SAGE

By the way, he had ruined it… I thought, suddenly remembering Adam’s statement. And his provoking question.

He knew I was Maya. Something about a mark… How had he noticed that?

Whatever, he had ruined it.

The thought burned hotter than the magic thrumming beneath my skin.

I had wanted this moment to be mine. I had wanted to peel the truth back slowly, to savor every second of dawning horror on their faces, to choose the exact instant I would say the names that haunted them.

Maya. Dora. Sage. One soul, three lives, an unbroken chain of pain they had forged with their own hands.

And Adam had...