him right up. “I simply said he wanted me to go alone. Jesus, guys, I’m not an idiot.”
Adam’s lips formed a shocked O and his cheeks got all hot and red. “Sorry, I just thought you’d—”
I waved away his apology. “With Cain out there”—I pointed toward the window to indicate the city beyond—“I’d have to be a fool to go anywhere without backup. So of course you’re all going. We’ll simply have to make sure he doesn’t see any of you.”
Erron sat forward. “I’ve been to the Spanish Steps. They’re huge and always crawling with tourists. It should be no problem to blend.”
“Okay,” Adam said. “We definitely need to check in with Rhea and the Queen.”
I nodded. “Get them on the horn.”
I would have preferred talking to Rhea and Queen Maeve in person, but even magical beings are slaves to the vagaries of time and space. Namely, Rhea was in New York and Queen Maeve was in North Carolina. And sometimes despite our access to spells and different dimensions, the Internet was just more convenient than magic.
The four of us gathered around the large desk in the alcove. The laptop sat open on the surface and two windows were open on the screen. On the left Queen Maeve frowned at us from the conference room in her treetop palace in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Because her quadruple nature was nearing the end of its Crone cycle, she looked older than Methuselah. Her hair was so thin the pink of her scalp shined through the white strands. Her parchment skin was nearly translucent and was wrinkled like a sharpei’s ass.
Rhea glared at the screen from the Hekate Council meeting room at the Crossroads estate near Sleepy Hollow. Her metallic-silver hair shone like tinsel and her green eyes flashed with annoyance. In deference to her newly elevated position as the head of the Hekate Council, she wore a white chiton. But her expression was pure schoolmarm—the same one she often wore when I screwed up during my magic lessons. “What part of ‘we expect daily reports’ did you not understand?”
I cringed. “Yeah, about that. Sorry—things have been a little crazy.”
Rhea raised a brow. “Crazy good or crazy bad?”
I glanced at Adam for help. “Crazy… it could be worse?” he offered.
The Queen pointed at us. “Who is the mage lingering in the background there?”
“This is Erron Zorn, Your Benevolence,” Adam said. “He volunteered to put us in touch with Abel’s contact here.”
The Queen nodded regally in Erron’s direction. “Well it’s good to hear some part of your mission was successful.”
Rhea’s expression was friendlier. “Thank you for your aid, Mr. Zorn. The Hekate Council is in your debt.”
Behind me, Erron shifted uncomfortably and cleared his throat. “You’re welcome.”
As a Recreant, it had to be odd for him to be having a discussion with the head of the Council that stripped him of his healing power when he dared challenge their authority. Of course, Rhea hadn’t been in charge when that happened, but still.
“And the meeting with the contact?” the Queen prompted.
“It went well,” I said. Not quite a lie, but not the whole truth either. I wanted to ease into dropping the bombshell. “We’ve managed to make contact with Abel and have a meeting set up for tomorrow night.”
Rhea smiled. “Excellent. Great job, you guys.”
“Err,” Adam said, shifting in his seat, “thanks, but there’s some new information about Abel you need to know.”
“Oh?” the Queen said.
“Yeah,” I said. “We found out his real identity.”
She banged an impatient hand on the table. “Out with it, girl!”
“We haven’t seen him in person, but we have good reason to believe that Abel is really…” Now that it was time to spill the beans, I couldn’t do it. Saying it out loud to Rhea, who’d known my father since he was a child and witnessed the fallout when everyone believed he had died, felt weird. Luckily Adam stepped in before the tension could mount too much further.
“Turns out Abel is someone you already know. Or knew.” Adam let out a breath. “Tristan Graecus.”
Rhea’s hand flew up to her mouth and a gasp escaped her. Queen Maeve simply blinked, the news far less shocking to her since she’d never met him and couldn’t care less about my personal dramas. However, since Tristan had been the son of the leader of the mage race, she no doubt knew the history about his disappearance fifty-odd years earlier.
“Are you certain?” Maeve said in the wake of Rhea’s shocked silence.
I shrugged. “Like I said, we haven’t met with him yet. But our contact swore it to be truth. Also, I spoke to him on the phone earlier and he answered to the name Tristan.”
“Oh gods, Sabina!” Rhea finally exclaimed. “Are you okay?”
I nodded. “I want answers and I really don’t like this kind of surprise falling in my lap right now, but as far as I’m concerned, it changes nothing.”
“Sabina, you’re not serious.” Rhea frowned. “This changes everything.”
I crossed my arms and set my jaw. “No, it doesn’t. I’m here to do a job. He has information I need to get the job done. I’m not interested in tearful reunions or heart-to-hearts or whatever.”