Page 14 of Obsidian Prince

The three women glanced at each other.

"The Celtic wolf is your best friend? Or the Army sergeant?" Arel asked, still without any sign of aggression or disturbance.

Liliana tilted her head, wondering. "The red wolf is my best friend. I like Sergeant Giovanni, but she does not trust Others, so she keeps her distance from me." Were these women also widow spiders like the Mirror club owner, Lady Daphne, and her nest sisters? Were they looking for revenge? She brought up her hands to rub her eyebrows as if her head pained her. Between her fingers, she risked a glance with her third eyes at the three women to see if they were human or Other.

Their auras held the feral shine of beast-kin. She sneaked a glance from a single, barely open fourth eye to see their Other faces. She saw tawny fur, long canines, and large golden eyes.

"Oh! You are lions!" she exclaimed. "I am a lion's daughter. I lost touch with the pride when my brothers moved away. It is good to meet you."

The three lionesses all wore identical expressions of confusion. Arel Magoro spoke for the group. "We thought you were spider-kin."

"I am spider-kin like my first mother, but my father was Simon, son of Simeon, cousin of Lycurgis, the last king of the lions of Nemea."

The daughter snorted again. "You are a lousy liar. That isn't even possible."

Liliana sat up to her full height. She looked up into the sneering face of the young lioness, chin high with pride. "I am not a liar. I tell only the truth, always." Her shoulders sagged a little. It was hard to be proud of her honesty when she didn't choose to be truthful all the time. Liliana just did not know how to lie, any more than she knew how to write computer code. "I tell the truth, even when it would be better if I didn't."

Arel Magoro gave her daughter a look over her shoulder that made the younger woman shrink a bit. "Forgive Kazi, seer. You must know, of course, that the lions of Nemea have been extinct for centuries. They are little more than a legend now."

"My father ..." Liliana had not talked about her father much with anyone since her brothers moved away to the coast. "Simon of Nemea left his pride so that his younger cousin could be king. He felt he would be a better leader, but my father knew he would defeat his cousin in the Challenge. A few decades later, he heard that his pride had been defeated in battle when he was far away in Egypt with my mother. The Nemean lions were considered too dangerous to be left alive by their enemies. They slaughtered the entire pride, to the last child."

Arel nodded. "We know the legend. The downfall of the greatest pride to ever be is a tale told often among lions." She glanced fondly over her shoulder. "To teach our children that even the strongest can fail."

"My father did not fail his pride. He was not there. If he had been there to fight, maybe things would have been different," Liliana said. Simon of Nemea had been a legend, at least in her eyes.

Arel chuckled low at that. "The story goes that they were outnumbered a hundred to one, and their enemies were led by Heracles, a granite Sidhe Fae with impossible strength. I don't see how one lion, no matter how formidable, could have made a difference."

The spider seer looked down at her hands, blinking to hold back tears. She wasn't even certain what she mourned. Her illusions of her father's invincibility had shattered a long time ago when she saw him ripped apart by a dozen red wolves. "Simon of Nemea is dead, but he was not the last Nemean lion. I had four brothers. Two died fighting beside our mother and father, but two came to America with me and my second mother. The descendants of my brothers, Jason and Petros, still live in North Carolina, I think. I have lost track of them over time, but it is possible that you have some of the blood of the lions of Nemea yourselves. We could even be related."

When Liliana said that last bit, the younger lioness, Kazi, rolled her eyes. "Right."

The lioness with the dark brown hair and olive skin looked thoughtful.

"Oh.” Liliana said. “You do not understand. My father was over eighteen hundred years old when he died ninety-three years ago." These women did not know about the long-term effects of spider seer venom. It was less well known now that most people thought her kind were extinct. "The fate of a spider seer's mate is tied to hers. My father lived for many centuries because my mother did. They died on the same day, fighting side by side."

For the first time, the brown-haired woman spoke up. "I heard that spider-kin live forever. I didn't know about their mates living so long. If your father died ninety-three years ago, then how old are you?"

"I am one hundred forty-six. I will be one hundred forty-seven years old..." Liliana considered the date on the calendar with the pictures of butterflies that she kept on her kitchen wall. She hadn't realized what day it was. "Oh. I will be one hundred forty-seven years old in three days."

Arel chuckled, showing a gap between her top front two teeth, in a bright smile that matched the laugh lines around her eyes. "And I thought I was getting on in years."

Liliana looked at her with all eight eyes for a moment, now that she knew she didn't need to hide what she was. "You appear to be in excellent health." She looked forward in time to see how far death was from this beautiful older woman. Liliana barely flinched as she saw the woman die. "You have many more robust years to live, assuming you and your daughter escape being murdered within the next week."

It was an unfortunate aspect of watching over her favorite red wolf that she had become less affected by visions of sudden horrific death. She expected it these days.

She looked into the crystal ball focusing her fourth eyes. Now, she knew why these three lionesses had come to her. Arel Magoro wished to avoid her death. Anticipating the questions, Liliana searched for the source of danger and a moment when it could be side-stepped.

The lioness with the smile lines around her eyes would be ripped apart by a group of men in full lion form. In Liliana’s visions, Arel and her daughter both fought valiantly. They took several of their enemies down with them, but in the end, they were pulled down by sheer numbers.

It was all too similar to the way Liliana’s parents had died. Her stomach twisted in horror despite her increased resistance to the sight of bloody death. Liliana shuddered. “You must leave Fayetteville very soon or you will be torn apart by more lions than you and your daughter can fight.”

"That's not what we wanted to talk to you about," the elder lioness said. "At least, not exactly."

"You do not wish to know how to avoid your own death and the death of your only child?" The spider seer had never been more astonished by any words spoken in her life.

"Well, we already know about that." Arel Magoro's voice was rich with sadness. "That's why we need your help, seer."

"Ask. I will give you only the truth, but I cannot guarantee that it will be what you want to hear."

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