Chapter 39
Evie
Evie always believed her imagination could take her to incredible places. Magical places where anything was possible and she could be anyone.
But imagination was a double-edged sword, for if you were able to imagine wonderful, beautiful things with perfect clarity, so could you imagine…the bad.
“We won’t know what’s inside until we open it.” Trystan’s large hand landed on her lower back, nudging her toward it.
“Why do you think I haven’t opened it yet?” she shot back, not taking her eyes off the large storybook sitting on the kitchen counter. After the book had appeared, Trystan had deemed it safest to open it right then and there.
No delays. No chances for it to get lost. They’d do this now.
And he expected her to be the one to open it.
“It looks just like the other one,” Gideon marveled, “except the edges are a little different. Benedict’s pages were silver.”
And this one was brilliant, with different shades coming together in beautiful swirls.
Evie asked, “How will I know what to look for?”
Becky was stern but kind when she said, “It’s a magic book, Evie. Let it tell you what to look for.”
Evie didn’t wait a second more, flipping open the book before anyone had time to argue. She flinched, waiting for… Well, she wasn’t sure what they were waiting for, but she was certain it wasn’t nothing.
Yet nothing was what happened.
“That was anticlimactic.” Keeley walked over to the table, leaning down to see what was written on the first page.
Evie was both alarmed and relieved to see that it was blank.
“Was it a trick?” Becky struggled through the question, stopping Cassandra from biting her brother.
“Maybe they’re not all blank?” Lyssa suggested.
“Turn the page.” Trystan spoke low in her ear, and she allowed the sound to calm her, his presence a shield.
Her shaking hand landed upon the weathered pages, crinkled and stained with the passage of time. She turned the page. And her world went to the deadlands.
The book began flipping, iridescent smoke rising from it until it landed on a specific page. Words appeared written in the air above them.
It’s a Core Healer’s duty to rid the soul of all pain and to destroy the source of Rennedawn’s sickness, to give it a name.
The pages fluttered and settled on an image that turned Evie’s stomach to lead.
Because etched there in stark black and white—in a book older than time—was a face and a name.
And they both belonged to Evie.
No one spoke. She imagined none of them could. What could they say? A magical book had just called her a sickness. And professed that it was a Core Healer’s duty to rid the world of her.
“Tryst!” Clare yelled, running into the room. “Come. All of you, quickly.”
“What is it, Clare?” Trystan asked in a clipped tone.
“The Valiant Guards are back, and they’re demanding a meeting with you—and the Wicked Woman.”
“We’re perfectly safe within the confines of the thorny grove,” Trystan promised her.
Clare’s urgency was the only thing that could snap Evie out of her misery. “Not all of us,” she said.
Evie’s stomach sank.
All eyes went to her as she croaked out, “They have Malcolm.”