She released her grip.
I tried to clear my head, to understand what I was hearing, but everything seemed too chaotic and unreal.
“I don’t understand,” I said. “Why did he attack me?”
Over on the couch, Lexi yawned and stretched. “I think he said something about his sister.”
“But I had nothing to do with his sister. She was the girl who was attacked by an animal. How could I have anything to do with her? And why were you there? You couldn’t have just been there randomly.”
“Oh, we weren’t,” said Lexi. “We were following you.”
I frowned. “But why? How could you know to follow me?”
Aspen cleared her throat as if she were uncomfortable.
“We’re always following you,” said Lexi.
A cold shock shot through me. “What?”
I looked at Aspen, hoping to see her laughing as well, but she looked very serious.
“Aspen?” I said, and it was really more of a plea than anything else.
“Sit up,” she said.
With some effort, I did as she directed. She retrieved a small purple cup from the table and handed it to me.
“Drink this.”
The liquid in the cup was a strange color, almost blue, and it smelled musty, of herbs and the earth. Bitter.
“Not again. What is it?”
“It’s not hallucinogenic, I promise. It will help with the pain, give you strength.”
Instead of tasting bitter, it was unexpectedly sweet and clean-tasting.
Staring over at Lexi, I tried to reconcile what I knew of her with the image of her slitting Guillaume’s throat.
“You really were following me?”
Aspen nodded.
“But why? Why would you follow me? I don’t understand.”
She pressed her fingers to her temples and looked over at Lexi. “It’s time, isn’t it?”
Lexi nodded. “We have to. Finn is wrong. We can’t just keep waiting for her to figure it out.”
“They’ll be pissed if we do this.”
“Then we won’t tell them.” Lexi cocked her head. “You know I’m right.”
Aspen sighed and seemed to prepare herself to speak. “Let’s try this one more time. Tell me what you know. Everything you know about this place.”
Blinking, exhausted, I did my best to reply. “I told you. You do something covert, something with the government or alchemy. I don’t know what’s real and what’s not anymore.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head, “you know more. Tell me anything you can think of. Tell me what you know.”
