Verum (The Nocte Trilogy 2)

He holds my hand as we walk to his car, and I let him.

Because I need his light to live,

Because a monster lives in us all.

That’s what I tell Finn later when I’m alone in my room.

My brother stares at me with imaginary pale blue eyes.

“Maybe,’ he muses. “But that doesn’t take away the fact that Dare was on our mountain that night, Calla.”

“The night you died,” I nod. He looks away and I know he doesn’t like being dead.

“Was he there?” Finn asks, and I can tell from his tone, that he knows. “Or are you confused?”

I sigh, long and loud, because I’m so tired of being the only one hidden from the truth.

“Just tell me,” I demand.

“I can’t.” His answer is simple.

“But you want to.”

“Yes.”

He gets up and paces the room, a slender lion in a cage. “Think, Calla. You know this one.”

I do.

I do know it.

It’s on the tip of my mind, dying to find its way in.

I close my eyes.

I spoke to Dare that night. I can hear his words.

Anxious, afraid.

Concentrating, I see the cliffs, the funeral home, the moon.

I see my brother,

And he’s alive,

Then he’s not.

My mother,

My father,

The flashing lights.

The beach.

And then…

There’s something.