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

Chapter 58

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Tolek

The Angels clearly don’t want me to participate in their trivial hunt for emblems .

I sighed.

The hunt wasn’t trivial, I was aware of that. But watching that damn archway seal with Ophelia behind it—being separated from her again when these trials had nearly taken all of our lives—was like a nemaxese’s claws sinking into my gut and shredding, tearing, bleeding.

“Come on,” Malakai said with a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s get this over with so you can get back to her.”

“Where do we start?” Santorina asked. The crescent moon carved into the marble floor, inlaid with flawless bronze, could have been indicating any direction, depending which way you looked at it.

But it was Vale who said, “That way.” With a sure hand, she pointed down the looming tunnel all the way across the atrium.

She took off without waiting for us, her boots ringing out on the speckled floors and skirt swishing around her ankles. Malakai and I exchanged a glance, then I hurried to the Starsearcher’s side. He hung back, bringing up the rear of our group.

“How do you know?” I asked Vale as we crossed the expansive atrium.

Her eyes were trained on the tunnel as she answered, “Ever since my reading of the gods, the connection with the Fates hasn’t broken.”

“You don’t always have a connection with them?”

“I do, but typically between sessions it reduces. Like a hum instead of a full song.” Her hand pressed to her breastbone as if alleviating an ache. “Now, they haven’t quieted.”

“Without the incense?”

She nodded. “They’re rather persistent, it seems.” Her voice was melodic, the same tone as when she’d read earlier, and when she looked up, her eyes swirled like shooting stars.

If her nine Fate ties were speaking, it had to be important. “Let’s listen to them, then.” I shrugged, looking at the archway ahead. “Wait!” I gripped Vale’s wrist right as she made to step into the tunnel.

My sister was behind me, her defenses raised. “What is it?”

I nodded to the stone carving the entrance. “Endasi.” Faintly, framing the arch and barely visible in the mystlight, the Angelic script was etched into alabaster stone.

“It was above the entrance to the catacombs, too,” Santorina reminded us.

“I suppose we’re going the right way, then,” Mila said. “Can you read it, Tolek?”

I scanned the overly-intricate carving. Xenique loved ostentatious designs, it appeared. “Roughly,” I began. “ Half of the seer’s treasure lies within .”

“The seer?” Malakai asked.

“Likely a way to hide Xenique’s name,” Mila guessed. “A way to refer to the power of Soulguider visions.”

Half of Xenique’s treasure. It was practically a map to the emblem itself.

“Let’s go then,” Malakai said, determined and nodding at Vale to lead the way. She tilted her head for a moment as if listening, then started down the tunnel.

Malakai, Mila, and Santorina followed first, but I hung back a step, checking the translation one more time.

“Come on, baby brother,” Lyria cooed, looping her arm through mine, and I walked along with her, hoping this time my translation was correct. Why only half of the treasure?

The tunnel was made of the same marble as the atrium, with veins of bronze that caught the mystlight flickering from sconces along the wide walls. Though not as towering as the entrance, the ceilings were high. How had a place this massive been built?

And how strong was the power that lay within to require such a cage?

Ahead of us, the others chatted quietly over the distant streams. Malakai bent low, whispering something in Mila’s ear that had a laugh bursting from her, adding some much-needed ease to this spirit-shrouded corridor. Lyria smiled at the sound ringing against the marble.

“You approve?” I nodded to Malakai and Mila up ahead.

“More than.” My sister flashed a dazzling smile, but it didn’t meet her eyes.

I put a hand on her shoulder, so slim beneath the leather. Had she always been that thin? I held her back a step. “Ria?”

Lyria’s eyes searched the expansive corridor. “It’s an odd place, isn’t it?”

“Not the most common,” I answered, shrugging and continuing to follow the others, “but it’s fitting for what we’re here for, I suppose. It would be interesting to explore it without the pressure of the Angels bearing down on us.”

“The damn Angels,” she swore, shaking her head. I let out a small, relieved laugh at her disgruntled tone. “Do you think spirits really linger here?”

“Truly, I’d never thought about it until Erista said what the purpose of the hall was.” I had always figured we were delivered to the afterlife by the Soulguiders upon our death. Mystique bodies were returned to the earth through the volcano and our spirits rested in the Spirit Realm.

Some felt differently about it. Believed in ways of divine intervention or reincarnation. I supposed they were possible. The idea of my spirit finding Ophelia’s in every life after this one was a thought so right it almost made me convert my beliefs on the spot. But it wasn’t something I truly spent much time considering.

Why worry about an afterlife when we had this one?

But from the way Lyria’s next words rushed out, it was clear she had contemplated it. “I think the idea of a spirit persisting can be quite romantic or torturous, depending on the person.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“If their life was so full of abundant beauty that they couldn’t bear to leave those they loved behind, even to wait in the Spirit Realm for the day others met them, well that’s quite a romantic view of life, is it not?”

“It is,” I whispered, ambling slowly behind the others.

“But if they’re trapped, if someone is ready to go and is somehow held here for eternal unrest…” She shivered. “I believe that would be one of the worst tragedies that could befall a warrior who has already given their life.”

Her brown eyes flashed up to mine, like looking in a mirror, and every life she saw taken on the mountainous battlefield died again behind them. The deep hues rippled with a pain that sliced through my chest.

“I like to think every spirit will end up where they belong,” I said.

Lyria’s voice was wistful when she answered, “That would be beautiful.”

Damien’s unholy cock, I wanted to rip the haunting memories from my sister. To take those wounds in her stead.

Lyria was too good for it. Or perhaps, none of us were truly good. To simply say someone was nothing but good trivialized the complexities of their spirit.

At her heart, Lyria was so much more than that. She was courageous and clever, but also compassionate and understanding. She, unlike so many commanders, had found a way to balance the two sides.

And because of that, she was carrying this weight of responsibility that was poised to shatter her bones.

“Where do you wish to end up?” I asked.

Lyria shrugged. “Wherever I’m meant to be, I guess.” A heavy I don’t know where that is echoed in the shadows of that sentence. “We can’t really be certain of the purpose of any of this, can we?” Lyria asked as we followed Vale around turn after turn, her reading leading the way.

“Which parts?”

She laughed, invigorated. “Of life. Of every damn day. It all builds to something, I would believe, but—I don’t know. Perhaps it’s because I’m surrounded by the energy of the Soulguiders and their heart of magic, but it feels like being in this place serves a purpose.”

“Every decision we make, Ria, contributes to our lives. The small and the large ones, whether they support what the Fates have planned for us or riot against it, it all weaves together. That’s what comprises our stories.”

“Being here, though”—she searched the tunnel, the endless halls branching off it— “makes me consider the point.”

Following the war, Lyria had been concerned with her role, with finding her place after witnessing such tragedy. She thought she was responsible for it, but I wouldn’t agree to that. Lyria was a part of the war, but she wasn’t the war. Just as the lives lost on that battlefield weren’t her. Thank the Angels.

In the shuffle of our boots against marble, I asked, “And what have you decided?”

“I think it’s you, Tolek.” Her eyes darted to mine. “I think we were robbed of so much time in our childhoods that the Spirits and Angels are trying to make up for it.”

My chest hurt at the thought.

Lyria continued, “To be honest, I don’t give an Angel’s ass about these emblems. I’d be thrilled to hand over my title now that the war is over. But we lost enough time thanks to our father. So, I’m here.”

I was the purpose for my sister. The sentiment tightened my throat and didn’t quite fit into the disjointed lines of my life.

Not after I’d had my worthlessness beaten into me at such a young age.

Not since I’d learned to accept that, while my life was filled with unconditional love from my friends, I would always lack those foundational pieces.

I was unlearning those lessons every day, chipping away at the dam they’d built within me. Now, my sister’s words flooded that barrier.

And between us, the dam cracked. “I don’t know much about life purposes or secrets of the world, but I know for a fact that I’m damn lucky to have you as a sister. To have survived what we did as children, the manipulation we clawed our way out of individually, and be able to stand together now? That feels pretty rare to me.”

She smirked. “The name Vincienzo means something pretty good, doesn’t it?”

“Because we made it so,” I said. “Not him.”

Our father was not the name Vincienzo. We would carve our own legacy.

I continued, “Maybe you’re right, and I’m your cause. If you need to think so, that’s okay. But I think it’s more likely that a small piece of both of our purposes here is to help the other. To assist in mending the scars he caused.” A shake of my head. “I don’t think that’s either of our full stories, though. I love you, Ria, but neither of us is each other’s entire purpose. You’ve got a shining future ahead of you, title or not.”

I tilted my head, whispering, “And by the way, if you don’t want the title, tell Ophelia. She won’t bat an eye at your reluctance.”

Lyria pursed her lips. “It’s not so bad.” A soft smile curved the corners of her lips, much softer than anything I usually saw from her. It was a bit more peaceful. A bit unburdened. “There’s something else I’ve been thinking about.”

“What?” I asked. If it was within my power, I’d help her achieve it. My sister had given so much of herself to the Mystiques, to our father’s grand delusions, she deserved whatever her heart clawed for.

“I want to get our siblings out of his hands.”

I stopped walking. I never claimed to be a good brother, but Spirits, perhaps I was worse than I feared. Because I’d been so focused on repairing this relationship, I hadn’t considered how our father might now be playing his games with those we left behind. The ones I barely had any relationship with because I’d spent as much of my adolescence as possible away from our manor.

When they were born—when my mother had miraculously delivered him three perfect babies after my birth nearly killed her—that had been the last day he’d shown any ounce of care for me. It was the day it officially became my fault that I nearly killed my mother. And because of it, a ruined and jealous part of me silently wrote off my siblings altogether.

As if a fire flared in my gut, my guilt over those actions forged into determination. “We’ll get them out before his claws are in them.”

“If they aren’t already,” Lyria muttered, striding ahead to catch up with the group. Though mystlight wavered in the tunnel, my skin chilled.

“If they are, we’ll help them. If it wasn’t too late for us, it isn’t for them,” I said. “Once this mess is over, we’ll return to Palerman and tell father we think it would be good for them to train in Damenal. That it would reflect well on the family or whatever horse shit will appease his ego. We’ll fight for them, Lyria.”

As no one had fought for us.

“That we will, baby brother.” She looped her arm through mine, and I was grateful I’d let the dam between us crack.

I’d stopped trying to track where Vale was leading us many turns ago, but the babbling of the streams grew louder, Lyria and Mila filling the silence with jokes. But we wound around another turn, and even their voices broke off.

The corridor opened into a chamber larger than the atrium, and we stood on a platform jutting out from the wall with a steep drop off into a river. It rushed endlessly in either direction, twelve feet below us.

Glass windows were cut into the marble walls all the way to high ceilings, exposing swirling tides within. Some moved as quickly as the Solistine River, some trickled like those cutting through the dunes.

And directly across the river from our platform, a thick wall stretched halfway to the ceiling—a dam holding the water at bay.

“The streams,” I said.

“This must be the source,” Vale breathed in awe. “The heart of the magic Soulguider power comes from.”

We peered over the ledge.

“Down there?” Lyria asked skeptically eying the spirit-laced water.

“Not fun enough, Lyr?” Mila quipped.

My sister smirked at her. “Sounds like exactly our kind of fun, actually.”

“Then as always,” Mila said, “let’s find a way.” She raised her brows at Vale. “Can you confirm?”

Vale closed her eyes. “Yes,” she affirmed. “Yes, down there, deep beneath the earth, is where the heart lies. Stemming from the mountains, as all sources of magic do.”

Then down there was where we had to go.

I searched the walls, but they were smooth. No signs of hand-or-footholds, no ladders or hints of climbing gear. Like one needed damn wings to fly down to the floor and retrieve whatever waited below.

But Ophelia needed that emblem, and if going down there could help her, I’d do it.

As I was looking over the edge of the platform, a groan echoed through the chamber and the floor lurched beneath me.

“What’s that?” I asked.

An earth-shattering creak split the air, the water below shivering.

Then, much like the one that had cracked within my heart at my sister’s melancholy, the dam trapping the flood of magic-spun water burst.