I’d truly forgiven her for the awful childhood she’d provided. I’d even let go of my resentment for the subsequent abandonment. She’d protected my boyfriend from certain death, and I had made sure the damage to her apartment was repaired pronto. I’d also agreed to stay and help her adjust to life without her arm and get to know her again.

But that was before I realized what she was doing. And what she wasn’t doing.

Tonight, November 16, was the Night of Hecate, and that particular goddess had shown me great favor. There was no way I would miss honoring Her. But I didn’t have to include Eris and Nana in it. I’d involved them because the guilt trip my mother was determined to send me on felt like a brand-new wedge between us, and I wanted it gone. I wanted her to get into a circle. I wanted her to see that she couldn’t perform ritual tasks like she did before. I wanted her to eat that knowledge and get angry. I wanted her to cry. Not in order to satisfy some vengeful side of me; those days were gone with the absolution I’d sincerely offered her. These things would be healthy for her. She had to grieve her loss in order to accept it. Instead, she was disguising the truth—and I was the camouflage.

That kind of self-deception wouldn’t help anyone.

But in this ritual she had been charged with specific duties, and she’d have to figure out how to perform them one-handed or admit defeat. Either would force her to begin dealing with her loss.

Since we were in Pittsburgh, I had selected a park where a triangle of land jutted between the Monongahela River and the Allegheny River. The tip of the triangle pointed toward the Ohio River, and on it sat a fountain celebrating this liquid confluence by spewing water high into the air. Or it did in warmer weather.