[This post is from Hecate’s point of view.]
Hecate swallowed once, twice. She shifted the infant in her arms, holding him a little closer, a little tighter, staring at Marin.
“How do you know?” she asked, knowing it was a bad question, knowing that she shouldn’t ask it but still unable to stop it from passing her lips.
Marin exhaled and shook her head. “Because I’ve seen it.”
Of course. Her gift. What kind of idiot am I?
A big, utterly useless one if the voices in her head were to be believed.
Remember, you don’t have to listen to them.
If only it was as easy as remembering that.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked,” Hecate said softly.
“It’s all right,” Marin said. She smiled weakly as she looked up again. “It’s not like you’ve been here to talk about it and honestly, I don’t think that it’s something my brother would have talked at great length about anyway. Don’t sweat it. I’m not going to.”
Hecate took a deep, shuddering breath, then nodded. “By all the powers that are and ever were, it must be some hell of a burden to carry, seeing the future even in glimpses.”
“Well, it’s not always fun,” Marin admitted. “But sometimes it’s useful. I just have to look at it that way and take the bad with the good. It’s not like I have a choice.”
“I guess not.”
“I don’t think we passed it on to him, though,” Marin said, staring at the baby in Hecate’s arms. “Not the way Thom and I have it. That’s a blessing, I think.”
“Both of you have the gift of foresight?” It pained her to call it a gift. The memories of others she’d known who had the same talent made her feel they were more a curse than any sort of gift.
For both of them to carry that burden, to see what may lie ahead…what hell that must be.
Another shiver wracked her. Baby Merlin made a quiet sound, one tiny fist free of his saddle and waving at her. Hecate couldn’t help but smile despite her darkening mood.
“We’ll take care of him even when you can’t, Marin,” she said. “I promise.”
“I may hold you to that.”
Hecate smiled. “I hope you do. Not because I want to lose you, but…but because I hope you trust me enough to do it.”
Marin reached over to squeeze her arm. “I already do,” she said softly. “You’re my sister now—you’re family. I trust you.”
