Dominic’s hand lashed out in front of her, halting her in her tracks.
“What—” She started, but was cut off as he held a finger to her lips. She stilled.
Then his finger left her lips and his outstretched palm in front of her turned upward. A small stream of water shot from his fingertips to hers, dousing the firelight.
The world plunged into darkness, silencing and suffocating. Immediately, she thought Dominic had left her for dead in this forest, gone to find the Whisperer alone. The silence was terrifying, unnatural, broken by her own rapid breathing and racing heart.
She startled at the sudden pressure on the small of her back, a hand gently guiding her forward. When her eyes finally adjusted, she saw the silhouette of Dominic standing next to her, head swiveling back and forth as he scanned the forest.
“Do you hear that?” he whispered, voice barely audible.
“Hear what?” Adara hissed back.
He grabbed the back of her tunic, stopping them again. Without the steady crunch of dirt and leaves beneath their feet, whispers drifted through the air, breaking through the silence like thunder.
Adara shuddered. Tortured, depthless voices murmured nonsense. It wasn’t until they got closer that Adara began to understand them.Broken worlds . . . ruination . . . scattered lives . . . time is ashes . . . eyes see name . . . weak flame . . .
A chill crept up her spine as the voices grew louder and more persistent, echoing through the woods like they came from a thousand different voices speaking at once. Their breaths caressed her ears, causing the hair on the back of her neck to stand up.
Turn back,one warned.
Fight more,another urged.
Then an entirely different voice spoke to her, sounding as if it’s raspy voice was right next to her.Make the break, end in ruins. Reverse the clock, not for the weak. Know the name, beware answers you seek. You’ll burn in your own heat.
Adara clenched her fists to keep them from shaking. She recognized all of those words. They were jumbled and unorganized, but she easily identified them from the Realm Fracturer riddle.
Except for the last sentence. Those words were unfamiliar. They sent an apprehensive chill down her spine. Made her scarred hands sting at the memory of burning herself.
The voice seemed to be warning her not to create the sword, but perhaps it was a defense of the Whisperer. Trying to keep them away because it knew they needed its eye.
“Did you hear that too?” she asked Dominic, keeping her voice low.
For a minute, he did not answer. Staring into the distance, Adara wondered what voices were distracting him.
Finally, he shook his head as if waking from a dream. “Hear what?”
She knew he was avoiding her question, omitting information, as usual. For a moment, Dominic still seemed dazed, then his head whipped to the right.
“Follow me,” he murmured. Without waiting, he took off running.
Adara followed silently, new flames in her palm flickering across the shadows. She didn’t care if its light attracted danger. She’d prefer to be able to see what she was fighting with the illumination of her magic.
She had no clue how he knew where to go, but Dominic led them right up to the entrance of a cave. Did the whispers help him find it? That could only mean the voices were leading them to their deaths.
Hesitantly, Dominic took a step forward. Undecipherable whispers roared to life in warning like a sudden torrent of rain pounding against a window. Adara glanced around her, searching for a body the voices belonged to, even though she knew she wouldn’t find one.
“Whatever you do,” Dominic said, his grave voice drawing her gaze back to him. “Don’t say my name in there.” He took another tentative step.
The pause in his voice told her there was something else he wasn’t telling her. She glared at him, debating on setting his clothes on fire for trying to keep her in the dark.
He huffed. “And don’t say your own, for that matter.”
“Why?” she asked, hating that she hadn’t picked up one of the tomes in his room. Surely, he’d had one that explained something about the Whisperer. It infuriated her that she had to rely on him for information.
“They call it the Whisperer because with one whisper of your name, it kills you.”
Adara gritted her teeth. The more she knew, the higher the chance they had of not making it out alive. Not saying her ownname was simple enough, but it would be easy for Dominic to let it slip, getting her killed, erased from existence.
