Emily stiffened under my hand, but I held her there, my lips moving swiftly, my voice all but silent.
“Your mother hid your mark. You were born with the symbol, I can feel it on your skin. The tattoo is only a cover. Brianna’s are as well. She put them on the inside of her wrists so they would find them. So they would stop looking before they came to you. There’s a curve beneath the symbol of the serpent that spirals up and right. She traced the ink to the left and down. It’s a small change, but that’s all she needed. She marked you as merely Brianna’s blood, but she knew they’d find her first. She knew Brianna would be their target.”
The hands Emily had braced against my arms curled tighter as we stayed there. When I’d said all I could say, my head fell forward, resting an inch above her shoulder. Not touching, not now.
Everything had changed. In one instant, the constant we’d lived with our entire lives was gone, swept from beneath us in a heartbeat. It was Emily.Emily.
A long moment passed before I noticed her mouth moving silently beside me. I’d been lost in my own revelations, been shifting my own realities. I carefully eased my head back to see her, and caught the forms of several ancient words. Another prophecy.
She was repeating back her mother’s teachings, aligning them to her situation. Finding her truth.
Her lips stilled and she looked at me. But she didn’t see me. Her green eyes were hollow, a vacant stare from someone lost and mislead.
“I need to see Brianna,” she whispered, her voice hoarse.
I nodded, helped her to her feet. There was nothing I could say. Nothing to be done. This was a blow that could not be softened. This one shouldn’t be eased.