Page 159 of Serpent In White

He never allows himself to.

Abdiel finishes his solemn song, but despite the lyrics holding a serious nature, everyone jumps up in applause, shouting and whooping. I clap my hands together as hard as I can, my wives squealing at my sides. And Drake bites his lip, watching Abdiel smile from afar.

Something feels sowrongwith Drake right now. There’s something happening inside him that doesn’t work. And naturally, he’s blocking it all out, covering up his thoughts as he does, not allowing me, or Abdiel, close enough to help.

To tell him we love him. That he’s not the evil he thinks he is.

Instead, he stays keeping us at a distance, keeping me away from him, just as Abdiel is.

I’ve never felt so alone.

“Encore!” The crowd is shouting, and Abdiel laughs with Jordan. The sight of him smiling always gets to me. It eases the pain in my chest.

They whisper to each other, likely deciding on a second song. Jordan strums a chord.

But it’s interrupted by a loud cry. “Stop!”

Everyone looks around, all of our faces mirroring the same confusion.Who said that?

The female voice continues, and as it does, it becomes very clear to me who is disrupting Abdiel’s performance, and our nightly reflection. My jaw clenches.

“Stop the show!” The girl shouts, that inconsiderate little thing jumping up onto the bench where Abdiel and Jordan are seated.

The Regnum’s eyes are set on her, silence in the crowd deafening. I witness my patrolmen rushing over. Drake steps forward, too. But when they look to me, I simply hold up my hand, signaling them to hang back.

Well, let’s hear what she has to say.

This ought to be good.

“Rhiannon, what are you doing?” Abdiel stands, his eyes pleading with her to stop whatever this is.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Abdiel,” she whispers to him, but then stands taller, addressing the crowd, “But the people need to hear this.”

rhiannon

Everyone is staring at me. Gaping,gawking.

I’m not a public speaker by any means, so to have this many eyes on me at the moment is very nerve-racking.

That said, it’s not exactly quiet.

I can heareveryone’sthoughts, so loud it’s like they’re all talking at once. I don’t know how they do this…

Empyrean.The drugs I took… I know Darian uses them. And Drake, and even Abdiel. That’s how they always answer my unspoken thoughts; that’s how they know what I’m thinking.

These drugs… they’re miraculous. Unlike anything I could ever anticipate experiencing. I always thought telekinesis was a myth, exaggerated by phonies just looking to take your money. But if this stuff was created in a lab, by Drake, then I can only imagine what else is possible.

My mind has been opened to so many things in the last couple of hours.

But then, of course, there’s the fact that this cult, which seems to revolve around these drugs, using them to brainwash people into thinking these brothers are somehow special, or godlike, is also covering up murder.

I witnessed Drake kill that man, in the clearing by the peak. I watched him drag the dude up the mountain, shove him to his knees and slit his throat.

It was terrifying in the moment, but even more so were his thoughts.

I heard him… remembering things. About his and Darian’s foster father. About their past.

Drake killed that man, too. When he was only a teenager.