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“Love. Yes, he abused it. Your trust, too. But do not despair,” he whispers and his voice fades in and out. The dreamworld flickers — I’m back in the cave — and then it holds and the garden around me solidifies and firms. I’m back on the bridge, only this time, the cool metal in my hand changes. When I look down, I see that I’m holding a bundle of brightly colored peonies and the collar around my neck is a chain of small yellow sunflowers, their faces tilted up as if I am the light.
“I saw something else, too,” the man says with a smile, this one saccharine. “I had another vision. A world where Omegas and Berserkers ruled side by side. A world where Paradise Hole was restored, brought back to the oasis it once was. Covered in gardens just as magnificent as this that you have created here, because you created all of them.
“Yes,” he says in response to my expression.
I’m shaking my head. “It can’t happen. I’m not that strong.”
“I’m not here to tell you what you are, only what I saw… I saw Beta families reunited with their children. I saw flowers,unending fields of flowers, grow.” More flowers sprout from the bouquet in my hand, and then come to cover the rest of me, little green vines wrapping around my body and crawling over the bridge and then out over everything. I look up and, for a flickering moment, there is a strong burst of sunlight, then it’s gone.
His face remains tilted towards the light that vanished, or never was. “I saw fires hold strong in the Rookery’s coldest winters. I felt sunshine as truly as you feel your Berserker’s touch and I know that you are the key to attaining it.”
“How?” Does he hear how my voice trembles? No? What about my heart?
His eyes open and he looks directly into my soul. “You already know.”
I take another step and the world around us flickers again. “You’re crazy. I’m not strong enough to kill a Fate. They have unlimited powers…”
“False. They have, at their core, the same gifts as the Fallen — dominion over earth and water, fire and air, mind and spirit, animal and human, life and death. Together, each of the Fallen can defeat the Fate whose powers they share.”
I’m still backpedaling, shaking my head. “But the Fates have the gifts of generations of Omegas. Gifts like yours. Like this. This isincredible. I can’t fight this — I can barely control my own gifts.”
He doesn’t chase me this time. He only narrows his gaze and drops his proffered hand back to his stomach, which he holds. “They have what they’ve stolen, yes, but you also have something else. Something that they don’t. Something that was freely given, that can never die, that is immortal.”
Tears again. Those damn tears. I shake my head but I can’t break the line of his gaze no matter how hard I try. My shoulders curl inwards and when I look down, I see that the flower bouquet in my hand has begun to wilt. Dead petals fall at my feet. I clench my teeth and press my wrist over my heart.
“Ican’t…”
“You can. Only you can steeryourfates back onto the right path.”
“I can’t kill a Fated Omega and Ican’tforgive him. You can’t ask that of me.He broke my heart.”
The world shudders and shakes. He looks up at the sky and suddenly a stone falls from it, smashing through the bridge between us. “I am not asking anything of you, sweet Echo, I am merely telling you what I saw.”
Another stone falls and as it splashes into the river below, I’m wrenched from the dream and back into a reality where Freya’s already standing and shouting. I don’t know how long she’s been shouting. “What happened? Where did you go? Why did your eyes cloud? Why did you not speak? What is this? What’s happening?”
I can feel the ground beneath me, cold and hard. I can feel my heart pounding, cold and hard. I can feel something in my hand — it’s a cold and hard metal chain — only when I look down, it isn’t. It’s long green stems and wilting flowers in a thousand different shades.I brought the flowers with me.
The man meets my gaze one last time before his eyes squeeze shut in pain. “You must take the path that Adam couldn’t. Only by taking that first step can you save Adam, save Gatamora and replenish Paradise Hole.”
His back arches, but he fights brilliantly against whatever binds him. He grabs onto the orb, digging his fingers into its shell. “Freya, you must not forsake the other Fallen. Find the other two. Only together can you survive the Fates.”
“I do not need help!” Freya roars.
“Then you truly will be the Fallen…” His head shakes violently, like he’s having a seizure. When he finally settles, I scream. He’s…he’sdead. He’s a husk of a human with black holes where eyes should be, shriveled, dessicated skin and a lipless mouth baring bright white teeth.
The light in his lap flares violently and the man — the corpse — screams. Pain is here, but she’s here for him, standing over him, her hands wrapped around him, squeezing. I lunge forward while Freya staggers back, holding her arm up to the light to fend it off.
“Freya, we have to help him!”
“You can’t,” the man wheezes. “They’re here.” The light under his fist is pulsing and, when I look into it, I can see colors moving…shapes…faces watching me.I gasp and lurch back, and Freya’s arm wrenching me forward is the only thing that keeps the next rock that falls from cracking open my skull.“Run.”
He seizes again. Tears well in my eyes. He grabs at his wrist with one skeletal hand and, with what looks like every ounce of strength he has, he yanks his hand off of the orb. He collapses and the sound of his body hitting the stones below is both wet and brittle and makes my stomach lurch. A gust of wind rolls off of the light source and, on its wings, carries the screams of a womanor four.The smell comes next and I actually do retch. I drop my hands onto my knees and open my mouth and purge a mouthful of berries and bile.
I blink away the dust that clouds my eyes and when I look up, all I can see in the sudden darkness is a lump where the man once sat. “Is…is he dead?” I gag.
Freya hisses, sounding every bit a snake. When I look up at her I can see that her nose is pointed and, in the muted light, her skin glistens like scales. “Yes. He’s…not been near the shore for some time.” She shudders —shudders —as her gaze assesses the pile where his body once was.“He was badly tortured.” Another stone drops into the center of the lake, causing a splash that makes me jump. “The Fates need to be stopped.”And I’m the key to how.
I close my eyes, hands still braced on my knees, and shake my head. “What was his name?” I whisper.
