Chapter 164 — The Gig Is Up

Chapter 164: Chapter 164 — The Gig Is Up

~ Raven ~

Isolde’s eyes widened.

Raven almost laughed.

It lasted no more than a second before Isolde pulled herself back together, but Raven had already seen it.

Her words had landed exactly where she wanted them to, and judging by the way Isolde was staring at her now, Raven had finally managed to surprise a woman who normally looked as though the world had never once caught her unprepared.

Raven let the silence stretch, then allowed the smile she had been holding back to come properly.

Isolde’s expression settled into the cool composure Raven knew far better, though something sharper remained in her eyes now.

"That," she said at last, "is quite an accusation."

Raven’s smile widened. "Your face was more convincing before you fixed it."

"My face?"

"Yes. Your face."

Isolde studied her for a moment before giving a quiet laugh and folding her arms.

"You seem very pleased with yourself."

Raven was. She had been waiting far too long for this conversation to feel embarrassed about enjoying it now. "Honestly, I expected you to be better at hiding the surprise."

"Perhaps I was surprised that you managed to arrive at something so ridiculous."

Raven’s smile thinned slightly. "Ridiculous?"

"Extremely."

Isolde said it with such effortless certainty that, if Raven had not seen that first reaction for herself, she might actually have believed her.

Isolde stepped closer, her expression shifting into something almost curious. "Tell me something, Raven. How certain are you that you haven’t simply convinced yourself you’ve solved something because you wanted an answer badly enough?"

That landed harder than Raven expected, but she refused to let it show.

"You’ve been a pain in my ass practically since I arrived at Valerius," she said instead.

One of Isolde’s eyebrows rose. "Have I?"

"The assessment. The cafeteria. The twins. Dante. Cassian. The Hunt." The examples came back to Raven one after another, and her irritation returned with them.

"Every time something humiliating happens to me, somehow the entire academy hears about it before I’ve even had time to decide how angry I am."

Still, Isolde gave her nothing. No flicker of recognition, no hesitation, not even the smallest sign that Raven was getting close to something she wanted hidden.

That was impressive.

Raven stepped closer. "You really didn’t think I’d figure it out eventually?"

Isolde merely watched her.

Raven held her gaze for another second, then decided she was done letting her pretend.

"Isolde Marchmont," she said, her smile returning, "or should I say Bellringer?"

This time she let herself enjoy the words.

"The gig is up."

For a moment, Isolde simply stared at her. Then her brows drew together, slowly enough that Raven could almost watch the disbelief settle in.

"Bellringer."

"That’s what I said."

Isolde looked at her as though Raven had just presented the most ridiculous conclusion imaginable. "What in the hell even makes you think I’m Bellringer?"

Raven’s smile remained in place, though she found herself watching Isolde more carefully now.

There was no panic in her reaction, no hesitation or nervous glance toward the door. If anything, she looked genuinely baffled by the accusation.

"I have my reasons."

"I would dearly love to hear them."

"You will."

"When?"

"When you stop pretending."

A quiet laugh escaped Isolde as she shook her head. "Raven, Bellringer is a man."

"People are wrong all the time."

"About one person? Certainly. About something half the academy has accepted for years?"

Raven shrugged. "Wouldn’t be the first stupid thing half this academy believed."

That earned the faintest twitch at the corner of Isolde’s mouth, but she recovered almost immediately.

"You really have convinced yourself of this."

"I didn’t convince myself of anything."

"No?" Isolde stepped a little closer, studying her with open curiosity now. "Because from where I’m standing, you’ve taken someone you already dislike, decided you finally found the answer you wanted and skipped over the small problem that nothing about your conclusion makes sense."

"When you say it like that—"

"It sounds insane?"

"I was going to say slightly less convincing."

"Generous."

Raven almost smiled, but Isolde was making this considerably harder than she had expected.

There was no nervousness beneath the denial that Raven could see, no hesitation while she searched for the safest answer or even the smallest glance toward the door.

Isolde looked exactly like a woman trying to understand how Raven had managed to arrive at something completely ridiculous.

And unfortunately, Raven knew better than most people that feeling certain about something did not mean nearly as much as it used to.

The Dreamwalker had already proved that.

He had already made her believe she was awake when she wasn’t, wearing familiar faces and building an entire lie around her before she realised she was still trapped inside her own mind. After that, Raven had learned not to trust certainty quite as easily as she once had.

She remembered his words clearly enough, but what if she had misunderstood them? Worse, what if she had simply taken one clue and convinced herself it meant more than it did?

She kept every bit of that off her face.

"I’m right."

Isolde studied her for a moment. "That sounded considerably less convincing."

"It wasn’t."

"Of course."

Then she stepped toward Raven.

Raven stayed where she was as Isolde closed the distance between them, her expression becoming unreadable again. By the time she stopped, she was close enough that Raven could make out the fine stitching along the edge of her collar.

Raven held her ground, suddenly wondering whether Isolde was about to admit it or try one last ridiculous bluff.

Isolde leaned slightly closer.

"Boo."

Raven jumped backward.

"Fuck!"

Isolde’s composure finally slipped.

A laugh escaped before she could stop it, bright and completely unlike the restrained amusement Raven was used to seeing from her. She turned her face away as though that might help, but by then her shoulders were already shaking.

Raven stared at her.

"You fucking—"

That only made it worse.

"You should have seen your face."

Raven glared at her while Isolde tried and failed to get herself under control, the laughter still pulling at her expression no matter how composed she attempted to look.

And that was what finally killed the doubt.

Slowly, Raven pointed at her.

"You bitch."

Isolde finally managed to look back at her, still smiling.

Raven’s eyes narrowed. "I fucking knew it."

For a moment she simply stood there, staring at her.

Everything Bellringer had done since Raven arrived at Valerius came back at once.

Her assessment. The cafeteria. The Blackthorn twins. Dante. Cassian. The Hunt. The polls. Every humiliating recording that somehow reached half the academy before Raven herself had even decided whether she wanted to remember what happened.

All of it had been this woman.

Raven also remembered several promises she had made about what she would do when she finally found Bellringer. Most involved violence.

Something in her expression must have changed because Isolde’s amusement sharpened.

Raven stared at her, irritation catching up with the relief.

"You really enjoyed making my life miserable, didn’t you?"

Isolde’s smile widened. "A little."

"I hate you, Isolde."

"That seems fair."

Isolde leaned back against the edge of the training table, looking entirely too comfortable with the fact that Raven had spent weeks imagining her as some irritating man she might eventually strangle.

The strangest part was that now Raven had seen this side of her, the difference did not feel as complete as it should have.

The public Isolde was still there. The composure had not disappeared, nor had the careful intelligence behind her eyes. This was simply something underneath it, something Raven had never been allowed to see before.

More irreverent and troublesome.

And suddenly a great deal about Bellringer made sense.

"Why?" Raven asked. "Why have you spent half my time at this academy making my life miserable?"

Isolde considered the question. "I wouldn’t say half."

"That’s your objection?"

"A great deal has happened to you without my involvement. I would hate to take credit unfairly."

Raven closed her eyes for a moment.

Of course.

Of fucking course this was Bellringer.

When she opened her eyes again, Isolde was still smiling, though the laughter had mostly faded.

"So," she said, "what gave me away?"

Raven’s irritation eased as caution slipped back in. She could answer that question, just not honestly.

"The voice."

Isolde stared at her for a moment. "The voice."

"Obviously altered," Raven said, keeping her expression perfectly straight. "Nobody actually sounds like that."

The look Isolde gave her made it clear she was not buying a word of it.

"The same voice that has fooled the entire academy for years?"

"Which says more about the academy than it does about me."

Isolde studied her for another second before a knowing smile returned.

"You are completely full of shit."

Raven shrugged. "Doesn’t make me wrong."

Isolde laughed under her breath and tilted her head slightly.

Only then did Raven notice the faint marking near the side of Isolde’s neck. It was so pale she had mistaken it for a shadow beneath her collar, but as she watched, thin lines began to brighten against Isolde’s skin.

Before Raven could get a proper look, Isolde turned toward her and spoke.

"Good evening, Valerius."

Raven jerked back.

The voice was perfect. Male, light and painfully familiar.

"Oh, fuck that."

Isolde’s eyes brightened immediately. "Now, ordinarily—"

"Stop."

"—I would begin tonight’s broadcast—"

"Isolde."

"—with something slightly less personal, but Raven Rivers has once again—"

"That is fucking ...creepy."

The sigil faded, taking Bellringer’s voice with it, and Isolde looked entirely too pleased with Raven’s reaction.

Raven stared at the spot on her neck where the markings had disappeared. So that was how she had done it all this time.

"That is disturbing."

"Thank you."

"It wasn’t a compliment."

Isolde accepted it with a smile before folding her arms. "Now tell me what actually gave me away."

Raven looked back at her. "I already told you. The voice."

Isolde studied her for a moment before the corner of her mouth curved.

"You are really full of shit, you know that right?"

Raven shrugged. "Doesn’t make me wrong."

"No, but you didn’t identify me from the voice."

There was no question in it this time.

Raven let the amusement fade from her face. "No."

Isolde’s expression changed with hers. The playfulness did not disappear entirely, but her attention sharpened as she waited for the real answer.

Raven let her wait another moment.

"Stillheart."

For the first time since admitting the truth, Isolde’s smile faded completely. Her brows drew together, not with alarm or defensiveness, but genuine confusion.

"What does Stillheart have to do with Bellringer?"

Raven studied her face, waiting for some sign that the question was another performance, but none came.

Isolde genuinely did not understand.

Which meant she did not know about the Dreamwalker.

Isolde watched her for another moment before pushing away from the table. "You came looking for me for more than Bellringer."

Raven said nothing.

Apparently, that was answer enough.

The humor had drained out of the conversation now, leaving Raven with the question she had actually wanted answered from the beginning.

She held Isolde’s gaze.

"How much do you know about Dreamwalkers?"