Goddess (Starcrossed)

choice will the fate of all be decided.
Nemesis has sent her vessel to blind us! Darkness! Darkness comes! He must be killed or everything will be destroyed!
     
    Helen and Matt stopped reading at this point and looked up at each other, brows furrowed. That last line they had both heard already—as they came into the library with Orion. “Vessel of Nemesis” and “Darkness comes,” sounded ominous to Helen. If the Fates were talking about Orion here, their descriptions of him certainly didn’t help his case much.
    “Is this Nemesis an evil goddess or something?” Helen asked Matt under her breath, trusting that he had done more studying than she had, as usual.
    “No, she’s not evil. And she’s way older than the gods,” Matt replied. “She’s a daughter of Nyx, like the Fates.”
    “So, Nemesis is probably the sister with the veil that Cassandra was talking about?” Helen asked hopefully, looking around.
    “It’s possible,” Castor replied.
    “And this is the only time all three of the Fates spoke together? This last line?” Matt asked Ariadne urgently.
    “Yes. They grew very agitated,” she replied.
    “That’s when we walked into the kitchen,” Helen said, catching Matt’s drift. “This whole bit about Nemesis and darkness could just be because they couldn’t see anymore because Orion walked in.”
    “Orion could have been blocking their prophecy,” Matt continued optimistically.
    “So, of course, the Fates would want him dead. They’ve been trying to kill him since before he was born. Even before that, actually.” Helen stopped and restarted, trying to explain. “The Fates have been targeting Orion ever since Troy because he made it out alive when he was Aeneas. He escaped fate. The only way Aeneas could have done that is if Nemesis was protecting him, too.”
    Helen saw confused and worried faces everywhere she looked. She rubbed her eyes, knowing she was making a hash of this and that she was probably hurting Orion’s chances more than helping them. She looked over at Lucas pleadingly.
    “Am I lying?” she asked him, calling on his Falsefinder skills.
    “No,” Lucas replied immediately. “She isn’t lying.”
    “Oh, of course,” Pallas said as he threw up his hands in exasperation. “Well, it’s obvious what role the Fates put you in, Lucas. You’re the Lover. You’d do anything for Helen.”
    “Yes I would,” Lucas admitted with brutal honesty. “But she’s still telling the truth.”
    “What she knows of it,” Castor said in a detached voice. “I’m sorry, son, but just because Helen thinks something is true doesn’t make it the truth.” Castor’s tone wasn’t confrontational. He was just making them aware of a loophole that he’d obviously spent a long time considering.
    A ghost of a thought traced across Helen’s mind—a niggling doubt about something that was important, but just out of reach.
    “It’s not just that. Orion can’t be the Tyrant because he’s the Shield,” Lucas said, waving away his father’s objection. “When Cassandra made the prophecy about Helen being the Descender, she said Helen would go down into the Underworld with her Shield.”
    “Granted,” Matt said equitably, like he’d already thought of this. “But you also found a way into the Underworld, Lucas. And you went there to protect Helen—to shield her.”
    “Okay, but I didn’t help her free the Furies,” Lucas countered, recalling the words of the prophecy.
    “Yeah you did,” Helen said sheepishly, hating to go against Lucas on this. “I was banished from the Underworld until you gave me the obol. And then you helped me figure out which river we needed.”
    “Yeah, but Orion was the one who was actually there with you when you freed them.”
    “Luke,” Hector interrupted gently. “You gotta admit Matt’s point raises the possibility that there is more than one interpretation of the prophecy.”
    “There’s always more than one interpretation,” Orion said from the doorway. Everyone turned to look at him as he came back into the library. “Face it. The Fates speak in riddles because they don’t know what the hell they’re talking about. If they did, they’d say something straightforward like, ‘Orion is the Tyrant and he wants to eat your brains for breakfast’ or whatever.”
    Hector’s shoulders started bouncing up and down with silent laughter. Lucas turned his head away and tried to stuff down a laugh of his own, but he made the