“For whom?”
Terra’s brow quirked, the first sign of confusion I’d seen from any of them. “For whom?”
“Yes. Who decided you needed to maintain the equilibrium?” Again, that bewildered look. “Is there a higher power than the Fates?”
“We answer to no one!” Incendia features suddenly tightened into a savage glare.
Well, I guess that’s a touchy subject. Whether there was someone or something higher was still unclear, though I had a feeling perhaps a higher power was in control, beyond these Fates. Incendia’s eyes narrowed as he read my mind.
“So, you just answer us when you feel like it?” I asked.
Terra smiled. “More or less. When one of you casts your spell, we decide how that spell will be delivered, how the course of fate will be changed. If it will be changed.”
Change the course of fate … the blood in my veins suddenly sparked. “Yes, about that.” Now I remembered why I was here. What had driven me to demand to see these wretched things. I crossed my arms, leveling Terra with a stare. “I don’t recall asking you to bind a baby to a deadly curse, or resurrect my lover. Or kill him in the first place!”
Four arrogant smiles answered me. I wanted to punch them all, but I knew they’d eviscerate me if I so much as moved.
“The rules are simple,” Terra began. “Listen closely, for we’ll only explain once. If we answer your request, we must do what you wish. How we choose to do so is up to us. That’s part of the fun.”
“Fun?” My voice turned shaky. Four universes, four games. Mage was right. This was all a game! I was their entertainment! “And of course you couldn’t ever simply give us what we want,” I added bitterly.
Bewilderment flashed across Terra’s face. “I suppose we could but … how monotonous this burden would become for us!”
“You killed Nathan because you were bored?” I shouted.
Her composure was enough to drive someone off a cliff. “No … you killed Nathan. Remember?”
Rage tore through me. I wanted to leap forward and attack her. I pictured doing it. The picture was immediately obliterated by a wave of crippling pain. My knees buckled and I crumbled to the pedestal, panting as it took its time to subside.
“Finished?” Incendia purred with a wicked smile. “I am the one who decided to eliminate Nathan. That was my twist to the spell. That’s how the game works. Each of us has our chosen ones and we can grant the spell but not without council and input from the others. That way, no one is favored.”
“So,” I said, still winded from my warning, “for every Causal Enchantment I come to you with, you will grant it but not without perverting it into something so skewed from what I asked for, it is more a punishment. To what end?”
“We’ve already explained that,” Incendia answered coolly.
I struggled to my feet. “Oh, yes. That’s right. For your entertainment.” I spat out each bitter word. “When will it end?”
“When only one chosen is left standing.”
“So one of you is supporting me while three of you are always trying to break me.”
“Basically,” Ventus answered flatly, shrugging. “Nothing personal.”
Yeah, right … “And so how many of these ‘chosen ones’ are left?”
“Two,” Unda answered. “You and Incendia’s.”
I’m in a competition and I don’t even know who my competitors are. A tiny part of me—the aggressive Sofie—swelled with pride over being in the final two. Whoever this person was, they were important. “So either I break or yours breaks,” I surmised. “And then what?”
Incendia shrugged noncommittally. “We start again. We choose another planet. We find our players, and we begin.”
How many of these “games” had they played? How many worlds destroyed? “And Earth? My world?”
“We never grant the same request in the exact same way twice. That’s a rule,” Terra began to explain in an authoritative voice. “But, no matter how we choose to play the game, all paths will lead to one fate. Your world will end, my dear Sofie. That I can assure you.”
A desperate numb feeling washed over me as I regarded Terra more closely. She was both my protector and my punisher. Without her gift of choice and her magic, I would not be a vampire. I would have died long ago, buried by Nathan. With her gift, I have suffered countless injuries, caused pain to others time and time again. And now they were telling me all of it was hopeless.
“Can’t I buy some more time?” I asked, my voice hollow.