揥hat is that thing??Marie asked as her black eyes grew wide.
揂tropos,?Dr. Kent said. She wasn抰 answering Marie. She was addressing the thing that had just emerged from the pool like a monster from a nightmare. 揑 have guests, and you are scaring them.?
揂tropos??Circe asked breathlessly. She was trembling so bad she could barely keep her feet under her. Marie kept her upright with one hand while keeping a death grip on me with the other.
The strange figure clambered to its feet and straightened up. The bones popped and snapped as they oriented themselves. The skin plumped up on its bones and the face became something more living than dead. She was an older woman, though she looked remarkably similar to Dr. Kent, draped in a pale yellow dress that seemed to materialize out of nowhere. She took a few steps on wobbly legs as the water dripped from her face and beaded on the mass of black coils atop her head. Her skin was the color of boat orchids, her eyes a stunning chestnut brown. She swept the water droplets from her bare arms and sighed. She leaned over the rim of the pool and took hold of something that almost pulled her off her feet. She braced herself against the pool抯 wall and drew something up from the water.
Another person.
This figure was more flesh than the other had been, almost fully intact as she emerged from the water, and was clothed in pale blue robes. Instead of looking like an older Dr. Kent, she looked like she might have been her younger sister.
揥e haven抰 long, Clotho,?said the younger-looking one.
Her voice sent a shiver through me.
揑 won抰 keep you, Lachesis,?Dr. Kent said. 揕ook who I have here.?
The sisters?gaze swept over Circe and then me. Three sets of inhuman eyes watched us carefully.
揇escendants of Hecate,?Lachesis said. She walked to the spinning wheel and stared at the glowing threads. 揥hat would you have us do??
Dr. Kent went to one of the surrounding alcoves and pulled from it a wooden chest the size of a shoebox. She handled it like it was fragile, but as she closed the gap between us and opened the top in front of me, it was only filled with more of the same string that was stuffed into the rock-cut shelves. Some strands glowing, others dull and nearly disintegrated.
揟hese are the threads I have spun for your family since Medea抯 time,?Dr. Kent said.
I stared into the box, and as terrified as I was, I couldn抰 help but feel a swell of fascination.
揇id you know that Medea and Absyrtus were the only children Hecate ever brought into this world??Dr. Kent asked. 揟hey were precious to her. And Medea was so talented. Gods. She was so skilled with poisons. She could craft a concoction that would kill a man over weeks, months even梕xtend the suffering as long as she liked. She was much like her own mother in that way. None of the stories save the one I penned were anywhere near the truth. They only served to soften her, to make her into something broken and spiteful梞urderous. It抯 a shame I didn抰 have a chance to record more, foolish as it was. I could spend a hundred pages telling you of the ways in which Medea cut down the people who betrayed her. She was ruthless when it came to the protection of her family梐nd her garden.?
My heart ticked up. 揟he garden? Is it on Aeaea??
Dr. Kent tilted her head and shrugged one shoulder. 揥ho抯 to say? But that would be a tale worth telling, wouldn抰 it??
I wondered if part of their covenant or whatever it was that kept them from interfering with mortals also made them unable to give a straight answer to a simple question.
Dr. Kent plucked a short dull thread from the box and held it up.
揝elene Colchis,?Lachesis said in a raspy exhale. 揟hirty threads.?
Atropos reached into the folds of her dress and took out a pair of glinting gold shears. 揋one.?The blades made a gentle clicking sound as she opened and closed them.
I sucked in a breath and held it as Dr. Kent picked up another dull string.
揟handie Greene.?Lachesis pulled a length of thread from the wheel. 揊orty-one threads.?
Atropos opened and closed her shears but said nothing.
I thought of Hecate having to watch everything that had happened to her children, forbidden to interfere though it was clear she had at least tried. She was a goddess that these other beings seemed to have a certain reverence for, but I抎 looked into her eyes and seen something familiar, something human梩he unmistakable mask of grief. My chest felt like it would cave in. I struggled to find a rhythm in my breathing that wouldn抰 make me pass out.
揈nough,?Marie said, her voice little more than an angry growl. 揥hat抯 the damn point??
Dr. Kent桟lotho梐nd her two sisters turned to Marie with eerily similar expressions.
Dr. Kent plucked a string from the box. It was thicker than the others. As big around as my thumb.