“Yes, you said that too.” Ur’syth turned to peer up at the drow, one shoulder hunched to the side. She cocked her head and sneered. “Did you bring her here to label me a heretic, or to prove to yourself that you’ve achieved whatever victory you sought?”
He stared calmly down at her and shrugged. “Both, most likely.”
The crone narrowed her eyes at him, then burst into wheezing, gasping cackles.
L’zar’s golden eyes flickered toward Cheyenne’s. Her nostrils flared and she shook her head. Proof for me too. No one in this world is sane.
The drow thief pressed his lips together and stared down his nose at the Oracle hag cracking up in front of him. Ur’syth flapped a wrinkled, mottled gray hand in front of her face, the black rags fluttering around her bony wrist. One cloth-wrapped foot thumped softly on the stone floor, and the crone shook her head as quickly as her deteriorating body would allow.
“I’d love to share the jest with you,” L’zar muttered, his smile thin and tight now in irritation.
“You would, wouldn’t you?” Ur’syth fell into a fit of hacking coughs and spat out a nasty black ball of phlegm. It landed in one of the potted plants, and a black, shriveled O’gúleesh version of a Venus flytrap snapped its brittle mouth closed around the unexpected offering.
Cheyenne wanted to spit herself and clenched her jaw instead. No wonder the Crown hates this creature.
Ur’syth cleared her throat, her sharp, pointed teeth glinting in her red grin. She wagged a finger at L’zar. “It’s all fun jests and playful mischief for the Dark Smiling Weaver until he realizes what a fool he’s been. Until he discovers he made himself the center of a universal jest much larger than himself.”
L’zar’s nose twitched. “And what might that be?”
“My prophecies are always fully and completely true, you drow-headed buffoon.”
He gestured at Cheyenne again. “Clearly.”
“Clearly, you didn’t take my interpretation of the threads at the full value with which I delivered them. Clearly, you came out of my circle that day already assuming I was wrong.”
“You were.”
“All this time, and you’re still dumber than my plants. Ha!” Ur’syth moved around Cheyenne again and peered up at the halfling. “I told you every child of yours you pursued would perish before their time. This one only lived because you abandoned her from the start. Quite a blow to your overinflated ego, isn’t it?”
L’zar snorted and eyed the crone up and down. “I suspected you already knew where the loophole was.”
“Not the prophecy’s loophole, Cu’ón. Mine.” The crone hissed out another laugh, pricking her shiny red tongue with her sharpened teeth. “I merely failed to spell it out for you. Wouldn’t be much of an Oracle if I had, eh?”
“Now you know I found it.”
“Oh, sure. She knows too. Don’t you, Cheyenne?”
Hearing her name on the crone’s tongue, slightly accented at the end with growling O’gúleesh sounds, sent a chill down the halfling’s spine. She forced herself not to back away from the beady eyes inching closer despite Ur’syth being at least two feet shorter.
“If he left you to suffer in our sister world, to grow into what you are now standing here before me, tell me how you came to my front door together.”
Cheyenne stared at what she thought were the centers of the Oracle’s all-black eyes. Maybe the whole thing’s one giant pupil. “I followed him through the streets.”
“Oh. You think you’re as amusing as he thinks he is. I can’t say I’m surprised.” Ur’syth’s tongue ran over her sharpened teeth. From within the folds of her tattered robes came the sound of nails scratching dry flesh. Cheyenne’s nostrils flared. “Did you seek him out, then? Did you pine after your nonexistent father and search the threads for him like he searched for you? Eh? Did you blaze a trail of scorched earth and broken promises like he did?”
Cheyenne pursed her lips, fighting back the spitting snarl she wanted to shove in the old Oracle’s face. She’s goading me. Don’t get pissed and stupid, Cheyenne. “No. I didn’t seek him out.”
“And yet here you are together, yes? Here you’ve returned, to Hangivol, the seat of the O’gúl Crown, to claim your birthright and turn the new Cycle toward you, a fully acknowledged drow in all her glory. Don’t be obtuse, girl. I know you couldn’t have done it without him.”
The halfling took a deep breath. “I went after an orc who almost killed my friend. Then I found L’zar safe and snug in a half-assed Earthside prison, and he took it from there.”
“Oh, is that all?”
“Long story short, yeah.”
“Very simple. Very amusing.” Ur’syth hissed out more laughter and tilted her head from side to side. A black-nailed finger stabbed toward Cheyenne’s face. “And you didn’t once go looking for the man who sired the magic running through your veins?”
“I stopped wondering who my father was when I was six, so no. It’s more like he fell into my lap.”
“Ah!” The crone shrieked with laughter, which cut off abruptly when another coughing fit wracked her.
Cheyenne closed her eyes and turned her head away. Please don’t spit again. Jesus, I can smell her breath.
“L’zar Verdys does have that tendency, doesn’t he? Falling where everyone else least wants him to land.” Ur’syth winked at Cheyenne and looked her up and down again. “And here you are now. The youngest of how many dead, L’zar?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
Cheyenne looked at him sharply and bit her lip, glaring at him. All his dead kids, and he says they don’t matter?
“Perhaps not to you, Weaver. Perhaps not to the rest of us. But they mattered.” Ur’syth nodded slowly. “Oh, yes. But not as much as this one.” In a blur, the Oracle’s hands lashed out from under her robes. Clammy, ice-cold hands clamped around Cheyenne’s wrist while the crone jerked up the sleeve of the halfling’s jacket.
Cheyenne immediately yanked her hand away in disgust and rubbed her wrist on
