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“And yet I do not have to be told that an old woman’s life is not only important because of how her granddaughter could be used!” Aurox hurled back at him.

Kalona reached for him, wanting to shake Aurox by the scruff of his shirt again, but Thanatos interceded. “No, the boy is being truthful. He does care for Sylvia.”

“He is also a creation of Darkness!”

Thanatos’s eyes widened. “Yes, he absolutely is. And that, Warrior, may very well prove to be Sylvia Redbird’s salvation.” The High Priestess began walking quickly away, leaving Kalona and Aurox staring after her. “Well, what are you waiting for? Come with me!” she called without pausing.

Kalona and Aurox shared a confused look, and then did as their High Priestess commanded.

Zoey

I couldn’t sleep. All I could do was worry about Grandma. I tried not to think about everything that Neferet could be doing to her, but my mind was filled with images of Grandma being hurt—or worse.

Neferet could have killed her.

“Stop thinking that!” Stark had told me sternly when he and I curled up in bed together. “You don’t know that’s happened, and you’re driving yourself crazy thinking it.”

“I know. I know. But I can’t help it. Stark, I can’t lose her. Not Grandma!” I’d buried my face in his chest and hung on to him.

He’d tried to reassure me, to comfort me, and for a while I had found comfort in his touch. I’d focused on his love and his strength. He was my Guardian, my Warrior, and my lover. He grounded me.

Then the sun rose and he fell asleep, leaving me alone with my thoughts. Not even Nala’s purr machine could turn my mind off. Seriously, all I wanted to do was to curl up in the corner and cry into my cat’s soft orange fur.

But that wouldn’t get Grandma back.

I knew my restlessness would wake up Stark, and while the sun was up that wasn’t a good thing, so I kissed Nala on her nose and tiptoed quietly from the room. My feet automatically took me to the kitchen where I foraged for a can of cold brown pop and a bag of nacho cheese Doritos. I sat at the table for a while, wishing someone would wake up and talk to me. No one showed up. I didn’t blame them. We’d been up early the day before, and everyone was stressed out. They needed to sleep. Hell, I needed to sleep.

Instead I stared at my phone, drank brown pop, and ate a bag of chips.

I also cried.

If Neferet had Grandma it was my fault. I was the one who’d gotten Marked and caused a bomb to explode in my human family.

“I shouldn’t have kept in contact with any of them.” I hiccupped a little sob. “If I’d broken from them, Neferet would have never known anything about my mom or my grandma. They’d be safe … alive…” I wiped the Dorito cheese on my jeans and used a paper towel to blow my nose. “I brought all of this vampyre crap on my family.” I put my face in the paper towel and bawled like a two-year-old. “That’s what I feel like—a damn toddler. Helpless! Stupid! Useless!” I sobbed. “Nyx! Where are you? Please help me. I need you so much!”

Then grow up, daughter. Be a woman, a High Priestess, and not a child.

Her voice filled my mind. I lifted my head, blinking quickly and wiping snot from my face. The earthen walls of the tu

She was absolutely and completely beautiful—every single pound and curve of her, which totally made me rethink my idea of “fat.”

She opened her eyes, and I saw that they were amethyst crystals, kind and warm and the color of violets.

“Nyx!”

Yes, u-we-tsi-a-ge-ya, that is one of my names. Though your ancestors would know me as Earth Mother.

“You’re my grandma’s Goddess, too!”

She smiled and it was hard for me to keep looking directly at her because she was so incredibly lovely. I do know Sylvia Redbird.

“Can you help her? I think she’s in big trouble right now!” I clenched my hands together.

Your grandmother knows me well. She may cloak herself in the power of my earth, as may any of my children if they choose to walk my path.

“Thank you! Thank you! Will you tell me where she is and then help me save her?”

You have the means for both, Zoey Redbird.

“I don’t understand! Please, for Grandma’s sake, help me,” I begged the Goddess.

She smiled again, and it was even more blinding. But I answered you when first you beseeched me. If you are to save your grandmother and, ultimately, your people, you will have to grow up. Be a woman, a High Priestess, and not a child.

“But I want to be, I just don’t know how. Could you please teach me?” I bit my lip to keep from crying again.

How to be the woman you were meant to be is something no one can teach you. You must find the way yourself. But know this: a child sits, weeps, and dissolves into self-pity and depression. A High Priestess takes action. Which way will you choose, Zoey Redbird?

“The right way! I want to choose the right way. But I need your help!”

As always, you have it. What I have gifted I never take back. I wish you, my precious u-we-tsi-a-ge-ya, to blessed be …

And the Goddess sank into the wall of the tu

I sat there and stared at the wall, thinking about what the Goddess had said. I realized what I felt was mostly embarrassment. Basically, the Great Earth Mother had just told me to quit whining. I wiped my face again. I sucked down the last of my brown pop.

Then I made my decision. Out loud.

“Time to grow up. Time to stop bawling. Time to do something. And that means if I’m not sleeping, my herd of nerds isn’t sleeping, either—sun or no sun.”

I retraced my path down the tu

“What’s happenin’, Z?” Stevie Rae answered on the third ring and sounded groggy.

“Get dressed, get a green candle, and meet me in the basement,” I said, and hung up. Aphrodite was next.

“Someone better be dead,” she said as her hello.

“I’m go

“Please tell me I can call Shaunee and Queen Damien and wake them up, too,” she said.

“Absolutely. Tell them to bring their circle candles. Oh, and have Shaunee grab Erin’s blue candle. You may be standing in for water.”

“I have a better idea, but that’s nothing new. Anyway, see you soon.”

By that time I’d gotten to my room. I didn’t hesitate. High Priestesses aren’t hesitant babies. They act. So, I acted.

“Stark, wake up.” I shook his shoulder.

He blinked, peering up through his cute, messy hair at me. “What’s wrong? You okay?”

“What’s wrong is we’re not sleeping until we have a plan to save Grandma.”

He sat up, dislodging Nala from his hip and making her mutter grumpy old lady cat noises at him. “But Kalona went to rescue Grandma.”

“Would you trust Kalona to babysit Nala?”

Stark rubbed his eyes. “No, probably not. Why do you want Kalona to babysit Nala?”

“I don’t. I’m just proving my point. Here’s the deal: I don’t want him to be who I trust to rescue my grandma.”

“Okay, so what now?”

“Now, we circle.” I went to the little table beside our bed and grabbed a lighter and the thick purple pillar candle that sat there, smelling like lavender and my childhood. I breathed deeply. Then I told Stark, “Get dressed and meet me in the basement.”