Page 111 of The Aether

“Please!” she cried. “Please, Papa. They will kill you. They will—”

Reaching through the bars, he extended his blistered hand for her to grasp. “I’ve told you. You’re my heart. I cannot live without you.”

Alastair staggered up to the cage, Castor beside him.

“Tell us what we need to do.”

“Don’t let me forget her.” His eyes burned as his vision of her blurred. “Don’t let me forget about her. They’re going to try, but don’t let them. I promised her.”

Nathanial and Evelyn appeared on the other side of the cage, each looking as if they were ready to destroy the world in their outrage.

“Help me, Dad,” Damian croaked. “Help us.”

“That’s what I’m here for, my boy.”

“That’s what we’re all here for,cher.” One nod from Draven had all the Sentinels joining hands as they formed a circle around Sabrina, Damian’s parents, his best friends, and him. “Hold the line,” the Guardian ordered. Bending, he said, “The others are only a show of force. None of us are powerful enough to fight the Fates. But you can.”

Unable to respond, Damian frantically wracked his pain-ridden brain for a solution.

“Remember the coin, friend,”Draven told him through their telepathic connection.

Heart in his throat, Damian plunged his damaged hand into his pants pocket and removed the token Masters had given him the day before. The one he’d impulsively grabbed before leaving home that morning.“What—”

“It’s a promise owed. Hold it up.”

Jumping to his feet from where he’d been kneeling, Damian lifted the coin high above his head.

“Call in the debt from the Fates, and do it now, Aether.”

It was then that he recognized the significance of what he held. The desire to laugh his joy, to kiss Draven on the fucking mouth, and to dance in celebration, all hit him at the same time.

“Save the kiss for your wife, friend.”

With a snort and a shake of his head, Damian shouted the words, “Sisters of Fate, I’m calling in your debt.”

The silence, immediate and eerie, registered through his ringing ears. Everyone, with the exception of the Fates, Damian, and Sabrina, was suspended in time.

“It belongs to another,” they intoned.

“He passed it to me of his own free will.”

They conversed with each other outside of his hearing as the dainty Sister watched him with something akin to pity coated with wariness.

“I wish my daughter set free. From now to forever, she is never to be subjected to your ridiculous tribunals again.”

“Not with her powers intact.”

“She is no threat to you or this community,” he insisted.

“With each day, she grows stronger. She cannot be left unchecked.”

“She’s not!”he retorted angrily. Seeing their averse reaction to his fatherly indignation, he checked his temper. “She’s not unchecked. Yes, she grows in strength, but she also grows in compassion and wisdom. With all the visions of future outcomes she’s received, all those that constantly flit through her mind regardless of how ghastly, she never shies away. Instead, she gains understanding. My daughter possesses a far better soul than the four of us combined.” Dropping his arm, he gazed down at the glowing coin. He frowned as the same sigils from the bars imprinted themselves on the flat surface. Lifting his head, he saw the diminutive Sister’s triumphant smile before she carefully smoothed her features. But her silvery stare bore into him as if she wished to impart knowledge.

Opening his mind, he sought her out.

“Throw the coin at the cage. There are no restrictions to the debt owed,”she said within the confines of his mind.“My sisters merely seek to test your commitment.”

Huffing out a breath of disgust, mainly at himself for not recognizing the game for what it was, Damian tossed the coin up. As it fell, continually twisting to show the heads of the Fates on one side and the sigils on the other, Damian once again absorbed the magic from those present. Then, in a single push from what he’d gathered, he batted the coin between the bars, where Sabrina plucked it from midair.

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