Page 74 of Right Hand Of The Reaper
Thane grabbed my hand. “Come with me.”
He dragged me from the room, up the stairs and onto a long gallery. There was a march of footprints behind me and, as I glanced over my shoulder, I saw Atticus, the twins and Magnus in hot pursuit.
“Where are we going?” I asked but the God didn’t answer. “Thane!”
He stopped so suddenly that I slammed into his back. “Do you know whose house this is?”
“What?” I was confused. “I thought it was yours.”
He shook his head. “It was left to my safekeeping, but it isn’t mine.”
“Whose is it?” Atticus asked as he stepped closer, almost slowly as if he didn’t want to startle Thane.
“I don’t know why I didn’t see it before,” Thane muttered, his eyes wide and a little wild. It was strange seeing the guy so frazzled.
“See what? You’re not making any sense,” I said.
His hand squeezed mine and I felt the bones in my hand crunch together. “You. She’s you.”
“You’re gonna need to start making some more sense, Grim,” Rafe drawled. “Talking in riddles isn’t going to help anyone.”
Thane looked deep into my eyes. “But she’s you. Don’t you see it?”
I stepped closer to him and placed my free hand on his cheek. “Who Thane? Who do you see?”
He pointed over my shoulder. “You. I see you.”
“Oh, fuck,” someone muttered. Another person gasped. Whatever was behind me couldn’t be good.
I turned around and found myself staring at a giant portrait.
Of me.
But it wasn’t me. It couldn’t be. She was wearing clothes that were at least two centuries old. Dressed in a deep midnight blue, with a pile of brilliantly white hair piled in curls on her head, was a woman who was the spitting image of me. She smiled, like she was amused by something that was a little saucy. A juicy secret perhaps.
“There are more,” Atticus said as he wandered down the long gallery.
I followed him, looking at all the portraits. She was in all of them, from various periods in history. Just the same in each one. The same hair and eyes, the same saucy smile.
“Who is she?” I asked, turning back to Thane.
There was a look of disbelief on his face, a wariness in his eyes as he watched me walk back to him. “Nyx.”
My stomach lurched. “How is that even possible?”
“I don’t know,” he replied with a shrug.
“Reincarnation?” Atticus asked as he looked at a portrait of her from the eighteenth century.
“Maybe,” Thane said as he went to stand by the demon’s side. “But I’m not sure how. I don’t think this is the same woman. I think each of these women existed in their own time period.”
“Why?” I asked.
“We’d have heard about someone existing beyond their time,” Magnus said simply. “That sort of thing wouldn’t have gone unnoticed.”
I joined Thane at the portrait. The dress she stood in this time was a deep ruby red, the same shade as Magnus’ eyes.
Wait. The first portrait I saw, she was wearing midnight blue, the shade of Atticus’ hair.
