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

Chapter 70

Chapter Seventy

Ophelia

Every facet of my body froze.

Every nerve and drop of cursed blood.

“ No ,” I gasped, barely audible, eyes meeting Tolek’s. There was an answer in those chocolate depths. One I didn’t want to unravel because to do so would rip my heart right from my chest.

“No!” I shouted to him.

“Ophelia—”

“Don’t you dare say another word, Tolek Vincienzo,” I swore, rushing toward him and fisting his leathers. “It’s not worth it. Nothing is worth you.”

“I told you I’d love you in any realm, Ophelia. That if we were somehow separated on this one, I’d find you. Infinitely doesn’t end here.”

“It doesn’t end anywhere,” I countered.

He gave me a sad smile. “But some things might have to.”

Angels, my chest was caving in. My lungs tight and breaths short.

Did I ever have a choice in any of this? Or was every day of my life—every moment I spent learning to let myself love him— another game of the deities? That used feeling crawled along my bones like poison ivy, strangling my throat until my eyes stung.

“Ophelia,” Tol coaxed, but all I could do was shake my head and blink back the tears.

I hated this. Hated that he thought this was fair—that he was willing to give up this life together because of the twisted bargains of our past. Hated more than anything the emblems weighing down our lives, dragging us to consider such dark depths.

I never had a say in any of this .

At our silence, Ritalia hummed with satisfied glee. “Now, hand over the remaining tokens, Revered.”

My eyes wouldn’t move from Tol’s, though. Couldn’t. Not with the weight of his life hanging over us. I could only watch him as he took deep breaths, telling me to mimic them.

There is a solution , I told myself with one breath.

There has to be , I encouraged on the second, timing my inhales to the rise and fall of his own chest.

I will not be their toy .

I was so lost in trying to find a way around this, I didn’t see the sphinx as she swept through the open ceiling and landed upon the seats rimming the theater.

And still, I didn’t look at her.

Just chocolate eyes and the saddest smirk I’d ever seen as he took a step toward me, his chest nearly brushing mine now, and he removed my hand from his leathers, cradling it between his own in some sort of quiet sympathy because Tolek Vincienzo was once again willing to give everything for me.

The warmth of his skin—he would lose that if I didn’t find a way out of this. His heart wouldn’t beat and his eyes wouldn’t shine. Tolek would never say my name again unless I gathered myself and fought.

As my breathing steadied, my other hand—the one holding the orb—brushed the dagger at my thigh.

But one voice pierced through the blood rushing in my ears. Malakai called, “Don’t give them to her, Ophelia!”

Enraged, I whipped my head toward him as he dropped off the sphinx’s back with Mila in his arms. Cypherion, Vale, and Lyria were behind him.

“Don’t do it!” Malakai repeated, eyes flashing from Lancaster to me and Tolek, and—he seemed so sure. His piercing green stare trying to tell me something as he set Mila down atop the seats and straightened.

The Bind pulsed beneath my elbow, but dammit, I didn’t know what it meant .

Didn’t give an Angel’s breath either. I stepped protectively in front of Tolek.

“What are you talking about ?” I shouted.

“Trust me!” And then he raced down the steps, sword singing as he and our friends dove to intercept the fae soldiers barely catching up, pouring in from the archway behind their queen, their shouts melting into the guttural, agonized roar in my mind.

The clashing of metal resounded. Zanox and Dynaxtar swooped in with our remaining party, the former dropping onto the top three rows of seats with a deep rumble.

And the presences—of the khrysaor, of my friends, of the man still staring intently at me and gripping my hand—were a different kind of armor amid this horror.

“Give the emblems over!” Ritalia ordered above the fray.

But Tolek’s faint “Ophelia” was so much louder.

And now that our friends covered our backs, he was tugging me toward the statue.

With every step, his breath tightened, a bargained noose slipping around his neck. It was low—barely perceptible—but it tore at me. So much so that I was lifeless, helpless, and Tol guided my reluctant hands to lift Xenique’s orb.

Cupped them ahead of the Angel’s waiting palms, held before her chest.

Moon-white glass swirled with visions. And in it, my life without Tolek played out. He fell to Lancaster’s bargain. I became empty, the footsteps that should shadow mine only a spirit. The halls of the Revered’s Palace echoed with silence. The mountains were void of life and promise and beauty.

Reality snapped back into me, and I reared away from the statue, spinning toward Tol. “I won’t do this!”

“You have to, apeagna . I’ll be okay,” he swore.

“But I won’t be.” My heart—it was cracking open in my chest. A sharp and splitting pain. Tolek would take it with him if Lancaster’s bargain struck true.

“And that hurts me more than anything else.” He dragged a thumb across my cheek catching tears I didn’t realize were falling. “I may not have much faith in the Angels anymore, but I have faith in us. In this. I make risky bets every day, and I never lose.”

I shook my head as a promise sparked in my chest. My glassy glare shot to Lancaster and Ritalia—I swore vengeance against them for even forcing this choice upon us. And when I met the queen’s stare, the gloating win pronounced in them, that desire burned like the hottest Angellight within me.

“ No ,” I growled. “I’ve fought long enough—lost enough, Tolek! I won’t have another thing taken.”

And instead of whirling toward Xenique and placing the orb in her waiting hands, I drew Angelborn.

Ritalia’s eyes widened as I pulled back my arm and she realized what I was about to do—where the force of my fury was going to land. With some ability I didn’t understand, the bloody queen of the fae waved a hand, and my spear was ripped from my person. In shock, I pulled Starfire, but she went sailing, too.

Then, before my eyes, Ritalia snapped her fingers. And with a smile carved from an ungodly place, she melted Starfire and Angelborn down to a river of silver and gold.

And that cracking of my heart—it became a severance as she took one more thing from me.

A scream wrenched from my throat. I lunged, but strong arms caught my waist.

Starfire .

The last piece I had of my father. The gift he’d given me on my tenth birthday. The only sword I’d ever owned. Wiped from the world in the snap of bloodstained fingers, as his life had been taken with a blast.

I cried out for my father, my voice ragged. His loss echoed through me endlessly as my sword liquified before my eyes.

And Angelborn.

Starfire was a weapon that grew with me , but Angelborn was the one created for me . Malakai had used it, too. That spear—it had been a piece of him and a driving symbol of hope when I’d found it. A sign that he was still alive, an indication that I was right not to give up on him. To fight.

And now, as Starfire’s singular gem fell to the swirling stream of molten silver and gold, it was like both weapons pierced my chest. Through bone and beating heart, all the way to their gleaming hilts.

Both parts of me I’d relied on, wiped from existence, their loss as deep as a piece of my own soul. I was a rag doll being pulled between enemies of gods and Angels, and my seams were splitting. Ripped apart as Lancaster’s bargain was trying to rip Tolek from me.

The call of the debt had been the striking of a match, and now the fae queen added kindling to the fire in my roaring heart. Fury burned through me, and I heaved in breaths I hadn’t even been aware of taking. My knees struck the floor and a warm chest braced my back.

Tears lashed down my cheeks. Tears for the piece of my father I’d lost, tears for Tolek, and wrathful tears for every wretched god and Angel and queen who tried to control me. Tears for the girl I’d been who’d never really had command over her life at all. Who had only been collecting these pieces?—

These pieces that meant so much to her, only for higher powers to continue to tear them away. Love after love, heartbreak after heartbreak.

“I’m so sorry,” Tolek muttered in my ear. His words were a gasp, a sign of Lancaster’s bargain slowly taking effect.

And that spurred the tears on faster. Turned every breath guttural as fire raged within me.

Tol didn’t say it was okay like he usually did when I was upset. He knew that to take a warrior’s weapons was to extinguish the light in their spirit, and he knew better than anyone how this particular dousing would drown me. How they’d all been crashing down on me for months.

Luckily for us, I’d burn from those depths before I allowed them to take him. I’d burn as bright as the fucking Angels.

“Keep fighting, Ophelia,” Tolek repeated. “Show her her mistake.” And it was his fading voice over that last word that made me find my own.

Through my sobs, I roared, “Stay true!”

And every warrior around me called out in answer.