And of despair and misery as she sat on the floor in the dark, alone, weeping out the shards of a broken heart. Her finger was bare.
She stood on the rise above the battleground, with the goddess a white shadow beside her.
You were the first to be called, and the last, Morrigan told her. They’re waiting for you. The worlds are in your hands. Take theirs, and fight.
She thought, I’ve been coming toward this all my life. Will it be the end of it?
Hoyt lowered his hands, brought her slowly back, as he closed the circle. Her eyes cleared, blinked.
“So? Did I pass the audition?”
Glenna smiled at her, then walked to the table, lifted one of the crosses. “This is yours now.”
Blair took it, let it dangle. “It’s nice. Beautiful craftsmanship, and I appreciate the gesture. But I have my own.” She tugged the chain from under her shirt. “Family thing again. Like an heirloom.”
“It’s lovely, but if you’d—”
“Wait.” Hoyt snatched at the cross, stared at it as it lay in his palm. “Where did you get this? Where did it come from?”
“I told you, family. We have seven of them. They’ve been passed down. You’re going to want to let go of that.”
When he looked up into her eyes again she narrowed hers. “What’s the problem?”
“There were seven, the goddess gave me, on the night she charged me to come here. I asked for protection for my family, the family she ordered me to leave behind. And these were what she gave me.”
“That was what, nine hundred years back? It doesn’t mean—”
“It’s Nola’s.” He looked over her head to Cian. “I can feel it. This is Nola’s cross.”
“Nola?”
“Our sister. The youngest.” His voice thickened as Cian moved closer to see for himself. “And here, on the back, I inscribed it with her name. She said I’d see her again. And by the gods, I am. She’s in this woman. Blood to blood. Our blood.”
“There’s no question?” Cian said quietly.
“I put this around her neck myself. Look at her, Cian.”
“Aye. Well.” He looked away again, then moved to the window.
“Forged in the fire of the gods, given by the hand of a sorcerer.” Blair breathed deep. “Family legend. My middle name is Nola. Blair Nola Bridgit Murphy.”
“Hoyt.” Glenna touched his arm. “She’s your family.”
“I guess you’d be my uncle, a thousand times removed or however it works.” She glanced over toward Cian. “And isn’t it a kick in the ass? I’m related to a vampire.”
In the morning, under a weak and fitful sunlight, Glenna stood with Hoyt in the family graveyard. The storm had soaked the grass, and rain still dripped from the petals of the roses that climbed over his mother’s grave.
“I don’t know how to comfort you.”
He took her hand. “You’re here. I never thought I would need anyone to be with me, not the way I need you. It’s all so fast, all of this. Loss and gain, discovery, questions. Life and death.”
“Tell me about your sister. About Nola.”
“She was bright and fair, and gifted. She had sight. She loved animals—had, I think, a special affinity for them. Before I left, there were puppies born to my father’s wolfhound. Nola would spend hours in the stables playing with them. And while the world turned, she grew to a woman, had children.”
He turned, rested his brow against Glenna’s. “I see her in this woman, this warrior who’s with us now. And inside of me is another war.”
“Will you bring her here? Blair?”