Page 114 of Trial of Thorns
Rev
“Reveln.” An alluring voice rouses me from a deep sleep. Darkness surrounds my body and soul, both. “Come here,” he calls. The voice is familiar but distant.
“If you want to know the truth...” the voice rumbles, becoming clearer. “If you want to know how I died... if you want to knowwhy...”
My eye fling wide, suddenly realizing why it sounds familiar.
“Reahgan?” I whisper.
“Yeeeessss.”
My brain can’t wrap around what’s happening. Panic fills my limbs. Panic and calm, somehow at the same time. My body moves without active thought, almost without permission. But I want this, I remember. I need to know the truth.
My feet shuffle over uneven stone, moving through the darkness like they know the way even when my eyes can’t focus on a thing in front of me. I wander down a thread of the caves I’m unfamiliar with, a tunnel small enough I must duck to crawl into, and the shifting of unease settles in my stomach—I’m not supposed to go here.
“Rev?” a sweet voice calls, but I barely register it.
All I know is that Reahgan is calling me, and I have to meet him. In the depths of these caves, my brother is waiting for me...
I stop suddenly as a firm hand grips my forearm. “No,” she tells me, fear and determination mixing in her tone. I blink. Pausing.
“You can’t take him,” Caelynn says to the darkness swirling around us, her voice trembling. “I won’t let you.”
A voice rumbles in laughter, deep within dark cave opening before us.
“Do you want to know why Caelynn is so strong?” the voice calls, now changing into something much more sinister. I blink and shake my head.That isn’t Reahgan.
My heart pounds in my chest as my mind clears to realize what’s happening. I was under a spell. I take a step back, and Caelynn pulls me farther from the tunnel. Whatever it was, whatever dark creature is waiting down there, was baiting me. Using my own grief against me.
“She hasmypower,” it calls, still laughing, but anger laces its unnatural tone. “She bargained for it. Ask her. Ask her what it cost.”
***
IDROP MY BUTT TO THEfloor beside our camp, body drained. “That’s how you got this power of yours?” My throat is dry, my voice hoarse. “This creature—whatever it is. You...” I press my fist to my eyes, rubbing. “How?”
I know the creature was trying to trick me. I was his prey. But his words somehow cling to my mind and I can’t let them go.
He was telling the truth. I know it. Deep down, I believe it to be true.
If only I had known. If only I had known.
My own words. A desperate plea the Black Gate so graciously illustrated. In my death, a violent, guilt-ridden death, I repeated over and over again—if only I’d known.
The Ruby Well tried to tell me.
The Sphynx’s riddle tried to tell me.
The Black Gate tried to tell me.
I am missing something big—something I need to know, or it will end me. And as I look into Caelynn’s dim eyes, once glowing bright with power no one expected her to have, I know she is the one that holds it.
“Tell me,” I growl.
“No.”
