Strange Fates (Nyx Fortuna) (32 page)

Even though I’d tricked Gaston into cutting his own thread of fate and saved their asses, it wasn’t enough.

I hadn’t enjoyed it. In fact, it made me sick. I was not cut out to be part of the Wyrd family.

I drove to Nona’s and didn’t bother to knock before I strode in. The three sisters were sitting motionless in the living room, as if they had been waiting for me. Deci looked emaciated. The poison was still in her system.

“You look like hell,” I said.

She snarled at me, but it was a halfhearted effort. I had other things on my mind.

“So I guess the cease-fire is over?” I asked. The aunts knew what I’d ignored about myself. I would do anything for the one I love. I hadn’t thought I was capable of love, at least not since my mother had died.

“What do you want from me? To beg?” I got down on my knees. “I’m begging. Let her go.”

“A bargain, my boy?” Morta asked. “Your life for hers?”

I started to nod, willing to do anything to save Elizabeth, but my mother’s voice rang in my head. “Never take the first deal you’re offered.”

“No,” I said. “We need to set terms first.”

Bargaining put a gleam into Morta’s eyes. “Good.”

“We need you to find someone for us,” Nona said. I’d heard that one before.

“How long will it take?” I asked.

“That’s entirely up to you,” Morta said.

“Who am I supposed to find?”

Nona opened her mouth to speak, but Morta forestalled her. “Not until the terms are set.”

“You set Elizabeth free before I leave,” I said. “And she goes back to her old life without any more interference from you. You don’t touch her or her brother. In fact, you forget they even exist.”

“How do we know you’ll keep your side of the bargain if we free our little bargaining chip?” Morta asked.

“Because I know what you’ll do to her if I renege on my promise,” I replied.

Morta let out a cackle. “Smart boy.”

“Anything else?” Nona asked, clearly impatient for it to be done.

I almost didn’t dare to say it. “When I find this thing you’re looking for, I’m done. I get to walk away. No repercussions.”

“There are always repercussions,” Nona said. She looked at her sister, who nodded. “But there will be none from us.”

“Then we’re agreed?” I asked.

“Agreed,” Morta said. She spit on her hand and held it out to me. I copied her gesture.

I had a pretty good idea what my aunts would ask me to do. After all, they’d been hounding me about my hidden thread of fate for the last few centuries. I bet Morta couldn’t wait to snap that sucker in half. She’d probably use her teeth.

But to my surprise, that wasn’t the task they set before me.

“My daughter Claire is missing,” Morta said shortly. “I expect you to find her.”

“Missing?” I stared at her stupidly. “And what kind of witch is named Claire?”

“She’s not a witch yet,” Morta said. “Her training was…interrupted.”

“What happened?” I asked. The thought of Morta reproducing made me slightly sick to my stomach, but I was curious about her daughter Claire. Did Decima have a daughter, too? Where were my other cousins?

Morta stared at me, her face expressionless.

“Oh, for god’s sake, tell him,” Nona said.

Morta remained mute but gave her sister a little nod.

“She ran away,” Nona said bluntly. “Almost a month ago. We haven’t been able to get a glimpse of her or where she is.”

“The Tracker couldn’t find her?” I’d assumed that he would have been the first person they sent.

I was right. “He was not successful,” Morta said flatly. Of course, he might have had a reason to lie.”

“What? Gaston couldn’t find a trace?” If the Tracker hadn’t been able to find her, I didn’t stand a chance. There was something they weren’t telling me.

I hesitated, glanced at Morta, and blurted it out. “Could she be dead?”

“No!” Morta shrieked at me. “She’s not dead.”

Nona laid a calming hand on her shoulder and Morta subsided. “We’re sure she’s alive,” Nona said. “Something is obscuring our vision where she’s concerned.”

“You have one month,” Morta croaked.

“A month? You have no idea where your daughter is and you’re only giving me a month?”

I met Nona’s gaze. “So much for trusting someone in the name of family.”

She turned away. “There are extenuating circumstances.”

“The circumstances are that you’re a treacherous hag,” I snarled, but my insults only seemed to make her sadder. If that was even possible.

“We need you to go somewhere that others are not able to travel,” Nona said.

Morta handed me a photo. “This is her most recent picture. We are hoping that you will be luckier than the Tracker.”

Luck? Is that what this was all about? I was the son of Fortuna, the luckiest person alive. They must be desperate if they were relying on me.

I glanced down at an attractive, sunny blonde of about twenty-three. She looked nothing like her mother or anyone else in the family. “Was she adopted?”

Nona and Morta exchanged glances. “She resembles her father,” Morta finally said.

“Who is…?”

My question remained unanswered. I guess my family wasn’t big on the issue of revealing paternity. We weren’t ever going to be a normal family, but I didn’t think they were out to kill me. At least not right now.

“All you need to know is that you were destined to take your place as a Fate,” Morta said. “Not fall in love with a mortal and live a normal life.”

“I don’t believe in destiny,” I replied. My aunts hadn’t mentioned the prophecy. I found the omission very interesting. There’d never been a male Fate in the history of the world. Why were they suddenly talking up the job to me?

Morta left the room and returned with Elizabeth.

“Remember what I said,” Morta reminded me.

“Like I could forget,” I replied.

Elizabeth’s hair was mussed and her eyes were red-rimmed, but she had pasted on a big smile. “You weren’t kidding about your family,” she said wryly.

I touched her face, trying to reassure myself that she was really there. “Are you okay? They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

She let out a shaky laugh. “Nona baked me chocolate chip cookies.”

Chocolate chip cookies couldn’t take away the fear I sensed in her voice.

“I want to talk to her alone,” I said to Morta. She gave me a long look and motioned to Nona and Deci, who followed her out of the room.

“They’ll leave you alone from now on, I promise,” I said.

“How do you know?” She’d put on a good front, but her voice shook as she asked the question. I hated my aunts for that.

“You’re safe,” I said. “My aunts will leave you alone as long as I cooperate.”

“What happens now?”

“I have to find someone,” I told her. “But you’re out of it from now on.”

“Do you have to go?” Her question ended on a sob.

“What do you think?”

She gave me a tiny smile. “I’m sorry, you know.”

“For what?”

“Sorry I hurt you, sorry for everything.”

Willow’s face flashed in my mind. Not as sorry as I was.

“Do you still…care about me?” she asked. “Just a little?”

I took her in my arms. “I’ll be back.” I whispered against her hair. I would fight for her, even though, in my secret heart, I knew she didn’t love me. In the history of the world, men had done much worse for a woman.

I wanted to ask her to wait for me, to tell her I loved her, but words failed me. Instead, I put into my kiss all the things I wanted to say but couldn’t. I’d saved her brother. She was grateful to me for rescuing Alex and confusing that emotion with love. It wasn’t love, but it was something. Maybe it could be enough.

Then I walked away, determined to make destiny my bitch.

Acknowledgments

I’m lucky to have so many great friends! Stacia Deutsch, Debby Garfinkle, & Alyson Noel—for the good coffee & advice and even better friendship. Collyn Justus—because she kept asking why. Mary Pearson and Melissa Wyatt for their emails chock-full of advice and support. Jessica Rothenberg for the brilliant feedback. My agent Stephen Barbara for his great sense of humor even when I lose mine. My editor Devi for her tough love. My family for understanding deadlines and still talking to me afterward.

meet the author

Photo © Keli Horton

Marlene Perez is the author of paranormal and urban fantasy books, including the bestselling DEAD IS series for teens. The first book in the series,
Dead Is the New Black
, was named an ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers as well as an ALA Popular Paperback.
Dead Is Just a Rumor
was on VOYA’s 2011 Best Science Fiction, Horror, & Fantasy List. Her novels have been featured in
Girls’ Life
,
Seventeen
, and
Cosmopolitan
, and Disney Television has optioned the rights to the first three books in the DEAD IS series.

She grew up in Story City, Iowa and is the youngest of twelve children. She lives in Orange County, California with her husband and children. Visit Marlene at
www.marleneperez.com
or at the Welcome to Nightshade Facebook Community Page at
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Welcome-to-Nightshade-DEAD-IS
.

Also by Marlene Perez

Dead Is the New Black

Dead Is a State of Mind

Dead Is So Last Year

Dead Is Just a Rumor

Dead Is Not an Option

Dead Is a Battlefield

Dead Is a Killer Tune

The Comeback

Love in the Corner Pocket

introducing

If you enjoyed
STRANGE FATES,
look out for

DARK DESCENT

NYX FORTUNA: BOOK TWO

by Marlene Perez
 

Nyx Fortuna is still reeling from Elizabeth’s betrayal, but Nyx’s cousin Claire has run away and he has to find her and bring her back or Elizabeth will suffer at the hands of his aunts, the three Fates. Claire has gone into the underworld of Minneapolis, where no one, not even the Fates, can follow. But Nyx must journey to a place where Hecate’s dark magic has Claire in her thrall. Saving his cousin means releasing Hecate from her underworld prison and perhaps fulfilling the prophecy foretelling the Fates’ downfall.

Chapter 1

“If I cannot deflect the will of Heaven, I shall move Hell.”

The whispering woke me up.

“Nyx, wake up, you’re in danger.” I recognized the speaker as Sawyer Polydoros, but that was impossible. I was on the couch, TV blaring, with a tower of empties on the coffee table beside me, but all I could hear was the sound of Sawyer’s panicked voice.

It had to be a dream. How else could I be hearing my dead uncle’s voice?

But I was the only son born to a Fate and stranger things had happened.

I inched up into a sitting position and listened, but the whispering had stopped.

There was someone in my apartment. Whoever or whatever it was barely drew breath, but a strange odor enveloped the room. Less pungent than a troll, but stinking of death nonetheless. A thin stream of moonlight lit the room enough for me to make out a long shadowy figure.

A wraith. I’d tangled with one a few months ago, managing to hack off its arms. I was guessing it was back for round two.

The thing was blocking the door between me and my bedroom, which is where my athame was. I’d need my knife if I had any hope of making it out alive.

There was another shadow by the front door. He’d brought a friend. Fantastic.

Sawyer’s warning had given me a few precious seconds. The wraiths didn’t know I was awake.

Wraiths used to be human and still retained a certain humanlike appearance, until you got close enough to look into their cold dead eyes and then you realized they weren’t human in the least. By then it was too late. The trick was not to let them get too close or they’d rip out your heart and have it for a snack.

I needed to get to my athame. I jumped over the coffee table, but my foot caught on the cans and sent them falling. The noise distracted my guests for a split second while I made a run for the bedroom.

I charged the wraith blocking my way. As I had suspected, it was the same wraith who’d attacked me at Hell’s Belles a few months ago. Its arm was missing, which meant it wasn’t there to invite me to tea. I needed to finish the job this time or it would finish me.

Only a necromancer could summon and control a wraith, but Sawyer had been the only necromancer in Minneapolis, and he was dead. It was finally occurring to me that Sawyer might not have been the only necromancer in town, just the only one I knew about.

The wraith saw me coming, but I kicked its legs out from under it and charged into the bedroom. I headed for my athame, grabbed the handle, and pivoted, but the thing was already upon me.

The wraith opened its mouth and the smell of rotting flesh filled the room. I threw a lamp at it, but it kept coming. I choked back vomit and lunged for it. The knife went in with a wet noise and the wraith fell to the floor, gushing dark noxious blood all over my floor.