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

Chapter 26

Chapter Twenty-Six

Ophelia

Despite the lightness of our footing, our boots echoed against stone so aged, I feared it might crumble beneath our feet. Moss clung to the walls, trapping in that eerie chill and compressing the air. It trailed all the way down the stairs, stretching along the narrow tunnel at the bottom. Even with my heightened vision, I couldn’t see the end of it.

My boots thudded as they met the dirt floor, unnaturally loud. As if some celestial presence wanted to ensure whoever entered the Starsearcher Prime Warrior’s private space was announced.

I kept my hands within easy reach of my weapons as we crept down the tunnel, the walls arching overhead. Mystlight orbs gathered intermittently along the ceiling, glowing as yellow as the fire of the Spirit Volcano.

“Mora?” I whispered. She hummed low in response. “Do you recognize anything from the scrolls?”

Her voice drifted through the tunnel like a wind. “They told of an ancient resting place, as old as Valyrie herself.” Tolek had told me as much. “Where the third of Valyrie’s races was held, and the only one of the locations that still exists.”

The first had taken place in a long-destroyed coliseum, the second in the Angel’s private estate, the location of which was now unknown.

“It did not specify what was faced in this race, though,” Mora added.

Santorina stopped short. “If they didn’t say what the third race was, what did the scrolls say?”

Mora’s answer became a lulling melody in the too-still air as we took careful steps forward, each loud and summoning. “That this is a place where the dead rest, the eternal home of her precious victors.”

Absently, I brushed a hand over the wall, and something behind the stone hammered distantly in response. My second pulse beat faster.

“Valyrie is one of the Angels whose magic had a connection to the gods,” I thought aloud, eyeing Mora and Lancaster. “Through Moirenna and the Fates. Is there anything you can infer based on what you know about them?”

“Every god has sacred grounds spread across Ambrisk,” Lancaster said. “Not unlike these sites you search for your emblems in.”

“Do you know of any of Moirenna that resemble this?” I gestured to the draping curtains of moss and crumbling stone—to the cloying presence of death.

“No,” Lancaster said curtly.

Mora added, “Many of Aoiflyn’s are kept close to her bloodline, locked securely. They are seen by few but are thick with power and abundant blessings.” She spoke wistfully, as if she’d seen them personally.

Rina and I exchanged a look at the vague comment, but we kept walking down the narrow tunnel. The weight of Starfire and Angelborn were steady comforts against my body, especially with the uncertainty of my Angellight.

“This is all a brutal, bloody game worthy of a higher power,” Lancaster muttered.

In the distance, a faint rumbling sound echoed. We froze, and my eyes flashed to the fae.

Breath fogging before me, I whispered, “Let’s not speak ill of them while at their mercy.”

He nodded, eyes icy as he watched the depths of the tunnel.

As we resumed walking, I wrapped my hand around the shard of Angelborn at my neck and summoned what strength I could from the singular emblem.

The metal warmed against my palm, my blood pounding faster through my veins as if to remind me why I was here. That steady pulse matched my steps, beating in my ears. I resisted the urge to summon Angellight to the tips of my fingers, even enough to let it hover there.

The stillness crawled across my skin, each second making me fidget more.

“Mystique,” Lancaster growled, flicking a glance at my necklace. “Why have you not studied your magic better?”

I stiffened, jaw clenching. “I haven’t had the time.”

“That is a poor excuse. You should be experimenting with this light despite the havoc it caused.”

Santorina scoffed, but my heart pattered behind my ribs. An icy chill crept down to my bones. It was that uncanny wind from before. The mystlight flickered with discordant warmth, and a part of me wanted to pull up that Angellight. To feel its safety and comfort, but I couldn’t know how it would react.

The end of the tunnel loomed closer. A darkness so vast and swirling with endless secrets. It pressed in on us. Called to me.

“It’s grown beyond what I’ve wielded before,” I admitted, hating showing the fae that weakness.

“What do you mean?” Lancaster asked. And then, because he likely sensed my growing discomfort, he tacked on, “What does it feel like?”

“It’s energetic and animated,” I answered. The light whirled within me, floating those comforting sensations through my blood. “Like something that could truly instill hope and life, that could heal.”

Lancaster and Mora exchanged a look.

A bead of unease slipped around my chest, spreading wings that rustled beneath my skin.

“What?” I asked.

The male’s jaw ticked, and Mora scanned the tunnel curiously. “Why did the power attack your sister?” Lancaster asked pointedly. There was something in the glare he gave me that I didn’t understand, like he knew about Jezebel’s contrasting spirit power, though we hadn’t given the fae any details beyond her connection to the khrysaor.

“No idea.”

Lancaster sucked in a breath. “Learn the magic,” he demanded, and annoyance riled within me. “There may be possibilities beyond the mortal bounds—things bolted by the hands of higher powers that could be cracked.”

As his words trickled off, we neared the end of the tunnel and the looming, black chamber. Another shudder went through the walls. It rocked into my bones and spurred my frustration with it all. With the fae acting superior, with the Angels leaving me without answers, with the magic indeterminable as friend or foe.

“I want to master it,” I swore. “I will master it. But I won’t risk the lives of others to do so.”

Before Lancaster could respond, I faced the chamber. I allowed myself one moment to study the darkness, then, I took the final step across the threshold.

The stone beneath my boot shivered and dropped an inch as if a lock had flicked. To our left, the wall burst in a spray of rubble and dust. Decaying, bone-white fingers punched through the air, intent and searching, horror sluicing through my veins.

And those hands latched around my throat.