Twisted Strings of Fate

Chapter 59

When I touched the pool on top of Ithaquack to return us back to the present time, my mind was in chaos. With each new adventure I went on, my perspective changed. I learned new things about myself and my whole outlook on the world changed. I was a different person than I was at the beginning of my adventure.

But after finding out that I was related to Aphrodite, everything stopped. Things didn't make sense. She must have been watching me from the beginning, perhaps my whole life. She had watched every moment. And she could have stopped me at any time. But she welcomed me on Ithaquack. She had helped me find the orb to look at the Strings of Fate which eventually led to the mirror. She wanted me to find out who she was.

Why?

Nothing made sense. Because it was now obvious that she was my enemy, the one I had to deal with to break my curse. Did she want me to know? Did she want this confrontation? What was her reasoning? Was it benevolent, wanting the curse broken just as much as I did? No, that didn't make sense because she could have told me when I talked to her on Ithaquack. Was she just playing with me? Did she want me dead?

Or did she have a different fate for me?

Mrs. Beakley vacuumed around the foyer, going first one way, then the other over McDuck's expensive rug before going diagonal. While they never taught British spies how to properly vacuum a rug, she had become just as meticulous and disciplined in her home-keeping abilities as she did for her country of origin. And it didn't hurt that she had observed Duckworth doing the same thing when he was alive, although she wouldn't acknowledge that to his cold, dead spirit.

When she went from rug to cold tile, she lowered the vacuum and went around the edges of the room, picking up potted plants and statues that decorated the corners and alcoves, her strength able to do most of this with one hand while handling the cleaning appliance with the other. She only took care with the full-length, ornate mirror that sat in the corner just by the stairs.

The mirror normally would be sitting around and collecting dust behind locked doors, Mr. McDuck had it brought up to the room with the most traffic, where it could be easily seen by the residents of the manor. Even though he had expressly warned his family of the dangers that the mirror posed, he insisted that it was harmless at the moment. Once Charity had touched the glass surface and she and those bonded to her had been sucked into time, nobody else could use the magic.

Mrs. Beakley gently lifted the mirror up with both hands and moved it several feet away. And even though the surface of the mirror wouldn't send anyone back in time, she still couldn't help but to keep her fingertips from brushing against the glass.

As she was moving it back, the entire mirror vibrated and jumped in her grip. At first she thought it was an earthquake beneath her feet but she quickly learned that it was the object in her hands that was shaking. Afraid that it would pull out of her grip and fall to the floor and break, she held it as best she could with how awkward a shape it was. When the mirror stopped shaking, she tentatively put it back on the ground before she saw the five bodies lying on the floor not far away.

They were piled on top of each other, wearing the same clothes they were last seen in but worn and dirty. They smelled of a group that had been camping for days, sweaty and earthy.

"Launchpad!" she cried out, seeing the body on top. "You're all back." She immediately set out to help them to their feet, starting with the large pilot then Starling and Drake. Charity, of course, was at the bottom.

"Is everyone okay?" she asked, noticing how there were faded bloodstains on Charity's dress, something that most wouldn't notice except Bettina who was an expert at these things.

"We're fine," Drake said, sitting back down even after Mrs. Beakley stood him up. "It's been…a lot trip."

"Almost three weeks," Mrs. Beakley said. "Time continued on while you were gone. For every hour you spent in the mirror, an hour passed by here."

Drake nodded, too spent to say anything more.

"What happened? Did you…" Mrs. Beakley stopped, not quite certain what to ask. They couldn't have possibly broken the curse in the past.

Charity had been staring off into space, as if lost in her own thoughts. Or perhaps catatonic. By the looks of the group, whatever they had been through, it would be a long story. They probably didn't want to tell it now, maybe after a good bath, a full stomach and some rest.

"I'll tell Mr. McDuck that you're back," Mrs. Beakley said. "Why don't you go upstairs and get cleaned up. I won't tell the kids yet so that you can have some peace." She was about to leave but then turned around, threw a sheet over the mirror and took it with her, to once more be locked up.

"Peace…yes…that sounds good," Starling said, wobbling before sitting down again.

None of them made any indication that they were going to do what Mrs. Beakley suggested.

"What are we going to tell them?" Drake asked, turning to Charity. "Scrooge isn't going to be satisfied with anything but the truth."

"More importantly, what are we going to do?" Fenton asked. "If what you say is true…if the white swan is Aphrodite…"

"It is," Charity said adamantly.

There was no doubt in her mind. Yes, Aphrodite had kept her face covered with a veil during that time she talked to Charity, but there had been that split-second moment that she caught a glimpse of the face. There was a reason Charity thought that the black swan had looked familiar when they had summoned her ghost, but she couldn't place where she had seen it. But now it was obvious. She looked exactly like Aphrodite, although she was missing the arrogant and conceited expression.

"I don't doubt that you're right," Drake said. "But what can we do? What can we do against a god?"

Drake was asking the right question. And Charity was lost in her thoughts as to the answer. Because even though she was a story teller, a writer who liked to think of plots within plots and plan what characters were going to do several chapters ahead of time, she had never let her imagination wander this far ahead in her future. She always hoped to progress this far by finding the truth of the curse, but she never let her mind go any further. What she would do when she met the white swan face-to-face? What would she do when she spoke to Aphrodite one more time?

Did she have to fight Aphrodite? Would she have to kill Aphrodite to break the spell? That seemed to be how some fairy tales ended. Either with a kiss of true love or defeating the villain. And they already knew that kisses wouldn't do in this case.

Kill. She had to kill Aphrodite.

She had to kill a god. It seemed impossible.

Or did it? There was bound to be one way. She just had to find it. She just had to use the right tools, the right resources, to make it possible.

And since Aphrodite could be watching this very moment, just as she had been watching Charity from the very beginning, she had to do it quickly and alone.

"I'm really tired," Charity said, standing up. "I'm going to take a hot shower and go to bed." She had to force herself not to run. She had to walk, steady and calmly. She couldn't do anything to warn the boys that she had an idea. She had involved them far more than she should have. She had to do the rest by herself.

"Wait! It's been three weeks!" Fenton shouted. "I have to call Mama."

"I'm sure Mr. McD has told her…" Launchpad started to say, but Charity stopped listening as she walked up the stairs, focusing on her goal. She only hoped that nobody had moved her things. Surely they would have been left in the guest room she had been using. Mr. McDuck wouldn't have given her and the others up for lost, would he?

"Oh my gosh, you're back."

Charity recognized the voice, although it had been so long since she had seen the young girl who had summoned her ancestor in the Ghost Realm.

"Charity!"

As much as Charity needed to go to her room, she forced herself to smile and remain calm. "Hey, Webby. Yeah, we're back."

"What happened? Did you find the black and the white swan?" Webby asked in her loud, excited voice. "Are you no longer under the curse?"

"Well…It's kind of a long story," Charity said, feeling antsy. She could see the door to her room in the hallway. She started inching her way to it.

"I'm guessing that's a no," Lena said, folding her arms. "If your curse was broken, you'd look a lot more happy."

The girl was definitely perceptive.

Charity pointed to her door. "I'm just going to freshen up for a while, and then I'll tell everyone. Your grandma saw us come out of the mirror, and she said we should get some rest."

"That'll be perfect," Webby said. "Then we can tell her all about those spells you figured out. The ones that the black swan drew in the sand."

Charity stopped mid-step. "The spells?"

"Oh, yeah. They were really, really old," Lena said. "Don't tell anyone, but Webby and I had to go digging around in one of Magica's old libraries. We sort of sneaked in one and took some of her books. But since she hasn't come looking for them, I don't think she knows…yet."

Charity fidgeted with her hands. "These spells…Do they seem really important?"

"Oh, yeah. They were big spells. Ones that came with a price," Lena said. "The first one we easily found once we looked in the right books, but the second one, it was harder beca…aaaah!"

Charity grabbed Lena and Webby's hands, pulling them along inside her room and shutting and locking the door behind her.

"Is this good?" Lena asked, confused. "You can kick her butt if Charity has gone evil, right Webby?"

Webby laughed. "Oh, Lena. That's a good one. But yes. Yes, I can."

Charity grimaced. "I'm sorry I scared you, but I really need to know what you found out, but not right now. I need to do something first."

"Like what?" Lena asked. "You're acting super weird."

"I need to find something," Charity said, pouncing on her bags that were left in a corner. She didn't bother to neatly search through them, instead she poured the contents on the floor, not even caring that underwear and tampons were among the items. She pushed and threw things out of her way until she found what she was looking for.

"Ah-ha!" she exclaimed, holding up a whistle.

"Yay, that's amazing," Lena said sarcastically, half-heartedly waving her hands.

"Wait, isn't that the…" Webby started asking.

"Yes, this is the whistle that the Muses gave me," Charity said. "If I blow on this, I can summon any one of the Muses, and they said that they could grant me one wish."

Lena looked more surprised than Charity had ever seen. "What? Wait, the Muses. You mean like Olympian gods?"

"I told you, Lena," Webby said. "We've been to Ithaquack several times."

"Sorry, I just keep forgetting that I'm not the weirdest person you've ever met," Lena said.

Charity ignored the friends as she lifted up the whistle. "Clio," she said the Muse's name before blowing the whistle.

In a twinkling of an eye, the muse was standing in Charity's room, which caused Webby and Lena to stop their talking and stare. Since Webby already met the Muse, she just waved but Lena's eyes widened. She had thought her aunt was intimidating with all her magic back before she lost it, but the goddess in front of her was a whole different kettle of fish.

Clio looked far different than when they had met on Ithaquack. She and her sisters had skated down from the sky in order to challenge Charity to a roller derby game, so she had been dressed accordingly. But now she was dressed to the nines in a dazzling dress with satiny flowing hair and her feathers sparkling.

"I was wondering if you were ever going to use that whistle," Clio said. "But since you've summoned me, I'm guessing you need help with the white swan enchantress. Oh, my sisters are going to be jealous that I get to hear the juicy details first."

Charity's heart spiked with adrenaline. "Can you put up a shield or something so nobody can hear what we're going to talk about?"

"Oh, so dramatic," Clio said. "Or is it because the white swan could be listening right now?"

"Yes," Charity said, hoping this would work. She couldn't risk the chance that Aphrodite could be listening right now.

"Alright then." Clio raised her hand and cast a small dome of light around herself, Charity, Webby and Lena.

Charity relaxed, but not entirely. There was a reason most of the gods on Ithaquack were afraid of Aphrodite. There was a chance that she could still listen in. So it would be best to wait until the last possible moment to ask Clio her questions.

"Now what is it that you want?" Clio asked. "Remember, you only get one wish."

"If you could wait a moment, I need to ask Lena a few questions first," Charity said politely. She hoped that Clio wasn't impatient today. The last thing she needed was to tick off a goddess.

Clio gestured for Charity to continue.

"Lena, you said that you know about the spell that the black swan cast," Charity said, turning to the pre-teen.

"Yeah. It was from a really old language. As I said, we had to look through some of Magica's old books," Lena said. She drew something in the air. "It's a spell of containment. It usually anchors a person to an object, like a lamp or a cage or a…"

"A lake?" Charity finished, remembering how the white swan was pulled into the water.

"Oh, like the story of Swan Lake. That must be the connection," Webby said.

"And the white swan has been stuck around this lake for centuries," Lena said, putting a fist on one hip.

"Try a couple of millennia," Charity said with a sigh.
"You went that far into the past? Girl, no wonder you look so bedraggled," Clio said. "Where is this lake? Do you want me to transport you there?"

"Not yet," Charity said. "Lena, what about that other spell? The one she started writing down but died before she could finish?"

"That was a lot harder to figure out," Lena said. "The symbol was unfinished, so we had look through several books before we found it. It's a siphoning spell."

Charity frowned. "What?"

"Siphoning. You know, like taking from one thing and putting it in another. Like siphoning gasoline from a car…" Lena explained. "The spell didn't indicate what was being siphoned away though. It could have been anything. Life. Time. Magic. Power."

"Blood?" Charity asked, remembering the prophecy that Ife said before they left Egypt.

Lena frowned. "Funny that you mentioned that. A lot of spells can backfire if they aren't done correctly or go unfinished. This particular spell would siphon off blood from the castor if it wasn't finished."

"And if the castor died?" Charity asked.

Lena shook her head and shrugged.

"Then it would have gone to the person the spell intended for," Clio said. "Magic usually asks a payment and doesn't care who it takes it from. But if that was the case, wouldn't the white swan be dead by now."

"Unless she has a way to replenish her blood quickly," Lena said. "There are a lot of spells that would allow a person to do that." She shuddered.

"Or unless she was able to replace the siphoned blood with something else," Charity said, feeling as if everything was clicking in place. "She replaced her blood with Ichor."

"But that would make her…" Webby started to say.

"A god?" Clio finished. "You think she's on Ithaquack?"

"I know she is," Charity said. "She's Aphrodite." Her fate felt finalized by making that statement.

Clio's face drained of color. "Wh-what? That—that can't be."

"You've seen her face," Charity said. "She's not a duck, is she? She's a swan." The two looked similar enough that nobody thought too much about it. Ducks were one of the most common races and often geese and swans were grouped along with them since they looked nearly alike.

"Aphrodite," Lena repeated not looking impressed. "Isn't she the goddess of love and cupids and stuff?"

Clio's wide eyes turned to Lena. "I'd be careful what you say about Aphrodite, especially if she has her eye on us. Oh, I hope not. I shouldn't be here. If you're going up against Aphrodite, I can't help you."

Charity rushed to the Muse. "Please, you have to help me."

"I can't!" Clio insisted, stepping away. "You don't understand. She-she's the most powerful of the gods. Everyone is afraid of her, even Zeus, and for good reason."

"I just want a few questions answered, that's all," Charity said. "That's all the help I need."

Clio bit her bottom beak. The strong, confident Muse that Charity had played against on the roller derby rink was gone, leaving behind frightened eyes. But apparently some of that confidence remained. "What do you need to know?"

"How do I kill a god?" Charity asked.

"I was afraid that's what you'd ask," Clio said. She looked upward. "I may regret this, but there is only one way. What I'm about to tell you is how the gods were made, although you've already guessed most of it. Once upon a time, we were all mortals, just like the white swan. To turn us immortal, we couldn't have a single drop of blood remaining inside of us. So she would remove our blood and replace it with her own, Ichor, the blood of the gods. It's what kept us from aging, gave us our power, and healed our wounds.

"But she warned us to never let a single drop of mortal blood mingle with our Ichor. Ichor was what kept us powerful gods, but we would be broken down to ash and dust with mortal blood because it would remind our immortal bodies what we used to be."

Clio finished with a firm, pursed beak.

Charity blinked a few times, processing this information. "So, I just have to inject her with some mortal blood and she's dead?" she asked, not believing it to be that simple.

"For any god, that would be correct," Clio said, giving up the last secret of Ithaquack. "Mortal blood would severely wound Aphrodite, but it has to be family blood to kill her. Blood to blood, and flesh to flesh. Your blood is needed to stop Aphrodite."

Charity's eyes widened, and Ife's prophecy returned to her. Blood and death.

"Whoa," Lena said as the silence drew far too long. "That's…wow. Good luck with that."

"Lena," Webby hissed to her friend. "Charity, are you really going to…"

"It's the only way to break my curse," Charity said. "But I'm not sure if I can do it."

"Yeah, killing a god isn't going to be easy," Lena said.

"Killing isn't easy," Charity said. "God or no god, I don't think I can take a life, not even to break my curse."

Clio's face grew even more frightened. "Now that you know, you must. Don't you understand? She will eventually find out that I've talked to you. Once she does, she will kill me and she will kill you. I thought that you were—" Clio looked upward, her eyes widened. "She knows."

Cracks began forming around the bright shield, growing bigger and bigger.

"I can't hold it for long," Clio said, holding her hands up as if bracing the shield.

Charity pushed the girls to the part of the shield closest to the door. "You two run once it breaks. I don't think she'll be interested in you."

"They know the secret," Clio said. "But I will erase their memories. It may save them from her wrath."
Both Webby and Lena protested but barely got a word out before Clio shocked them with her power, both collapsing to the ground.

"Thank you," Charity said, getting closer to the Muse.

"If you want to thank me, then you'll destroy that monster the first chance you get," Clio said. "Either save me or avenge me."

Then the shield broke, and the two were snatched up from where they stood in McDuck Manor, feeling as if they were shot into the air inside a giant rocket. When the pressure abated, Charity and Clio found themselves standing on top of a lake of glass, surrounded by a white beach and tropical plants. Charity recognized it. She had been there less than an hour ago, although it had also been over two thousand years ago since she had walked along that beach.

Clio screamed as she was thrown backward by an invisible force. A glass pillar shot out of the lake, and Clio slammed into it. Tendrils of glass as fine as yarn wrapped around her, keeping her close. Golden Ichor dribbled from her mouth.

"Clio!" Charity shouted, running towards the Muse. Please say she wasn't dead. Please say she wasn't dead. But before she could reach Clio, a person appeared in front of her.

The white swan smiled, looking far more hale and powerful than when Charity saw her being pulled into the waters of the lake.

"Hello, dear niece," Aphrodite said.

(Author's notes: We're at the climax of the story, and there's going to be a lot fewer chapters than I thought. I had planned on 65, but because I combined a few chapters alone the way, there's only going to be 62. There are three chapters left, and all of them are complete. I didn't want to post the chapters of the climax and make my readers wait a week or two to be able to finish this cliffhanger. Instead, I'll be posting every day. Today is Chapter 59, Saturday will be Chapter 60, Sunday will be Chapter 61, and Monday will have the last and final chapter, number 62. I will also warn my readers, please expect these ending chapters to be somewhat long. If you are not in a place or time that allows you to read for at least an hour, I suggest waiting until you can.

I also plan on writing a long section of Author notes at the end of the final chapter, which will explain my plans for the future of my Ducktales writing career.)