- Prey
- Sphere
- Black Rose
- The Great Train Robbery
- Blue Dahlia
- Carnal Innocence
- Dance Upon the Air
- High Noon
- Lawless
- Sacred Sins
- Tribute
- Face the Fire
- Holding the Dream
- A Man for Amanda
- All the Possibilities
- Next
- Prey
- Sphere
- Black Rose
- The Great Train Robbery
- Blue Dahlia
- Carnal Innocence
- Dance Upon the Air
- High Noon
- Lawless
- Sacred Sins
- Tribute
- Face the Fire
- Holding the Dream
- A Man for Amanda
The Last OraclePage 1
A.D. 398 “Her name is Anthea,” one of her patrons declared from below. Pythia kept her gaze focused on the child. “Anthea, do you know why you’ve been brought here?” “Your house is empty,” the child finally mumbled to the floor. So at least she can speak. Pythia glanced to the temple’s interior. The hearth fire burned in the center of the main hall. It was indeed empty at the moment, but the child’s words seemed to whisper at something more. Maybe it was her manner. So strange, so distant, as if she stood with one leg in this world and the other beyond this realm. The child glanced up with those clear blue eyes, so full of innocence, so in contrast with what spilled next from her lips. “You are old. You will die soon.” From below, her patron attempted to scold her, but Pythia kept her words soft. “We all die eventually, Anthea. It is the order of the world.” She shook her head. “Not the Hebrew boy.” Those strange eyes bored into her. The hairs along Pythia’s arms shivered. Plainly the girl had been taught the catechism of the cult of Christ and his bloody cross. But her words again. Such strange cadence. The Hebrew boy… It reminded her of her ancestor’s prophecy of doom. “But another will come,” the girl continued. “Another boy.” “Another boy?” Pythia leaned closer. “Who? From where?” “From my dreams.” The girl rubbed the heel of one hand at her ear. Sensing there were depths to the girl that remained untapped, Pythia plumbed them. “This boy?” she asked. “Who is he?” What the child said next drew a gasp from the gathered crowd—even they recognized blasphemy when they heard it. “He is the brother of the Hebrew boy.” The child then clasped tight to the hem of Pythia’s skirt. “He burns in my dreams…and he will burn everything. Nothing will last. Not even Rome.” For the past month, Pythia had attempted to learn more of this doom, even taking the girl into the sisterhood’s fold. But the child had seemed only to retreat into herself, going mute. Still, there was one way to learn more. If the girl were truly blessed, the power of Apollo’s breath—his prophetic vapors—might burn free what was locked within the girl’s strangeness. But was there enough time? A touch to her elbow interrupted her reverie and drew her back to the present. “Mistress, the sun…,” her younger sister urged. Pythia focused to the east. The eastern skies blazed, heralding the coming sunrise. Below, shouts rose from the Roman legion. Word of the girl had spread. Prophecies of doom had traveled far…even to the ears of the emperor. An Imperial courier had demanded the child be delivered to Rome, declaring her demon-plagued. Pythia had refused. The gods had sent this child to her threshold, to Apollo’s temple. Pythia would not relinquish the girl without first testing her, putting her to the question. To the east, the first rays of the sun etched the morning skies. The seventh day of the seventh month dawned. They had waited long enough. Pythia turned her back on the fiery legion. “Come. We must hurry.” She swept into the temple’s interior. Flames greeted her here, too, but they were the welcoming warmth from the temple’s sacred hearth. Two of her elder sisters still tended the flames, too old to make the harsh climb up to the caves. She nodded her gratitude to each in turn, then hurried past the hearth. At the back of the temple, stairs led down toward the private sanctum. Only those who served the Oracle were allowed to enter the subterranean adytum. As she descended, marble turned to raw limestone. The stairs emptied into a small cavern. The cave had been discovered ages ago by a goat herder, who upon nearing the cavern opening, fell under the sway of Apollo’s sweet-smelling vapors and succumbed to strange visions. Would that such gifts last one more sunrise. Pythia found the child waiting inside the cave. The girl was dressed in an alb too large for her and sat cross-legged beside the bronze tripod that supported the sacred omphalos, a waist-high domed rock that represented the navel of the world, the center of the universe. The only other decoration in the cave was a single raised seat, resting on three legs. It stood over a natural crack in the floor. Pythia, long accustomed to Apollo’s vapor, was still struck by the scent rising from below, smelling of almond blossoms. The god’s pneuma, his prophetic exhalation. “It is time,” she said to the younger sister, who had followed her down. “Bring the child to me.” Pythia crossed to the tripod and mounted the seat. Positioned over the crack in the floor, the rising vapors bathed her in Apollo’s breath. “Hurry.” The younger sister gathered up the child and placed the girl into her lap. Pythia cradled her gently, like a mother with a babe, but the child did not respond to such affection. |
- The Loners
- The Saints
- Switched
- Fangtastic!
- Re-Vamped!
- Vampalicious!
- Tome of the Undergates
- Black Halo
- The Skybound Sea
- If You Stay
- If You Leave
- Until We Burn
- Before We Fall
- Every Last Kiss
- Fated
- Suspiciously Obedient
- Random Acts of Crazy
- Random Acts of Trust
- Her First Billionaire
- Her Second Billionaire
- Her Two Billionaires
- Her Two Billionaires and a Baby
- His Majesty's Dragon
- Throne of Jade
- Black Powder War
- Victory of Eagles
- Tongues of Serpents
- Empire of Ivory
- Crucible of Gold
- Delirium