Page 67 of The Reveal
I’m tempted to indulge in a full-on fit, but I’m not sure I’d ever stop.
I push away from the door, my whole body feeling jerky and strange. Like the hangover I had the day after our twenty-first birthday that inspired me to never, ever drink that much again, no matter how many times Augie called me a lightweight.
I think of him looking healthy. I think of him being able to focus on me, to talk to me. I think of our foreheads pressed together, and even the memory of it is soothing. Maybe in time I’ll stop remembering where we were. Or the bars between us.
I head toward the kitchen, thinking I’ll make myself a nice snack and try to quiet down my feelings with a hefty dose of sugar.
But when I open all the locks and make it into the kitchen, I stop short.
The lights are all off, but Maddox is standing there. She’s staring out between the bars and the planks over the window toward the moon up above.
She looks back over her shoulder when I walk in, and for a moment, we stare at each other.
I don’t have to ask where she’s been. I can see the usual marks on her shoulder since her sweatshirt is drooping halfway down her arm. Her smoky-quartz gaze sharpens and traces over me, and I know immediately that she can scent Ariel’s mark, but when her gaze meets mine again, she doesn’t ask.
There are more similarities between us than differences, at least in this moment. Sure, she’s a whole werewolf as well as beingher, but we both look a little rumpled. A little shaky. More than a little off our game.
Something passes between us that feels like communion. She nods. I smile. Then we set about making ourselves more of that decadent hot chocolate, and when it’s done, we go and settle outside on the back porch again.
It’s already significantly colder than it was last time we did this. I don’t even remember when that was. It seems like a lifetime ago. Another life I lived before Ariel, but I think that really, it was a week.
Just a week.
We sit there for a while. It feels much better than being sick and sad on an impervious floor.
Maddox keeps looking at the moon, so I do too. I try to imagine what it must be like to live a life that’s consciously arranged around moon phases. Maybe we all follow the moon, in the end, and only some of us know it.
As I think that, I shift where I’m sitting and realize that the cards have found me again. I can feel the weight of them, pressing there between my breasts like they’re aiming to press deep into my heart.
That’s not the kind of creepy I’m in the mood to share, so I don’t. I think about what Ariel said. That I’m the next oracle. Thatthe cards have chosen.
I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know what that means. On the other hand, the cards pressing into me feels almost soothing, so maybe I know more than I want to admit.
“You good?” I ask her, eventually.
She laughs a little, or maybe it’s more of a sigh that the night breeze twists into something new. “You know. Ty gets a little cranky around the full moon. It’s not unexpected.”
“Your ritual.”
“To be honest, though, I don’t really mind it from him. I get where he’s coming from. My whole family, on the other hand.” Maddox shakes her head. “Anyway, it’s been a long night.”
“Apparently, it’s a big night for family drama,” I mutter.
I feel her gaze on me, but I’m still looking at that moon.
That horrible vision takes the opportunity to pummel me again, like it’s offended I might find a little solace in the night sky. It’s not a jumble of vision and nightmare this time. It’s crisp. Ithurts.
I could ask my grandmother for guidance, but I still don’t want to. That feels like surrendering, and I’m full up on surrender at the minute. I have to interpret these things on my own.
I breathe through it, telling myself I’m in charge. That I’m looking for clues, so it’s not so much a surrender as a deliberate immersion.
It sucks me in, hard.
I get the distinct and immediate impression that the vision feels like I’m not taking it seriously enough. This time, I’m less an observer of the ritualistic slaughter and more a participant. Not just any participant—this time, it’s me on that altar.
And I can feel everything.
The ropes on my wrists and ankles, so tight that they’re sawing into my skin, leaving a bloody mess. I can feel how shredded my throat feels from the screaming, and how much every part of me hurts. I can feel the burn of the cold against my naked body.
