Fatal Circle

“The bite was just for show, Nana.” The lie tumbled out so easily when I heard her fear and worry trembling in her voice. “The other . . . the culprit is being questioned. We’re all fine. I’m okay, really. What’s happening there? How’s Beverley?”

Nana sighed and I could hear her relax in the sound of it. “She got a perfect score on her spelling and vocabulary semester test, so we went to the movies to celebrate.”

What? Doesn’t she know how dangerous it is to take Beverley away from the safety wards of the house? But they couldn’t stay inside forever. According to Aquula, Fax Torris’s threat stated she’d go after Beverley if I didn’t deliver Menessos at dawn on Sunday. We had a little time.

The first part of the plan had to make sure the fairies thought we were complying with that. Then they had to be stopped once and for all.

Then it hit me: Aquula’s death meant that severing the ties to Menessos was as easy as killing the remaining two fairies. Our plan had to utilize that, and somehow strengthen Menessos against that dual loss.

“. . . left Ares out,” Nana was saying. “I thought he’d be okay, but he chewed up one of your couch pillows. I’ll replace it. And I promise we’ll remember to crate him before we go out again.”

“Good.” If only the worst of the problems I faced was a teething Great Dane. I unbuckled the boots.

“And the men came to install the security system this morning. Done and gone in three hours. Said it secured the house against intruders as well as the painting. And while they were here, a contractor showed up to give a quote on renovating the dining room into a bedroom. He said that it would actually be better to just add a whole room and a bathroom than to take away the dining room.”

“What about the cellar entry?” I dropped the first boot aside.

“He drew a picture on that grid paper to show you what he means.”

“I’m anxious to see it.” I considered. “With just a crawlspace under it, we may have to put heated flooring in to keep your room from getting too cold in the winter.” I wiggled the second boot off.

“This quote isn’t cheap, Persephone, and I don’t think any heated flooring was included in his estimate.”

“You’re worth it, Nana. How are your knees feeling?” I never got the chance to ask Xerxadrea to teach Nana how she did that mist trick. I wished I could tell Nana about Xerxadrea’s death, but—if she knew an Eldre

“Steady.” She paused. I sank on the bed and drew covers over me, threw them down again, rose up and got the bloodstone. “What was it that Joh

The sigh that left my lips must have sounded like a yawn through the phone. “The fairy. Aquula. She died, Nana.”

“Oh.” She was silent a moment. “I’m sorry.”

“Me, too.”

“You must be worn out.”

“Yeah. I am.” I held the stone tight and let it bleed energy into my palm. “And Nana, please don’t go anywhere. Threats have been made. I’d feel better if you’d promise me that you won’t take Beverley away from the house and wards this weekend.”

“But—”

“No buts, Nana. This is serious. The fairy made a threat against Beverley again. And you. Promise me?”

She delayed. “I promise.”

“Thank you, Nana. I . . . I love you.” I didn’t tell her that nearly as much as I should.

“I love you too, Persephone.”

I was asleep as soon as I closed the phone; the bloodstone was still in my hand.

When I woke, Joh

My first thought was to wake him and find Menessos and tell them about the soul-sharing. My second thought reminded me Joh

In the tub, when the water temperature was just right, I relaxed in the heated fluid and steam surrounding me.

I flipped my meditation switch to on and hit my alpha state—my meditation mode. Visualizing the grove of old ash trees beside a swift-flowing river, I imagined walking toward the water.

My skin seemed dim. As if the sunshine here weren’t touching me.

Proceeding with my method of cleaning my chakras, I sat on a rock and stuck my toes into the water. My shields begged to be let loose, to be eased for just a short time. Here, alone, it was safe to let go. I gave in and tried to loosen that protection the same way a flexed muscle relaxes. But the shields seemed cramped in place, and would not lower.

Typically, if my body was clothed when I meditated, I was clothed here within the meditation. If, like now, I meditated in the tub, I showed up here naked. So, I scrutinized my exposed skin. All of me was coated in something murky.

The coating was all the emotions my life path had cultivated. The ones I didn’t want, like despondency, panic, shame, fear, and grief. The ebb and flow of emotions was healthy, but I’d been shoving all these feelings down and tucking them far away. Tucking them here. They weren’t released, so they didn’t recede naturally. Instead, these emotions were dammed up. And they stagnated.

Like mold on past-ripe fruit, this darkness was the rot of what was meant to nourish me. This was the apathy I’d protected myself with while, like an emotional anorexic, I avoided the buffet of negative feelings my life had served me lately.

Sure, I’d devoured the laughter and the happiness, the contentedness. But, to be the Lustrata, to be balanced, I had to ingest the negative emotions, too. I had to consume all of it to truly own my life and my destiny.

That’s part of the cost.

I’d thought that, to accomplish all I had to do, a barrier around my emotions would be helpful. And this was the apathetic wall I had to show for it. I’d been building up my shields in the last few weeks, taking them down less and less, strengthening them by constant use. With Menessos bouncing all over my emotional trampoline, and my being absent from this place of cleansing and release, I’d been reinforcing these shields with the mortar of pain, guilt, denial, and mourning.

But strength had to be balanced with vulnerability. Closing off to the negatives meant not being open to the positives.

I understood what I’d done now, but undoing this damage would not be easy. Nor should it be.

I leaned over the water and looked at my reflection.

I could leave this murky shield alone. Let it get thick and so solid it would never come down.

My eyes adjusted to see through that reflection, to the things under the surface, the stream bed, the stones.

Nana once told me how if you peer into a stream during the day you see your reflection. But if you look in the stream on a moonless night, you’ll see the stream bed. She’d said, “You’ve been exposed to the dark, so you’re seeing below the surface, now, Persephone. You’re seeing the beauty in the smooth stones, but you must also feel the slime covering them. Slime that, if you’re not mindful of your footing, will cause you to slip . . .”

I’d slipped. There was slime on me that would make me someone I didn’t want to be. I didn’t want to be unable to care, to be cold and indifferent. I’d rather be strong and vulnerable.

In that instant I stood and clawed at the murky surface of emotion. Rending a hole, I released those feelings I’d resisted and fought against. Sobbing and staggering further into the river, I tried to use those emotions, to convert them into anger and rage, to fuel the destruction of that barrier. But the wave of anguish was too strong, the barrier too thick. The more I dug at the shield, the deeper the emotion became. Relentless, I tore until my fingers, in the meditation, were bloody.