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“
How would you debate it?”
I thought when I couldn’t contain my curiosity anymore.

Landen looked down at me and shook his head side to side; I could see a sparkle in his blue eyes, which took my breath away. “
I just think that people who hide behind their childhoods are foolish. Just because your parents were great doesn’t mean that you are, and just because they’re bad, it doesn’t mean that you are. All the time people spend using their past as a crutch could be spent living a life they want to have. We control our thoughts - no one else,”
he thought.

I stared forward at the hallway that was approaching, going over every word he just said.

“Waiting for your comeback,” Landen said aloud in an amused tone. Marc looked curiously over his shoulder at me.

I blushed slightly and smiled. “Well, don’t faint: I don’t have one. I agree,” I answered, looking up at Landen. He laughed under his breath.

“If you’ve managed to leave her speechless, you have to tell us how,” Dane said.

I playfully glared at him, and he shrugged his shoulders. “I’m just saying,” Dane said, avoiding my eyes and adjusting the books he was carrying. Shaking my head, I reached for one of the books.

“From the outside, it doesn’t seem as big as this,” Marc complained as he continued to walk forward.

“Go to your left up here,” Landen said, still smiling at me.

We passed five more doorways before we turned left into another hallway; from there, we could see August and Perodine at the end of the long hall. We entered the room through one of the doorways that framed the fireplace. August looked up, startled to see us come from that direction. Perodine never lost her gaze with the scroll. Marc looked back at Dane and us when he saw her; it was clear they weren’t expecting to see her so dressed down: she’d pulled her silver hair back into a ponytail, her pant legs were rolled up, and she was still barefoot. Landen set our bags beside the couch and took the book from me. Marc let his and Dane’s bag fall next to ours.

Marc pulled out a chair at the table and took a seat. Landen leaned over the table, looking at the notes August had made. Dane and I leaned against the back of the couch.

“How?” Perodine asked, tucking a loose lock of hair behind her ear.

“Well, love, I guess they were twins. Samilya was given to a ruler; years later, she ran to her sister Jayda, telling her that darkness had consumed the man she loved. Jayda was taken by mistake by the ruler’s guards. When she stood before him for punishment, the darkness left, and Jayda and the ruler lived a very long life completely in love,” August explained.

I could feel astonishment come over Perodine; her face lost all of its color, and she slid into the chair in front of which she was standing.

“Are you OK?” Landen asked.

“I just...I just remembered Donalt from long ago...he wasn’t always...cold,” Perodine said in a quiet voice. She looked at me. “I told you that at one time I did love him. I...I lost our first two children. The grief changed me, and I went months without even seeing him. I just don’t remember when he changed. I mean, I remember coming to him, wanting to try again, and...he felt empty. He made me feel like a nuisance,” she said. She sighed and looked to the shadows of the room, then to the scroll. “I just want to know what I’m fighting: the man I gave my life to, or a darkness that took him from me.” Perodine reached for the books and turned the pages, then looked up at August. “Can you read this? Tell me more so I’ll know.” she said.

“I’ll show you what I know,” August said, placing his hand on hers.

“Have you learned anything else about the scroll?” Landen asked, stepping closer to the table.

August broke his stare with Perodine and looked up at him. “Perodine has assured me it’s not the orbit that brings the trails,” he answered.

I looked at her. “Then what is it?” I asked.

She looked up into my eyes, and I could feel her grief. “After Donalt saw you for the first time, he was furious – he knew that you would end his dark reign. I had him watched, and my spy witnessed the chant that envisioned the battle you’re in.”

“Chant? Like a curse? You’re saying I’m cursed?” I said, gasping for a clear mind as hopelessness consumed me.

“No,” she said, rising to come to my side. “No one can ‘curse’ us; our thoughts control our lives. Even if it were possible to be cursed, I’d already protected you at that point.”

“What was the purpose of the chant then?” I asked, growing too tired to understand half-spoken myths.

“Its purpose was for him to see each time you’d be strong enough to strike him, to cause his rein to crumble. In his mind, he thought if he could see when you were coming, he could cause you to fail.”

“I’m not coming for him. I wouldn’t even know he existed if it weren’t for Drake coming after me with the blue moon. Why would I chase a devil?”

“You’re seeing this from the moment you’re in now. Try to imagine a grand scheme stretching across a multitude of lifetimes. In reality, a million different circumstances could have lead you there on that night. The point is, there are ten moments in this lifetime that you will be strong enough to bring the devil to his knees. These moments are reflected by the universe above – eight planets beyond the sun and moon will be your power to come full circle and defeat the dark ruler,” she answered

“Can you see the moments? Can you tell me when the next one will be?” I asked with pleading eyes, shaking in fear of what was to come.

Landen came to my side and tried to push peace into my body; the numbing feeling was chasing away my fears, but I still trembled.

Perodine fought back tears before turning to walk back to the table to look at the scroll. “Each moment was traced by the stargazers of that time and recorded here. Some will be easily seen, like the Blue moon; others will be more obscure. The only thing I know for sure is that the influences will come in order of the orbit. To find the time, we’ll have to watch the skies above and the prediction of the scroll; when they match, we’ll know that the trail is upon us.”

As we all felt the weight of helplessness, the room grew still – and at that moment, I wasn’t sure that I wanted to know. It was like having someone tell you that your life would end on this day at this time...who would want to know that?

August leaned closer to the scrolls and began to study them more ambitiously than ever before.

“The skies almost completely match what the scroll reflects around Venus. Now, to make you as strong as possible, we must find out how he plans to defeat you, understand what you’ll face so you’ll be prepared physically and mentally for anything he can use against you,” Perodine said, pulling her notepad closer to her.

“Have you found any answers so far?” Marc asked.

Perodine took in a deep breath as she read her notes over. “We’re pulling out the symbols now. Landen, have you tried to heal anyone on your own?” she asked.

“Pelhan just taught me. Does it say that there?” he asked her.

“We think this symbol of a fish and a hand means a Pisces healer; we just didn’t know if it was you or Drake,” Perodine answered.

I felt the tension rise in the room; it was exhausting me.”
I need to sit down,”
I thought.

“
Are you OK?”
Landen thought.

“
Just tired,”
I thought as I slowly walked around the couch in front of the fireplace and fell into it. Dane took a seat on the opposite couch and protectively watched my every breath.

“So who are we fighting here - Drake, Donalt, or both?” Marc asked.

“I don’t know,” Perodine answered, still puzzled. As I gazed at the raging flames in the fireplace, Drake’s perfect image surfaced in my mind; all I could see was the pain I left in his eyes.

“Tell me about what Venus will bring, the characteristics; is it not the planet of love?” Landen asked.

Silence filled the room, and the tension continued to climb. I could feel August and Perodine struggling with the emotions they feared the worst, but they didn’t want to show it to us.

“Just say it,” Landen said in a low tone.

I heard August clear his throat before he began to speak. “Well, yes, it does influence love - most of the time. But Venus is entering retrograde in the sign of Scorpio,” he said.

“Go on,” Landen said.

I turned in my seat to see them behind me. Marc and Landen had their arms crossed, and Perodine and August were staring at each other as if they were trying to give one another some kind of hidden communication. Perodine looked past them at me, then back to Landen. “Your decisions will be made with a clarity that does not know the emotion of guilt. There will be nothing that can be held back; every truth that can be told, will be. Past relations will surface,” she said.

“What do you mean? Relationships in past lives? We already had to deal with that,” Landen argued.

“Son, that is not the part we’re worried about,” August said, sighing deeply. “You’ve had the privilege of making decisions with your heart, and the heart often has no clear reason. This time, Venus will influence you to make a rational decision based on what you see - not what you feel. Throughout history, it has been known as the heartless, the opposite of the love Venus normally gives us,” August said.

Landen looked back at me, then to August. “Does this affect only me and Willow, or all of you?” he asked.

“Everyone,” Perodine answered. “We must realize that now, because as the hours move forward and truths are revealed, we have to hinder our anger. This darkness feeds off the negative – and right now it’s being fueled by the workers on the other side of that wall.”

“What truths? Willow and I have held nothing back, have we?” Landen asked, confused.

“If you remove the emotion of love and look at things from a rational point of view, you will find a truth that has escaped you before,” Perodine answered.

“Why did you think Drake was a healer? Is he not on the same side as Donalt?” Marc asked, trying to comprehend what he was hearing.

August looked at Marc, and a sense of grief came over him; he understood Marc’s anger, but he wanted him to move past it, to see Drake as the brother he was to Marc – not the enemy.

“For all we know, Drake is just an innocent bystander – someone Donalt planned all along to use as a vessel. His and Landen’s charts are weaved so closely together, you can barely see the defining line; at this moment, I fear his life is the one in danger – not Landen’s,” August said, looking down, prepared to block himself from the arguments he thought would come his way.

August believed what he said. As Landen heard the truth in his words and felt the emotion of grief and sorrow fill him. I was too tired to try and understand if the sorrow was for August or Drake; instead, I turned forward and resumed my stare at the raging flames in the fireplace.

I heard the shuffling of papers, then felt an astonishment coming from Perodine. I turned in my seat and watched her recording symbols from my birth chart and the scroll we’d brought.

“That may be the time we will face the climax of Venus, the window Donalt will use. The universe is a sea of perfect numbers, and Donalt would had to have found a way to weave himself into the equation, into the place of Landen or Drake. If this is right, he will have the chance on Willow’s birthday, the nineteenth hour, minute, second,” Perodine answered.

I felt August’s fear, and my eyes raced between them. “A number that can only be divided by one and itself,” August whispered.

“What are you saying - Donalt is going to try and become me?” Landen asked, feeling just as scared and confused as I was.

“Maybe...maybe you, maybe Drake, but one of you,” Perodine said, leaning in to look closer at the scroll. Landen felt my uneasiness and came to sit by my side; I curled up in his arms and watched the fire.