The Rise of Fortune and Fury (Chronicles of the Stone Veil 5)

We just had a date, of sorts.

Lunch to be exact, and it was wonderful because it was just the two of us. Outside of the time we spend in our bedroom—where conversation isn’t necessarily at a premium—we get to spend little alone time together. This has been especially true since Zora has come, because I’ve been devoting a lot of time to hanging out with her.

In the past two days since returning from Semper Terra, I’ve taken her out of the condo and shown her what Seattle has to offer. Of course, that had to include visits to the Space Needle and Pike’s Place Market. That precipitated a stop to the very first Starbucks across the Market so I could explain Seattle coffee to Zora. While she’s not a coffee connoisseur, nor has she actually had a cup of coffee from One Bean yet, she did proclaim my place much better. I loved that so much because while Zora doesn’t think she’s likable, doesn’t know how to be a sister, or even how to show kindness, that statement said everything about the kind of person she’s becoming since leaving the Underworld.

Carrick and I also took Zora to the Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum, as well as on a ferry boat ride. She is still getting used to mechanized and electrical wonders—cars, boats, planes, elevators, televisions, smartphones, and such. And hilariously, the thing that seems to impress her the most are the robotic vacuums Zaid has set up around the condo to sweep the floors on the off days from when the cleaning service comes in. She’s also enamored with hairdryers and microwave ovens.

Many of these things, she had heard of before. Amell taught her about the magic of a jet plane in the Earth realm as he’d take her flying across the Underworld caverns. She wanted to take a plane trip, but she still couldn’t quite understand how enormous an actual passenger plane was. To give her some perspective, we took her to the intersection of 188th Street and 16th Avenue so she could watch some planes land at Sea-Tac. I was afraid she was going to have a heart attack as the first one came roaring over us.

In all, the last two days have been idyllic for me because I’ve been able to spend time with Zora without the weight of the prophecy in my face. Carrick, Maddox, Zaid, and Boral were still working hard to find information about where Kymaris might be and where the ritual will be held. Titus stayed back in Semper Terra where he and Caiden will continue to recruit annihilators to join us for the probable battle, and Rainey and Myles are still in Fiji, but they’ll be home in two days.

Carrick has never begrudged me time with Zora since she returned with us. He knows she’s been lost to me for twenty-eight years, and I have but days to get to know her. He also knows he has me for eternity, so he’s contentedly taken a backseat for my attentions.

This morning when he suggested a lunch date, I jumped on it with excitement. He offered for us to take Zora, but I found myself craving some normal alone time with him as he had been having for me.

We left Zora settled on her bed, reading a book, and she assured me she didn’t need me hovering. The subject of Zora’s magical powers has been put on the back burner. We all assured her there was no pressure for her to figure them out, and that we were not going to expect anything from her in the way of helping us battle. We even teased her that she would earn a permanent seat on the Scooby Gang, which means she would stay far from the danger when it came down to it.

We had to explain what the Scooby Gang was, of course. That necessitated us watching some Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes so she could get the reference, and we ended up binging one afternoon until deep into the night. Zora found the show to be nothing but mindless entertainment. She was understanding humor more because she laughed a lot. I actually found it to be inspiring watching Buffy kick some demon ass. It would be a man’s equivalent of watching Rocky before stepping into the boxing ring.

At any rate, Zora was here in the sole capacity of being my twin sister and for us to hopefully build a long life together. She’d stay well away from the battle when it went down, as would Rainey and Myles.

And everyone was okay with that.

“We should do this more often,” Carrick says, pulling my hand up and actually tucking it into the crook of his elbow, which had us moving closer together as we walked. It was an old-fashioned move, and I wonder how many times we had walked together like this over the centuries.