Parting my legs so I could bend over without my stomach hitting my knees, I pick it up, losing my battle with tears all over again. To anyone else, this could be from a hawk, but I can feel the divinity coming off the large brown feather.
Julian is at peace.
Chapter 42
I sit on the porch swing, hands going to my stomach. Juliet is moving around, kicking me in the ribs and stretching the confines of my insides to their limits. Rolling my neck, I stretch my arms out and watch Scarlet run around the yard.
It’s been a week since Evander brought over the fragment of the gemstone, and a week since I found the feather I know without a doubt was a sign.
Julian is at peace.
I don’t know where, and I don’t know how, but he is.
It brings me comfort yet doesn’t make me feel better. I miss him, and as each day passes, I grow angrier and angrier. Paimon is going to fucking pay for what he did, and the coward hasn’t been seen since his plan crumbled apart. He’s still trapped in Hell, and the Horsemen are on the loose. It’s only a matter of time before they team up again.
Though there’s a chance the Horsemen are acting on their own now, and I can’t turn on the news without seeing something that makes me question if it was sparked by them. Political leaders who used to get along are suddenly at odds with each other. The same disease that killed livestock in the Middle-East made its way to the UK, and as of now, no one knows how it spread. The cost of beef has already gone up here, and a farm in Kansas that grows crops for livestock feed got an unusual amount of rain, washing away what was just starting to grow in the fields.
And just last night, an earthquake happened in the Caribbean. Dozens of people are dead, and hundreds are missing.
War, Pestilence, Famine, and now Death are gathering souls. We have to stop them before they get even more powerful.
“Ready?” I call to Scarlet, slowly getting back on my feet. Juliet feels heavier again, and I think I’m around thirty-six weeks now, even though I haven’t been pregnant for that long. Part of me does fear I’m going to have a giant baby just chilling inside me until her actual due date well over a month away. “Actually, never mind. It’s so nice out,” I tell her and telekinetically throw her slobbery tennis ball. “I’ll be right back.”
Lucas is in the kitchen, watching a YouTube video on how to make a grilled cheese sandwich on his iPad. It melts my heart every time I see him cooking for me. He’s gotten a lot better, and I fucking love him so much for trying.
“I don’t need anything,” I tell him and attempt to wrap my arms around him, but my stomach gets in the way. “Though a three-cheese sandwich with avocado sounds amazing.”
Lucas finishes buttering the piece of bread and puts it on the cast-iron skillet. “I will never understand humans’ love for avocados. Green, mushy fruit sounds disgusting without knowing how it smells.”
I laugh. “I can’t eat it plain, but it’s good in things.” We kiss, and I break away to get my book of shadows, my mom’s dark grimoire, and the fragment of the gemstone Evander brought over. “I was doing some thinking,” I start, flipping a page in the notebook.
“Don’t overexert yourself,” Eliza’s singsong voice comes from the hall. Her usual smug smile turns genuine when she enters the kitchen. For the most part, it’s been nice having her here. Sticking more to a regular vampire schedule than Lucas, she sleeps during the day and goes out at night. Where she goes, I don’t know, and I don’t want to.
“Hah. Too late for that.” I point to my notes, showing them a spell I’m working on. “The circle we cast when you were cursed was very effective in holding the black magic in place but took time to cast. There’s no way we could set things up and stand around a Horseman long enough to cast the circle, and it’s a literal circle of protection that needs to be visualized. But I was thinking if we used some of the same sacred geometry in this circle but set each trap up in a triangle shape instead, and had all four triangles together, it would look like this.”
“It’s a square.” Eliza’s brows go up.
“Exactly. Four corners. Four elements to draw power from, all while using the same spell Paimon used on me.”
“A circle within a circle,” Lucas sums up.
“Yes.” My eyes light up. “I’m going to test out a mini version and then send my notes over to Evander if it works out like I think.”