My gaze lifted from the shattered stone to the man standing tall before me, and I was glad that I could learn something else about him, even if in this place. As my gaze followed the statues on each side of the trail, I realized they were father and son, standing beside each other and giving each other strength. More importantly, they were all smiling.
The March of Kings wasn’t a show of power, superiority, or of the greatness each ruler possessed. Getting to stand beside their father and among the kings of the past was an honor, an accomplishment they never took for granted, and it showed in their expressions.
“Do you want to walk it?” Evie asked, taking my hand in hers.
I shook my head. “Maybe someday.” My chest constricted with the realization that, once I destroyed Raithian, I would never really get to share this experience with my ancestors.
Wrapping her arms around my neck, she pulled me down for a kiss. I didn’t resist her. The more I acknowledged how this would end for me, the harder it was to accept that I would have to say goodbye to Evanna.
We began to walk around the park, searching for a place that might hold the crown or a clue we could use. Unfortunately, there was nothing but ruins and statues.
“What exactly did the Truth Teller say?”
“Just another weird riddle,” I huffed at Kingston, rubbing both hands over my face in frustration. We’d been here for over an hour, but we hadn’t found anything that could help us.
“Can you tell us?” Asher added. “Maybe we can help you understand.”
“We might as well try,” Evie encouraged, caressing my back.
“Right.” It took a moment to remember the exact words, but once they came to me, they rang as strongly as the first time I heard them.“‘The hands that cover my eyes may not allow me to see, but they will uncover the crown if you can see through the flaws.’”
“Okay…” He sighed, turning around to search again. So did we.
“The hands that cover my eyes...” I recited, walking towards a dead tree at the edge of the park and turning to face the space. “Maybe I need to stop seeing and feel or hear something.” Lifting my hands, I placed them over my eyes and tried to focus on everything that surrounded us.
Kingston echoed the words, walking to my right while he tried to decipher it too.
“The hands that cover my eyes...” Evie and Asher repeated too, moving to my left and before me.
Nothing. I could hear or perceive nothing other than them moving all around me. What the hell did the riddle mean?
“Maybe is not a riddle at all!” Evanna suddenly gasped across from me. “Brax, look!”
I dropped my hands to see her pointing to something behind me.
“Another fountain,” Asher added, rushing past me.
About twenty feet behind me was indeed another fountain, a pretty large one, but that wasn’t what Evie saw. A statue stood at its center, a figure with covered eyes, but a multitude of thorn-filled vines wrapped around the entire structure like a cocoon.
Swiftly pulling out our spears, we attacked the overgrown plants together, slashing and cutting, pulling, and freeing until the image of a beautiful woman in a flowy gown stood before us—both her hands covering her eyes just like I had done.
“It’s her. It’s the Truth Teller,” I declared as my pulse began to race with recognition. I had no idea how I knew that. It wasn’t exactly Asher’s mother, more like a symbol of every woman ever born with that purpose, but it was her.
Rushing to the edge of the fountain, Evie attacked a mass of dead branches, revealing a golden plaque. “It reads, ‘Truth Teller, Goddess of Destinies.’”
“Princess Evanna is right,” Asher added, and we could almost see the wheels turning in his head. “She didn’t give you a riddle, Brax. She gave you a location.”
Blinking, I tried to focus. “‘The hands that cover my eyes may not allow me to see…’It’s literally about her.‘But they will uncover the crown if you can see through the flaws.’” I stepped into the dried fountain, stopping in front of the Truth Teller. “Maybe she is facing the direction of the crown,” I added, turning to see what she would see if her hands were not over her eyes. Kingston, Asher, and Evie entered the fountain too.
Nothing.
There was no cave, no boulders, no water, no bushes, nothing that might hide a crown.
“It’s not out there,” Asher announced from behind us, so I turned, finding his gaze focused on the head of the statue. “I think it is inside her.”
Walking to his side, I glanced at it too. The flaws! The back had been opened and plastered again, leaving visible imperfections.
Shit.
