Page 57 of Mortal Desires

“You’re saying Abuela was allowed to come to me because I needed to get the ring?”

“Pilar!” Vicious growled.

I shook my head, not paying attention to him. “No. Listen. She came back and told me to get the ring and I wore the ring and…”

I looked away from Vicious and back to the fates. They were smiling again. “We like knowing more than the lord.”

Vicious rumbled, but I kept him in check.

“I still don’t understand.” I tried hard, knowing Vicious’ patience was waning. “So Abuela was allowed to make a trip after her death just to make sure I’d have this ring here? Now?”

“Everything happens at once.” This time, it came from Vicious.

“I don’t know what this means,” I said, exasperated.

“It means she could die and do what she had to do even if the timeline wasn’t correct in the above. Up there you live linearly, not here.”

“Still a big exception, isn’t it? How many people die then visit the future before they ascend?”

“It’s not the future because—”

“I swear if you say everything happens at once one more time…” I raised my finger at him.

“We like the true queen.”

I turned to them. “You keep saying that. The true queen. How many false queens are there?”

They all nodded, satisfied with the question. “Very good. If everything happens at once, and if there was a plot. If the coven wasn’t the coven. If the head of a snake was cut before it slithered away. If the queen was false. What would happen?”

“Head of a snake…” I looked at Vicious trying to see if this made sense to him. But he was looking at the fates with a tick in his jaw.

I opened my mouth to ask another question, but he was quicker than me.

“Where are my guards?”

They hummed and nodded, again satisfied with the question. “They left for the same reason your queen is here.” And they turned to me. “Tell the lord the only magic strong enough to break underworld rules. Strong enough to bring back the dead. Strong enough to sever the bond between servants and their eternal task.”

I shook my head for a second confused why they thought I would know. But the ring burned my skin and I gasped, “Soulmates.”

Her hand felt clammy in my palm as I dragged her away from the fates as quickly as I could. When we reached the forest edge and her legs couldn’t run through the thick roots, I gathered her in my arms and raced to the boatman.

I didn’t expect the fates to say anything relevant. The fact that Pilar’s grandmother could do that trip without my permission meant someone else allowed it. I’d always bet on the fates to rearrange the rules. But I assumed it had something to do with Pilar’s power. Maybe the grandmother needed to be the one to guide Pilar for the first time. That was not what the fates said, and by the way, my wife was shaking like a leaf? She had a lot to explain.

As the boatman arrived and I put Pilar in a seat before I sat, I tried to think about everything they said. Every detail sounded important.

“What they meant by—”

I shook my head.

This wasn’t the place. It wasn’t the time.

Pilar listened to me for once in her life and remained silent until the boatman delivered us to our side of the river. I raced up the stairs with her until we were safe on the palace grounds.

“What did they mean by cutting the snake’s head? Is the snake you?”

“No. Maybe. There’s too much information.”

“Let’s write it down before we forget.”

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