“Whose ship is it?” I wondered aloud and Ashley froze and looked up at me with the most tender, sad expression I’d seen on her before.
“Axon, there are statues of the goddess, thesirretgoddess, less than one hundred feet away. Whose ship do you think it is?”
No, it couldn’t be. “Is there a door?” I asked. I needed to get to the bottom of this. I needed to show Ashley that this was not my people’s ship. I refused to believe that what I’d been told my entire life was a lie.
“Umm,” she hummed aloud as she walked to the other side of the ship.
“Here! It’s over here!” I walked to where shewas and saw her fiddling with what looked like a handhold.
“It’s locked, but it looks like something is supposed to go here, like a key.”
There was an indentation in the metal above the handhold that looked familiar to me. It was a symbol I knew I’d seen many times, but I couldn’t remember where.
I got on my knees and ran my fingers along the lines of the oval shape with the engraved picture of a set of stars above symbols that meant nothing to me. I slowly traced each star as I forced my brain to remember where I’d seen this image before. It was shiny just like this ship, it hung on something. It...
The memory hit me like an avalanche. I remembered where I’d seen this symbol before. On shaky feet, I stood back to my full height.
“You’re right. There is a key that fits here and I know who has it.”
“Who?” Ashley asked as she held my hand in hers.
“The priestess. The pendant on her necklace is the key.”
Chapter 22
Ashley
“I don’t understand. Our people came here through a miracle of the goddess. We didn’t come here on a ship,” Axon looked at me with imploring eyes, as if I held some secret answer to why the ship was here and why the priestess had the key to unlock it.
“I’m not sure. Maybe the miracle was the ship.” I attempted to cheer him up by throwing out ideas. I couldn’t imagine what he must be feeling, knowing that the foundation of his people’s origin story might be a lie.
“Maybe the goddess provided your people with the money to buy this ship which they used to come here?” I hedged.
“Then why not just say that? Why keep us in the dark about our past?”
His expression turned from confused to angry in a flash. “My brother shifters have spent their entire adult lives believing that the goddess punished them for killing our mothers and sisters, and there’s a possibility that the goddess might not be real at all,” he seethed.
“I need to get to the bottom of this. My brothers deserve answers. The entire dekes deserves to know the truth.”
“This,” he pointed to the ship, “this is our history and for some reason we’ve been kept in the dark about it.”
“What can I do to help?” I offered. Axon was my mate, and I loved him with my entire being. It killed me to see him in such turmoil, and I would do anything to bring him peace again.
He furrowed his brow and looked back at the ship, then back at me. “Come with me.”
“Come with you? Where?”
“I’m going to seek out the priestess. I’m going to demand answers. I will bring her here tied up in my web if I need to, but she will give me the answers that I seek.”
It was dangerous, but I understood his need to face her. He was confused and hurt and needed answers, and I would support him in this. I would be by his side every step of the way.
“I’ll go with you. When do we leave?”
Axon looked to the sun that was still high in the sky, then he looked to the east in the direction of the valley where the priestess lived.
“Right now. Today. There’s a cave that’s a midway point between here and the valley. It belongs to Rhaz, but I’m sure he won’t mind if we use it.”
“Today.” I nodded my head in firm agreementof his plan. He’d keep me safe physically, and I’d do my best to protect his heart. We’d go on this journey together as mates.
