The Deck of Omens (The Devouring Gray #2) - Christine Lynn Herman Page 0,95
flourished his arm and bent down into a mock bow. “In the flesh.”
“But…” she whispered. “How?”
“I took their powers as they died,” he said, shrugging. “That Saunders immortality looks good on me, don’t you think?”
It explained a lot. It explained too much. May knew that if she lived through this, it would take her a long, long time to sort through all of it, through the impossibility and ugliness of her very existence. But right now she had to think. She had to keep him talking, because he was telling her things that were actually useful. She could fall apart later.
“So then you have power,” May said, frowning. “You have… everything. Why would you bring me here? Why would you tell me this?”
“Stop!” The voice rang out through the Gray, through the trees. May whirled around, her mind struggling to process the sight before her. Justin, bedraggled and sweaty, staring at them both with abject horror. May wanted to believe it was the Beast playing tricks on her, but she knew better. Her brother had followed them into the forest, into the Gray.
“Justin,” she said. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m taking you home.” Justin stared at her, determination written across his face.
“Well.” Ezra?—no, Richard—smiled slowly. “This is unexpected.”
“Get out of here,” May gasped. “He isn’t who he says he is. Justin, I don’t know how much of that you heard?—”
“I heard enough,” Justin said grimly. “Richard.”
“You poor boy.” Her father’s voice was so soft, May barely heard the words. “You should not have followed us.”
“Justin,” May said again. “Run?—”
But it was too late.
The roots around her moved, whipping into action. They bound Justin’s arms and legs and forced him to his knees, his eyes wide with panic. He didn’t even have time to scream before they slid across his mouth.
May rounded on her father. “Let him go!”
“No,” Richard said hoarsely. “Not unless you drink.”
May could not think, could not breathe. Her brother was here. Her brother was in terrible danger?—they both were?—and it was all her fault.
All she could think to do was keep Richard talking.
“Please,” she said, extending a shaking hand. “Just explain why you even need me at all. Don’t you have all the power you ever could have wanted?”
“No!” The word burst through his careful mask, and then Richard breathed, reeling his fury back in. It disturbed her to see how he could put his anger on and take it off again. “Their powers?—our powers—are weak reflections of the true magic here. But the other founders were frightened of that power. It caused the corruption, and they wanted to stop it, even if it meant all of us losing our abilities. I couldn’t let that happen.”
“So you killed them.” May’s voice was hollow.
“I did what I had to do,” Richard said. “But I didn’t realize that their deaths meant I would be locked away from the source of our power. It took many years before I figured out that I would not be able to override their sacrifice in order to get my full powers back on my own. Someone else would have to do it.”
“Someone else. You mean me.”
Ezra—Richard—nodded. “You are the bridge between the Gray and Four Paths, May. You’re a conduit, a mediator, and instead of keeping them apart”?—he smiled—“you will bring them together, and you will give me the reward I’ve been chasing for a hundred and fifty years.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” May said, hot tears gathering in her throat. “I’m not capable of any of the things you just said.”
“Yes, you are,” Richard said, steepling his fingers thoughtfully beneath his chin. “When you use the Deck of Omens, May, you’re asking a question. Who do you think is answering it?”
The voice. It had whispered at the edge of her consciousness for the past year, and she had tried to drown it out, push it back. But it had only grown stronger. May thought of all the words she had used for what she was communicating with when she used her powers. The roots. The tree. The town. None of them had ever been right. But they had all been so much safer than what she’d feared in the back of her mind, a truth that she could only face now that so many more terrifying truths had come to light.
“The Beast.” May could barely choke the words out. And he nodded, and her world crumbled.
Her power wasn’t seeing the future at all?—it was talking to a monster.