Raven’s Edge

Chapter 3

“Nina? Where are—”

But the words died on her lips.

At first she frowned, not understanding what it was she was looking at, for the door was being propped open by what looked to be Nina’s foot. She paused, confused, but a moment later, she reached the threshold and pushed the door open the rest of the way.

Blood. Blood was everywhere. On the floor, on the chair, and all over Nina’s white shirt. Further back in the house, Ezra lay motionless.

Rainn might’ve screamed, might’ve called for help, but she found she couldn’t move at all; only her eyes darted back and forth, taking in the scene. Then, as her gaze shifted to Nina, she realized her eyes were still open. At first, she’d thought she was dead, but now…

“Oh, my God, Nina!” Rainn dropped to the floor, her knees hitting the wood hard. Somewhere in the back of her mind she registered pain, but for the second time that day she felt as if everything she was experiencing somehow removed her from reality. The pain within her started at her knees, then moved quickly to her chest, though she barely felt any of it. It was as muffled as Gideon’s speech had been.

Was this really happening?

It was then that Nina’s eyes moved and locked with Rainn’s.

Rainn couldn’t think, and as if watching from outside her own body, she saw herself climbing over to the old woman and putting her hands on her bloodied chest.

“What happened?” she asked, unable to think clearly.

Nina opened her mouth, but no words came from her. Instead, a thin, red bubble of blood burst from her lips. Her gaze suddenly became urgent. She mouthed something, some word that Rainn couldn’t understand.

“Who did this? Nina, answer me.”

But it was clear she was unable to speak. She lifted one hand, drawing in the air as if it were a sheet of paper.

Rain couldn't read the word she drew. She looked over at the wood chair that sat before the tiny table where they ate their meals. Upon it was one of only three books the little family owned. Books were heavy, and they were low on the priority list for most. She jumped to her feet, not feeling anything now but panic. She grabbed the book and ran back over to Nina’s side.

Again, Nina moved her finger, and Rainn understood; she needed something to write with.

Rainn took in the cottage, but she knew quite well that no pencil or pen took up residence there. Then, a realization dawned upon her, and she understood just how desperate the situation was.

“You’ll have to write with blood,” she said quietly.

Nina seemed to understand, lifted up her hand and swirled her fingers in the pool of blood that was on her chest. Then, she lifted it into the air and toward the book.

Rainn realized her left arm had been cut so deeply the wound reached all the way to the bone. For a moment, she thought she would be sick. Death was hard enough to stomach without horrors such as these.

But Nina gripped her arm with her one good hand, staring pointedly into her eyes. She held out her finger toward the book.

Rainn suddenly understood and placed it before her.

“Write it,” she encouraged.

Nina’s finger finally met the paper, and for a moment, she simply smeared it with the blood. Then, with release of two blood bubbles from her mouth this time, she began to write.

S

E

B

With each successive letter, her eyelids began to droop until her hand fell, and her head shifted to one side.

With horror, Rainn finally understood: Nina was dying, and time was running out.

“Keep going,” she said, but Nina’s eyes stayed closed this time. Rainn lifted her hand, limp now, and placed it upon her chest, swirling her fingers in the blood once more, then lifting her wrist back toward the pages.

But Nina didn’t move; her hand didn’t move, her eyelids didn’t flutter, and the only motion that seemed possible was the blowing of sickening blood bubbles. Finally, the bursting of them stopped, and her chest became motionless.

“No, Nina,” Rainn said quietly.

She placed her hands upon Nina’s chest once more, determined to stop the blood flow, determined to bring her back to life. Silent tears snaked down her dirty cheeks, leaving marks of clean skin beneath the sweat and mud.

Suddenly, she heard a cracking twig outside. She jumped to her feet and grabbed for the gun, holding it out in front of her, ready to fight.

But nobody came. No one was there.

She dropped the gun and began to shout. “Nina! Somebody! Help me!”

She looked down at her blood-covered hands, and reality seemed to dawn upon her. Desperate to wipe it away, to pretend this wasn’t happening, she wiped her hands on her pants, not thinking.

She looked up and remembered Ezra was lying nearby. Barely able to understand, she got down on all fours and crawled over to him. But what she found there was even more alarming; his throat had been slit, and the pool of deep red blood lay beneath his head, darkening his white hair.

Part of Rainn knew she was too late, and yet she gripped him by the shoulders and shook him, screaming.

Finally, reality crashed down upon her. She sat back, looked down at her hands, and then out the door.

Where was everybody?

She stood, her knees cracking, her neck hurting, and walked back to Nina, looking for the book. It lay upon Nina’s stomach where it had come to rest, the two pages written upon stuck together, drying fast. Rainn reached for it, then sat back down and carefully pulled the two pages apart.

S-E-B

What did it mean?

Her stomach sank, and this time, she was sick. She began to crawl, but she wasn’t fast enough; she threw up all over the floor, the sick mixing with the blood there. She gagged and spit out a mouthful of bile. She remained there on all fours, waiting for it to stop. She sat back on her heels, wiping the tears away with the back of one hand. But this time, her body was wracked with sobs; and she found that once she started to cry in earnest, it was impossible to stop.

Who had done this? Why would anyone—?

Suddenly, the memory of Gideon’s face popped into her head, and for a moment, she believed that maybe he had infiltrated the village, maybe he had killed them as revenge for her actions that day.

That’s ridiculous.

There was no way he could’ve made it back before she did, and how would he even know which house to go to? Even then, did the kid have two brutal murders in him? It seemed highly unlikely, and yet she considered it. What other answers were there?

None. Nina and Ezra had been celebrated for their care of Rainn over the years, the village leader Enzo bequeathing extra food upon them to ensure she grew up strong and willing to help the village.

Who, then?

She stood up and moved quickly to the door, suddenly thinking the killer could still be close by. Nina had still been alive, and surely that meant that the attack had only ended minutes before Rainn’s arrival.

She stepped out upon the porch, then carefully made her way down the two stairs and into the dirt. Slowly, she spun around, searching for him, for this unnamed foe, whoever he was.

“I’ll kill you,” she said under her breath. Then, louder “I’ll kill you!” she shouted. “You will be unrecognizable when they find your body! I will cut you to pieces and sell you back to whichever village you belong to!”

The wood was darkening, the sun already set. Tendrils of smoke rose into the air, a beacon to let the village know the time for dinner had come. They would be walking down there now, all of them, even the elders. She looked down at herself, at her bloody handprints on her pants, at the dried blood creasing the lines on her hands. She was just about to start running down to the others, just about to raise the alarm as loudly as she could the closer that she got, when she remembered: the book was still in the house, its information easy for anyone to read.

Maybe not decipher, though.

The thought of walking back into that place, but the thought of being alone with the dead bodies of her protectors terrified her. She’d never seen anyone die before, not even when an elder had taken his last breath before the adults in the village; she’d been too young then. And this, this was impossible, unthinkable, terrifying.

But the book is inside.

Did it matter?

She took a deep breath, and she found that it did. Carefully, she stepped back to the doorway, looking at the darkening interior as if waiting for one of the bodies to come to life again.

But nobody moved. Nobody breathed.

She stepped over the threshold, only two steps inside until she reached the book. Now, the pages were stuck to each other in earnest, and despite her efforts to detach them, she found the pages ripped. She glanced toward the hearth where the dying vestiges of a fire burned. Then, she did the only thing she felt she could do in that moment and ripped out the two stuck pages, crumpling them in her palm. She tossed them onto the fire, grabbed a poking stick, and jostled the wood until the flames came to life and consumed the pages, consumed the proof, for Rainn understood now. For whatever reason, that information needed to stay a secret. It was written for her and no one else, even if she didn’t know what it meant.

Once burned, the pages would never be readable again. She quietly closed the book and wiped the blood from its cover. She stood up straight and placed it neatly upon the shallow mantle, as if someone had put it there without thinking, without caring, and certainly without knowing the secrets that had once been written within.

Then, she turned away, stepping carefully over the bodies of her protectors. As soon as she was clear of Nina’s motionless feet, she burst through the door, jumped from the porch, and ran.

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Thank you for reading! Stay tuned for the official launch of

Raven’s Edge next Friday, May 30!