Descendant

“Good luck with that,” Douglas said.

Toby raised an eyebrow at Cal’s father. “I’m listening,” he said.

“The fog,” Cal’s father said. “It’s not natural.”

“Told ya.” Rafe shot Mason a look.

Douglas looked over at his son. “Your mother’s been busy. Don’t ask me how, but she’s called up a Miasma curse.”

It was the first time that Mason had ever heard Toby Fortier swear in a language that she didn’t know. She raised a weary hand. “What’s a Miasma curse?”

“It’s a kind of blood magick.” Toby looked as if he wanted to kick a wall in. “Brutal blood magick.”

“Care to elaborate?” Fennrys asked.

Mason found it faintly comforting that Fennrys didn’t know what they were talking about either as Toby and Douglas exchanged a laden glance. Douglas reached for a television remote and hit the on button. “These news reports started coming in when you were out in the river.”

A harried-looking news reporter from a station in New Jersey was sitting behind a desk commenting on a sudden, widespread affliction that had swept through Manhattan in a matter of minutes, accompanied by a thick fog, that had caused virtually all the city’s inhabitants to fall into a kind of torpor. Traffic cams and ATM surveillance footage showed people lying crumpled on the sidewalks or slumped over tables in restaurants. Some still shuffled erratically down the streets, like sleepwalkers. Wrecked cars from drivers who’d gone catatonic at the wheel were scattered all over the road, along with pools of blood and broken glass.

The news anchor spoke of repeated attempts to contact their affiliates in the Manhattan stations, to no avail. The National Guard and terrorist response teams had been called in. No one had any idea what was happening. But it seemed that anyone who made it inside the fog barrier—even lowered from helicopters in full protective hazmat gear and respirators—succumbed almost instantly. New York, it seemed, was under siege. Authorities had offered varying opinions as to whether it was natural, biochemical, or something else entirely. None of them had so far speculated that the attack was of a mystical origin.

Mason couldn’t tear her eyes away from the screen.

Eventually, Fennrys cleared his throat and said, “So what you’re saying is that we’re not getting into Manhattan anytime soon.”

“That’s pretty much what I’m saying, yes.” Toby ran a hand over his face. “It would seem that, somehow, Daria Aristarchos has managed to procure herself a kin killer. A powerful one. And she’s found an even more powerful conduit to draw on all the stray magick that’s been pouring into the river from the rift between the realms. She’s using both to focus that power and channel it into casting a curse.”

“Her conduit is probably that haruspex she’s been keeping on the payroll,” Douglas said.

Toby nodded. “Most likely.”

Mason raised her hand again. “What’s a haruspex?”

Douglas grimaced in distaste. “A diviner. Normally someone who reads the entrails of slaughtered animals to see the future.”

“And yeah,” Rafe added. “That is as disgusting as it sounds.”

“This one,” Douglas continued, “if it’s the girl I think it is, can also tap into deeper magick. Much deeper. She’s sort of like a supercharged sorceress . . . the kind that only comes along once in a thousand years. Like Semiramis, or Merlin, or Medea. Only in this case, this girl has never been in control of the magick, or even her ability to access it. Anything beyond reading the future in the guts of a goat, and she needs someone else to pull the strings and channel the magick into a working enchantment.” He spun his chair in a half circle and wheeled over to the tall window, yanking the pale curtain aside and peering out, even though the view was mostly just darkness and trees. “That someone, in this case,” he said, “would be my beloved ex-wife. The harpy.”

“She is?” Rafe asked.

“Oh. Ah, no.” Douglas grinned sourly. “I only meant that as an insult. She’s not an actual harpy.”

“There was one of those outside her window, though. Last week. I saw it . . . with this guy.” Cal pointed at Rafe. “You were there with Mason’s brother. You work with my mom.”

“Not exactly.” Rafe shrugged. “I maintain alliances with several factions. Mostly, I’m just trying to work at keeping the status quo. And Roth was secretly meeting with Daria because he doesn’t want Ragnarok any more than the rest of us. No matter what his father thinks.”

“Can somebody please cut to the chase here?” Mason stood up and paced restlessly. “I mean, I get it. There is very suddenly a whole lot more to the world—the worlds—than I ever thought. I understand that Gosforth is some kind of . . . link. Hub. Whatever. I get that we’re all caught up in this. What I want to know is what this really is.” She gestured in the general direction of the city. “This Miasma. Blood curse. Whatever. I mean, okay, my dad—who is clearly a lunatic—wants to end the world. But . . . aside from stopping him, what does your mom want?”

“Well . . . ,” Douglas answered for Cal. “Daria does want to avert the end of the world. But only because she wants to reshape the world in her own, particular way. And she can’t do that if Gunnar Starling wipes the slate clean. Now that he’s ready to pull the trigger on Ragnarok, Daria is desperate. But the same set of circumstances that give Gunnar his chance also give Daria her own window of opportunity.”

“The rift between the realms,” Rafe said.

Douglas nodded. “All that arcane energy leaking out into the East River. Exactly. With Manhattan completely surrounded by water, the flow of magick is circling the island like a castle moat.”

“So that’s why she’s used the Miasma—she’s drawing it up out of the water in order to isolate the island. She’s turning Manhattan into an arena.” Toby grunted. “Her own personal coliseum.”

“A fit stage for a fight to the death,” Douglas said, “between her forces and Gunnar Starling’s for what is, in her mind, the noblest of causes.”

“And a whole shit-ton of collateral damage means nothing to her,” Fennrys said, the words laced with disgust.

Douglas sighed. “No. It doesn’t. We used to argue bitterly about it. In her dearest-held dreams, she wants to turn the mortal realm back into a place that the gods—her gods, the Greek gods—would once again feel welcome in. The role of humanity would simply be to serve those gods.”

“All of which sounds pretty much like ending the world, too,” Cal murmured. “At least, the world as we know it.”

Douglas nodded. “And most people’s existence in it. That is, unless they have a fondness for toiling in the service of a bunch of spoiled-rotten superior beings. No offense.” He nodded at Rafe.

“None taken.” The god nodded graciously. “I am rather superior. And I naturally assume the ‘spoiled-rotten’ was directed at others.”

“I can’t believe Mom would do this,” Cal murmured.

“Gunnar’s forced her hand. But really, his Ragnarok ambitions are just a convenient excuse for her, son,” Douglas said. “A way to get her biggest competition and, to date, her strongest deterrent out of the way once and for all.”

“She’s using the threat of Ragnarok to convince the other Eleusinians that what she’s doing is to protect them,” Toby explained. “And all of humanity.”

“If only she were that noble of spirit,” Douglas said. “The reality of it is, she’s always wanted this kind of power for herself. Power and revenge.”

“Revenge?” Mason asked.

“Yelena Starling was Daria’s best and dearest friend,” Douglas said. “From the time they were kids, those two were inseparable—closer than sisters—and Daria was the one who introduced Yelena to Gunnar way back in the day. She’d never admit it, but I think she holds herself partially responsible for Mason’s mother’s death because of that. Of course, nowhere near as responsible as she holds Gunnar. And I hate to say it, you, Mason . . .”

There was compassion in Douglas’s green eyes. But Mason wanted none of it just then. She knew perfectly well what she was responsible for. And what she wasn’t. And most of all, she knew what she would never be responsible for—and that was the end of the