The Reckoning Read online

  “Ready?” Tristan asked, and Beckett nodded.

  They got their backpacks, the tent, and a small bag of equipment out of the back of Beckett’s Jeep, and Tristan led the way through her backyard and into the woods. Their only light was the moon, which totally disappeared in some places particularly dense with foliage.

  “Hang on.” Beckett stopped, and Tristan stopped as well. Moments later, his phone flashlight lit up the immediate woods in front of them, and they resumed walking.

  Tristan supposed the woods, especially on a windy, blustery night such as that one, would be considered creepy to most people, Beckett being one of them. To her, however, the semi-turbulent weather matched her semi-turbulent state of being most days, and Tristan found the big, bright moon nearly as soothing as the daytime’s big, bright sun. Plus, she’d grown up with these woods; she’d explored them inside out and upside down, every trail, every overgrown path, every twist and turn they had to offer in their modest patch of Lavelle. She knew the wildlife, knew the greenery, knew there was nothing threatening lurking in the shadows or behind some of the trees which were as wide as two of her. Tristan could probably walk to the river with her eyes closed by now, not that she’d attempt it. She smiled into the dark as she led the way through the last bit of forest to “her” clearing.

  “Here we are.” Tristan held out her arms, and Beckett looked around, his impressed face illuminated in the moonlight. The river, less than ten feet from where they stood, rushed quietly, and the overgrown grass whispered soothingly in the wind as Beckett let his eyes adjust.

  “Wow. How did you find this place?”

  “I grew up here. Well, you know, with my back to the woods. I used to love, still love, going off by myself to explore, and a few years ago I found this place. I’ve been coming back ever since. There is literally no one here, ever, so when I need to be alone and think, this is where I come.”

  Beckett nodded, and they got to work setting up their tent and the small, portable campfire pit. Beckett had it going within minutes, and they sat down beside it with their s’mores ingredients, grinning at each other.

  As far as Tristan was concerned, that night was one of the best she’d ever had. Between the dance and being alone with Beckett -- totally alone with next to no chance of being interrupted -- under the stars in her favorite place, she couldn’t remember the last time she had felt so happy. Hours later, she drifted off to sleep with Beckett’s bare chest pressed against her back, his warmth radiating through her thin t-shirt, and his arms enveloping her against the February chill that permeated the tent in spite of the small space heater running on high.

  Tristan slept blissfully until the night had begun to give way to the dawn. She wasn’t sure what stirred her out of her slumber, but her pounding heart let her know that whatever it had been, it was terribly out of place in their secluded clearing. Her eyes opened wide and took stock of the tent, which looked just as it had when they’d fallen asleep. Tristan stayed perfectly still, just listening. Beckett was still wrapped around her, sleeping peacefully, and she tuned out the sound of his even breathing. For endless minutes she listened, her ears straining against the deafening silence… Wait, why was it so silent? Why couldn’t she hear the river?

  “Trinity.”

  Her name, a whisper on the morning wind. Tristan’s stomach clenched painfully, her heart still pounding, and her breathing grew panicky.

  “Trinity. Trinity. Trinity.”

  All around the tent now, in different volumes, her name. She couldn’t identify the voice, couldn’t tell if it was male or female, but she felt it rebound in her skull, over and over, a sense of dread unlike she’d ever known settling over her.

  Tristan twisted around and shook Beckett’s shoulder, but he slept on, oblivious. She didn’t know how, but she knew he would not wake up for this no matter how hard she tried to rouse him.

  “Trinity.”

  The voice boomed right outside the tent flap, and Tristan jumped, sitting up. She quickly pulled on her jeans, sweater, and boots, and she scooted to the opening, unzipping it and squinting against the freezing cold and the stark whiteness that awaited her.

  Snow. Everything was covered in a thick blanket of pure white snow, so bright it was nearly blinding. She shielded her eyes, stepping out of the tent, and looked around. There was no one there. She shivered as the wind blew, snowflakes catching in her hair and eyelashes, the tiny particles also seeming to glow against the ombre lavender sky. Where had this weather come from? The forecast had not mentioned a word about snow, which was impossible -- snow was something they never got in Lavelle; it would have been the top story all over the local news stations.

  “Trinity.”

  The voice again, ringing across the clearing from every direction; its reverberation intensified until her very bones felt like they were rattling, and Tristan had to stop herself from covering her ears. It wouldn’t make a difference anyway. To her left, a thick tree branch cracked beneath the foreign weight of the heavy snow, and fell to the ground with a muted thud.

  “What do you want?” Tristan cried out, her voice reedy with terror.

  “You. This is a warning. Relent. Relent in your selfish pursuit. Follow the path your ancestors have laid for you. Follow your bloodline. Relent. Relent, or disobey at your own peril.”

  Tristan’s hands flew to her mouth. She knew the voice now. It was Orion. He had found her, away from her family, powerless. How? Wasn’t he still too weak to travel away from the swamp in which he’d been hiding? More importantly, though, what the hell was she going to do? Tristan looked back at the tent in which Beckett innocently slept, knowing she would protect him no matter what came next, and an incredible anger coursed through her. Who was Orion to follow her here and threaten her? What kind of coward was he, waiting until she was isolated from her family and then swooping in? What right did he have?

  “I won’t.” Tristan spoke loudly and clearly, with bravado she didn’t even remotely feel. “Joining the community is no longer a law. I am free to choose, and you cannot force me onto the path I have always known I will not take.”

  For a few moments, there was silence. Then the woods to her right rustled, and Tristan’s head whipped around as Eva Revet emerged, still in the dress and heels she’d been wearing at the dance. Tristan’s heart dropped through the ground. Eva was smirking, always smirking, and her long, raven hair rippled in the wind as she approached Tristan. She walked right up to her, stopping mere inches from Tristan’s face. Tristan lifted her chin, trying to channel Olivia and her courage, refusing to step back though she wanted nothing more than to somehow wake Beckett so they could run as far away as their feet would carry them.

  “Relent.”

  Orion’s voice boomed out of Eva’s mouth, and she lifted her hand, placing it dead center on Tristan’s chest. Pain detonated in every part of Tristan’s body, and she screamed until she was sure her throat was bleeding.

  “Tristan! Tristan!”

  She was shaking, a voice was yelling beside her ear, and Tristan opened her eyes. She looked around, panicked, and saw Beckett with his hand on her shoulder, his expression mirroring her own. Tristan scrambled past him, fumbling with the tent flap with violently shaking hands until she got it unzipped. She stared outside in horror -- while it was dawn, the sky the same lavender it had been, there was no snow. No Orion. No Eva. Tristan looked down. She was still in her t-shirt and underwear, her clothes still piled where she’d discarded them last night. Her chest was pale and undisturbed, her body felt fine. It had been a nightmare. Just a nightmare. Right?

  “Tristan?” Beckett’s voice was heavy with sleep, full of apprehension. “What the hell?”

  Tristan flopped back into the tent, staring at the ceiling as she struggled to catch her breath.

  “I’m sorry,” she said finally, turning her head to look at Beckett. “I had a nightmare.”

  Beckett laid down beside her, his hand on his chest. He blew out a long breath.
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  “I hoped I would never have to hear you scream like that again.”

  “What?” Tristan asked sharply, and Beckett’s troubled eyes met hers.

  “You were screaming like… like you were being attacked again… and I couldn’t wake you right away. I was shaking you and calling your name for at least two minutes until you came around.”

  Tristan rolled towards him.

  “I’m sorry.”

  Beckett shook his head.

  “Don’t apologize. It was just, uh, quite a way to wake up.”

  Tristan smiled in spite of her still-jangling nerves, and Beckett wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close. He kissed her forehead.

  “Do you want to tell me about it?”

  Tristan shook her head, knowing she couldn’t even if she wanted to.

  “No. It was… dumb. I’d rather just try to forget about it as quickly as possible.”

  She felt Beckett nod as he began running his fingers through her hair, and Tristan drifted off into her own thoughts. Had that really only been a nightmare? She couldn’t remember ever having had one so realistic. She’d been able to feel the brush of the snowflakes on her skin, the cold wind that blew off of the river. Everything had been as vivid as though it’d really happened, but it couldn’t have. How could it have if she was still in the tent, still undressed, and Beckett had confirmed she’d been sleeping?

  Tristan knew it ultimately didn't matter; while her nightmare about her execution had technically only been a nightmare, she was sure that this most recent incident had been a premonition, too. Another warning from Orion. Another confirmation that he was circling above her head, closing in. What did he want with her? Was Eva working for him? Why was it so important to Orion that she, what had he said, follow her bloodline? Was it really just a matter of pride? Was it really just that he didn’t want her to embarrass him by turning her back on the community? He seemed to be making an awful lot of fuss, if that was the case.

  Something told her that was not the case.

  Chapter 29

  Celes had been right that Tristan’s next crash would come in March. Her energy surge came while she was at school on a Friday, in the form of the light above her head in Chemistry class suddenly growing brighter and brighter until the long tube had shattered completely, causing a dull tinkling sound as the glass shards were caught by the plexiglass that housed the lightbulbs, extinguishing the offensive glow. Emmeline had looked at Tristan with trepidation, but Tristan kept her face as interested as her other classmates as she glanced upward, shrugging before she returned to her test.

  Sure enough, her crash followed on Wednesday. She’d told Sol the day before, so Sol didn’t even bother to check on Tristan that morning before she called her out of school for the day. Tristan stayed in bed happily, having forgotten how absolutely exhausting a crash was, snuggling back under the covers and closing her eyes, hoping she’d sleep until Saturday’s gathering.

  An indeterminable amount of time later, Tristan felt her arm being squeezed, vaguely heard her name. She cracked one eye open, her brain immediately protesting the disturbance, and saw Olivia standing beside her bed.

  “Beckett is here,” Olivia said in a low voice. “Downstairs. He was worried when you didn’t come to school or answer his messages all day.”

  “Did you tell him I’m sick?” Tristan asked, her words so heavy with fatigue that she was nearly slurring.

  Olivia nodded.

  “He’s persistent.”

  “Well what am I supposed to do, Oceana?” Tristan asked, with effort, her eyes closing again.

  Olivia sighed. She placed her hand on Tristan’s arm, and Tristan opened her eyes as she felt energy flowing into her. Her brain’s immediate reaction was to shake Olivia off, but the energy flow was like finding water in the desert, so she hesitated for a good thirty seconds or so, basking in the feeling.

  “Stop.” Tristan sat up, finally pulling her arm away. “You don’t have it to spare.”

  Indeed, Olivia looked tired and wan, her crash having been on Monday, but she merely shook her head.

  “I’ll be fine, Trinity. Feel better enough to go downstairs and see Beckett?”

  Tristan swung her heavy legs out of bed and stretched, her shoulders slumping when she finished, resting.

  “Gods, this sucks.”

  “Well this is probably the last time you’ll have to deal with it, if that helps.” Olivia gave her a dejected smile, and Tristan stood, squeezing her hand.

  “I’m just going to use the bathroom and then I’ll come downstairs.”

  Olivia nodded and left the room, and Tristan pulled her hair into a ponytail, grimacing at her deathly pallor. She freshened up in the bathroom as quickly as she could, then made her way downstairs.

  Beckett stood as Tristan crept into the living room, his eyes immediately scanning her face in concern.

  “Hey, beautiful. How are you feeling?”

  Tristan sat on the couch, leaning her head back against the cushions and briefly closing her eyes.

  “I’ll be OK.”

  Beckett sat beside her, giving her a once-over. She was as pale and sickly looking as she’d been back on Halloween, and it suddenly occurred to him that he’d never gotten around to asking her what had really been going on at the time. To be fair, however, things were different between them then -- the odds that she’d actually tell him were not even remotely in his favor. Maybe she’d tell him now.

  “Is this the same thing you were dealing with back on Halloween?” Beckett’s voice was low; though Olivia had disappeared into the depths of the house and Beckett hadn’t seen Evander or their parents at all, he couldn’t be too careful.

  Tristan hesitated, then nodded, her eyes still closed.

  “And is it… Is there something I should know, Tristan?”

  Beckett’s tone had Tristan turning to look at him. His voice had been filled with dread, matching his expression, and his eyes were hooded with worry.

  “It’s nothing chronic or terminal, if that’s what you’re asking,” Tristan said finally, trying to sound as reassuring as possible.

  Beckett blew out a long, relieved breath.

  “That answers that. But also doesn’t really answer a bunch of other things.”

  Tristan nodded. It wasn’t the first time Beckett had attempted to ask her about something he found strange or puzzling, community-related things, and Tristan had side-stepped his question. She couldn’t find a way to explain to him why she and her family really were kind of odd when you spent time with them up close, how they all seemed to know so much with so little conversation passing between them, how Evander was so strong for someone so slight and why Olivia was forever looking at people like she knew what their exact intentions were. She couldn’t answer at all for the obvious calm vibe Sol carried with her from room to room, or the obvious powerful vibe Umbris carried with him. Tristan knew it frustrated Beckett, though he’d always accepted her hedging, and she was always quick to apologize to him and then send up a silent prayer to the universe that he wouldn’t grow tired of her secrecy before June, when she could finally let him in on some things.

  “I know. I’m sorry. The best I can give you right now is that it won’t always be this way.”

  Tristan looked genuinely torn. That cryptic answer also didn’t offer him anything, but Beckett didn’t want to be a jerk and push her to talk about things she clearly wasn’t ready to talk about. He was as curious as anything, but he would have to content himself, for now, with the knowledge that Tristan was not dying. He forced aside a flash of frustration -- these conversations never seemed to be productive or satisfying -- reminding himself that just because they were dating it did not mean he was entitled to her secrets, or really anything about her at all. His biggest fear was pushing her too hard, right out of his life; though they’d only been dating a short time, entertaining the idea of a future without Tristan was no longer an option, whatever it took. The thought, sudden and inte
nse, alarmed him.

  “Are you OK?” Tristan frowned, watching his expression rapidly shift, and Beckett confirmed he was.

  “I’m fine. I’m just glad you’re OK.”

  Tristan continued to look at him, knowing he was lying, but accepted his answer. What else could she do? It would be laughably hypocritical of her to demand he tell her what was on his mind when there was so much she herself was withholding from him. She sighed, her eyes drifting closed once again.

  “I’m sorry I’m rotten company today.”

  “Don’t apologize. I should actually probably get going and let you get back to bed. I just wanted to make sure you were alright.” Beckett took her hand, his thumb stroking over the back, and Tristan gave his a faint squeeze.

  “Thank you for coming to check on me.”

  Tristan stood and Beckett protested, but she waved him off. She walked him slowly to the door, and rested her head against the frame as he stepped out onto the porch.

  “Can I kiss you?” Beckett asked, and Tristan smiled, nodding.

  Beckett kissed her softly, and Tristan cupped his face.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  As usual, Beckett looked like he didn’t want to go, but he reluctantly stepped back, giving her a short wave as he descended the porch steps. He drove home, continuing to muse over Tristan’s mysterious, non-contagious, non-terminal illness, as well as the many other mysteries she presented. Though he reminded himself again that they were still a new couple, the more Beckett thought about it, the more he realized Tristan was almost a total stranger to him. He wouldn’t push her to divulge anything she didn’t want to, but he was going to do some light digging the next time he saw her.

  ***

  Sol administered mini-infusions to both Olivia and Tristan that night, enough so that Olivia’s color returned and Tristan felt wiped out, but not completely useless. She was still as pale as alabaster, but she could deal with that until the gathering.