And then her white eyes were gone. Reality returned to show Asher pulling her hand away from my chest.
The world crashed into my senses sharply, loud, and vibrant, like it had never left me. I stood with the chief’s help, sweet oxygen effortlessly filling my lungs.
“It’s fine,” I assured them.
“Are you certain?” Asher asked, standing between his mother and me as though to shield me from her.
“I’m perfectly fine.” It was the honest truth, every cell in my body tingled with energy I couldn’t begin to measure. I wasn’t even cold anymore, although it was below freezing here.
A slow, hopeful smile curved the Truth Teller’s lips behind him, like now we shared a secret she was fated to impart onto me, and her job was finally done.
With a slight head bow, she turned around, entering her cave.
10
“What did the Truth Teller say?” Kingston’s question brought me out of my thoughts as we flew back to the mildest part of the Icelands to cross the portal back home.
My troubled gaze was still focused on the retreating ice mountain that rose in the distance. Facing him, my attention settled on him. What Asher’s mother shared with us in the cave wasn’t exactly the kind of thing anyone would forget hearing, so why was he asking? “You don’t remember?”
His expression mirrored the perplexity I felt. “I did not hear anything.”
“A seer’s truth is meant to be heard by one person only,” Asher clarified. “That was you.”
Oh. A weighted breath burned through my chest knowing I was the only recipient of that dumpster fire. Now I wasn’t exactly sure I wanted anyone else to know.
“We can help you understand,” the chief assured just as we landed.
Fuck it.
“I heard a voice that said I was evil like Raithian and that I might kill you all.”
The expressions of shock and dread that captured both of their faces would have been comical if my situation wasn’t as bad as it got.
“That is not what it said,” Asher argued while Crystal’s portal began to form.
With a sigh, I rubbed both hands over my face. “Well, basically.”
He adamantly shook his head. “The Truth Teller’s words cannot always be taken literally. More times than not, they are meant to be interpreted. Tell me exactly what you heard from the voice.”
I couldn’t lie, his conviction gave me some relief. If her words were not entirely literal, then all was not fucked.
“Four Dragons,” I began. “That seemed like the most important message for me to grasp since it repeated over and over in an echo. Even while other messages reached me. Then the voice mentioned a betrayal. ‘Betrayal waits in the shadows’, I think,‘breaking the heart of all hearts.’”
That made them exchange a loaded glance, though I supposed that was as straightforward as it got.
“Someone close will betray us? Who? And who isthe‘heart of all hearts’?” Kingston asked, seeming deeply troubled.
“Not sure… Evanna?” I offered, hating for that to be my first guess, but they didn’t seem too convinced.
Evanna wasn’t exactly the type to wear her heart on her sleeve. Not that I blamed her after everything she’d been through. So much pain made people build walls that could seem impossible to take down. They became guarded.
“Maybe the ‘heart of all hearts’doesn’t mean emotion,” Asher added, probably thinking the same thing I had. “Maybe its pointing us to someone who is at the center of everything that has happened.”
Basically, the same.
“The next thing I heard was ‘Let go of the evil inside you to master your power…’”
“There is no evil in you, Braxton,” Kingston declared, leaving no room for discussion. “That must mean something else.” His gaze went to Asher, urging him to confirm his words.
