Total pages in book: 20
Estimated words: 18410 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 92(@200wpm)___ 74(@250wpm)___ 61(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 18410 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 92(@200wpm)___ 74(@250wpm)___ 61(@300wpm)
A fortnight later everything was ready. Now, all Arianna had to do was to convince her friend Matilda to perform the ritual.
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Matilda and her husband sat on the couch together and listened to Arianna explain her plan with precision and with care, proving to them that although she had been idle during her stay, her mind had not.
Arianna knew the entire plan hinged on her friend’s acceptance of the unspeakable, so once she spoke all she had to say, she got up to give the couple some alone time to debate among themselves. to give the couple a sense of privacy.
When she returned Matilda was standing at the window, watching the New York traffic outside, her husband nowhere to be seen.
“You know what you ask of me, Arianna?” Matilda asked without looking back at her.
“Yes.” Arianna replied simply. Matilda would be considered a practitioner of dark arts, might even be banned from the local coven. The residual of the dark art would reflect upon every work she performed after that.
“Have you talked to Archer?”
“No.”
“Are you going to?” Matilda turned to look at her friend.
Arianna met her eyes with a steady gaze. None of the grief and pain she had left with a fortnight ago showed through. “No. You will tell him you have no news of me, as you have been doing for the past year.”
Matilda sighed and came to stand beside Arianna, taking her friend’s hand into her dark ones. “Can’t you find another way?”
“I have tried. There is no other option.”
“If I do what you ask of me,” Matilda inhaled a deep breath, recomposed her thoughts. “You understand you will be human. You will lose what is essentially you.”
Arianna’s soft green eyes held no doubt, no fear. “I know.”
“You might forget about everyone, everything. I don’t know if I can spare that part.”
“I understand.”
“How are you going to teach the child if you can’t remember? If you don’t have any more magic?”
“I won’t.”
“You…” Matilda dropped Arianna’s hand, huffed a humorless laugh. “You want to forget, don’t you? You think that if I do this, the pain will go away, that you will no longer grieve?”
Arianna didn’t reply, didn’t feed her friend any bull.
Matilda turned around, moved away a few steps. Whirled back, her brown eyes blazing with anger. “What about those of us you’ll leave behind? Don’t we get to grieve, to feel?”
“If we don’t do this it won’t matter who can grieve or not, Mattie. The portal can’t be closed. If we kill Remo, even for a few weeks, the portal could activate at a time he isn’t present to capture the beings. I’m giving you a chance here to close the portal and get rid of Remo.” Arianna opened both her hands and showed the empty palms to her friend. “I can’t do this again and know I will lose what I cherish in the end, Mattie. This way, I give you all I have without the pain of me feeling.”
“And get a chance to live a normal life, away from everyone.”
“Do you begrudge me that wish, Mattie?”
“And if it doesn’t work? Then we lose you for nothing?”
“It will work. I have both the Sidhe queens invested on the plan.”
“Both? Seelie and Unseelie? You bargained with them?” Matilda asked in horror.
“Not bargained, no.” Arianna said. “I explained the situation, told them I could give them a weapon to fight the invasion. They are both willing to teach it all it will need – mentally, physically, magically. It’s the best weapon I can make, the best plan –”
“It’s a baby!” Matilda exploded. “It’s a life, for God’s sake, not a weapon!”
Arianna’s eyes iced over, her voice cooled. “It’s a weapon, Matilda, that will be created for this sole purpose. It will be raised and trained by both Sidhe queens to become this deadly weapon that will save all those planets. At the end, it too, will die to protect you all. Don’t belittle it.”
Matilda swallowed a terse reply, knowing she had hit a festering wound. “What about Archer?” she tried again.
“He already thinks I’m dead. He’s already grieved for me. I am not his mate, Matilda. He’ll find someone, eventually.”
Matilda closed her eyes briefly, grief already beginning to carve a hole inside her.
“And if I do it wrong?”
“You won’t.”
“Maybe if I leave something for you to build on, you won’t have to forget, to… to...” Matilda almost choked on the word “Maybe, like with Cara, maybe I don’t have to dabble in the dark power. I can invert some of your energy inward, we can work something from there.”
Arianna didn’t say anything. They had already tried that before and it hadn’t worked. Furthermore, she didn’t want to raise a child, or be part of that child’s life, knowing she would be sacrificing it later on.
Matilda exhaled deeply. “It will take time pulling everything inward, getting it ready.”