"Threads of Darkness encase them," Thanatos said, still gripping my shoulders. "Open the circle so that I may complete the spell. We need the power of Death and all five elements to battle this evil."

"Zoeybird, do as she says." Grandma lifted the purple candle.

With shaking hands I lit the match and yelled, "Spirit, join our circle!"

Thanatos raised her arms. Flinging salt around us she spoke the final words of the spell :

"Death's dark door I command open to me

The truth Darkness has hidden we shall see!"

The scarlet rope expanded and with a deafening roar it funneled up and up, creating a chaos of glowing red that ill uminated the bruised storm clouds filling the swol en sky above us.

"Keep control of your elements! Remember our intent!" Thanatos yelled. "Begin with air!" Damien lifted both of his hands and in a strong, sure voice called, "Air, blow from this place concealing shadows past!" A gale blew from Damien. It captured the chaotic red glow and changed it into a cone of swirling, concentrated energy.

"Fire!" Thanatos commanded.

Shaunee lifted her hands, shouting, "Fire, strike, burn, destroy what would prevent our sight!" Lightning sizzled, magnet-like, drawn to the center of the glowing cone.

"Water!"

Erin's arms weren't lifted. Instead she was pointing to the spot where Grandma had found Mom's body. "Water, with tide of truth wash clear sight-stealing time!"

Crack! A bolt spiked from the sky, striking the ground. As the earth opened, water rushed up from it, rippling in the red earth like a pool of blood.

"Earth!"

Stevie Rae, still on her knees, was staring at the battle Dragon waged with Aurox, watching it circle ever closer and closer to Rephaim's still body. She was crying and her voice shook, but her words rang across the circle, carried by the power of her heartache. "Earth, your bosom nurtures and keeps this spell 's key."

The water rippled. Images lifted from the pool's depths as if the earth was vomiting them, but they wavered and were unclear, just unrecognizable glimpses of faces and vaguely human forms.

"Spirit!" Thanatos called.

My mouth opened and through me, spirit recited the correct words from the revealing spell. "Lost years, wasted tears you felt my mom's cries.

Spirit, release the truth before our eyes!"

Instantly, everything outside the circle-Aurox and Dragon, Darius and Stark and Aphrodite-ceased to exist for me. The only thing that was real was what was being revealed within the pool. The water cleared and, as if it was happening before my eyes I saw my mom on Grandma's front porch. She answered the door, smiling but looking kinda confused. Then the scene expanded and the point of view changed and I could see Neferet, naked, standing on the other side of the open door, asking if Sylvia Redbird was home. I heard Grandma sob and I wanted to run to the pool of water, to stand between it and Grandma-to try and shield her from the grisly, unbearable vision I knew it was going to expose.

But I couldn't move.

"No, wait." Panicked, I looked down. The red glow that had outlined our circle had expanded. It carpeted the entire space, engulfing each of us.

"This is too much! I don't want Grandma to-"

"You cannot stop it," Thanatos said. "Death has put this spell in motion. Only death can release us." Grandma managed to lift her arm. She slid her hand in mine. Trapped by the power of death unleashed through the elements, we saw everything.

Neferet bound my mother with sticky, whip-like threads of black and then she slit her throat and let the threads drag her from the porch. In the middle of a blighted circle, the white bull of Darkness drank from her until the threads surrounding him were swol en and bloated. After Mom was dead and drained of blood, Neferet, laughing, mounted the beast and they disappeared together.

"It is true," Thanatos said. "Neferet's Consort is Darkness."

Then Stevie Rae cried, "Help Rephaim! The bull 's gonna kill him!" I looked from the disappearing vision in the pool to Stevie Rae. I only had time to wonder why the hell she was on her cell phone before the world around me exploded into sound and blood.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Kalona

Rephaim hadn't told him. His son had let him believe the Goddess had forgiven him, and in doing so she'd gifted him with the form of a human boy.

Rephaim hadn't mentioned that he'd been condemned to be a bird, a beast who could only long for something that was, with a creature's mind, forever unattainable.

"At least for the hours of daylight it is unattainable," Kalona said, pacing across the top of the ridge.