"I'm not speakin' to you at all ever again," Stevie Rae told her.

"Good. Now, on to the important stuff. You two aren't gonna like either of the things I have to say, but you need to listen up-unless you want to be like my mom."

"We're listening," I said.

Stevie Rae kept her lips pressed together, but nodded.

"First, bumpkin, I know you've gone all goo-goo-eyed about Kalona since he dropped water on your birdboy and resurrected him-"

"He cried immortal tears on his son and magickally brought him back from near death. Jeeze Louise, you were there! You saw it," Stevie Rae said.

"You're not speaking to me, remember? But you just made my point for me. Up until a few hours ago we believed Kalona was as batshit crazy and dangerous as Neferet. Now he's Death's Warrior. The school's gonna slobber all over him, just like they did after he broke out of the ground. We're going to show more sense. Or, at least I'm going to show more sense. It'd be nice if you two joined me."

"I'll never trust him." I spoke quietly, saying words that came from deep in my heart.

"Z, he gave Thanatos his oath," Stevie Rae said.

I met her gaze. "He killed Heath. He killed Stark. He only brought Stark back because Nyx forced him to pay a life debt for Heath. Stevie Rae, I was in the Otherworld with him. Kalona asked when Nyx would forgive him. She told him he could only ask when he was worthy of her forgiveness."

"Maybe that's what he's working toward," she said.

"And maybe he's a manipulative, lying, ra**st and murderer," Aphrodite countered. "If Zoey and I are wrong, then great. You can say 'told ya so' and we'll all smile and throw an effing party. If we're right we will not have been caught off guard when a fallen god goes on another rampage."

Stevie Rae sighed. "I know-I know. You're makin' sense. I'm not gonna trust him one hundred percent."

"Fine. But keep an eye on your birdboy, too. He trusts his dad one hundred percent, which means Kalona can use him. Again."

Stevie Rae's expression tightened, but she nodded. "Yeah, I will."

"Second"-Aphrodite shifted the bulk of her attention to me- "explain the weird shit that went through your mind when you called that f**king bull by Heath's name last night."

"What?" Stevie Rae blurted. "That's not true. Is it, Z?"

Okay, lying would be easy. I could just say that Aphrodite had obviously lost her mind and had been hearing things. I mean, there had been a crapload of Crazy happening all at once last night-not to mention all of the elements manifesting so powerfully that nothing was totally clear except my mom's murder by Neferet and the fact that she was the Consort of Darkness.

And I almost did lie.

Then I remembered what lying to my friends had cost me before-not just their trust for a while, but it had cost me respect for myself. I didn't feel good when I lied. I felt out of sync with the Goddess and the path I believe she wanted me to walk.

So, I drew a deep breath and told the truth in one burst of words: "I looked through the Seer Stone at Aurox and I saw Heath and it freaked me out and I called his name and Aurox turned and looked at me before he started changing back into that bull thing and that's why when he charged me I just stood there and told him he wouldn't hurt me. The end."

"You have lost your f**king mind. Shit, and I think I threw away my mom's shrink's number too soon. You need to medicate and evaluate."

"Well, I'm gonna be nicer than Aphrodite, but it just doesn't make any sense, Z. How could Heath be around Aurox?"

"I don't know! And he wasn't around him. It was like Heath glowed on Aurox. Or at least shadowed him with a moonstone shine." I wanted to scream my frustration at not being able to describe what I'd glimpsed.

"Was it like a ghost?" Stevie Rae asked.

"That might make a little bit of sense," Aphrodite said, nodding to Stevie Rae, as if the two of them were figuring through it. "We were in the middle of a ritual evoking Death. Heath's dead. Maybe we snagged his ghost."

"I don't think so," I said.

"But you don't know for sure, right?" Stevie Rae said.

"No, I don't know anything for sure except that the Seer Stone is old magick, and old magick is strong and unpredictable. Hell, it's not even supposed to be anywhere except the Isle of Skye, so I don't know what's going on with me seeing stuff through it here." I threw up my hands. "Maybe I imagined it. Maybe I didn't. This is weird, even for me. I thought I saw Heath, and then Aurox changed completely into that bull thing and ran off."