Total pages in book: 209
Estimated words: 196141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 981(@200wpm)___ 785(@250wpm)___ 654(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 196141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 981(@200wpm)___ 785(@250wpm)___ 654(@300wpm)
“He’s here,” she corrects him. “He’s been sitting by your side for many, many hours over the past few days, in fact.”
“Days?” Kaleb is nearly sprung from the bed, sitting up too fast again. “How long have I been here?”
“Two days, I believe. Perhaps three.” She glances back at the window. “Time feels so odd in a place of no illusions. I spent far too long in Markadian’s House. My sense of time … cannot be trusted.”
Kaleb hesitates. “Is it … Is it true that Markadian … is dead?”
Raya looks at him, struck by the question. Her eyes detach, mind wandering to another world. “I’m … I’m not sure.”
“I heard something. Maybe earlier tonight. My brother. I … I thought I heard someone say that Markadian … is …”
After a moment’s hesitation, Raya leans forward. “It shouldn’t matter. You should feel nothing for that man. He tried to kill you. Don’t you remember? The lion.” She suddenly can’t look at him. “That’s the reason your face is … how it is. And … your eye.”
“My eye?”
“Sorry.” Raya bows her head, as if literally growing heavier. “I feel like the doctor should be here, telling you all of this. I should summon one of them. Or both. I’m not equipped to—”
“I lost an eye, didn’t I.”
It doesn’t quite come out as a question. It’s a statement. To confirm what he already suspects, what he’s gathered in his foggy, deteriorated moments of consciousness over the past few days.
When Raya lifts her face to his, there are tears in her eyes. “It is so much more that you’ve lost. Because of one person. Because of someone I mistakenly called my best friend.” Her voice breaks upon saying the name. “T-Tristan.”
The name hits Kaleb at once. “Tristan? But he …” The misty blue eyes that pierced through the hungry flames. Gentle eyes of an angel. Hair as bright as heavenly light. “He’s the one who—”
“He’s the reason you lost your life to that prison,” she states. “He’s the reason you lost yourself to Markadian’s lust. Tristan is not your angel, Kaleb. He never was. He’s a selfish person who—”
“Raya.”
The two turn. Kyle has appeared at the door, silhouetting the light that pours in from the brighter hallway.
“And he’s back,” says Raya. “Do you disagree? With my little assessment of the disease that is Tristan?”
Kyle approaches the bed, comes to Kaleb’s other side. “I just think there’s a better time for this, and my brother—”
“He betrayed you, too,” she goes on. “His ambition in trying to bring back your friend from the dead, that cost me half my arm. You didn’t know that part, did you?” she asks Kaleb suddenly, her voice turning sad again. “I hid my arm from you all this time. In baggy sleeves and dresses. I was ashamed. Not for my missing limb, but for the fact that it reminds me of how so naïve I was to believe Tristan was a good person. Tell him.” She turns her sharp eyes onto Kyle. “Tell him the story. You and Tristan. How this whole twisted affair began. Tell him what he did to you.”
“Not now.”
“Tell him how he ended your family, ended your life, and hid your brother from you for all of those years.”
Kyle bows his head, eyes shut. Raya, too, clutching the edge of the bed, holding back a whole tirade of anger.
After a moment’s thought, Kaleb says, “I see it another way.”
Kyle opens his eyes, turns to him.
Raya just stares down at the bed, jaw tightened.
Kaleb licks his dry lips and measures his words. “I … I see it as an act of … compassion. What Tristan did. I know what you’re probably thinking. It happened a long time ago. But I dreamt of it so often, it’s like it happened yesterday. That night … the fire.”
Kyle keeps watching Kaleb, listening.
Raya turns her head finally, her teary eyes upon him.
“Tristan could have left me,” says Kaleb. “He didn’t. He … He saved me. It wasn’t easy. He saved me from the fire. Vampires are vulnerable to fire. He risked his own life and … and saved me. I could be dead right now. Instead, I got to live so many more years. I got to meet you, Raya. I get to see you again, Kyle, my … my brother.” He smiles as he gazes at Kyle—who has started to gather tears in his own eyes. “I got to hone my violin skills. I got to read so much. Learn so much. Make new friends. My life hasn’t been so bad, not really. And now …” He suddenly thinks on the old man’s words of prayer. Were they uttered yesterday? The day before that? It feels like mere minutes ago. “Now I get a second chance at life. A second life. I’m born again, here with you two. And stronger for it. Tristan … saved me.”