The Myths of Ophelia (The Curse of Ophelia #4)

Chapter 25

Chapter Twenty-Five

Malakai

“I’m sure it’s usually beautiful here,” Mila whispered as we crept around the back of Titus’s manor. “But tonight, this place is unsettling.”

“Maybe it’s the fact that we know he’s keeping our friend hostage inside,” I said dryly.

Mila shuddered, shuffling closer in the shadows of a crooked cypher tree leaning against the side of the manor. “Probably.”

“Mila,” I said, turning so I blocked her from the grounds beyond. “Are you sure you’re okay doing this?”

When Cypherion and Ophelia told me what role I’d be playing tonight, I didn’t even consider disagreeing. Also didn’t consider who I wanted to accompany me when they said it was best if I only took one person.

“Of course, I am,” Mila answered too quickly, blinking those crystal eyes up at me as she fidgeted with her wrist cuffs.

I nodded, taking a step closer. “What’s happening to Vale isn’t happening to you, Mila. We’re going to get her back, and neither of you are ever going to be imprisoned again.”

Mila sighed, dropping her hands. “I don’t want to go back there, but the thoughts keep pressing in.”

Grabbing her hand, I brushed my thumb across the top of her ivy-carved cuff. A weight seemed to rise off her with the gentle touch. “I made you a promise during the war that we were going to survive. Together.”

Her swallow was audible. “Being here is…hard.” A slight laugh. “Maybe that’s not the right word. I keep seeing flashes of my own imprisonment, but this is a very different type of cage.” Mila looked at the high walls of Titus’s manor. “No one deserves to live in a cage, regardless of the metal the bars are forged from.”

The light pouring from windows three stories up peeked between the cypher branches, highlighting the walls of her fortress, and solidifying as her gaze snapped back to mine. Not keeping me out. Never keeping me out anymore. But a barrier for the rest of the world.

“Even though I’m scared, I’ll do this.” A waver of uncertainty went through her words, though.

“When you were in that place, you said all you could do was look up, right? At the world waiting for you. And make yourself a promise that you’d get back there.” She nodded, and I jerked my chin to the wide sky sweeping over the sleeping jungle. “Then keep looking up, Mila, and remember the promises you made to yourself to live freely. Always remember to look up.”

“Look up,” she repeated. And the steel fire of her heart glinted in those words.

It was an inferno that ravaged my soul—one that Mila captured with her very being. Repeating that gentle drag of my thumb across her wrist cuff, I took in her expression. The way the moonlight sloped across her nose and rounded her jaw. The way it somehow both softened her features and highlighted the sharp points.

I made sure her eyes were clear, then I leaned forward, attention on her lips. She inhaled right as I met her and pressed against me, hands sliding up to lock around my neck.

For a moment, I let what we were about to do fade. Let the branches of the cypher trees mask us from the world, and I kissed the woman who consumed me.

I’d once kept so many words bottled up. I’d let all the things I wanted to say to the last woman I loved bury themselves in the depths of my shredded soul. Never again.

“You’re so strong, Mila,” I said as I pulled back, lifting her wrist. “Every damn day, it’s admirable.” I pressed one more kiss to the thin barrier of metal hiding her scars from the world.

“You can show me how much when we’re done here,” she said, assuming a low confidence that had my cock stirring. If she gave me the chance, I’d leave no doubt in her mind about how much I admired every inch of her.

“Motivation,” I said, casting a look over my shoulder. “I like it. For now, let’s get in and out of here unnoticed.”

“That’ll be my job, Warrior Prince.” She smirked up at me, the mischievous glint I’d missed back in her eye. “I’m much stealthier than you.”

“Lead the way, General.” I flattened my back against the wall, letting her creep past and step carefully over the bright flowers and garden decor.

Titus was certainly a creature who adored opulence. I didn’t understand it, but it was one word I could use to describe this entire estate. From the distant iron gate where Harlen told us to leave our horses to the abundant groves of a variety of fruit trees, he spared no expense.

“Watch your footing,” I whispered, nodding ahead.

Mila followed my gaze to where a small snake slithered through the stalks and wrapped up a cypher. “I hate snakes.”

“We’ll be inside soon,” I assured her.

Mila nodded but kept an eye on that creature winding its way up the trunk and into the branches. And I kept an eye on the clenching of her hands, the flinches toward the swords across her back.

A few feet ahead, a window large enough for Mila to slip through had been propped open. Harlen had laid out the plan perfectly, though my skin prickled with each step.

“Be careful,” I whispered as she sank into the dark cellar. A stupid warning. Of course she would be careful.

But her answering smile was grateful, moonlight filtering through the dense branches to halo her expression. “Always.” And she faded into the shadows.

I waited impatiently, fingers tapping a silent beat against my palms until she unlocked the door into the ground level for me to join her. We shut it behind us in case someone came down here, and tension wormed through me at the click of the lock.

It was long, quiet minutes of creeping up staircases, wending around corners, and ducking behind the ostentatious drapery. Endless listening for footsteps or voices, though we found none.

Thick gray rugs lined the halls, so at least that was a blessing of the Angels. Neither our steps nor small noises carried as they would on the bare ivory marble beneath.

If only the curtains had been pulled across the windows. But as we ducked under the tall frames so as not to be seen by any outer patrols, the grounds stretched beyond. Harlen swore there wouldn’t be too many guards, but Titus had doubled his routine system of sentinels since Vale returned. Including a team of escorts at her chamber.

Those would be our biggest threat. One we were approaching quickly. My hand drifted to my sword across my back.

I nudged Mila as we turned down another hallway. We didn’t need to communicate out loud given how we’d drilled the layout of the manor into our heads today. I knew every turn she was about to take and that Vale’s corridor was the next over.

I tapped my nose. Smell anything?

Mila sniffed. Shook her head, brows furrowing.

Harlen had said he would set up the incense hours before we arrived. Some slow burning oil combination barely detectable until it was too late, imbued with a powder that would knock out the Starsearcher guards.

Why anyone would sell such a thing, I didn’t know. But it would work in our favor tonight.

That is, assuming Harlen was able to light it properly. But given that the subtle lavender scent supposed to lull the guards outside Vale’s door into a heady session was undetectable in the hall, my chest tightened.

I raised my brows at Mila, a silent, Your call, General .

She peered around the corner. Held up three fingers.

Three guards.

Mila turned back to me, and I caught her stare.

I tried to communicate to her that there was no way in Damien’s sorry existence I was leaving this manor without Vale—not with Cypherion’s voice in the back of my mind telling me how much he trusted me—but if Mila didn’t like the odds, I understood. She’d suffered enough for unjust causes.

But she nodded at me with wrath in her eyes. And silently, she pulled a knife from each thigh.

With the light prowl of a jungle cat, she danced around the corner, long braid whipping in her wake, and let both blades fly.

I had barely stepped into the hall when I heard the unmistakable squelches of knives sinking into throats. The thuds of the bodies falling.

And the shout of the one guard left standing.

Mila charged, ducking his sword and swiveling behind his back, meeting his blow with a solid strike. With his attention on her, I charged.

Another guard shot from the perpendicular hallway, intercepting me before I could reach Mila. He launched a series of triple-bladed Starsearcher daggers at me, like stars hurtling through the sky.

I ducked the first two, the third slicing along the skin of my neck. It sheared off a small section of hair with it, and I growled at the guard.

Pressing my hand to the wound, I dodged another dagger. Over my opponent’s shoulder, Mila unsheathed her second sword and crossed them to meet a vicious strike aimed for her head.

She stumbled back a step, but the guard pressed forward. He slammed his sword on her wrist as she twirled around him, and he knocked one of her short swords to the ground.

Shock widened Mila’s eyes. Shock—and fear . Something she never allowed to slip into her fights.

I saw red at it.

With a grunt, I blocked my guard’s final dagger and slammed my shoulder into his gut, sending him toppling into a marble statue. His head cracked back with a nasty crunch.

Unremorseful, I charged toward the Starsearcher now towering over Mila.

And I didn’t think as I sheathed my sword in his back. As the blade poked up through his chest, dripping with thick crimson.

I shoved the guard off it and wiped the blade on his tunic, trying to stop my own damn hands from shaking. I couldn’t lose myself again. But Mila?—

Only once I mastered my breathing and knew my panic was tamped down did I look at her. And I saw past the hardened stare, the nod she gave me in thanks. Pulling her to me, I pressed my lips to hers and indulged the desperation that had become a live and pulsing thing within me.

“You’re okay?” I muttered against her mouth, one hand cupping her face.

She nodded, the fear evaporating from her eyes, but a question resting there. “You?”

“Yeah,” I assured her. Since you are . Stroking a thumb across her cheek, I added hurriedly, “Let’s get going before more guards show up.”

We didn’t waste time hiding the bodies. They’d know we were here when Vale was gone.

I jammed my heavy boot against the handle, the lock splintering and doors flying wide.

Mila and I barreled into a suite bedecked in as grand decor as the rest of the manor. With a lavish bed staring at a row of windows exposed to the night sky, rich rugs and large mirrors adorning the space.

But—

“Where is she?” Mila panted, racing around the room and into the depths of the bathing chamber while I checked the balcony, but the doors didn’t open.

“She’s not here,” I said. “Harlen said she’d be here. She’s here every night as soon as dinner ends, which was two hours ago now.”

Vale’s routine was clockwork. A repetitive pattern meant to lull her into mundane compliance and appease her magic.

“Do you think Titus demanded an emergency reading?”

My mind whirled. Did we go through the rest of the manor or retreat? I couldn’t face Cypherion if I chose the latter. Couldn’t return without answers and his girl safely in tow.

“I don’t know.” I gripped the hilt of my sword and stepped toward the door. “But we have to find?—”

A sharp, icy tip pressed into the skin of my neck, and a gravelly voice threatened, “Not another step.”