9. Chapter Nine #2
“Please?” Felix urged as he sat up and patted the edge of the bed beside him. His molten gold eyes were serious now- burning with something I didn’t recognize.
Swallowing hard, I slowly closed the door behind me. My feet moved before I had a chance to second-guess them. As I approached, I caught Drake still chewing, spoon halfway to his mouth.
“Gods, this is good,” he muttered thickly, grabbing the wine and drinking straight from the bottle. I bit down a smile despite everything.
Felix gave me a knowing look, one brow arched. “You see? A miracle. You’ve turned him into a man of feeling, Eva. If he starts reciting poetry next, we’ll know you’ve bewitched him.”
“Glad you like it.” I smiled.
“Look, Evandra,” Felix began slowly, the playfulness sliding away. His gaze locked on mine, all warmth and no smirk now. “We haven’t been completely honest with you.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper. Unease crept into my chest, tightening like a vice.
“We actually knew a bit about you before we came here,” he admitted.
I looked at him warily, my stomach twisting, waiting for him to continue.
He hesitated, glancing at Fen, who was casually picking at her nails and looking utterly disinterested.
“I know this may come as a surprise to you, but we were… associates of your mother,” the words hit me like a slap to the face.
Even Eldrake, who had been shoveling food into his mouth moments ago, froze, his eyes flicking toward me at the mention of my mother.
“My mother?” My voice cracked as I knitted my brows, hurt and suspicion clear in my expression. “Is this some kind of joke?” I stood abruptly, the room blurring around me as anger and disbelief boiled in my chest. “How dare you?—”
“Please, listen.” Eldrake’s voice interrupted, soft but commanding.
I looked at him. There was something in his expression, something raw and pleading, that made me pause. Slowly, I sank back onto the edge of the bed, my hands trembling in my lap.
“How much do you know about your mother?” Felix asked gently.
“I…” I searched my memories, grasping for something concrete. “I know she worked for the royal court somehow.”
Fen scoffed, rolling her eyes. There was a pause, heavy with unspoken tension. Felix exchanged a glance with Fen and Eldrake before nodding toward him.
Eldrake leaned forward. “Your mother was part of the royal court, at first,” he said.
“But she wasn’t human. Not fully. She served as an ambassador between the humans and the Riftborn—until King Aberdeen outlawed magic and ordered us to be hunted.
” My heart hammered. “She went into hiding with the rest of us,” Eldrake continued, “but she feared staying in Riftreach would draw the King’s wrath down on everyone.
He wouldn’t stop hunting her, and she refused to put the city at risk.
So she fled… until the King finally tracked her here, and ordered her killed.
Her Rift was too powerful. He was afraid. ”
“ No .” I whispered.
“She helped stop a genocide,” he said. “Her power turned the tide in a battle the King wanted to be forgotten. That’s why they erased her. That’s why they burned her.”
“The fire…” I said, voice breaking. “It was an accident.”
Felix shook his head gently. “No, darling. The fire was the King’s doing. Not fate. Not chance. His cruelty.”
“Stop,” I snapped, standing again. “Stop talking about my mother like she was—like she was Riftborn . My father would have told me!”
The three of them exchanged a look. Pity . Fen finally looked up. Her voice was sharp and unflinching.
“Why do you think your father hid you in this shit-hole town your whole life?”
My chest was hollow. My voice cracked.
“I- Excuse me,” I rasped. “I need—” I didn’t finish. I turned, flung the door open and ran. The slam echoed down the hall.
I threw open the door to my dull, familiar attic room, the hinges groaning in protest, and collapsed onto the bed.
The old mattress sagged beneath me, sending a puff of dust swirling into the air as I landed.
I didn’t care. Tears poured down my face, hot and relentless, blurring my vision as I gasped for breath between sobs.
My chest heaved. My mind spun in an endless loop of disbelief, anger, and grief.
I sobbed for my mother—not because I believed them—not yet—but because she wasn’t here to tell me the truth herself.
I ached for her voice, for her guidance, for the truths I’d never gotten to hear from her lips.
Instead, there was only silence where answers should have been.
I sobbed for my father, for the man I trusted. The man who always seemed so open, so kind. Had it all been lies? Was it for my safety—or his own selfish reasons? I didn’t know, and that cut deeper than I cared to admit.
I buried my face in my pillow, muffling my cries, but the pain refused to be stifled. My whole life- this town, this inn. No choices, no say in the matter—just the life my father decided for me. And now I was learning that life was built on secrets.
My fists clenched around the edges of the pillow, trembling with frustration. There was a whole world out there, vast and beautiful that I’d never seen. A world I hadn’t even allowed myself to dream of until now. And yet, here I was. Alone. Ignorant. A mess of emotions I couldn’t sort through.
I sat up slowly, wiping at my tear-streaked face with shaking hands.
The room felt colder than usual, its plain walls closing in on me.
Mechanically, I changed into my silken nightgown, letting the soft fabric glide over my skin.
It was the only luxury I allowed myself, and tonight, it felt like a hollow comfort.
I climbed back into bed, curling into a tight ball beneath the blankets.
My tears had slowed, but the ache in my chest lingered, sharp and unrelenting.
I hated this. I hated the way my life had turned into something I barely recognized.
Hated the secrets, the lies, and the strangers who had upended everything with their cryptic revelations.
Most of all, I hated the loneliness—the way it clung to me like a second skin, leaving me hollow and adrift.
The earth blurred beneath me, moving far too quickly as though some force beyond myself was carrying me.
My breath came in sharp bursts, and a fire raged inside me—an inferno so fierce it drowned out everything else.
It wasn’t just anger. It was primal, consuming, coursing through my veins like molten blood, roaring in my ears until the world around me became a haze.
I was running. But I wasn’t myself. I was taller, stronger.
My heart was not my own, but it was familiar.
Brambles tore at me as I hurtled through the darkened wood, the sharp tang of fear flooding my senses.
I could smell it—my prey’s terror. It clung to the air, thick and pungent, igniting something savage within me.
Ahead, a flash of white. My focus narrowed.
My pulse thundered. My legs, impossibly strong, launched me forward with terrifying speed.
The air tore past me, and the branches whipped at my skin, but I felt nothing.
The scent hit me again, sharper this time, and I knew I was closing in.
Then, with no conscious thought, I was on it—on him.
The world turned red. My claws—talons, I realized—slashed through his flesh, rending it apart with brutal efficiency.
My hands, my fingers, were no longer human.
They moved with an unrelenting purpose, shredding pink tissue and spilling crimson blood in rivers.
A sound rumbled deep within me, guttural and feral, echoing through the woods.
It was the growl of an animal, but it carried the weight of human rage—a horrible sound, one that made my stomach churn even as it reverberated in my chest.
Then, through the sea of blood and viscera, I saw it. A face. Colin’s face.
His eyes were wide with terror, his features frozen in death- permanently twisted in horror so pure it burned itself into my mind.
I tried to stop, tried to pull myself away, but I was trapped—helpless—watching as this monstrous form tore him apart.
My claws ripped through him with savage precision, and his expression froze in that final, terrible moment of realization.
I wanted to scream, to wake up, to flee from the nightmare. But I couldn’t move, couldn’t look away. I was locked inside this creature’s eyes, forced to witness the carnage, the overwhelming, unrelenting violence. I was watching death.
I gasped myself awake, bolting upright as though the nightmare were still chasing me.
My chest heaved, the air in the room thick and suffocating.
My hands instinctively went to my face, rubbing at my eyes with trembling palms as I tried to gather my bearings.
The room around me was cloaked in darkness, faint moonlight filtering through the cracks in the curtains.
My breath came in shallow, uneven gasps, and my heart pounded against my ribs like a storm surge.
Sweat clung to my skin, the damp fabric of my nightgown sticking to my back and chest. My pulse didn’t feel like mine.
My skin buzzed like it remembered someone else’s grief.
I stared at the shadows dancing across the walls, my mind racing.
What the hell just happened?
The dream—it was unlike any I’d ever had before. For the first time, I hadn’t been reliving that horrible fire, trapped in some hazy memory. This was something else entirely.
I hadn’t just seen Colin’s death— I’d felt it . I felt the rage, the bloodlust, the savage need to hunt and destroy. The image of his face, twisted in terror, burned itself into my mind, refusing to leave.
“What’s happening to me?” I whispered into the darkness, my voice shaky and small. The timing… it couldn’t be a coincidence. It can’t. My thoughts spiraled as I clutched the edge of my blanket.