Page 46 of Evermore (The Never Sky #3)

“It’s not too late to turn back,” I whispered to the strongest woman I’d ever known as she came up beside me.

“I hold a piece of them now,” she replied. “Perhaps they will see reason through that connection.”

“They’ll only see the Wrath, Min.”

A slow smile spread across her face. “Good. Because that’s exactly what I feel.

And I’m here because I told you I would stand beside you as long as you don’t go to the Forgotten.

I can’t imagine how hard it must be for you to fight that urge.

But I’ll not see you fade into nothing, Reverius Hawthorne Noctus.

Even if that means a little tough love from someone who’s known you longer than most realms have known daylight. ”

My power stirred restlessly beneath my skin, responding to the pure potential surrounding us. But none of it mattered. Not the pain. The ramifications. The cost. Not even the gods that would whisper about this day for centuries. Only her.

I stepped forward, power erupting outward, golden threads of magic weaving through nothing.

The void shuddered. My boots scraped against something that wasn’t quite floor, wasn’t quite air, sending ripples of possibility spreading outward into the darkness.

Nothing about this space was settling. I’d have rather spent a century in Death’s Court.

Three voices, the Fates, spoke into my mind as one, their words reverberating through my bones, though no being stood before us. “You dare?”

“I do.”

Minerva swayed slightly backward, and I knew without asking they’d entered her mind for a different kind of torture. Likely stoking the Wrath they believed had been stolen from them.

Their laughter sounded like a thousand small bells, each slightly out of tune. But underneath it lay the scrape of thread against thread, the endless working of the loom that bound them. “The Keeper grows bold in his desperation.”

“Or foolish,” another voice added.

I might’ve been standing with my eyes closed in the middle of the Never Sky for all I could see, but in small traces, from the span of one blink to the next, flashes of what happened around us came into view.

And though I could not see the Sisters of Fate, couldn’t even feel their presence, I caught a glimpse of hands working eternal threads, fingers bleeding where the sharpest strands cut deep.

“Or both,” said the third.

I gritted my teeth against their mockery, squaring my shoulders. “I seek an audience.”

“Of course you do. Why else would you dare enter? We deny your request. Return to the makings of your choices.” The words struck like a physical blow, sending me stumbling backward, the taste of copper flooding my mouth.

Golden threads of my power snapped and withered.

“We do not treat with gods who would bind us.”

“That was Ezra’s doing, not mine.”

“Yet you stood aside.” Their voices twisted together, sharp as knives.

The air grew heavy with the stench of rotting futures, discarded timelines decaying in the void.

“You watched as he stripped away our freedom. As we were bound to this loom, our fingers forever bleeding, our eyes forever seeing what must be and cannot be, never to walk among the moments we weave. Never to taste the futures we spin.”

“And now you come crawling back,” another sneered. I thought I saw her, ancient and terrible, threads of fate wound through her flesh like living chains. “Begging for help with your precious Huntress.”

My hands clenched into fists, power crackling between my fingers. “I don’t beg.”

More laughter, cruel and cold, echoed from everywhere and nowhere. “No? Then what do you call it?”

“A warning,” I growled, and my voice carried the weight of centuries.

“Her power grows unstable. If Alastor breaks her, if the madness claims her, there will be nothing left to salvage. If she cannot be saved, neither will the balance of power. There will never be forgiveness for my brother and nothing you weave will matter because I will burn it all. I will seek the end you fear. And don’t think for a second I can’t.

I was fucking created to do so.” My power throbbed, absolutely pounding beneath my skin like a weapon waiting for release.

Silence stretched between us. What I could only assume was the loom creaked, threads snapping. The whisper of lives being woven and cut swirled around us. Finally, after what felt like eons, a small, slithering voice said, “We will consider granting you an audience… on one condition.”

I lifted my chin. “Name it.”

“When Archer Bramwell sits upon the throne of Stirling, when his blood mingles with the ancient power of that seat, then, and only then, will we hear your questions. Not your plea, Keeper. We make no promises of aid. But we will listen, and perhaps we will answer.”

“He won’t?—”

“You will see this fate come to pass or we will not hear you. There is no argument unless you wish us to rescind. You must not speak of this to him. The mortal prince must believe it is his choice alone that puts him on the throne.” The voices began to fade, and with them went the scent of blood and promises, the weight of futures pressing down.

“The price is set, Keeper. The task named. Choose wisely. Time grows short, and madness waits for no god’s convenience. ”

The void swallowed their final words, leaving Minerva and I alone with the endless nothingness. My power flickered weakly, spent from reaching into this place where most gods feared to tread.

“Well,” Minerva said dryly beside me, though I heard the tremor she tried to hide, “that went about as well as expected. Though I must admit, their Wrath feels stronger here. Perhaps that’s why they’re so eager to see the mortal prince take his throne. The thread of his destiny… it burns.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because there’s a piece of me living in this void now.”