Page 78 of What Sleeps Within the Cove

It felt like I’d failed, like I had spared her life but hadn’t yet accomplished the side task of needing to bring something to the Cradle of Creation to present to the Primordials there in an offering they didn’t deserve. Given that all the rivers required a trophy of some kind, the lack of one made nausea swirl in my gut. If I survived these trials and made it to the Cradle only to be turned away because of my desire to save a creature that didn’t need to die, I couldn’t begin to imagine the rage that would consume me. It terrified me to think of what I might do.

Who I might become.

My fingers moved over the hind’s soft coat, her antlers glowing with golden light as she tilted her head farther. My hand slid along her head, allowing her to guide my touch to where she wanted it. I stroked the base of one of her antlers, shocked to find it smooth and almost polished as she moved away, tugging her head back until my hand grasped the end of her antler. I gripped it, studying the stare she kept on my face.

She jerked her head to the side, nearly tearing my hand open on the sharpened point of her antler. Instead of bleeding me, she tore it the other way until the antler cracked in my grip, the sound echoing through the woods as I held her stare, trying to understand what she’d done.

She was not afraid or angry, instead holding me pinned in that moment as she twisted her head one last time and the piece of her antler broke free, leaving me to stumble back from her broad form in shock.

I stared down at the antler held in my hand, the gold gleaming like the hilt of a dagger. It would make a crude but beautiful weapon, all sharpened edges and pointed tips.

“Why?” I asked, even though I did not expect an answer of any kind. I wanted to understand, to decide why the hind would injure itself so greatly and diminish its ability to protect itself from harm.

The hind tilted its head to the side as if listening to me, and we stood there for a moment until a woman’s voice broke through the silence.

“For your kindness, Child of Fate,” she said, stepping out from the trees. Her hair shone like silver silk, her dress a thing of beige that draped over her fair skin. One side of her face was beautiful, youthful and full of life, but the other was a gnarled mess of flesh and bone, an empty eye socket and skull protruding where the skin had seemingly melted away. Her hands twisted as she toyed with a spool of thread that she unwound and rewound, fidgeting as if she could not play with those golden threads.

My breath caught as I studied her, watching another creature toy with the threads that only I had been able to see until this moment. She did so with an absent mind, her familiarity with the texture of them and the way they moved so innate that I stuttered, unable to find any words.

Two more women with half-rotted faces stepped out of the tree line behind her, the same threads from her spool arching through the air where they too played with them between their fingers. The woman to her left was perhaps the youngest of the three, with dark black hair and a gray dress, her hair pulled back from her face with a crescent-shaped headband. The one to the right was the oldest, with deep red hair and a pair of golden shears held in her hand. I watched as she cut the thread she fiddled with, the gold of it leaching away to leave the fragment dull and lifeless. It fell to the ground, discarded and forgotten the moment it vanished into the leaves.

A life ended, a life forgotten.

I knew without a doubt that these three women with the rotting faces were the figures that had been toying with my life since before I’d been born. That they were the ones responsible for me and my creation.

The Moirai. The Fates themselves.

I swallowed, gripping the antler tighter in my hand as if I would be able to defend myself from any harm these women wished to bring me. There was no denying the Fates’ influence, no movement that would be faster than their ability to cut my very thread and end my life.

“Those who seek to take from this place will always leave empty-handed,” the oldest said, her voice clear and calming in spite of the grotesque way her teeth moved where her skin was missing. “But those who respect our creatures will always leave with a gift from the forest itself.”

I raised my chin, needing the answers that I was afraid to ask the questions to get. “Why are you here?” I asked. The Fates had existed since the dawn of creation. They’d spun the wheel of time and the lives of Primordials, Gods, Fae, and humans alike for more years than I could count.

For them to appear before me now meant that they’d made the careful decision to do so.

They didn’t bother to pretend that I was unaware of who they must have been, but the golden-haired one in the middle stepped closer, still twirling that spindle of thread around and toying with it. She approached me as the hind faded into the woods behind me, stopping only when we stood eye to eye. She was my height, an unusual fact I had come not to expect of the immortals that surrounded me. Even most humans were taller than me, leaving me feeling strangely uncomfortable with the proximity of her face as she stared at me with eyes that looked like molten gold.

She reached between us, raising a single hand to touch a sharp nail to my cheekbone.

Warmth spread through me at the touch, life and hope and magic blooming on my skin. I raised my hand to touch it, feeling my fingertips tingle as the magic spread. The darkened fingers lit with gold, my own magic rising in response as the color spread through theviniculumthat covered my arm. “You asked a question of one of our children. We came to give you an answer,” she said, but there was something more hiding in those words.

One of the others stepped forward, grabbing a golden leaf from the tree at her side. She crushed it into powder in her hands, pouring it into a vial that she pulled from her pocket. “Blow this into the face of your mate and it will reverse the effects the Lethe has had on his soul. His memories will return to him without consequence.”

She held out the vial for me, and I took it from her without hesitation, staring down at the golden powder held within. “You came here to give me this?” I asked, unable to stop the odd emotion from bleeding into my voice. It was a bittersweet sort of appreciation that came with mixed feelings about their help.

Where had they been all the other times I needed help? Where had they been when I was suffering and had no one who could save me?

They’d been the ones to put me in those situations, to force me to live through defining moments so that I could become the version of myself that served their purposes.

“You have endured so much on your path to us, Estrella Barlowe,” the dark-haired woman said finally, tipping her head up to look at the river where it appeared above my head. Ready to swallow me whole and return me to the surface so that I could continue on my journey. “You deserve to have him at your side for now.”

The river lowered above my head, the water pressing in as time ran short. There were so many questions that needed answers, but I wouldn’t have the time. The golden-haired woman spoke, her voice ominous. “But be warned, there will soon come a time where you must continue your journey alone. Your mate will not be permitted to pass through our temple to enter the Cradle of Creation. For that part of your journey, you will continue alone.”

I nodded, even though I hated the thought of being separated from Caldris for a moment. “I understand,” I said, and I realized I meant it.

I didn’t know what the Cradle would hold for me or my Fate, but I knew it was mine alone to bear.

FIFTY

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