“Who are you talking about?” I gripped his arm.
“I saw him kiss her at the resistance camp. When she was on her own, I asked her what was going on,” he explained in a dreamy, far-off manner. “I couldn’t believe my eyes. Why would she be kissing him? She swore me to secrecy and said that I wasn’t to say anything.”
“Who kissed her?” I demanded.
“So I didn’t say anything,” Isidor sighed, turning to look at me for the first time. “I kept my promise to her and now I wish I hadn’t. You were right, Kiera, I saw them talking together beneath that willow tree.”
I wanted to scream at him, “Stop rambling – just tell me! Who was it you saw with Kayla?” but I had waited this long for him to start talking, so I didn’t want to interrupt him for fear that he might clam up again, so I let him continue.
“The night Kayla was murdered,” Isidor continued. “They had been together. As I laid her in her grave, I could smell him on her. I don’t know if he was the one who killed her, but they had definitely been together.”
Almost on the verge of screaming at him, I took a deep breath and said, “Isidor, who is he?”
With a look of sadness, Isidor said, “I’m so sorry, Kiera, I wish I didn’t have to be the one to tell you this as I know it’s going to break your heart, but I think Elias Munn is -”
Before he could finish, there was a swishing sound like a blade being cut through the air. And then Isidor was clutching at his throat.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Isidor’s eyes spun in their sockets as he grappled at the wooden stake which was now protruding from his neck, just above his Adam’s Apple. Blood pumped from between his fingers and ran from the corners of his mouth in thick, black lumps.
“Isidor!” I screamed as he wobbled before me.
Taking him in my arms, I cradled him against me. I looked around frantically to see if there was anything close at hand I could use to stem the flow of blood from his throat.
“Help me!” I screeched. “Somebody help me!” And it was then that I saw it: Isidor’s crossbow propped against the wall in the gap we had slipped through earlier. Someone had shot Isidor with his own crossbow.
Isidor shook violently in my arms as if he were having a fit and his eyelids flickered. “Don’t you dare die on me, Isidor!” I roared at him “Don’t you dare! Do you hear me?”
Opening his eyes, he peered at me and made a gargling noise in the back of his throat. A black bubble of blood formed between his lips, then burst, showering me in a fine spray of blood. Knowing I was losing him and still desperate for answers, I lowered my face next to his and said, “Isidor, who did you see with Kayla? Who was it that betrayed her?”
His eyes flickered again, then closed. Shaking him by the shoulders and with tears rolling down my cheeks, I cried out loud, “Who did this to you?”
With his eyes still closed, Isidor took one blood-stained hand from his throat and gently ran it down the length of my face, taking my tears with it. Then, his hand flopped away and he fell still in my arms.
“No!” I screamed until my throat felt raw.
With my arms around him, I pulled him close, and all I could do was cry. I felt as if my heart had been crushed inside of me. “Isidor, wake up! Please,” I begged him. “I can’t lose you and Kayla! I can’t!”
I looked down into his face and could see those black flames tattooed up his neck now smeared crimson. His little tuft of beard jutted out and his eyebrow piercing gleamed green in the light of the roots that hung down from above us.
“Isidor,” I sniffed. “Please don’t leave me – please!”
But there was only silence apart from the drip-drip sound of the roots behind me. For how long I sat there and cradled him, I didn’t know. It was probably only minutes or perhaps just seconds before the others came running.
Coanda was first through the gap and onto the ledge, Luke at his heels.
“What’s gone on here?” Coanda asked, but I was too numb to say anything.
Luke rushed over and gently took Isidor from me. I was reluctant to let him go at first, but Luke prised him from me. I watched as he laid Isidor out upon the floor and pulled the stake from the puncture wound in his neck. He then laid his head against Isidor’s chest as if checking for a heartbeat. Slowly, Luke raised his head and looked at me.
“What happened?” he asked, sounding breathless. “Who did this?”
“You tell me,” I spat, and Luke recoiled as if my voice was full of venom. “One of you is a fucking killer and I want to know who!”
“Kiera, what are you talking about?” Luke asked, his eyes wide as he stared at me.
“Can’t you see what’s happening here?” I hissed, getting to my feet. “First Kayla, now Isidor - we’re being picked off one by one! There’s a freaking murderer amongst us and it isn’t me!”
“Kiera,” Coanda started, coming towards me. “What happened?”“What do you think happened? Are you fucking blind?” I barked in sheer disbelief at him. “Somebody shot Isidor with his own crossbow!”
“But why would anyone want to do that?” he asked, glancing down at Isidor’s corpse then back at me. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Isidor thought he knew who had murdered Kayla,” I started, looking at both Luke and Coanda. “Apparently, whoever killed her had become close to her in the last few days of her life.”
“But who was it?” Luke demanded.
“You tell me, Luke,” I said staring into his eyes. “It could’ve been you who killed her.”
“It could’ve been - but it wasn’t…” he said flatly.
“And what about you, fly-boy?” I snarled turning on Coanda.
“What’s that s’pose to mean?” he shouted.
“We don’t know you - apart from the wild stories you tell about yourself, none us really know you. It was you who led us out here. It was your idea to come to the Light House. And why didn’t you really want me to tell anyone? Huh? Was it so you could murder us one by one and no one would ever know? You could be Elias Munn!”
“And what about you?” Coanda said. “We only have your word that Kayla died the way you said she did. It was only you who examined her body. That could’ve all been some elaborate show just to hide your own tracks.”
“Oh my god!” I gasped. “That’s ridiculous‘!”
“Is it?” Coanda went on and even Luke was now eyeing me with a look of distrust. Or was that just my own paranoia kicking in? “It’s you standing there with Isidor’s blood on your face and hands. The crossbow is just over there in that gap, within easy reach I’d say. We only have your word that he told you this stuff about Kayla. For all we know, he could have been accusing you of being the one who killed Kayla and you silenced him before he could tell anyone else.”
I stood and stared back at Coanda and Luke and both stared back at me. “Do you really believe that’s what happened?” I breathed. “Do you really believe I could kill Kayla and Isidor? I loved them like a brother and a sister. Do you really believe this, Luke?”
He was quiet for a moment as if contemplating his answer. Eventually he said, “I don’t know what to think anymore, Kiera. Everything seems to have changed.”
“But you can trust me,” I said, searching his eyes.
“Like I trusted you with my best friend, Potter,” he reminded me. “I honestly didn’t think you were capable of doing something like that to me.”
“Luke, you make it sound as if we were engaged to be married or something,” I gasped. “We were good friends, that was all.”
“I thought we were more than friends,” he said. “I thought we had something special. You didn’t turn me down when we were together in that underground lake.”
“Okay, so I fell in love with Potter, your best friend, but that doesn’t make me a murderer,” I insisted.
“But it’s okay for you to point the finger of blame at us?” Coanda asked. “And as far as I can see, neither of us have done thing to raise anyone’s suspicion; yet you are happy to point the finger of blame at one of us. I thought you could see things, Kiera Hudson. Why can’t you see who this Elias Munn is?”
“I don’t know,” I said, trying to mask my own frustration.
“Maybe he has already blinded you?” Coanda said.
“How?”
“With his love,” Luke said, and I detected a note of sadness in his voice.
“You’re talking about Potter again, aren’t you?” I asked.
“Well where is he?” Luke asked. “No one has seen him since Kayla’s dead body showed up. Now Isidor is dead and there’s still no sign of him.”
“Have you seen him since he disappeared?” Coanda pushed.
“No,” I whispered.
“Is that a lie?” Coanda came at me again, and I felt as if I was being interrogated.
“No,” I said again without looking at either of them. But of course it was a lie. I had seen Potter and he had told me he was going into hiding and that he would follow us from a safe distance. But where was he now?
Coanda came towards me, and leaning in close he said, “If I were you, Kiera, I’d take a very long look at your lover, Potter before you go pointing the finger at me again.” Then turning, he growled at Luke, “Help me lay this boy to rest.”
I watched them silently carry Isidor from the cave. Taking his crossbow, I cradled it against my chest and began to cry.
I leant against the wall and slid to the floor where I rolled onto my side and closed my eyes. Taking my iPod from my pocket, I switched it on and began to listen to Wherever You Will Go by Charlene Soraia. I couldn’t help but think of Potter and that cigarette end I had found by the weeping willow. Had he put it there? He knew me well enough by now to know how I worked – how I could see things. Had my love for him blinded me just like Coanda thought? I hated thinking like this about Potter but so many roads Elias Munn had laid led to him. Would he have murdered Kayla? But then I remembered how he had suddenly been so protective of her when I’d explained Coanda’s plan to him. Why? The message my father had left for me in that book: ‘One may smile, and smile, and be a villain!’ Half-smiling to myself through my tears, I wondered if that single passage didn’t actually take Potter off the suspect list. After all, he didn’t smile that often as he always seemed so cranky and pissed off.