“So. The end is coming.”

The Oracle looked up from the fire she tended in her cave. She was making a jambalaya dish that a seer in New Orleans had taught her at the turn of the century. It was one of her favourites.

A person with short brown hair and two different coloured eyes, one green and one brown, stood at the opposite end of the fire. They regarded the boiling copper pot hanging from a spit over the fire.

“Éire,” the Oracle smiled. “Lovely to see you. You don’t visit anymore.”

“I’ve been so busy recently,” they said. “The animalia are . . . well, some of them have been compromised.”

The Oracle nodded, wrinkling her nose. “Nasty business with King Rok. Attacking that little girl?”

“Corvine may be among the youngest of the animalia, but she is not a little girl by any means. If she were not so fiercely loyal to that vampire and everything she stands for, I would worry about her,” Éire sighed. “The curse Corvine’s heritage leaves her with is tricky. But Corvine says the vampire is a cursebreaker.”

“Yup,” the Oracle nodded in agreement. She stood up from where she sat on an outcropping of rock that she had made from the cave walls as a seat. “Éire, would you like some jambalaya?”

“What is it?”

“They make it on Earth, famously in a portion called Louisiana. This one has chicken, shrimp, and sausage along with a lot of tomatoes.”

Éire eyed it. The Oracle could see they were weighing the benefits of eating meat.

“The pig king will eat anything,” the Oracle pointed out. “Queen Galla disdains her own people. King Crustacea has so many in his phylum that he won’t notice the difference.”

“That’s why you could never do my job,” Éire said, giving in and taking the bowl the Oracle offered them. “Just because Galla is not a kind ruler does not mean that she disdains her people. It’s hard when chickens and pheasants are so stupid. And you know he goes by the name Arthur, not Crustacea.”

“As if Galla is so smart.”

“I didn’t come here to talk about my choice of animalia—”

“And then Arachne. A human? Éire, that choice was so poor I found it panhandling in the streets of Britain.”

Éire put their free hand to their head. “Here we go.”

“Human minds fracture when they live so long. Popular examples include: Ilona Emelyn, the Fates, Atlantes, almost all of the gods.” She glared at Éire. “Their psyche fractures.”

“Popular bad examples: Hazel Ruaidhrí, Grey Cross, Frey, and Freya,” Éire countered. “Anyway, Oracle, that’s not the point.”

“You’re right. Hazel and Grey had kids, which made it very different. And Frey and Freya have kept to their purpose with great resolve.”

Éire tilted their head and looked at the Oracle. “You’re evading.”

The Oracle sighed. “I know. I heard what you said when you first came in.”

“Ah, I was beginning to wonder if my remark on the apocalypse was to myself.”

The Oracle scrunched up her face and shook her head distastefully. “I dislike that word. It refers to Earth, not any other realm.”

“What do you prefer?”

“Just, ‘the End’,” the Oracle said. “As you said when you came in.”

Éire nodded. “It has begun, then? I wasn’t wrong?”

“The vampire is coming into her powers. Ilona’s alliance with that . . . creature . . . to interfere with the fledgling was a portent of things to come.”

“Like?”

She ignored the question. “It is surprising how many mortals will be involved,” she said. “Remember the last time we thought the End would come? There were so few mortals. Humans were building their homes in the Eastern portion of their world. The Lights destroyed so many of their homes and reduced their population so drastically.”

“And this time?” Éire asked.

The Oracle shook her head. “There are more creatures in the universe now. So many mortals.”

Éire nodded.

“The vampire will only trust mortals. It is her nature, though she is no longer one. She will bring mortals to the fight.”

“Then we’ll all die,” Éire said, shaking their head in disgust. “They are so weak.”

“Éire, you underestimate mortals,” she said. “You do not see all as I do, only your domain. They will prove formidable. Their short life spans force them to be much more cunning than you would think.” She looked up the ceiling thoughtfully before shrugging. “But enough of this talk. It isn’t my job to end your prejudice.” She pointed to the cooling bowl in Éire’s hand. “Eat your jambalaya.” A spoon appeared in the crudely carved wooden bowl.

Éire stirred the soup-like food in their bowl. “Oracle . . . should I prepare my people?”

The Oracle’s light humour and temper faded, and her age showed for a moment. She was normally so vibrant and cheerful. She had been blonde with blue eyes and young.

But with the change in her expression, the blonde gave way to grey roots and the bright blue clouded to grey. The supple skin wrinkled.

“I don’t know what the End holds in store,” the Oracle admitted.

“How long?”

“We have less than three human decades.”

Éire stared at her. “You’re joking.”

The Oracle shook her head.

“The tremors only just began—”

“Mortals work quickly,” the Oracle waved her hand. Her youthfulness returned. “I told you that. Everything is much more accelerated.” She shook her head. “The Old Ones. You guys always expect that things are a long way off. It isn’t so.” She looked to her bowl. “The end of an era is coming. We cannot stop its coming, but you all can influence how it ends.”

Éire looked down at their bowl.

“Eat before it gets cold.”

Éire picked up the spoon and brought a mixture of tomato, celery, rice, and shrimp to their mouth.

“Ow, that’s spicy.”