Wicked Rebellion (Darkwater Reformatory Book 3) Read online

  “Sure,” Brodin said, his gaze meeting mine. “Sound good to you?”

  I nodded and we started in the opposite direction of Rohnan and Jacey.

  Overgrown shrubs lined the side of the path between us and the Reformatory, blocking most of the first-floor windows. As our footsteps crunched on the path, the woods to our right hummed. Insects chirped and birds shrieked, and I didn’t hear anything of concern, but I couldn’t shrug off the feeling something or someone watched us. Bixby?

  “I hope Kai is okay,” I said in a low voice. It felt wrong—and scary—to speak loud enough to draw attention. “I’m worried about him. He disappeared, but Bixby’s magic hit him.”

  “I’m worried too. He was hit hard.”

  “I have to trust he’s okay, that he found help once he disappeared,” I said, squinting at the dark stones making up the path, as if it had been constructed with crushed obsidian.

  “Have you tried calling him?”

  “Not yet.” I’d been afraid. What if he didn’t answer?

  We rounded the corner, keeping the vine-covered Reformatory constructed of pale gray stone to our left. Another long stretch of building awaited us, with the path meandering along the side like in the front. I spied nothing but woods to our right, with one trail feeding into it in the center.

  I wasn’t sure what I expected to find here, but this wasn’t it. In some ways, the Reformatory reminded me of an academy I’d attended before transferring to Crystal Wing Academy, only older and more rundown.

  “I don’t like that we’re not seeing anyone,” I whispered.

  “Same.” He cast me a grim look. “I thought…Well, I’m not one-hundred-percent sure what I thought we’d find, but I guess a school. Maybe an assassin school.”

  “You thought we’d be trained to be assassins?”

  “It made sense. Why else release criminals from what’s supposed to be a lifelong incarceration unless you can manipulate them into doing something in exchange?”

  “I thought we’d be reformed. Somehow.” Stupid belief on my part. Why hadn’t I asked around more about the Reformatory when I was living at the prison?

  Maybe because I was afraid they’d kill me or refuse to answer.

  “Reform. You mean you thought we’d be taught how to handle our magic in a good way?” He scowled. “Don’t expect that from Bixby or Duvoe.”

  “True.” We came to the end of this side of the building and turned left, taking the path weaving along the back, passing a second trail leaving the main route, and entering the woods. At this rate, we’d meet up with Rohnan and Jacey soon, and we could go inside and explore the interior of the Reformatory. I also suspected we’d find nothing more than we had outside already. Woods, the main path and the trails leaving it, and the building to our left.

  There had to be something here, something that could help us. I wouldn’t give up until I found it.

  Our feet crunched on the path as we strode forward.

  “From the little I know about blood bonds,” Brodin said. “And from what I know of my father, which is enough to make me want to throw up, I bet he gave you a timeframe for killing me when he hauled you back to see him.”

  I couldn’t speak and I couldn’t nod. Frustration burned through me like a white-hot flame. I wanted to shout out the conditions and what Ramseff would do if I didn’t comply, but I couldn’t. A bond like this could not be spoken of.

  “Good assumption on my part,” he said, watching my face. He brought me to a standstill and turned me to face him, taking my hands in his. “Let’s see if we can reveal a few more details.”

  “You know that’s not possible.”

  “I bet,” he bit down on his lower lip, hard. “Let me ask questions and you answer what you can, okay?”

  My nod came out jerky. I hated this. Hated what I was being asked to do. And I hated myself for agreeing in the first place.

  “Do you have years to kill me?” he asked.

  “No.” My answer slipped out easily because I wasn’t revealing details that were locked down by magic.

  “Days?”

  My body stiffened, and my lips clamped tight.

  “Ah, so days,” he said, still watching me closely. “One day?”

  “No.”

  He grinned. Actually grinned. How could he laugh when this was complete torture for me? But I got it. He was gaining important information that could make a difference. “Two days?”

  “No.”

  “See?” His fingers squeezed mine. “We’re getting somewhere.”

  “Yes.” It felt wonderful to see this unfolding. Maybe we could do something about it together because I was useless handling it on my own.

  “Three days?”

  “No.”

  “Four?”

  “Also, no.”

  “Five?”

  My body stilled. I swore the air around me stopped moving with me.

  “Huh,” he said. “Six?”

  “No.”

  “So, five. Five days.”

  I said nothing and could not move even if I tried.

  “That’s not long to figure this out,” he said.

  My head shake confirmed his statement. “I feel terrible.”

  “It’s not you. You were manipulated.” He tugged me into his arms, his warmth spreading through my frozen body. “We’ll figure this out. Promise.”

  I wished I could believe him. I wanted to trust this would turn out right, but the Master Seeker was cleverer than me. He twisted this into a knot I couldn’t unravel.

  “Do the five days start tomorrow?”

  I couldn’t blink.

  “Sorry, let me rephrase that,” he said. “I assume the clock starts ticking today, a day that is already half over.” His arms tightened around me. “Four days left.”

  It wasn’t enough.

  Backing away from me, he stared toward the forest and tapped his chin. “I wonder if the days are linked to tasks.”

  “That would fit with Darkwater, wouldn’t it?”

  “Yeah.”

  We started walking again and Brodin kept hold of my hand.

  “I bet the tests will take place in the woods,” he said.

  What a treat. “Maybe. Or inside.”

  He nodded, his gaze falling from mine. “I’m sorry you got roped into this.”

  “It’s not your fault. I wanted to be here.” After all that had happened, it was hard to remember why. I mean, I knew. When I was a baby, my birth father stood at my bedside and drained the core essence of my power from me. This was the part of me that would make me shine when I used magic. My mom never knew why he took it. He loved me, she said. He’d never given any indication he’d cause me harm.

  The last was hard to believe after what he did.

  He ran and no one knew where he’d gone. No one remembered his existence except me and my immediate family. In my need to take that part of myself back, I’d sought my father, finding a half-sister I loved along the way. Fleur. The person the Master Seeker would kill if I didn’t carry out his command to murder Brodin.

  There was a way out that would save both him and Fleur. I needed to find it.

  I made the blood bond with the Master Seeker, not Brodin. I was the one who promised to do whatever he asked to learn the whereabouts of my father. I’d gotten that information, but it came with a bitter price.

  Posing as me, someone had murdered Brodin’s mother. I’d been convicted of the charge and sent to Darkwater Island, a forbidding spit of land essentially lost in a sea filled with monsters who would strip the meat from my bones before chomping through them as well.

  Trapped, we’d taken the Reformatory Challenge, believing passing the catacomb tests would allow us to eventually be free.

  My father was supposed to be here at the Reformatory, but I was beginning to believe everything I’d been told was a lie.

  I stumbled along beside Brodin, lost in the past, until he grunted. My gaze followed his.

  Fog c
loaked the area ahead of us, thicker than mud.

  I tightened my fingers around Brodin’s.

  “Turn back?” he asked.

  “Walking into that would be crazy.” It was so dense; it blocked the sun. Tendrils floated off the main mass, reaching toward us.

  We backed up before stopping.

  Like a curtain, the fog lifted, dissipating into the sky. The path winding across the back of the Reformatory had disappeared, replaced with a trail weaving into the woods. It crossed a bridge over a bubbling brook and, as if straight out of a fairytale, a small castle waited on a hill beyond, nestled in a hillside of rolling grass.

  “Weird,” Brodin said.

  “It’s magic.”

  “Ominous magic.”

  “Agreed.” My lips thinned. “Do we follow the path or turn and run in the other direction?”

  “No idea,” he said. “I’d say you choose, but I don’t want to put that burden on you.”

  “I hate castles after that test in the catacombs.”

  The castle lured us in and locked us inside, then drugged us into compliance with an amber liquid. We remained there in a daze, slowly forgetting who we were, while Akimi completed puzzles containing pictures of us. If she’d been allowed to complete the last one, we would’ve been locked inside the castle forever. Or eaten by the giant beast looming outside.

  I’d snatched up and eaten the final puzzle piece, setting us free to continue on to the next part of the Challenge.

  “There’s no reason we need to eat or drink, assuming we actually go to the castle,” he said.

  “Sounds like you think we should take the path and see where it leads us.”

  “Any better idea?”

  My shoulders slumped. “Go back inside and start climbing stairs.”

  “When what we seek could be out here.”

  “Are we seeking something?”

  “You’re the Seeker. You tell me.”

  “No clue.” I lifted my hands, showing him the tenna bracelets restricting my magic. “And wearing these, I’m no Seeker.”

  “You’ll always be a Seeker. And you won’t always wear tennas.”

  “That fog could be a reveal.”

  “Maybe,” he said. “Or it’s a lure into yet another trap.”

  I took a step forward and peered back at him still standing in place. “What do I have to lose?” My life was no longer my own. I either killed Brodin, the guy I cared about more than any other, or the Master Seeker would murder my sister. I’d loved my little sister from the moment I knew she existed. We grew close when I attended Crystal Wing Academy. How could I let anything happen to her? But I also…okay, I kind of loved Brodin, too.

  There had to be a way out of this.

  “Let’s see where this takes us,” I said, starting toward the cute little wooden bridge that could’ve been featured on my mom’s calendars. It appeared whimsical. Storybook worthy.

  Magical like everything else in this damn place.

  Time was ticking. The next four days would fly by, and I had nothing to show for the time I lost today.

  “This could be a first test,” I said.

  “Or it could be a trap.”

  “Our options are limited. We can go to the castle and see if it reveals anything or turn around and look for Jacey and Rohnan, but then we won’t know what we’re missing here. The fog came up then dispersed, leaving this path to follow.”

  “We’ve taken one path after another since we were dumped on Darkwater Island.”

  I lifted his hand and squeezed it. “Together. We’ve taken each path together.”

  “You’re right.” His easy grin slipped over me like a cardigan on a chilly winter’s day. It felt right. True. “Together.”

  We walked onto the new path that was more a pine needle-strewn trail meandering through the woods leading to the narrow wooden footbridge arching up over the river. As we approached the bridge, the gurgle of the water below tinkled through the air.

  “It’s—”

  “Like a melody I’ve heard before but somehow forgotten,” he said, cutting in to speak my thoughts.

  We strode up and paused in the middle to stare at the colorful fish darting about below the water’s surface. Dragonflies flitted here and there, scooping smaller bugs out of the air. None came near, and I didn’t sense anything different about them, not that my feelings meant much in a magical world.

  We walked down the other side, our footsteps dull thumps on the wooden surface, until we reached the trail again.

  “Castle,” I said, nudging my head in that direction.

  “Answers, right?”

  I huffed out a breath. “I hope so.”

  As we approached the castle, the trees along the sides of the trail clustered closer, their upper branches lowered as if in protection. Or they planned to attack. Nothing on this island could be trusted. Cool air drifted from the forest, and despite the humidity lingering in the day, I shivered. My skin lifted goosebumps, and I swallowed deeply against the lump of dread clogging my throat.

  “Should we turn back?” I whispered.

  “Your decision. I’m with you no matter what.”

  I should trust my judgment, not lean on Brodin, but was it wrong to be glad he was here facing this with me?

  Our feet touched the white stone walkway leading to the front of the small ivory stone castle. We paused on stone steps to stare at the two turrets and the walled walkway between them spanning the front of the building.

  A quaint, purple-painted door seemed to shimmer. A click and it swung open.

  With shuffling steps, an older man appeared in the doorway. His chin lifted, and his hand rose to beckon.

  “Welcome, niece,” he said. “Would you like to come inside and learn how to escape Darkwater Island?”

  Chapter Four

  This man was my father’s twin brother, my Uncle Blaine?

  His clothing hung on his gaunt frame, a patched shirt and pants that looked as if they should be thrown in the rag bin. His lanky gray hair needed to be cut, unless he liked it drooping around his shoulders.

  Stooped in the doorway, he clutched the frame with arthritic fingers, his piercing blue eyes studying us both. With his hunched shoulders and too-thin body, he appeared pitiful, something I would’ve never expected. A band of sympathy tightened around my chest. My grandfather told me my father, Bastian, was the sun to his brother’s moon. That Bastian was the good son while Blaine…

  How could anyone call this the evil twin? He might’ve been a nasty person when he was younger, but this old, worn-out person couldn’t cause much harm to someone now.

  “Don’t stand there,” he said, crooking a knobby finger our way. “Come inside.” His rheumy gaze scanned the woods around us. “You never know what—or who—might be lurking.”

  Though the day was hot, goosebumps lifted across my skin. I scanned the area, but nothing moved in the woods. Sunlight flickered on leaves rippling in the wind and a few insects buzzed.

  Brodin’s fingers tightened around mine, and he leaned in close to speak near my ear, his voice dropping to almost nothing. “What do you want to do? We can return to the Reformatory or go inside.”

  I lifted my hand to block my mouth from Blaine’s intent gaze tracking my every movement. “I need to know what this means.” And I wanted to talk to him. Would he have information?

  “I understand. Your father.”

  “And him.” My gaze met Brodin’s. “He’s my uncle. In the past year, I’ve gone from having only my stepdad and mom in my life to meeting and loving my sister and grandfather. And now… Well, he’s family, even if he’s suspicious. My grandfather warned me about him. Does it make sense that I want to pursue this, or am I being stupid?”

  “Curiosity is natural.” Brodin’s gaze chiseled in on the man watching us. “And he might have answers about all this.” He shrugged. “You decide, though. I’m with you wherever you choose to go.”

  My heart flipped like it alway
s did when I interacted with this guy. From the moment I met him, I knew he was special. Almost perfect. Why had he chosen me, a girl who had no future? I wished we were back in our small room in the tower, during one of the catacomb trials. We’d spent the night together and shared… It had been wonderful. A first for both of us. I saw a side of him he shared with no one else. It rounded him out and made me fall for him even more.

  Hell, I was more than half in love with him already.

  “I don’t need statues out front,” Blaine growled. “If you don’t come inside now, I’m shutting the door and then I’ll be done with ya. You can wander around the building and grow roots out back or stumble around in the woods for the rest of your days, for all I care.” With a snarl, he turned and shuffled into the dark interior. “You’ve got one minute to decide.”

  Disappearing into the darkness, he left the door open.

  “I’m going to see this through,” I said, stepping forward.

  “All right.” Brodin kept pace with me up the stone steps and in through the arched entrance.

  I stopped inside, shuffling my feet on the woven mat while taking in the tiny foyer. Hand-hewn boards had been nailed in place underfoot and patched plaster walls were hung with portraits of old people. A door at the opposite side of where we stood opened to a hall that took visitors to a sunny kitchen. Openings on either side led to living and dining rooms.

  Gilt didn’t encrust everything like the castle we’d escaped from in the catacombs. This place wasn’t fancy at all. In many ways, the interior reminded me of my sketar witch grandmother’s small cottage. So why the exterior castle appearance?

  It was rustic but welcoming. Although, a true welcome had yet to be established.

  “I’m in here,” Blaine’s voice called from the room on our left. “Don’t doddle.”

  With a raised-eyebrow glance at each other, Brodin and I strode into a small living room. My shoes sunk into the dark blue, plush carpet. Two of the walls held paned windows, and late-day sunlight leaked through the glass, highlighting dancing dust particles in the air. The lacy curtains sifted and flowed in the light breeze. Paintings of deer leaping through a pasture and horses placidly grazing graced the walls.