Page 48 of Tangled Threads Of Fate

I looked up at Nate, who shrugged. Maybe he could talk to animals. Far less strange than having a lion’s head, probably.

Erus turned to me, his eyes soft. “You should tell us more about yourself. We know very little, except that you spoke to an Oracle and that you’re pregnant. What did you do before this all started?”

I wanted to give him some warmhearted story about how wonderful my life had been to this point, but honestly, it made sense that I was somehow mixed up in a Greek tragedy.

“She’s been on the earth for barely twenty years—how interesting could it be?” Demke sneered.

Milo tensed beside me and shot Demke a look that promised violence if he didn’t watch his tone. It was an expression that looked a lot like indigestion.

On my other side, Nate stiffened, putting his drink back down on the table. He eyed the men around the table with barely restrained disdain. “Perhaps we should go back to the rooms so you can get some rest.”

I did feel tired. Creating three people was exhausting.

I gave him a wan smile. “Okay.” I looked around the table. “Thank you for lunch. It was delicious,” I said to Demke, my voice polite. I ran a hand across Milo’s shoulders, and he leaned into my touch.

I needed time to digest all the revelations of this morning, and I intended to do that while snuggled in the safety of Nate’s arms.

Chapter 24

ERASTUS

As soon as Wren left, the vibe of the table changed. It didn’t help that Tryp was well and truly on the way to being trashed and that Milo’s eyes followed her until she disappeared into the house.

It also didn’t help that something lurched in my chest, compelling me to follow her, and it took an awful lot of willpower to squash it down. Even then, the urge sat there like a weight, rippling over my skin and whispering in my brain to go to her.

The compulsion hadn’t even been this bad with the Goddess. I’d wanted to be with her all the time, but out of devotion, not because the threads of fate were tugging around me like I was caught in a fisherman’s net.

“Well, that was interesting,” Teron said, sipping his drink.

Demke growled beneath his breath. “Interesting isn’t the term I’d use, old friend.”

“The girl didn’t mean it.” I was already jumping to her defense, though I knew in my heart that even if I wasn’t now tied to her, I’d feel the same. She’d looked distraught at the idea.

Giving me a haughty look that he’d perfected so well, he took a sip of his drink. “Purposeful or not, she’s pulled you deep into her web. Even now, I can tell you want to leave and go to her.”

Teron was giving him a sharp look, but I couldn’t deny his words. I was saved from replying by Tryp’s forehead hitting the wooden table top. “I just want to fuck her.”

I rolled my eyes, stroking my fingertips down his muscular back. “You wanted to fuck her before your fates were tied.”

“Didn’t say I didn’t.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes, and our connection told me that he wasn’t quite as dismissive of what had just transpired as he’d like to pretend.

Shaking my head, I looked back at our leader. Demke had guided us from death more times than I cared to admit over the last few Ages. “So, what do we do now?”

“Teron and I stay the hell away from her,” he grumbled, but Teron merely squinted an eye at him.

“I’m not going to do that. She needs medical observation. I can’t do that from six feet away.”

Curling his lip in a sneer, Demke stared down his oldest friend. “I’m not going to lose you too.”

The mirthless smile on Teron’s face was filled with pain. “You think I would wish to stay on this plane of existence without my closest companions, my family? I’d rather go back into the tapestry with them than suffer an even lonelier existence without them.”

Demke’s eyes burned, but he didn’t try to dispute Teron’s words.

I posed the question to Demke about what we would do, but I knew that despite the fact he was our leader, I had a new purpose now. One that had its hooks in my soul and wouldn’t relent until she was safe.

Was it weird to feel relieved? To have a purpose once more? A new Goddess. I shied away from the thought. No, not a newGoddess. I’d had one of those and I didn’t want another. Wren could be something new to me, perhaps something more than anything I’d had before.

I bit through a warm grape, letting the juice pool on my lip. “We should fortify. Strengthen the wards. Put out a call to the people who watch the edges of our territory, in case other Pantheons or the Fates try their hand at entering our territory once more.”

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