How to Change Your Stars

Chapter Eighteen ~ Celestial Dust

The wind gusted through the rose bushes. The trees of the Nightmare Forest creaked in the distance. Sam had been right: it was too loud. Ari must've misheard.

"You told me you planned to destroy it." Sam's jaw tightened as he moved to stand beside Ari.

So she'd heard correctly after all. Bile seared her throat.

Ester clutched the Nanorian to her chest and laughed. The wind carried the sound, tossing it back and forth so that it surrounded them. "A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver."

"Proverbs 25:11," Sam murmured.

"Good to know." Ari dug her fingers into his arm. "But what does it mean?"

Sam was silent for a moment. When he finally spoke, his voice was hoarse. "It means she seduced us with words."

Ester fixed her eyes on Ari. "I admit I didn't have much faith in you. I was afraid you'd give the Nanorian to the angel."

"You knew?"

Ester nodded. "I knew everything. I knew who you were as soon as you stepped foot in that house. You were who I had been waiting for, the only one who could retrieve the Nanorian."

"And Mrs. Hart-I mean, Daniel?"

"Didn't he tell you not to believe everything you hear? You should have listened."

"Daniel was working for you?" Ari frowned. "But he tried to take the Nanorian."

"Nothing breeds trust like a more menacing foe." Ester tucked a wayward curl behind her ear. "My sister placed two enchantments on the Nanorian. I believe Samael told you the first: that no Cruxim would ever be able to find it. The second was that it must be given freely. I couldn't take it from you; you had to hand it to me of your own free will."

"Oh, God..." The blood drained from Ari's face. She scraped her nail over the cut on her palm, again and again. Pain blazed through her, affirming the reality of her mistake. She drew quick, shuddering breaths. What had she done?

"Daniel." Sam raised one shaky hand to his forehead. "Tell me he isn't who I think he is."

"The man who shot you." Ester's reply was sharp as an icicle.

"You?" Sam spoke haltingly. "You had him kill me?"

Ester sighed and turned her back on her nephew. "Your murder was Daniel's idea." She approached the fountain and ran her hand over the edge. "Daniel has proven himself useful." She paused. "Nepenthe can be useful too, if one knows how to use it."

Ari couldn't believe she'd been so stupid.

"The rose on my window ledge...it was laced with nepenthe."

Ester tilted her head toward the starless sky and recited in a clear voice, "I saw a dream and it made me fearful; and these fantasies as I lay on my bed and the visions in my mind kept alarming me. Daniel 4:5." She turned to face them, her heavy cloak twisting at her feet. "Your dreams would have shown you things. I needed you to forget." She looked at Sam then, and her expression softened. "I am sorry I had to mislead you, Samael."

"I'm sorry I was so easy to mislead." Sam released a long breath and tightened his fists. "Did you know? About Perides?"

"Oh, my dear Samael. Of course I did."

He stared at his aunt as though he'd never seen her before. "I believed everything you told me."

"Everything I told you was the truth." She waved her hand. "With a few details left out. You made your own interpretations."