Page 41 of Call of the Ride
Seeing she needed to intervene before we devolved into another primal fuckfest, Marena quickly offered to take us directly to Cassandra’s through her underground network of mystical tunnels. No sooner had we left Veles and Jarilo behind in the Nav than we found ourselves back in London, a few blocks away from the Emporium.
Tan’s rage had apparently heated to a low boil again, as he banged through the front door so violently it almost flew off its hinges. “Where the fuck are you, Cass?!” he boomed, his powerful light incinerating the beaded curtains as he stalked through them toward the back. I jogged after him, trying not to get distracted by the strap-ons displayed in the adult area.
Now is not the time, Ace.
“I’m back here, crab cake!” Cassandra’s brogue rang out, sounding not in the least concerned for the vengeful man headed her way. My eyes adjusted to the low light of the back room, and I noticed the seer wearing a dark blue robe as she slowly circled the room, lighting countless candles. “I assume you’re here for my blood, not that it will do you any good in helping you find Matthew. Alas, you always were an impulsive boy who barely knew his arse from his elbow.”
Sounds like my cue.
Before Tan could actually murder the woman, I interjected, “Ms. Moonstone, Tanhas just used hisimpressivepsychic abilities to reveal a conversation between you and Matthew from only a few weeks ago. It sounded as if he were flying to London—to the Tower of London, to be exact—to meetyou,of all people. So, you can appreciate how we are justdyingto hear what you have to say for yourself.”
I dropped the politeness, wrapping Cassandra in a bubble of threatening heat, hearing Tan purr with satisfaction as her eyes widened in fear. Unsure if I was the one controlling my power, or vice versa, but feeling something close to euphoria either way, I moved closer to the trembling seer. “And understand, this is the only chance I will give you to tell us the truth.”
Chapter 32
Vasilisa
Watching my Rider threaten a potential enemy—feeling his power thundering through our bond—sparked a level of satisfaction and desire in me that was unmatched. Recalling how desperate Asa had been to please me, I made a mental note to compliment him later on how he handled the situation.
On what a good job he did.
“I’m not working for Matthew, you blooming idiots!” Cassandra huffed, apparently more interested in indignation than repentance. “Yes, I have had the displeasure of knowing the man for quite a few decades, but I just can’t seem to get rid of him—like a nasty rash.”
“As fucking delightful as that mental image is, Moonstone,” Nox interrupted. “We’re going to need you to start talking. How the hell do you know my father?”
Cassandra sighed and nodded before gesturing toward the pentagram at the center of the room. I suddenly noticed there were cushions, evenly spaced around the circle with just enough for all of us to sit, as if she’d known exactly who was coming.
Of course she did.
We sat, some more begrudgingly than others, and Cassandra grabbed what looked like a grimoire before joining us. “Nox, I hope you realize by now that your father has been involved in occultism for quite some time. Because if you don’t, you’re dumber than you look.” This seer allowed her insult to hang in the air a minute before continuing. “To answer your question, I first met Matthew about 40 years ago, during a summer solstice gathering at Stonehenge. Of course, I was high as a godsdamned kite at the time, so I don’t remember much about our initial meeting. But then he showed up at the doorstep of my Emporium a week later...”
“And you’ve been helping him ever since, I gather,” Tan growled at the woman, but she simply gazed at him with a surprising level of sympathy.
“Tanny, the gift of the sight is a tricky beast. We can’t control how it manifests, or even when it will come to our aid. With me, I have what the Scottish call second sight, which mostly allows me to foretell disaster and unfortunate circumstances. Zehra, on the other hand, has been gifted the ability to see someone’s destiny when given the right circumstances, including her own. And then we haveyou,little lamb. Even with how new you are to this, you accessed a past conversation you weren’t even present for, whichisimpressive. Given your parentage on both sides, there’s no telling what you might be capable of...and I hope you can trust me enough after this to help you hone this talent.”
The seer patiently observed him for a moment, but when my Bright Dawn gave her nothing but a scowl, she simply sighed. “What I’m getting at, in my lovable, roundabout way, is that even I didn’t see this coming. I didn’t know the type of man I was dealing with at first—what he was capable of.”
“Why does Matthew believe he alone is destined to be Vasi’s Rider?Allof her Riders, in fact...” Asa quietly asked, and I gaped at him in shock. While Matthew had insisted I belonged to him when he cornered me in the Facility’s restricted area, I hadn’t realized how deep the delusion went.
Cassandra winced. “It might be because I told him that. Not on purpose!” she quickly added as my men growled in unison, like feral beasts. “Matthew was loitering in my shop one day—scaring away my customers with that mean face of his. So, I decided to pass the time with a good old-fashioned tarot card reading. I planned to simply give him some wild geese to chase, but a blasted vision overtook me in the middle of the session.” The seer trailed off, opening her grimoire to absently flip through the pages, and I narrowed my eyes, suspecting she was stalling.
We don’t have time for this!
“What. Did. You. Tell. My father?” Nox gritted out, echoing my frustration.
She snapped her gaze to Nox’s face. “I simply saw that he would play an important role in the legend of Vasilisa and her Riders—that he was integral to her Riders being awakened. Unfortunately, Matthew then went and fell down a research rabbit hole, probably aided by a mix of radical occultists and Google. When he showed up at my door again, he’d convinced himself that if he could somehow becomeall three Riders,he would become immortal. I didn’t have a clue how to untanglethatmental mess, so I simply ignored it, hoping the fruit loop would eventually let it go and move on.”
“He didn’t let it go, unfortunately,” Asa frowned. “Mokosh told us he then showed up in the village of Temnota, probably to gather knowledge from the priestesses there who still followed the old ways.”
Cassandra nodded grimly. “Yes, I suspected as much, but at that point, I was focused on Zehra and couldn’t be bothered with random loonies. By the time I saw Matthew again, he’d connected with some equally batshit men and was running a Facility out in the woods like a movie villain in his lair. Apparently, HQ is here in London somewhere, so I’ve been kept in the loop more or less every time Matthew disgraces the city with his presence.”
“So you humored the wanker, just so you could keep tabs on his craziness?” Tan hesitantly asked, his expression hopeful. I suddenly realized that much of the anger he was directing at Cass also came from a place of deep hurt and betrayal. Probably because so much else in his life had been proven false, he desperately wanted–needed–this to be true.
And I hope, for his sake, it is.
Cassandra held Tan’s gaze for a long moment before she replied, “To be honest, Tanny, it took me an embarrassingly long time to fully recognize how dangerous Matthew was. As mentioned, I’d been consumed with preparing your mum for her own destiny, which was related to Matthew’s, ironically. Again, my understanding of the bigger picture only went so far. While I'd assisted Zehra with creating one of Vasilisa’s Riders, I had no way of knowing the status of the other two. It wasn't until Nox was yanked back from the darkness with that ugly mug of his that I realized just how intertwined it all was.”
She paused, looking down at the grimoire again, her normally carefree expression deeply troubled. “Should I have done more to convince Matthew that his delusions of grandeur were mistaken? Perhaps. But then, would Nox have been created with the help of a goddess among priestesses in a remote village? Even with the sight, it's difficult to see all the twists and turns along the path. However, since I’ve learned just how evil Matthew and his minions are, I have done everything in my power to impede what he’s trying to accomplish. That, I swear to you.”
