All Chapters of Bound by the Cursed Moon: Chapter 581 - Chapter 590

Point of View: Rhen (Female Lead)"Rhen, my people have kept a locked door for two hundred years. We never once heard a knock. Last night something knocked back, and our bell rang nine times by itself. Please tell me exactly what you tore."I am Rhen, and I wanted to distrust the woman in front of me, but her hands were shaking worse than mine.The Marrow riders had spread along the quarry ledges. There were thirty of them, maybe more. They kept their hoods back and their palms open. Somehow that frightened me more than swords would have."Sit down before you fall," Tobias told Isolde, and pushed a stool toward her with his staff."I have been riding since midnight.""Then you will tell your story sitting."She sat. Her braid was gray at the ends. She stared at the copper case on the ground as if it might bite her."You said you were not the last," Kieran said. "The last what?""The last keepers." She rubbed her eyes. "My people guard a sealed stone in an old hold on Hollin Hill. Seve

Point of View: Rhen (Female Lead)"Rhen, I have farmed this orchard for forty years. I know every root. That hole was dug twice. Once by the boy, and once by somebody with bigger boots, who left before the frost settled. Come and look."I am Rhen, and I did not sleep, because Hesper stood at the door of my tent at midday with mud to her knees."I thought we were done with the orchard," I said."The orchard is never done with you." She dragged me by the sleeve. "Bring the boy."Jory came without being asked. He walked behind us with the blanket still over his shoulders, silent, his eyes on the grass. I had the feeling he already knew what we would find.The apple tree looked smaller in daylight. The hole at its roots was wide and ragged. Hesper's dog sat beside it, tail low, whining."Look." She knelt and pointed. "Here is the boy's mark. Small boots, one heel worn down. See how the earth is scooped with fingers? That is Jory.""Yes," Jory said miserably."And here." She pointed again,

Point of View: Rhen (Female Lead)"Rhen, please do not tell Papa. The lady in the cave sings to me at night. Last night she learned a new word, and it was not my name. It was yours. I am scared, but Papa says brave girls do not complain."I am Rhen, and I knocked on Edric's door with a basket of bread I did not know how to offer.The sundown scene was still in my head. Orne had unrolled the page, and it had lain there blank and perfectly still, like a sheet of new snow. Nobody could say why my stomach hurt looking at it. Tobias had called for a vote, and the village had agreed to wait until dawn. Then the Order rode out to their camp on the north road, and everyone scattered like startled birds.His cottage stood at the lowest edge of the quarry road, so close to the cave that the grass grew thin and strange around it. A lantern burned in the window. Behind the glass, three small shapes sat in a row on the bed.Edric opened the door a crack."I did not send for you.""I know.""I have

Point of View: Rhen (Female Lead)"Rhen, I have read this ledger for fifty years. Tonight I found a note in the margin, written in a hand older than mine. It says: seven hands, seven doors, one table. Do not let them make it one hand."I am Rhen, and when the knock came at Edric's door, I nearly threw a stool.It was soft. Three taps, then a pause. The cave had not stopped singing, and Mira still sat upright in her bed with that terrible clear look. I held her hand. My piece burned in my pocket. The song hovered right outside the window, patient as rain."Do not open it," Edric whispered. He had woken, ashen, and pulled his children behind him."It is a knock," I said. "The cave does not knock.""Rhen. It is the middle of the night.""Then it is someone who cannot sleep either."I opened the door. Wren stood on the step, lantern in one hand, ledger tucked under her arm, spectacles crooked. She looked ten years older than she had that morning."May I come in?" she asked."Wren, what ar

Point of View: Rhen (Female Lead)"Mama, all five pieces are humming the same note. Wren's, Petra's, Alden's, yours and mine. It is a counting song. Somebody is calling the sixth. If we do not answer first, someone else will."I am Rhen, and before dawn we all stood at the mouth of the cave with our hearts in our throats.Briar had come running down the road as the sky went gray. She had pulled Alden's chair behind her, Sable pushing it from the back. Petra followed, wrapped in a heavy shawl, her piece pressed against her chest. Isolde came last, hood up, Harl trailing like a shadow. Edric would not stay in the house. He held Mira's hand and watched us with a hollow, stubborn face."Mama," Briar said again. "Please. Listen."I listened. The humming was faint but undeniable, a low five note song that crept up my arm from the scrap in my pocket. It was not the cave's lullaby. It was something older. It counted. One, two, three, four, five. And then a pause, long and hungry, where the si