Persephone Alcmedi 00 - Wicked Circle

fine.”
    No, he wasn’t. He was hoarse. Ever since I’d staked him and applied a second hex to him, I’d been aware of his death every morning and his regained life every evening. While he tended to die gently, his sunset awakenings were violent. I’d felt him screaming his way back to life before the ritual started. Even so, the pity I’d felt earlier was in short supply now. “Liar.”
    “You are correct in refuting my statement,” he said sullenly, “but mortals often downplay their replies to such questions. It is unnecessary for you to impugn my character over it.”
    If I could have reached through the phone, I’d have smacked him.
    “Persephone?”
    “Hmmm?”
    “Our fears have been realized.”
    Unmoving, I felt like I’d been kicked in the gut. “Heldridge?”
    “He gained an audience with the Excelsior. You need to come home. Immediately.”
    With one box of supplies on the passenger-side floor and the other on the seat, I arrived at Eris’s apartment over the Arcane Ink Emporium. The Slut wasn’t here.
    There were, however, lights on upstairs. So, retrieving my wet clothes from the narrow crevice that Corvette owners call a trunk and lifting the boxes stashed up front, I hefted it all up the metal steps.
    Going home had been my desire even before Menessos had called, and now I had a good excuse. Knocking on the door and hoping they heard me over the music playing inside, I had time to rehearse my announcement once more before the door opened.
    Zhan relieved me of the boxes. I put the Corvette keys on top. She carried the supplies toward the black door of Eris’s “woogie room,” where she kept all her magical materials.
    Nana and Eris sat in dining chairs near a table lamp missing a shade. My mother’s wet hair clued me in that she’d just showered, and she wore only sleep pants and a bra. Nana jabbed a needle into Eris’s shoulder joint, stitching the flap of skin where her arm used to be. Eris winced.
    My horror must have been evident. After a shallow but derisive snort, Nana explained, “Her stitches broke.” Eris squirmed as Nana sewed, tightened the thread, tied it off, and cut it.
    The wound was ugly enough before. I shut the door behind me and approached.
    “I felt them pop when I fell down the embankment trying to get you,” Eris said.
    Crap. Here we go again.
    Nana smeared Neosporin on a gauze pad and placed it over the wound, securing it with medical tape. “Bled all over the place, but her wet red outfit didn’t exactly show it.”
    “Did you—”
    “Sterilized the thread and the needles.” She passed Eris a T-shirt. “I’m not stupid, Persephone.”
    Nana was more than her I-need-a-cigarette cranky. That meant she was in pain. “Did you—”
    “Took Aleve. I’m icing my knee every fifteen minutes and am in the off-phase right now.” She tugged the back of the T-shirt down as Eris struggled into it.
    Zhan returned. “How are you?”
    “Knocked my head, but it isn’t bad.” Before anything else could be said, I blurted, “I have to go to Cleveland. Right now.”
    “Why?” Nana demanded, going from cranky to pouty.
    With both of them injured, I felt guilty about leaving them. “Bad stuff,” I said. Without a word, Zhan was in motion, gathering her things and mine, packing.
    The Slut’s distinctive motor roared outside, pulling up. “What kind of bad stuff?” Nana pressed.
    Pounding footfalls outside gave me reason to avoid answering. I opened the door. Lance lugged two large pizza boxes and a pair of two-liters inside.
    He must resemble his father, I thought. With sandy blond hair, he didn’t get his looks from our mother. Lance was also trying to grow a goatee without much success. He sort of resembled Shaggy from the Scooby-Doo cartoons.
    The smell of the pizza instantly reminded me of how hungry I was.
    Lance rounded the table and set the boxes down. “Does weird shit happen around you all the time?”
    “Lately it does.”
    He gave me a reproachful glare as he strode into the kitchen. I helped Nana and Eris twist their chairs back to the table. Lance brought cups, an ice bucket, paper plates, napkins, and two wet rags. “I put some soap on these,” he said. After he’d put the other items down, he gave one rag to Nana. Sitting down next to Eris, he washed her hand.
    She protested, “I just got out of the shower.”
    It would have been better to let her figure out how to do it herself, but he was reacting as any good son would,