Page 58 of Tear of Destiny

There’s that look again, so I quickly get up. I help Kate to her feet and then turn back to Frances, who still has the guy pinned on the ground, and tell myself she’ll be fine. I don’t like to leave her here like this, and I really hope I’m doing the right thing.

“Come on, Yoru,” I say. “We need to get out of here.” He looks at me and then turns around and leads us through the darkness. It’s not long before we reach a door. We open it and tumble through Frida’s painting back into my room.

Kate and I sit on the floor, and it takes us a moment to process everything that’s just happened.

“Who was that guy?” Kate asks eventually.

I shake my head slowly, his pale face, hollow cheeks, and red eyes still vivid in my mind’s eye. “Frances said he was an ovlem – a Noctu addicted to dying breaths. He needs them to stay sane and not turn into one of the fallen.”

“He seemed pretty insane to me. I guess he hasn’t had any dying breaths for a while,” Kate remarks.

“I guess not. But why did we see that vision? And why did he trigger it?”

“He seemed to know Frida,” says Kate. “Which isn’t really surprising, since she defected to the Noctu at some point.”

I nod thoughtfully. “I wonder when and why she decided to turn against the Tempes. I mean, thanks to the vision we now know that she wasn’t as crazy as we were led to believe. She was right. Patricia was a goddess of destiny. And it wasn’t Frida who hurt her, it was Charles. Frida actually saved her life.”

“She gave her a chance at survival,” Kate agrees, “but she still intended to hunt her down later. Frida took her to the retirementhome. She probably paid a price for that. Maybe the Noctu took Patricia into their care. I mean, Frida must have told them about her.”

“I just don’t get it,” I mutter. “What did that guy have to do with Frida?”

Kate shrugs. “I don’t think the vision came up because he knows about that event. It was probably just triggered because he knew Frida and was thinking about her. He seemed to be in a pretty heightened emotional state. I guess I didn’t have enough energy to hold onto the vision all the way to the end the first time. But when he touched me, he seemed to jolt something in me – maybe I absorbed some of his intense emotions.” She shakes her head thoughtfully. “I don’t know. But it was powerful enough for me to call up those images again and hold onto them to the end.”

Kate’s probably right. It can’t be easy maintaining those visions, and I guess it requires not only practice and focus but energy too. And the guy seemed to have loads of that despite his pitiful appearance.

“I wonder if Frances is okay,” Kate says quietly after a period of silence.

“I don’t know. I really hope so.”

I briefly consider letting Noah know. He could check on her. But I guess she’d be pretty pissed at me if I did that. She doesn’t want to be rescued or protected. And I can totally understand that. Still, I’m worried about her, and I weigh up whether to return to the Odyss to see if she’s okay.

And in the end, that’s what I do. But Frances and the ovlem are both gone. Thankfully, I find no traces of blood, and I can only hope Frances wasn’t hurt.

On the weekend, I visit Mom and spend the day with her. She’s bought cake, and we cook dinner together. It’s nice to spend time with her, and we laugh a lot. But I keep seeing this pensivelook on her face, tinged with sadness. It hasn’t been long since Charles died, and, of course, she misses him. She doesn’t know what he was or that he was using her – at least at the start. Whether that really changed toward the end, I can’t say. I hope so for her sake.

It’s late evening when I say goodbye, promising to visit again soon. I walk down the street lost in thought. I’m still wondering what to make of Kate’s new vision. It changes so much, and at the same time, it changes nothing. Frida didn’t kill an innocent person, and she didn’t tell lies about Patty. Patricia was a goddess of destiny, and despite that, my great aunt saved her life. Why? And when did she go over to the enemy side? I’m acutely aware that I’m still missing a piece of the puzzle. But at least I’m a little closer to solving it.

I turn into another street, and I’m walking past a house with a dense hedge when I hear a voice. “Finally. I was wondering when you’d show up.”

I flinch, but the fright quickly passes and is replaced by simmering anger. “Noah, what are you doing here?”

“What do you think? Waiting for you. I figured you’d have to visit your mother at some point. And I was hoping to run into you. We need to talk; you know we do.”

I avoid his eyes, and I’m tempted to keep walking. But one thing stops me. “We’ve already said everything there is to say.” I see him open his mouth to argue, but I don’t give him a chance. “How’s Frances? I guess she told you about the fight. Did she kill that ovlem? Was she hurt?”

Noah looks at me in astonishment and frowns. For a moment, he seems lost for words. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. But Frances is fine. I saw her yesterday. She didn’t say anything about a fight.”

That surprises me. Frances and Noah are close; she’s really attached to him. Why would she keep something that importantfrom him? He seems to be asking himself the same question.

“If you know about the fight, I guess you were involved,” he concludes.

I sigh and silently curse myself for bringing it up. But I just wanted to know if Frances was okay.

“Kate and I were in the Odyss. I tried to summon the door again.”

Noah raises his eyebrows and gives me a dark look. “Okay. And you were attacked there?”

I nod. “By an ovlem apparently. He said all kinds of crazy stuff and attacked me and Kate. Luckily Frances arrived and intervened so that Kate and I could get out of there.”

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