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

Chapter 48

Chapter Forty-Eight

Vale

Cypherion was sound asleep when I slipped out of our bed. I kissed his forehead, and his hand flexed over where he’d held me only a moment ago. But he’d been under so much pressure recently, I didn’t want to wake him for my own restlessness.

Instead, I slipped one of his tunics over my head, grabbed the bag of tinctures I’d purchased in the Lendelli Market last night, and crept out of the room.

Slivers of twilight slipped between the curtains in the hall, bathing the wooden planks and my bare feet as I padded to one of the spare rooms on this floor. Cypherion’s tunic slid against my thighs with each step, providing the comfort only he gave me. The one I recalled to get me through those days in Valyn. In the quiet, it wrapped around me, bolstering the hollow Titus’s death had carved in my spirit. Those edges, as sharp as a jungle cat’s deadly claws, were slowly dulling, forming something new.

Soon, dawn would strike, and the inn’s patrons would wake, the cooks arriving to prepare breakfast, but for now it was silent.

Except for the Fates pushing at my mind. They’d been excessively loud ever since the seeing chambers broke through the blockage, and I was still struggling to decipher what they wanted.

As the calamity crashed through my mind, I rounded the corner and came to an abrupt halt.

“Good morning, Vale,” Barrett greeted from his seat before the crackling fire. He folded and refolded a piece of parchment in his hands.

“Sorry, I didn’t know anyone would be in here.”

“Not a problem.” He gave me an attempt at one of his characteristic smirks.

“Is everything all right?” I asked, stepping further into the room.

Barrett sighed. “Fine. Received more correspondence from home. The same as before, Nassik has not been present.” He fiddled with the paper again, but it was obvious he didn’t wish to speak of it further. The pressure of the Engrossian people had been weighing on the crown prince, despite the fact that their tour had been successful so far.

“I can leave you to your writing,” I offered.

Barrett sat up straighter. “Nonsense, I love your company.” He nodded at the bag dangling from my hand. “What were you coming here for?”

Placing the pouch on the low oval table taking up the center of the room, I unloaded my supplies. “I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d read. Erista helped me track down a few new tinctures and candles I’m very curious about.”

I set a line of six small jars along the edge of the table, their dark glass reflecting the firelight.

“What’s so intriguing about them?” Barrett asked, leaning forward. The chair creaked beneath him, it’s amethyst velvet overstuffed and worn.

“They’re from a shopkeeper known to work closely with Artale’s magic,” I explained, and Barrett’s eyes widened. I was afraid to say what I hoped these specific tinctures would do—what higher power I wanted to access with them.

I looked away, pulling out one of my usual blends and igniting an incense stick, propping it over a small silver dish. “I need to conduct a session to warm up first, though.”

Had to clear the pressure my Fate ties were pounding on my mind.

“By all means,” Barrett encouraged. He reclined in his chair, tilting his head curiously as I went about my reading.

Once I had all of my supplies set up as I preferred, I sat back on the thick russet rug and crossed my legs, taking a few focused breaths. My eyes slipped closed, and I fell into the space where the Fates ruled my mind. White fire blinked to light, stars calmly zipping across the sky.

I started with a familiar topic. Cypherion.

Ever since I returned to him and found out the truth about the fae queen’s prophecy, I’d been attempting to read his fate and see what may come of it. Unfortunately, foretold futures of the kind were hard to access. Still, I conducted a daily check to ensure nothing tragic had changed.

As I tried to pull up his future and open my connection to any one of the Fates that may know of him, a blinding trail of starfire flared behind my eyelids. Fate voices collided, and I couldn’t tell one from the other.

I sighed in frustration.

“Everything okay?” Barrett asked.

I cracked an eye open. The prince still folded the letter in his hands. “Technically, yes. But my readings are still muddled.”

“I thought the seeing chamber fixed that?”

“It did, but it wasn’t instantaneous. I can access all the Fates again, but they’re like a riled hive of bees. The messages are blending together rather than being communicated one at a time.”

It had happened in the Valyn archives, the first time I’d been able to access my Fates in months—when I’d been told I would be Titus’s downfall—and every day since. It was difficult to decipher clear readings currently, but it was slowly healing.

“Try again,” Barrett said, his dark green eyes soft with understanding. “Keep going.”

And I did.

For long, quiet minutes, I tested the future of every person we knew, pulled at every Fate tie laced through my magic and tried to peel apart the voices. But they were stubborn, shouting to be heard over the others, gathering in my chest until it was hard to breathe.

Clearly, these lower readings weren’t working.

I could try…

My mind went to the emblems, to the Angels and gods no Starsearcher in history was able to read. Except for the flashes I’d been granted of them in the seeing chambers.

I shouldn’t push the magic, not when it was so new. But the pressure in my chest squeezed tighter, my head pounding.

I pulled at one, one tied to who I thought was the Fate of Fertility, though it was hard to tell among their swarm. It was no more than a corner of a godly reading, though.

And the beat of my session crescendoed in my mind. One of my Fates spewed shooting stars, the trails of starfire igniting brighter than I’d ever seen, and images spilling through them.

I gasped, elated at the return of proper magic. Finally, after weeks of empty attempts, a figure burned in that white fire.

“Who is that?” I asked the Fates in my mind.

She was a tall figure, her features masked behind a mist. But her palms were open at her sides, and from them, a thick crimson liquid dripped to the earth.

Blood .

And from that blood, humanoid creatures rose. A number of them, of all sizes, and each had one tether leading back to her. She turned her face to the sky, hair slipping around her shoulders and?—

Pointed ears caught the light.

“Fae?” I gasped.

Who was this woman? Based on the accounts Ophelia shared of Ritalia, this wasn’t her. Was it a former queen? Were those on the leashes her subjects?

I scanned the crowds of fae, but the trails of starfire were dimming, this strand nearly reaching its time. The Fate who had given it to me—whichever it had truly been—did not speak, did not elaborate. I tried to gather any remaining clues as the white dimmed. There, at the very edge of the vision, were two faces I knew. Two who slept in this very inn.

What did Lancaster and Mora have to do with this? What did any of it mean?

Please, I wanted to beg the Fates. My shoulder ached. Please, I’ve lost so much already. Have mercy on me. Show me something.

But the star was past its time. For now, the reading was forfeit.

“Vale?” Cypherion’s voice pierced the dull starfire, and my eyes snapped open. He was dressed in his leathers, his weapons strapped to his body and hair half pulled back. “I’m going to work out with Tolek and Malakai. Do you need anything?”

“No, thank you,” I said, and despite my still clouded readings, his attention softened my frustration. I allowed the sage and bergamot from his tunic to calm me, combatting those sharp edges of my voided spirit.

Cypherion nodded, leaving, and Barrett went, too, off to meet with the city council. I turned back to my supplies, preparing to fall back into the Fates, those six tinctures lining the table taunting me.