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Rona bends to crouch next to me, her blocky body making the squat look more like a knee flex. Her multitude of clothes swish and rustle with the movement. “Your path isn’t easy, but you could have so much if you commit to it.”
The story of my life. If I’d tried a little harder at school, at home, at work. If I’d done a better job molding myself into whatever people needed from me. I’m still failing. “I can’t be who you want me to be,” I whisper.
“I need you to be exactly who you are.” More brownie cryptic speak has me frowning at her. “You will be a great queen—perhaps the greatest of all time—if you’ll let yourself.”
“No pressure,” I mutter.
“The reward will be worth it. You can help souls for decades in your realm or for centuries in this one. You found your mates. The entire keep would love you as your new family if you let them. You’d bring honor to the Borderlands simply by being you. The Bridge chooses; the goddess within it knows who would be her best ambassador. You’ve nothing to lose and everything to gain if you’ll just get out of your own way.”
Riiight? The goddess wants a girl who flunked out of school, couldn’t keep a job, and was a disappointment to everyone but my Lala and my friends. And the twins, a voice inside me whispers. The humming of the Bridge twists into a bright melody, full of promise. Huey purrs against me. The pages Dyphena left behind whisper against my skin. And I’m too afraid to peel away all the masks I’ve carefully created to show the world and hide behind.
“I’m scared,” I admit.
“Then you’re on the right path. One only you can tread. But also one you don’t have to go alone.” Rona walks past me and Huey, past the pretty bed with its mound of lace-trimmed pillows, into the wall and disappears.
I strain to hear footsteps, but there’s nothing. Not that I should’ve expected there to be. The twins are stuck in stone, Darok will be outside, and who knows where Rona goes when she doesn’t want to be found? Rubbing my fingers over the feathers on Huey’s head, I focus on his cooing instead of the worry that I’ve pissed off the brownie and wasted the chance to ask her to read the letters for me instead of simply shoving them at her.
Seconds and minutes creep by like hours. The words beneath my fingers still jumble into an unintelligible mess yet the twins won’t get answers if I don’t woman up. I draw Huey onto my shoulder and push to my feet. “Come on. Let’s go find Rona and beg for help.”
Except she’s not in the bedrooms or the kitchen. When I call out to her, she doesn’t answer.
“You have any ideas?” I ask Huey.
He blinks big eyes back at me.
I continue my one-sided conversation. “Don’t guess there’s any chance you can read in this or your other form?”
He blinks again.
“Yeah, I thought not. Want to keep me company while I try to make out what the letters say?”
Swooping from my shoulder, he takes off for the great hall.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” I add, hoping Rona might pop out of the walls, but nope, I’m stuck sitting on the couch nearest Jace and Atticus with them frozen in stone as they wait for the sun to set.
Toeing off the sandals, I curl up and open the first letter. I twist the page to different angles, hoping one might unlock the writing.
I work at putting the letters and numbers in order, but the sounds don’t make sense. Things swap around as if running away from me. I search for patterns or repeating themes like I do with tarot cards. Using that tactic, some of it comes through. The twins’ names. Home. Family. Sisters. Brothers. But progress is slow, and the fear, excitement, and overwhelm of last night catch up to me, and I catch myself nodding over the pages.
Just one more letter. I shake myself awake each time with the promise that I’ll rest if I can figure out the next few lines. Huey gives up, face-planting on a nearby chair—his feathered tail sticking out amid tufts of downy softness.
“Future queen, wake up,” a voice calls.
I snap to attention. “What, huh, I’m not?—”
The Spidress looms over me.
I swallow a shriek, but she doesn’t seem to notice. Or maybe she doesn’t care.
“I brought my little one who you saved in your realm.” A teensy spider suspends from a fine thread of web off the Spidress’s head to hang between her top row of eyes. I focus on the itsy bitsy scary instead of the giant one’s fangs. “And presents,” she says with a flourish. “Come see.”
As if I had a choice. At least spiders and their body language are easier to read than letters.
26
ATTICUS
PAGE OF SWORDS: BE CURIOUS. BE INSPIRED. TEST OLD BELIEFS.
