Oubliette (Cloud Prophet Trilogy) (15 page)

I am not trying to scare you. I am only trying to convince you that, yes, you are the Prophet. My successor. My descendent. You are of my line. Your mother’s side, not your father’s side. If I could kill that bastard for what he will do, what he did, to your mother, I would. But by then I will be gone and you will be the product of his greed.

I saw you first about a year ago. You appeared to me and I assumed you were another product of my gift, just another slave girl going about her boring duties. My gift began to spiral out of control as I aged. Unable to control it, I saw anything and everything the moment clouds came into my view. It drove me mad, until you began appearing with regularity and I learned that you were not of my time, but you were my destiny.

One day I had a vision in which you spoke to your friend Ella and she recounted the history and the legend, the prophecy I was to make. It was then I realized that our fates were entwined. Your story could save mine. Our stories together could bring us both the respect and glory we deserved.

You see, everyone knows I have gone mad. I know it and I know they whisper about me. I hide in my home. I’ve boarded the windows and I only come out on bright, moonlit nights. Yes, I could come out in the daytime but then they look at me and point. My gift, once so useful, once so sought after, has deteriorated into a joke. Even the children laugh at me when I pass by. I can no longer bear it, which is why I’ve created this home, this room you now sit in.

No one can bother me here. No one can find me here. It is my sanctuary. My oubliette.

I looked around the room, but the portal I’d come through was gone. There was no thread, nothing to get me out of here. I couldn’t create a portal myself. The blood in my veins pumped harder every second as I began to panic. I could do nothing but read on.

I saw you, Reychel. I know what you stand for. You believe in truth and love. Even though your childhood was spent in slavery somehow you grew up without hatred in your heart. You also grew up rarely using your gift.

When I knew those things about you, I felt my heart begin to harden. Yes, harden. I began to hate you Reychel. My gift had driven me mad and yours wasn’t hurting you. No, you were coasting through life without facing the torments of our gift, this rare and wondrous gift that Eloh granted to us.

I grew to hate you, Reychel. I hated everything about you. Whenever your face popped into my head I would scream and thrash at my eyes. I wanted them to be gone. So I withdrew further into my home and into this oubliette. It was the only place I could get away from the clouds, away from you.

Shuddering, I rubbed my hands over my arms, trying to calm the feeling of ice passing over my skin.

It occurred to me that your future was intertwined with my life. Everything I did now would affect your future. I had seen it, Reychel. Your friend Ella said so. I was part of the legend as are, were, damn this time paradox is driving me insane, you. I determined your fate. How do you like that? It was your face that tormented me and I had been given the chance to torment your future. I could lay it all out for you so you would have no chance to fight it.

I saw your strengths and your weaknesses. I know you delight in truth and love. You hate violence, don’t you Reychel? You hate it so much and you would do anything to avoid it, wouldn’t you? Today I am taking that choice away from you. I am going to put you in the position to make a decision that I know will drive you mad. But decide you must, Reychel.

Does it make you angry that I have determined your fate? That I have put you in a position to make a decision that will be thrust upon you, no matter how much you resist? It may have already happened. Are they asking you Reychel? Are they asking you to stand up and declare a vision that shows the Serenians are victorious over the Malborn? Have they?

They’ve asked you because I told them to. I made the first prophecy. The prophecy that made me a hero and made people forget my madness. The prophecy that elevated me nearly to the status of Eloh. The prophecy that will follow you for the rest of your life. That is, if you want your people to be free.

I know you have never received a solid vision concerning the freedom of our people. I have seen your visions with you. They haunt my dreams. I have gone hungry for days because I could not leave the house for fear of seeing you again. I loathe you and I want you to loathe me.

My hands shook as they rested on the bottom of the pages. I’d been set up. He knew what my life would be like. He gave a prophecy that gave hope to generations of Serenians only to pay me back for haunting his visions. None of this was my fault and now his plan had come to a head.

An army waited outside the town. Serenians wanted their savior, their prophet, to lead them to freedom. They believed in me. They trusted in me. And it’s a lie. All of it a lie to pay me back for something I hadn’t even done.

His visions must have been very detailed for him to know me so well. I’d been struggling the last two weeks. Caught between being truthful and giving my people hope. The vision I’d had right before coming here had shown a victory, but the details were blurry. I had no guarantees they would succeed, even if I gave them a false vision. I could tell them that they would succeed to bolster their confidence. Would it be enough? But if it wasn’t, I will have lied to my people and sent many of them to their deaths.

Tears fell from my eyes. I pounded the table with my fist, spilling the bowl of sand. The ink bottle fell over and ink bled on the table next to the book. But he wasn’t done, no there was more to be read.

You ruined my life. You sent me into madness. Are you feeling even a fraction of what I’m feeling, Reychel? Will you tell the truth and send your people into despair? A feeling they may never recover from and hand victory for once and for all to the Malborn? Or will you lie? Send them into battle not knowing whether they will succeed or fail? Sentence them to death? What will you choose Reychel? Everyone believes it is your destiny to save them. Will you be the one to tell them none of it is true?

I grabbed the book and tried pulling it off the table but it wouldn’t budge. I grasped at the pages, pulling desperately to tear them out of the book. They also wouldn’t move. The enchantments he’d placed on them held them tight to their place. I couldn’t take the book as proof. I couldn’t tell anyone what he’d done. No one would believe me.

I screamed, scratching at my scalp. Falling to the floor, I realized the despair of the situation. What would I do? What could I do?

I’d bring Mark back. I could bring Nemison. I could bring them all. I knew which portal took me here, I could easily do it again. But I had to find a way out first.

Racing to the bookshelf, I pulled out every book looking for one that might hold a clue to my escape. But the titles were in another language, written in Zelor’s scrawling script, mocking me at every angle. He’d trapped me here and he knew it. He would have known I couldn’t open portals and he’d left me here to face my doom.

I sank into the chair and flipped through the pages again. There had to be something here, something that would tell me how to escape from this prison he’d created for me. I came to the last page and reread his final words. They held no clues.

I grasped the cover and lifted it up to shut the book, but a strong hand reached out and slammed it back down. I lifted up my eyes and in front of me shimmered a man, a tall, gaunt man with long black hair with a quill in his other hand. I let go of the book as it rotated around so that I was reading it upside down and he began to write.

The pen shimmered, as much a vision as he was, but the ink was as real as the chair I sat on.

I told you time passed differently here. Do not think you will be left here for dead. I could leave you here until everyone forgets about you, but that would be too kind.

He paused and smiled, his teeth reminding me of the foreboding stalactites that led me here.

You will go back to your friends and you will fail.

He laid the quill on the book and turned around. Flicking his fingers towards the wall, he opened a portal. I didn’t waste one moment as I launched myself from the chair and jumped through. I landed on my feet, but my knees buckled and I rolled to the ground. Pebbles clawed at my scalp and my palms. I grasped the air, desperate to pull a string, but the portal closed behind me.

I stood up and smiled because I knew he’d made one mistake, a mistake that would help me lead everyone back here to see his treachery. As I turned around to face the seven portals in the cave, looking for the one that had led me to the oubliette.

But I didn’t see it. There were only six portals, with a gaping hole where the fifth portal had stood. It was gone and so was the only proof I had.

I fell to the floor and wept.

Chapter Twenty

After I had wrung every drop of emotion from my body, I unfolded myself from the fetal position on the floor. A baptism. A rebirth. I placed my hands on the rocky ground, but I didn’t feel the pebbles digging into my hands, drawing tiny drops of blood as I forced myself to stand. I didn’t brush the tiny bits of rock and dirt off of my dress.

The blood burned in my arms, it pumped hard through my veins like a volcano about to explode. My eyes seared like a dry desert under a hot sun. The Prophet, that madman who had set seven generations of chaos into motion, was responsible for this path I had taken. His lie, his utter falsehood, doomed me to make a decision I wasn’t prepared or equipped to make on my own, but his cleverness kept me from proving the truth to anyone.

Krissin wouldn’t believe me. She’d assume I was making another excuse and she’d insist I lie anyway. Zelor would get his way, no matter what I did.

My nails dug into my palms, only aggravating the cuts that were already there. I didn’t care. I reached up for the portal thread I’d left earlier. I stepped through into my room, only to see Krissin sitting on my bed.

She stared at me and Eloh only knew what I looked like.

“Reychel,” she gasped, running over to me, “your dress is torn and filthy. Where were you? Are you okay?”

She ran her hands over me, straightening out the dress, pressing out the wrinkles and pushing pebbles to the ground. They littered the floor with rocks and dirt, reminding me of the cave I had just returned from.

I pushed her hands away and strode over to the window. When twilight greeted me, I stepped back. How long had I been gone?

“Reychel?” she asked. I heard her, but chose not to answer. I wasn’t ready. I didn’t know what to say. It was almost sunset. The prophet had been right, time didn’t move the same in his oubliette. I thought I’d been there for only an hour reading his sick confessions, struggling to find a way out, but it had taken me most of the day.

I felt her hand on my shoulder. Why did this have to be the first time she’d chosen to be kind to me? I wasn’t ready to accept her kindness or the role of Prophet. I didn’t know what to do.

The sun sat behind the mountain, the same mountain that concealed the Sons. Tomorrow they would emerge at Krissin’s bidding. I had one day to decide what to do and how to do it. Everyone’s fate rested in my hands.

“Fine,” Krissin humphed. “If you aren’t going to talk to me then I’m leaving. We were supposed to talk this morning, to plan our course, but you’ve been off doing Eloh knows what. Rolling around on the ground or whatever…”

I turned around to face her and held my hands up. The blood was still fresh, still welling up on my palms.

“Reychel!” Krissin gasped and grabbed my hands. She pulled me over to the table with the pitcher of water, positioned my hands above the wash bucket and poured the water over my hands. Using her soft fingers, she worked on the wounds gently, setting the tiny pebbles free. Then she tore a piece of the shift from under her dress and wrapped it gingerly around my hands.

“I know we haven’t been friends,” she said. “I know we haven’t really gotten along and I suppose some of it is my fault.”I grunted and frowned. “Okay, okay, most of it is my fault. But we need to work together. I don’t know who to trust and neither do you. Without my father here I feel so lost. I’m not sure how to proceed.”

I looked deep into Krissin’s eyes, seeing the spark that shone inside. She was gifted like me, and her gift had been a curse too. It was the prophet’s gift that had gotten him in trouble, driven him mad. Would this gift do the same to me? I shuddered.

“Reychel?” Krissin asked again. I could tell she was worried. Her eyes softened, the glare she so often reserved for me was gone.

“Is there a way to destroy my gift?” I whispered.

“What?” she asked. “Did you just ask if you could destroy your gift?” Krissin laughed, throwing her head back and her golden curls fell down her back in ripples. “You must be just as mad as the last prophet.”

My eyes met hers and for a moment, I knew she was afraid of me. I drew back my arm and I slapped her, leaving a red mark in the shape of my hand on her cheek. My hand stung, the wounds recoiling from the violent smack.

Krissin’s hand flew to her face, covering the spot I’d hit. Her eyes narrowed as she reached out and grabbed my wig, pulled it off my head, and it flew to the floor. Once again our eyes met. Hers widened as she looked from my head to the wig. She gasped and then giggled. Krissin clutched her stomach, without pausing to breathe, and knelt to the ground.

Now I wondered who was mad.

“I’d forgotten that this wasn’t your real hair,” she said between gasps. “I was going to pull you to the ground and beat you senseless for slapping me and all I defeated was your wig.”