Tempt the Stars

anything.”
    “Even in the tarot?”
    “No. That is, the Star card showed up, but . . ”
    “But . . . ?”
    “It lied.”
    “How can this be the will of the council?” Caleb demanded. “Did you hear nothing Artemis said?”
    But the council was already leaving, the guards holding us back. They did not explain themselves to mere mortals. They’d killed him, and they wouldn’t even tell us why.
    “Answer me!” Caleb said, because no one had ever said he lacked courage.
    And then one hesitated, and slowly turned. The very last one I’d have expected. The one Mother had called Adra.
    The one who had killed him.
    “They heard,” Adra said quietly. “More than you, war mage.”
    “Meaning what?”
    The demon’s eyes found mine. “They heard the final gambit in a great game.”
    “Goddamnit, Jonas!” That hadn’t been Marco or the girl, but rather the tall witch with the short gray hair, whose name I’d forgotten.
    At least, I had until Jonas looked up, frowning. “Do you know, Evelyn, I really do not need—”
    “It’s not your needs I’m interested in,” she said, getting in Jonas’ face. There was a war mage at his side, not Caleb, but someone I didn’t know. Someone I didn’t even remember arriving. But he made a small movement, and the witch bared her teeth at him. “Feeling lucky, sonny?”
    “I don’t need luck,” he said, very low.
    “No, but considering who you work for, I assume skill is too much to—”
    I stopped listening.
    “What are you talking about?” Caleb looked like he wanted to put a fist through Adra’s face.
    I didn’t. I just wanted Pritkin to move. Wanted to see the chest go up and down. Wanted to see him open those eyes and glare at me about something, anything . . . 
    “I am talking about the fact that the being you call Artemis had won an entire universe for herself by her treachery, for she was the only great power left. She had ensured that by hunting the greatest of my kind to extinction, and then by exiling her own people. But she made one miscalculation. She left herself too weak to capitalize on her victory.”
    “You lie!”
    “Why? For telling you what you do not wish to hear?” Adra asked, unfazed. “The one you call Artemis may have founded your order, war mage, but make no mistake. It was to serve her needs, not yours.”
    Caleb turned away with a curse and Adra looked at me. “We don’t know what went wrong. Perhaps the spell took more energy than she’d planned, perhaps her fellow gods fought harder than she’d expected. All we know is that the aftermath left her vulnerable, and she was forced into hiding. And she was good at it, for we sought her, those of us she had wronged. And while we did not find her, we ensured that she could not surface, could not risk feeding on our lower orders, could not regain her great strength. We might not be able to bring her to justice, but we could force her to fade into obscurity among the humans, to die alone and unsung, bitterly brooding over how close she came.”
    I’d been bending over Pritkin, but at that I looked up at Adra through a veil of tumbled hair. “You’re twisting everything.”
    “But we were wrong about one thing,” he told me steadily. “We underestimated, by far, how long that process of decline would take. Just when we were sure she must have died, just when we thought ourselves safe at last, she formed another plan. A plan involving a child.”
    “I want a word with the Pythia,” the older witch said. It didn’t sound like a request.
    “If Cassie wishes to speak with you, she may, when we are finished here,” Jonas informed her. “Perhaps you can agree that stopping the return of an ancient menace is a little more important than whatever minor issue—”
    “Yes,
minor
,” she said. “Do let’s worry about the politics before we concern ourselves with silly women’s issues. But if I may remind you, it was a
woman
who brought you this information,
women
who assisted in getting her here, women who died tonight!”
    “I am not going to do this with you, Evelyn. Really I’m not,” Jonas said, little spots of color appearing on his fair cheeks. “This is not an example of misogyny despite your strange determination to make it one. This is—”
    “—ridiculous,” I said, looking at Adra in bewilderment.
    “Is it? A child who would be half human. A child who could feed here, on earth, as the gods could not. A child who could be hidden in the