The Scribe

Chapter Twenty-Two

Blackness. Silence.

She heard groans and knew they came from her throat.

Her chest ached. Her ears hurt. Everything hurt.

Someone was carrying her, but it wasn’t him.

“What happened? What happened?”

“Gone,” she whispered when she heard his brother’s voice.

She saw it again. Her mate’s radiant face before it dissolved into gold dust and drifted to the sky. The hollow feeling in her chest rose and enveloped her.

She closed her eyes.

Ava ran through a dark forest, thick with fog. He was there. He had to be.

Where was he?

She tripped over roots in the path and the ground rushed toward her. Black leaves slapped her face.

Darkness.

“Do not fear the darkness.”

She slept.

She was in Cappadocia. She didn’t know how. They put her in a bed that smelled of him, and she slept.

Warm, wrinkled hands forced her up in the bed.

“Drink. You must drink.”

No.

“Please, Ava.”

Small hands led her through the forest. Soft hands clutched her fingers. Childish voices whispered in her mind.

“Come back.”

No.

“We need you to come back.”