Page 69 of Veinblood
“Would they issue a bounty if they thought it was rumor? The incident a while back. When they chased someone they claimed was a petty thief out of Ashenvale, followed by talk of the Shadowvein Lord being paraded through mountain settlements while he died.”
“There have been rumors of sightings before.”
“She carries power that matches the prophecy.”
Kessa’s eyes narrow. “Prove it.”
This is a test. If I fail, I will die. I know it as surely as I know my own name.
I force myself to meet her eyes, then reach inside and summon my familiar, hoping that it responds and doesn’t choose this moment to ignore me. To my relief, mist rises from my arm, twists and swirls, then slowly takes the form of the mist stalker.
Kessa’s eyes widen, and she stumbles back a step. She stares at the beast, and then at me, then turns on her heel and walks out.
I look at Corwin. “What is happening right now?”
“Stay still.” His lips barely move, and his eyes don’t leave the door Kessa disappeared through.
My heart is pounding, and lightning sparks between myfingers. No more than five minutes pass before Kessa returns with three other people. Two men and a woman, all moving with a kind of grace that suggests they’re anythingbuthumble farmers. But the way they walk isn’t what stops the breath in my lungs. It’s the woman.
Dark hair streaked with silver. Eyes with the same silver flecks that mark my own. The same face I’ve seen in dreams since coming to Meridian.
“You!” I lurch to my feet on unsteady legs.
“Elowen.” Her voice is as familiar to me as Sacha’s. “I am so pleased to finally meet you in person. My name is Vorith.”
The world spins around me.
How can that be possible?
“You’re supposed to be dead.” The words come out breathless. “How are you here?”
“As you can see, I am far from dead.”
“But Nyassa said?—”
“Nyassa is alive?”
“Yes. The ritual sent her to Earth with me. She thought you all died.”
“Alive.” Her voice catches, and she takes a moment to compose herself. “We hoped, but had no way to know for sure.”
“You’ve beenhereall this time?”
She nods. “Protecting the families who escaped the purges. Keeping them safe while we wait.”
“While you wait for what?”
Her smile changes her entire face, turning it from severe to almost ethereal in its beauty.
“For you, and for our Vareth’el.” Her eyes when they meet mine shimmer with suppressed power. “For shadow and storm to finally unite.”
At the mention of prophecy, the air in the room changes, turning heavier. I try to ignore it and focus on the thousand questions spinning around my head.
“How many are there?”
“Hundreds, Elowen.” She smiles. “More than the Authority could even imagine.”
Dizziness overtakes me, and I grasp at the table’s edge. An entire hidden population ofVeinbloods that everyone assumed had been destroyed.
