Fate’s Fury Epilogue
Finn’s arms were still wrapped around Fate when they tumbled through a dark corridor on the other side and slid to a stop. The ride back had been an ecstatic collision of pleasure and pain. Forged together by love and a kiss that had lanced delicious sparks along her spine, the bombardment of the portal’s hot bolts of electricity zapping from every direction had been not only bearable, but also strangely exhilarating.
Finn helped her to her feet. “That was interesting.”
“Just a little.” Still giddy, she giggled.
Sithias appeared in the open doorway, shining a flashlight in their faces. “What are you waiting for? Get out here!” He dragged their bags out of the closet into the bookstore’s storage room.
The lights were on, just as they had been the last time Fate had been in the bookstore.
Jessie poked her head through the thick velvet curtains. “Hurry up. You have to see this!”
The musty odor of dust and old cardboard wafted in the air as Fate stepped out into the storage room. When Finn closed the door to the janitor closet, she checked for the Lock to the portal. It was still anchored to the outside of the door.
She reopened the door to a shallow closet filled with cleaning supplies.
Sithias stared at the contents of the closet. “How did those get there?”
“The portal shut down on the other side. This is what you get when it’s not active. Mops and brooms.”
Jessie huffed impatiently. “Hey! I’m getting old waiting for you.” She disappeared behind the curtains.
They weaved through the maze of stacked boxes, out into the main floor. The familiar creak of the old cedar flooring beneath Fate’s step and the cozy reading nooks tucked away in snug corners filled her with a conflicting mixture of nostalgia and homesickness.
She reached for Finn’s hand, comforted beyond measure by his presence as they passed by the bookshelves lined full with the colorful spines of hundreds of books.
When they rounded the last row of bookcases, Fate stopped. Every muscle tightened with loathing when they saw the giant, ten-foot-tall Book of Fables leaning against the stairwell leading to the second floor. It seemed a lifetime since Fate had laid eyes on the scarred wooden cover with its intricately carved relief of an oak tree and title spelled out in mellowed, gold-leaf letters.
She shook as her gaze moved to the round, tarnished wrought iron lock patterned with leafy scrollwork surrounding a large keyhole. To anyone else, the lock was added adornment on what had been Fables Bookstore’s elaborate, old-fashioned sign from when the business had first been established. No one would ever suspect the book was a cursed object waiting to devour the first unsuspecting person unlucky enough to read aloud from its pages.
This was troublesome since the ‘sign’ had been anchored to the outside wall of the building the last time she’d been there. The bookstore had also been flooded with fans dressed as the characters from her book. An untimely event that had marked the beginning of all the tragedies that followed.
Jessie stood next to the Book of Fables, gesturing impatiently. “Look what we found.”
Sithias rushed over to stand on the other side, pointing emphatically at Brune’s missing key. It was now as long as a cane, back to its original size, just as it was when Fate discovered it the first time around. Finn may have been the one to use the huge key to unlock the Book of Fables, but she’d spoken the words on the page that trapped them inside the stories.
Dread pressed in on Fate from all sides. Why was the key propped on end next to that evil book? Left there like a spooky gift.
Jessie lifted an ordinary tag tied to the scrollwork on the key’s filigreed bow. Fate recognized it from the supplies in the storage room.
“There’s a message written on it,” Jessie said.
“Read it out,” Finn suggested, when Fate didn’t move.
Jessie untied the tag and held it out to Sithias like it was a dead rat. “You read it.”
Sithias looked equally reluctant to touch it. He finally plucked it from Jessie and read the words slowly. “Fate. You took everything from me. I won’t stop until I’ve done the same to you. D.”
Jessie stomped her foot. “D for Devil! Diablo! Daughter of Judas!”
Fate’s head filled with a harsh buzzing growing louder by the second. What more could she possibly lose? Her blood chilled, slowing in her veins. Was Darcy threatening Gerdie and Brune? The last members of her family?
Or was Darcy only leading her to believe she’d entered into the Book of Fables? Was she here in this world planning to hurt Finn, Jessie and Sithias?
Fate pressed her fingers against her throbbing temples. This wasn’t supposed to happen. She was supposed to be stitching the ragged pieces of her shattered life back together into something manageable. Peaceful. Normal.
But Darcy had thrown down the gauntlet. This was an outright challenge she couldn’t ignore. From where Fate was standing, this was a duel to the death, because she could not–would not–stand by and let Darcy harm anyone else she loved.
“It sounds like she’s goading you into going back inside the Book of Fables.” Finn sounded far away.
Sithias joined in from that same distant place. “Oh dear, I can’t imagine the destruction she’ll wreak in Oldwilde.”
“Should we go in after her?” Jessie asked.
Suddenly they were all talking at once. Their voices grew faint as if Fate was floating off into space. “Hey love, can you hear me? Are you all right misss? Fate… Fate?”
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