Page 116 of Reverie

“Did they bring you to the underground? My father. Did you…” kneel before him before he slit your throat? “There was adark room well underground, beneath the mansion on Isla Cara. There was a raised platform. Were you on it?”

Luna’s skin turns pale and she nods before saying, “Yes, I remember that night. You were there?” Her voice takes a reedy cast, and Misha reaches over to grab her hand.

“After they….”

“Nearly killed me?” Luna offers.

“Yes. After that, you fell to the ground, and there was a distorted voice that spoke. I didn’t recognize the voice then, and thinking about it now, I don’t know who it was.”

I rub my thumb with my index finger.

“I get a feeling that maybe…maybe it was The Architect.”

I remember the strange sense of awe my father had when he addressed the person in the shadows.

“There wasn’t anyone who my father revered. He was friendly with people, but to say he was ever awestruck by someone? I can’t say that I’d seen that from him,” I say.

Amelia sits up straight. “You’re right, Hunter. There wasn’t anyone he cared about like that, but still, what makes you think it was The Architect?”

I don’t know. Not truly.

“It’s just a hunch,” I say.

“I still feel like we’re missing something,” Misha mutters, looking down at his papers. “We’ve gone through Isla Cara over and over. It feels…like an obvious oversight.”

Luna gives a small sigh. “Yes, but Misha,” she says.

But before she can complete her sentence, I interject. “The messages,” I say. All three look at me with confused expressions.

“What do you mean, Hunter?” This comes from Amelia.

Pulling out my cellphone, I scroll through my texts and find the one from all those months ago.

“I took Winter to an appointment and received this cryptic message.” I toss my phone on the table, pushing it toward Luna, who shares the screenshot with Misha and Amelia.

A Scar

A Liar

“Any ideas? We couldn’t trace it from anywhere. Unless it came from you all?” I ask.

Misha and Luna shake their heads, negative.

“It’s an anagram,” Max says, piping up from his spot in the corner where he’s been silently tapping away over the past several hours. I didn’t think he was paying attention at all, but evidently he’s been processing our conversation.

We all turn to him. “Didn’t you look into this before?” I ask him. I’d sent him the message almost immediately after I’d received it.

Max has the grace to look chagrined. With a grimace, he says, “Yeah, I did…but I figured it was Amelia up to her usual stuff.” He shrugs and my eyebrows crease.

“Her usual stuff?” I ask. Misha releases a long sigh that turns into a groan.

“Misha and I had a few…disagreements about how much contact we should have with you. We planned to quietly observe and not interject in your lives until we were sure, but….”

I roll through my memories, searching for all the stand-out instances.

“The bag from the doctor’s office?” I say.

“That was my doing,” Amelia says while Misha grumbles.