Page 10 of Eternal Surrender

He cringed. Alex joined me by the window and said, “Those are mine. I ran out of space.”

“You’re a bad liar.” I walked away, toward the walnut writing bureau and leaned against it. “What kind of person am I?”

“A deep thinker.” He pointed to the book Voltaire I was holding. “Well-read.”

“Go on.”

“Cautious—usually that is. Kind. Thoughtful.”

“Then why are you wary of me?”

He shook his head, as though apologetic.

“Nothing adds up.” Nearing Alex, I tried to extract more from him with the mere persuasion of my intensity. “Where are my clothes?”

He blinked several times as though considering how best to answer.

I shook my head and started for the door.

“You were a good brother,” he burst out.

“Still am, hopefully.”

“Ingrid’s gone.”

“And why would I care about that?”

Alex looked away.

Jacob cut me off in the doorway, and I tried to nudge past him.

He pressed his hand to my chest. “You had a breakthrough. Share it with us?”

I eased his hand off. “If you’re going to access my thoughts at least give me the privilege of reading yours.”

“Of course.” Jacob opened up to me, yet adroitly controlled each thought. “I’m here to help you” was all he gave me.

I barged past him and into the corridor, hoping this time Alex wouldn’t follow. With my mind closed to prevent them tracking me, I flew toward the upper rooms of the castle.

Instinct guided me, drawing me into a part of the castle that felt sacred, ancient and somehow bound to me.

Inside the small dark room, I nudged between the numerous painted canvasses, nightscapes laying here and there, a disarray of half-finished artwork seemingly long given up on.

Finding a space on the floor, I sat with my back against the wall, staring at Ingrid’s notebook that I’d just pick-pocketed from Jacob.

The quiet closed in.

Leafing through the pages, I read Ingrid’s scribbled notes, her words unraveling as though in my head, exposing what she’d seen and heard while in the castle last night. I browsed her last entry.

“The Mount’s dungeons. Alex is here. A priest. Two young women, one blonde, the other has raven hair. I recognize the blonde woman from Stonehenge. They’re staring at something moving in the shadows, a naked man is doubled over. Now standing. Jadeon. No. . . Orpheus’s features, as though. . .”

With my head resting against the cold brick, I braved the nightmarish memories teeming in, frantically crawling around my brain, insistent on devouring my last bit of sanity. Ghosts raging within, a constant flow of experiences I’d not earned or lived through. Jaw gaping, I tried to fathom what I’d done.

Stonehenge’s monumental pillars looming large in their magnificence, this sacred circle where the Stone Masters’ rituals had taken place; the bloodiest of ceremonies. The fierce sunrise. . .

A fight to the death.

My death.