Read Prophecy (Residue Series #4) Online
Authors: Laury Falter
I agreed. “Incredibly accurate. I could see in those passages what almost all of the defected Vires told us about the records – the ones they stole thinking they were the originals. Giorgia, Maleko, Kalisha, even Braith, who we never could find again after we brought him back to the village. His part was clear, too. It must have been the one that identified each of us.”
“Or a version of that record,” Eran suggested, which I nodded to in agreement, now that we knew there were adaptations.
“But there
was
one part omitted,” I mentioned.
Jocelyn nodded, having picked up on it, too. “It doesn’t say anything about the Relicuum taking the Nobilis’ life.”
“That must have been in Isadora’s record,” I thought out loud.
“Right, the bogus future they recorded for The Sevens,” Jocelyn surmised. “Why would they add that in?” she asked with a perplexed shrug.
I knew immediately, because I would have taken the same tack. “Protection. It was an attempt to convince The Sevens we weren’t dangerous or important enough to harm. They just didn’t have any idea how much The Sevens would fear us.”
“And work to erase the sources of that fear,” Eran added.
We processed this information for a few quiet seconds. Then I asked, “Is that it? Is there anything else?”
Maggie was still reviewing the pages of papyrus, flipping them cautiously to the side to ensure she hadn’t missed anything. Then her hands stopped and she dipped closer to them, squinting.
“There is one last part here,” she remarked. “It’s written in the bottom corner of the last record.” She laughed to herself, in reflection. “And I think you’ll agree with it.”
As she translated it, two things happened. I realized that she was correct. I did agree with it, having lived the words personally. And then nostalgia washed over me while I thought of the two women, Miss Mabelle and Miss Celia, who collaborated from the very beginning to make sure our true futures were followed and who seemed to hold a special appreciation for the phrase themselves.
“Things,” Maggie read. “They aren’t always what they seem.”
EPILOGUE
15th Century
France
The Ministry
T
HE ROOM WAS SMALL,
with just enough floor space for a bed made of stuffed burlap sacks, a single chair, and a table large enough to fit it. The door was made of heavy wood with a lock that rivaled the sizes of its more traditional counterparts. The walls, floor, and ceiling were made of rock, sharp-edged so that you wouldn’t consider leaning against it even if you were weary. There were no windows. Two torches on opposite sides of the room offered the only light. They cast shadows across the walls, eerie motions that brought on nightmares for any occupant.
The sole inhabitant of this room was small enough that if you looked directly inside at eye-level you would miss her altogether. Her height, having been a childhood challenge, convinced her to develop other strengths, alternate skill sets that might serve her well throughout the rest of her life. This path led to convincing her sisters, five more with the same potent gift that all had been granted at birth, to develop theirs. From then on, they spent long hours in a circle, testing, measuring, training each other. And over time, their notoriety for channeling the future grew larger and expanded to the far reaches of the world.
It wasn’t long before seven individuals came for them. They had their futures foretold and in them there was darkness. The woman and her sisters refused to finish and the individuals left. And when they did, the sisters left with them, taken from their homes in a single night. But their horrors had just begun. Separated into rooms deep underground, they carried on for the benefit of their sisters who lived on the opposite side of their walls. They did as they were told by the seven individuals for the sake of their sisters. And what they were told was to record the detailed future of each one of the seven who had taken them.
They worked long, hard, sleepless hours, forgoing food at times, ignoring their illnesses, the inflammation in their fingers, the gradual tears in their only set of clothes, and the exhaustion of their minds. So when the seven individuals arrived for their monthly update, as the records were nearing completion, the woman struggled between elation for her sisters’ freedom and fear of repercussion for the future the seven faced.
At exactly the same time as all the years prior, her cell door opened and the seven who had taken her and her sisters so long ago filed in. The sight of them had become a part of the constant routine of life now and their entrance stirred nothing other than the fabric of their clothes. She did notice that their moldavite stones were impeccably polished today, and determined this was likely due to the significance of this particular visit.
They each positioned their gaze at the table where several pieces of papyrus and an ink bottle lay.
“I understand you are the last to complete the record,” said the one whose traditional dress included leather straps for holding up his clothes. Suspenders, as he had referred to them once.
“I be very close now,” the woman asserted.
Another one of them stepped forward, toward the woman, the gold-trimmed robe he wore skirting the ground. “Tell me when,” he demanded.
Calmly, she replied, “Nightfall.”
That seemed to appease him and his associates.
“Yu’d be releasin’ my sista’s then, as agreed on?”
The woman stared back, waiting for an answer.
One man stepped forward to place a hand on her shoulder. “As agreed on, Wilda.”
But his words did not correlate with the images rushing through her mind. These were the man’s thoughts, and they were strong enough that she had inadvertently detected them.
And they caused her to shudder.
He leaned his head toward her in mock sympathy. “Are you all right, Wilda?” His voice was now coaxing, reassuring.
She brought her hands up to rub her arms. “Cool down hea,” she responded. “Would like ta see the sun again.”
“Of course you would,” he said with a smile. “In due time.”
She nodded, managed a smile, and watched as he turned to leave the room.
“Nightfall,” he repeated in warning.
But when the door closed, Wilda did not return to the table. Instead, she pulled a long piece of string from her dress, recovered the needle she had used to mend tears throughout the years, and quickly began sewing the papyrus on the inside of her skirt. Her fingers moved swiftly and her eyes repeatedly peered at the door, while the images of what she had seen in the man’s thoughts haunted her. They were visions, expectations of what was to come, and they drifted through his mind tinged with a dark sense of excitement. As much as she tried, Wilda could not shake the images of her sisters’ doing the same as she was now, or of their bodies strewn on the street corners, or of the mobilization of an army designed to dominate the world.
When she finished, and several pieces of blank papyrus still lay on the table, she sat and conjured an entirely new fate of those who would soon be called The Sevens.
They would not know that she had deceived them. They would not prevent the two young lovers from setting their fate in motion. They would not take control over humanity. No, they would not learn their true fate until it was too late.
She set down her ink writing instrument just before the door opened again. And as it did, she waited patiently for them to enter and take possession of the records, a knowing, wicked smile rising slowly to her lips.
THE END
About the author
Laury Falter is the author of the bestselling Guardian Trilogy and other young adult paranormal romance and urban fantasy novels.
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