Chapter 15
Destiny Indeed
I woke up with one of those full-body yawns that you want to stay in but know your muscles will cramp if you don’t stop in half a second.
My eyes blinked open to a cerulean ceiling, a turquoise wall, and a wooden headboard I didn’t recognize.
I sprang up to sit and fast deduced that I didn’t recognize the rest of the room either.
It was at least twice the size of my dormitory and held no resemblance to the neutral grays that I took comfort in.
While the wall at my back was turquoise, the other three walls were painted in the most exquisite mural of an underwater ocean scene.
Sea creatures I had never read about swam among vast spreads of vibrant coral.
Waves of water swirled and gushed in the most realistic effect.
The furniture in the room matched the deep-sea theme with shell-shaped knobs, a clam chair, and a shimmering fish-scale blanket over my legs.
I felt like a whole mermaid.
I knew I was at the inn, but this had not been the kind of room I expected based on the quaint little living room from my first visit.
I also hadn’t expected to wake up without an ounce of pain, considering the wounds I’d covered myself in the day before and the excruciating headache that had nursed me to sleep once the vomiting subsided.
I threw back the blanket.
What in the—
My mouth dropped open.
Not only did I feel fine, but I looked fine too. Not a scratch or streak was visible on the skin not covered by the baggy shorts and oversized t-shirt that I hadn’t been wearing the last time I was conscious.
My stomach dropped.
How long have I been out? And who the hell changed my clothes?
The groggy comfort of waking up in a clean, soft bed evaporated with a full-body shudder. I vaguely remembered a wet cloth wiping my face…someone touching my shins.
But had someone undressed me?
I licked my lips before padding cautiously across the shipwreck-style floorboards that could have been imported from the time of the Ancients.
I opened one of the three doors in a low-stakes roulette.
Bathroom. I tried the second door. It opened silently, and I poked my head out to look down a hallway lined with reddish-brown teakwood doors.
Ten doors on each side of me, maybe, before the hallway turned at both ends.
I took a deep breath and slipped out. Both directions looked identical, so I chose right. I always chose right.
Most of the doors had brass numbers hanging in the middle that matched their doorknobs.
Some, though, bore pearly-white nameplates instead.
Ezra Michael Bloomberg
Adriel DaVonte Johnson
The doorknobs were of the same opalescent material, and I felt a distinct urge to reach out and touch one. It felt cold under my hand and belonged to Matthias—no middle or clan name. I imagined what it would look like if they attempted to fit my name on one of those plates.
Probably wouldn’t fit.
Why would they even try?
I drew my hand back and continued until I reached the bend at the end of the corridor. More doors.
The final door on the right stopped me in my tracks. It was drastically different than the others.
Ornate carvings covered the wood from top to bottom.
A detailed carving of a barren tree adorned the top half, and it seemed to shine with wooden branches painted gold and swaying in the wind from a light breeze that swept past me, tossing loose strands of my hair around my ears.
The bottom half had another tree. It was nearly identical, but it boasted green leaves and fruit that turned red the longer I stared.
A serpent with wings on its head curled around the roots.
I looked back up at the first tree to check if it, too, had a snake.
But the shape in the center, between the two trees, caught my eye first.
In the middle of the door was a creature that looked like a bear with antlers.
It was plated with nearly endless layers of beveling so that it seemed your arm could not possibly reach far enough.
The end was actually what caught my eye.
For in the belly of the bear lay a shape identical to the mark on my chest.
As if summoned, the skin where that mark lay began to tingle. The tingling escalated to a burn. My whole body stiffened, except for my heart, which pounded into my rib cage.
I licked my lips and realized my mouth was too dry.
No time for hydration. I’d just found my destiny.
No need to start your drama this early in the morning, Eliana.
Truthfully, I didn’t know what time it was, but it was too early for this.
Still, I searched for a knob because how could I ignore a door with the same mark as the one I was born with?
I mean, it wasn’t entirely out of left field, considering this mark had also been on the letter.
Soren and Winifred had clearly explained that this mark had something to do with me and this whole Daughter of the Scepter thing.
I checked over both shoulders to make sure no one—especially not Soren—was watching.
Then I pressed my hand against the door. I had barely touched it when it slid to the side and disappeared into the wall.
I shouldn’t have been impressed by the technology because it was most likely the work of nanos, definitely not as shocking as Soren’s warp-jump nonsense from yesterday that flipped my stomach inside out.
Note to self: Tell him never to do that again.
I peeked once more down both hallways before I slid into the room. The moment I was past the threshold, the door sealed shut behind me.
Destiny indeed.
The room was smaller than I expected. I think I had been anticipating the door to open up to another dimension or something—a secret realm where waterfalls of wine filled golden goblets the size of swimming pools. Maybe I’d learn how to teleport or shoot lasers from my eyes.
Maybe I’d end up in the Void.
Instead, it was only a bit bigger than the common room I’d shared with Astrid back at the dorm.
There were three couches with different upholsteries of blue suede, black leather, and brown linen. On the floor, cushions formed a large oval with the sofas. None of them matched either. A few knitted blankets were strewn over the couches or folded sloppily next to the cushions.
To the far left of the room, an enormous corkboard dominated the wall.
Notes of every color and size of paper imaginable—all in different writing as well—covered the board.
Beneath it sat an oak desk, buried in loose papers and open books.
While some were printed, some seemed to be handwritten journals with illustrations and scribbles in the margins.
Three half-melted candles sat haphazardly around the desk. And as I turned about, I noticed there must have been more than a hundred candles in various stages of use placed about the room.
Then I saw the tapestry, hung from floor to ceiling, spanning the entire width of the wall.
“What in Babel is this?” I muttered under my breath.
Ice marched down my spine, and it became difficult to swallow as I looked at the images of monsters torturing and murdering a man. A grotesque creature sat on a throne of skulls with blood pouring out of its eyes. People knelt at the creature’s feet, pained and weeping, begging.
I’d never seen that anguish on a face in my life. I swore I could hear faint screams.
The final scene was the most confusing, but also the most clarifying about the situation I had thrust myself into with my bloodlust. An enormous tower rose from the green, lush land. The tower reached up to the clouds. Blood oozed from it, and fire blazed from the side.
Sour and stale, my tongue fell heavy in my mouth. The taste of the previous night’s vomit began to reawaken.
I had put myself in the lair of a group of sick psychos that wanted to destroy billions of people in a horrific and sadistic show of blood and torture.
“Well, look what I’ve found. A Tower troll sneaking around where she doesn’t belong.”
I jumped, but fortunately didn’t scream, as I whirled around to see a devil standing in the doorway. Adriel wore a smirk with dead, flat eyes as he shook his head.
“Like what you see?”
My face crumpled in disgust. “What the hell is this? Is this what you all want?”
He threw his head back and laughed. It was loud and sharp like broken steel. When Adriel looked back at me, his hollow eyes held none of the amusement in his vicious grin.
“This is your doing, Rapunzel. You and your Citizens are the ones who worship the Dark One. You all gave in.”
“Leave her alone!”
This voice was a feminine voice that I didn’t recognize. A flash of color shoved its way past Adriel. She couldn’t have been older than fourteen. Her fiery sprigs bounced around her head as she skipped toward me.
“Glad to see you’re awake!” she chirped.
I took another step back.
My elbow brushed the tapestry.
Knowing I was touching it and whatever that scene was trying to relay sent a wave of revulsion through my body, and I wrapped my arms tightly around myself.
“Don’t worry about him,” the girl said. “He’s an idiot. I’m Zuri!”
She held out a tiny pale hand. Her smile was so pink and cheery, it could’ve been piped from frosting. This girl did not belong in this room.
Zuri. Soren had said that name. The healer.
I glanced down at my legs and then back at her.
She followed my gaze.
“Yeah,” she beamed. “Pretty cool, right?” She wiggled her fingers. “It’s my Charism!”
“Alright, Zuri, give her some space.” Another voice pulled my attention from Zuri toward the doorway. Adriel had disappeared, and in his place was a girl three years older than me with a blinding smile that I’d seen plastered across screens growing up.
An icon. A legend.
The girl who’d clawed her way up from the 200K level and made little girls like me believe we could do the same.
But Salah Walton was dead.
Three years ago, after her affair with a married Administrator, she had killed herself. I hadn’t just heard rumors. I was the one who found her.
I’d been the last person to see her alive. I’d been the one she wrote the suicide note to. And I’d been the one to find her lifeless body on the floor of the Babel girls’ bathroom.
Now it all made sense.
I was having one of those weird, vivid dreams.
Or I was dead.