Lorraine thrust her hands out to either side the palms glowing white. The floor-to-ceiling glass walls of her summer palace smashed instantly, sending a shower of shattered shards shooting outwards. Behind her, the grand, four-metre-wide chandelier snapped from its cord and crashed to the ground. Tiny pieces of crystal were flung in every direction, some of them slicing through the hem of her silk crepe white dress from Chanel. Even being as hyper-sensitive to touch as she was, Lorraine barely noticed. Her golden-blonde eyebrows were knitted together, crumpling her photoshopped face into an ugly scowl which looked… wrong, somehow. This was a face crafted for cold neutrality and subtle smiles; it clashed against strong expressions of emotion.

Damn him.

Who was he, or anyone, to tell her what she couldn’t have? Lorraine was a goddess. More than that, she was the goddess. Now that Aura was dead, she was the female deity with the largest monotheistic following. And if you only counted believers of status, influence and breeding, she was the only female deity with a monotheistic following.

The crystal pieces of the chandelier crunched satisfactorily under her stilettos as she stepped up to the hole in the wall where the window had been, surveying the gardens below with an expression like oncoming thunder. Shaman knew Lorraine and Mallos’ relationship primarily as one of rivalry, but they had had something akin to friendship for thousands of years. Neither of them had probably ever referred to the other as a friend, not even in the privacy of their own minds, but they had… an understanding. A mutual kind of empathy, born of the similar struggle against darkness which had characterised their thoughts and actions for millennia. They knew each other, in mind and body. Neither had ever rejected the advances of the other.

Until today.

“Fuck you.” Lorraine told the wind toying with the tendrils of golden hair framing her face, revelling in the vulgarity of her own tongue.

Why now? What had happened now that had changed everything? Lorraine’s turquoise eyes roamed the tops of the topiaries, watching them flutter in the wind. It wasn’t the bloody job. Mallos never let work interfere with his sex life. It wasn’t an overhang from his centuries-long imprisonment, either; he’d come out of that with as much interest in the opposite sex (and the same sex) as he’d ever had.

She closed her eyes, exhaling, trying to pinpoint the moment.

There had been a shift, recently. Lorraine had noticed that he was less inclined to flirt with the receptionist. Since he’d become Acting Chairman, she hadn’t once walked in on him talking a break from work to enjoy another person’s company, which should have happened at least once by now.

Fuck you for picking now to become asexual.

Except he wasn’t, was he? He still slept with that pirate whore who hung around his stupid house.

Lorraine’s eyebrows knitted together again. Taking a deep breath, she vanished.


The Alliance headquarters in Madrid, a skyscraper of glass, looked out of place compared to the interesting old architectural features of the rest of the city. The bottom two levels were some toy shop while the upper stories were ‘offices’. Lorraine teleported directly onto the third floor, where the reception was. The Alliance employees were probably used to Allianah and Tsi popping in and out, but they’d never seen Lorraine here before. To his credit, the receptionist blinked only once before dipping his head respectfully and muttering one of her epithets. She didn’t even let him finish before interrupting him.

“Nepenthe Kroenus.” She hissed, without explanation.

The receptionist didn’t ask for one. He abandoned his post to hasten them both into an elevator, which they rode up to the seventh floor. The receptionist pointed wordlessly down the corridor towards a series of glass-walled, shared offices, before backing back into the elevator and jamming his thumb against the down button. Wasting no more of her time on him, Lorraine strode down the corridor, earning herself a great deal of stares from the agents in their offices. The door to the correct one flung open of its own accord. Lorraine’s heels clipped against the wooden floorboards as she stepped inside, her narrow eyes on the only woman within. The only other two occupants of the room, both male, glanced sideways at each other. She ignored them, her eyes flicking down and up Croe’s body, assessing.

“So,” she said softly, folding her arms across her chest. “This is the happy little housewife behind my friend’s new-found monogamy. What did you use?” She raised one eyebrow a fraction. “A love potion? A curse?”