He choked back his rising emotions. “I remember you.”
She smiled weakly and laid her head to his heart. “I cannot stay long,” she murmured as she wrapped her arms around his waist.
“What happened here? Has Hekate passed?” David asked, caressing her hair.
“Here,” she lifted away from him, placing her hands where her head had laid. “I can show you.”
In a heartbeat, David was able to see them together in the room as if he’d leapt backwards in time. Hekate, alive and still with child, sat behind a cauldron of noxious liquid, herbs strewn about the floor around her, situated amongst sleepily burning candles that dripped pools of wax on the stone.
The cluster of crows she’d just summoned fell away, leaving a scowling Morrigan behind. Her hair was cropped, its waves unkempt behind the corvid diadem that interrupted her icy eyes. The muscles of her tattooed arms bulged with tension as she gripped her spear with unabashed irritation. “You dare,” she hissed.
Hekate stood, looking relieved despite the war goddess’s mood. “It should not have to take that much for you to come to your own sister.”
“You are not my sister,” Morrigan scoffed. “My sister died a very long time ago. She was my twin—I felt it the instant she was gone. You are simply the result of a poorly hatched plan by her and Lucius.”
“Come now. Why be so cross with me?”
“After my death, I was able to see your true nature and all that you have done. You deceived the Council, convincing them you were on the side of righteousness while you and your brother murdered your entire bloodline, including your own mother, to ensure absolute power.”
Hekate shrugged. “I have my reasons.”
Morrigan snorted. “Oh yes, I am sure you feel very resolved in your selfish motives.”
“Oh, as if you are absolved of selfishness,” Hekate retorted as she gathered up her ingredients, tenderly placing the delicate herbs back into her apothecary box and snapping closed the lid. “Did you forget how you left me behind while you frolicked about the earth with Osiris while Set, your true husband, rotted away in the Underworld?”
“Stop acting as if you are her,” Morrigan demanded. “If you were truly my sister, you would remember his crimes and why we banished him there.”
Hekate put her hands on her hips. “Whether you wish to accept it or not, I am her reincarnation. You might have forgotten me during my abandonment, but that does not change the true nature of my soul.”
“I did not abandon my sister!” Morrigan sputtered. “She chose to stay on earth. How could I have possibly foreseen that my memories would be taken from me when I rose to earth?”
“Even if it was not intentional, Nephthys, it was abandonment just the same. First Protector, indeed,” she said with a snort. “And furthermore, Set is not the creature you believe him to be. He regrets murdering his brother—it was a crime of passion. You were the one who betrayed him, leaving him behind. In fact, running away seems to be a common theme for you.”
“So that is your intention—to force me to be with Lucius? That plan has never worked for anyone.”
“Sister, you must understand that it is your and Osiris’s love that has shattered the balance of earth,” Hekate softened her tone. “In order to restore it, you must return to Set, the one who loves you above any other.”
“I am not your sister,” Morrigan asserted, her voice reaching a poisonous intensity. “Might I remind you that Isis became Set’s consort, the reason that you are even alive holding his descendant in your very womb?”
Hekate sighed, running a hand over the swell of her stomach. “Yes, this is true. It was my idea that we have children together, planting the seeds in his mind so he could feel as though he figured it out on his own. It was the only way to ensure my heka would remain safe—dispersed amongst my daughters. But believe me when I tell you, I have long accepted that Set actually loves you, just as I once accepted that Osiris felt the same. Unlike you, I do not require adoration from any male, nor do I need another being to fulfill me.”
“If your intention is to upset me, it will not work. You are simply affirming what I already know—that you are not my sister. She understood and respected my love for Osiris when we lived in Egypt, she even watched over my sons. In fact, I should tear you apart for desecrating her memory.”
“Had I known that the love between you both would threaten our realms, I would not have accepted it,” Hekate maintained.
“No one could not have stopped it. Even we could not.”
“Nephthys, Osiris knows his history now. I told him everything. He does not search for you; you mean nothing to him. He loved a mortal girl named Gaia and his love died along with her. You must abandon this need for his affection—you are a goddess above all else! Osiris and I will remain on earth, as it should be, to fix all that has been broken, while you and Set return to the Underworld, taking your proper place as the guardians of death.”
Morrigan laughed at her. “Anubis would never let that happen. He guards the gates against my forced return.”
“Oh, do not fret, I have thought of everything. I plan to put you back into the body of Delicia, then formally end your life. Anubis will think you are her. As for Set, I let him believe that David was dead, then I brought him back to life in secrecy. David will end his life, since that is the only way that we can ensure he is delivered to the Underworld for Anubis to guard. Hopefully, there you will reconcile.”
“If you wanted what was best for Set, why take him away from the earth that Isis brought him back to?”
Hekate sighed, a look of dismay settling over her features. “This earth does not serve him well. The longer he stays here, the more tormented he becomes. He started this life a seeker of wisdom and truth, not some power-hungry warlord. What he has become is disgraceful. Humans are not meant to live so long in one body. It has poisoned him.”
Morrigan shook her head in disbelief. “You speak to me from a high pedestal, yet you betray him. And she who you consider to be your sister.”
“Nonsense. I am taking control of that which is mine. Heka is mine, giving life is my gift. I am the mother of this world, and as such, I must restore its ma’at and put its shattered pieces together again. This is why I had to consume all power, so that none of you would be able to prevent my doing so.” Her face was smug, satisfied by her plan, when unexpectedly, the expression crashed. Fear flashed across her eyes as they widened, water trickling to the ground from between her thighs. “Oh no...it is not yet time…” she groaned. She reached her hand between her skirts, lifting it up to reveal a coating of bright red.
Morrigan rushed to her side only to be blindsided by Delicia, revived by the scent of such powerful blood. She tore at Hekate’s throat before Morrigan could pull her off. Frantic, Morrigan’s apparition quickly resumed its place inside its former vessel, halting the attack, but Hekate already lay in an unconscious heap on the ground.
David found himself breathless as the vision faded, realizing his hold on Morrigan had tightened. He let go to face her. “Did Hekate survive? And what became of her child?”
“Hekate is dead, Isis’s bloodline is no longer,” she assured him.
Before David could press her further, she leaned forward to kiss him, filling his mouth with her taste. “I will miss you so much,” she sighed as she pulled away. “I am starting to believe that this is just my life—an endless yearning for that which I cannot have.”
“Wait—” he began, before he sensed Lucius behind him.
He turned to see his nemesis covered in shining armor, the black panels shielding his entire body save for his head, an ornate dragon carved into his breastplate. He nearly dropped his sword and helmet in surprise, beholding Morgana standing before him. “It worked?” he said, hopefully. “She brought you back?”
Morrigan narrowed her eyes. “Your plan failed. I possessed her body of my own accord, one final time, so that I can speak to you both before I return to the Otherrealms.”
“Both?” Lucius suddenly realized David was in the room. “You!” he growled in recognition, but before he could lunge, Morrigan waved her hand, freezing them both in place.
David searched her eyes frantically, realizing that not only couldn’t he move, but he also could not speak.
