Burned

not your judge. Good is a multifaceted ideal. For instance, behold one facet of good.

Aphrodite’s spirit journey slowed, bringing her to a halt over an amazing-looking grove. She blinked in surprise as she studied it and realized it reminded her of the grove near Sgiach’s castle. As she made the comparison, Aphrodite sank gently down through the canopy of tightly knit leaves to rest just above the thick carpet of moss that covered the ground.

“Listen to me, Zo! You can do it.”

At the sound of Heath’s voice, Aphrodite whirled around to see Zoey, looking so pale she was almost translucent, and Heath. Z was pacing around and around in a circle, looking totally creepy, while Heath stood still, watching her with an incredibly sad expression.

“Zoey! Finally! Okay, listen to me. You gotta pull yourself together and get back to your body.”

Completely ignoring her, Zoey burst into tears, though she didn’t stop pacing. “I can’t, Heath. It’s gone on too long. I can’t bring my soul together. I can’t remember things—I can’t focus—the only thing I know for sure is that I deserve this.”

“Oh, for shit’s sake. ZOEY! Stop bawling and pay attention!”

“You do not deserve this!” Heath stepped close to Zoey and put his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to hold still. “And you can do it, Zo. You have to. If you do, we can be together.”

“Great. I’m Christmas Carol-ing like the damn ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and whatever. They can’t hear a fucking word I’m saying!”

Then perhaps, daughter, for a change, you should listen.

Aphrodite stifled her sigh of frustration and did as her Goddess advised, even though she felt like a creeper gawking through someone’s bedroom window.

“You mean it, Heath?” Zoey stared at Heath, seeming for an instant more like herself than the freaky ghostly thing that couldn’t hold still. “You’d really want to stay here?” She smiled tentatively at Heath, her body twitching restlessly under his hands.

He kissed her, and then said, “Babe, wherever you are is where I want to be— forever.”

With a painful groan, Zoey broke out of Heath’s arms. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” she said, pacing and crying again. “I can’t hold still. I can’t rest.”

“That’s why you have to call your soul back together. You can’t be with me if you don’t. Zo, you can’t be anything if you don’t. You’ll just keep moving and moving and losing pieces of yourself until you fade completely away.”

“It was my fault you died; it’s my fault you’re here where you don’t belong. How can you still love me?” She wiped her stringy hair from her face as she began circling around and around Heath— never still—never resting.

“It’s not your fault! Kalona killed me. That’s all there is to it. Anyway, what difference does it make where we are and even if we’re alive or dead, as long as we’re together?”

“You mean it? Really?”

“I love you, Zoey. I have since the first day I met you, and I’ll love you forever. I promise. If you’re whole again, we’ll be together forever.”

“Forever,” Zoey whispered the word. “And you really do forgive me?”

“Babe, there’s nothing to forgive.”

With what was obviously a huge effort, Zoey stopped moving, and said, “Then for you, I’ll try to do it.” She spread her arms and threw her head back. Her pale body began to glow, first with a small, tentative light from within. Zoey started to call out names, and—

Aphrodite was jolted from the vision and lifted out of the grove so quickly her stomach gave a nauseating lurch. “Oh, ugh! Too far, too fast. I may barf.”

A warm wind passed over her, calming her dizziness. When she began to move again, her nausea was gone, but not her confusion.

“Okay, I don’t understand. Z pulls herself together, but she stays here with Heath instead of going back to her body?”

In this version of the future, yes.

Aphrodite hesitated and then, reluctantly, asked, “But is she happy?”

Yes. Zoey and Heath are content together in the Otherworld for eternity.

Aphrodite felt the sadness, heavy and thick, but she had to continue, “Then maybe Z should stay where she is. We’ll miss her. I’ll miss her.” Aphrodite hesitated, quelling an unexpected urge to cry before she continued. “It would definitely suck for Stark, but if this is where she’s meant to be, then Zoey should stay.

What is meant for each person changes with their choices. This is only one version of Zoey’s future, and like many choices that are made in the Otherworld, hers has threads that change the tapestry of the future on earth. If Zoey chooses to stay, behold earth’s new future:

Aphrodite was sucked down into a scene that was all too familiar. She was standing in the middle of the field she’d been in during her last vision. Just as before, she was one with people who were burning—humans, vamps, and fledglings. She reexperienced the pain of the fire, along with the abstract agony that had enveloped her during the original vision. As during the last vision, Aphrodite looked up to see Kalona standing before them all, only this time Zoey wasn’t with him—making out or saying whatever she’d said in the second part of the vision that destroyed him. Instead, Neferet stepped into the scene. She strode past Kalona, staring at the burning people. Then she began tracing intricate patterns in the air around her, and as she did so Darkness bloomed all around her. Spreading from her, it stained the field, extinguishing the fire, but not taking away the pain.

“No, I won’t kill them!” She gestured with one finger, and a cluster of tendrils wrapped around Kalona’s body. “Help me make them mine.”

Kalona absorbed them. Aphrodite concentrated on him and, like a mirage materializing, the tendrils of Darkness that encased the immortal’s body became visible. They writhed, causing the fallen immortal’s skin to twitch and shudder. Kalona gasped, and Aphrodite couldn’t tell if he felt pleasure or pain, but he smiled grimly at Neferet, spread his arms wide to accept Darkness, and said, “As you wish, my Goddess.”

Covered in the tendrils, Kalona moved up so that he stood in front of her, and then the fallen immortal dropped to his knees and bared his neck. Aphrodite watched Neferet bend, lick Kalona’s skin, and with a greedy fierceness that was frightening, she sank her teeth into Kalona and fed from him. The tendrils of Darkness quivered, throbbed, and multiplied.

Utterly grossed out, Aphrodite looked away to see Stevie Rae enter the field.

Stevie Rae?

A dark thing moved beside her, and Aphrodite realized that Stevie Rae was standing next to a Raven Mocker, right next to him—as in so close they appeared together.

WTF?

The Raven Mocker’s wing spread up and out, and then curled around Stevie Rae, as if holding her in an embrace. Stevie Rae sighed and moved even closer to the creature, so that his wing totally enveloped her. Aphrodite was so shocked by the sight that she didn’t see where the Indian kid came from—he was just suddenly there, right in front of the Raven Mocker.

Even through the pain and shock caused by her vision, Aphrodite could appreciate how incredibly gorgeous this new kid was. His body was amazing, and he was mostly naked, so there was a lot of it