Page 22 of The Trials of Ophelia

Secretly, I was torn. Happy to have Jezebel beside me, but terrified of the hollow look behind her eyes—dead and poisoned by a fate I didn’t understand. She didn’t appear ready to talk about it, but we all watched her with concerned stares.

“Good,” Tolek said, squeezing Jezebel’s shoulder as he walked back around the table. “We need you, Jez.” And they exchanged a smile in their own secret language.

“Cyph?” I asked. “I’d like you with us, but if you insist on going to camp, I’ll understand.”

Let him make his own choice.

Cypherion’s voice was as void as Jezebel’s stare. “What will we do with her?”

Every spine in the room stiffened. The her he referred to wasn’t my sister, nor was it Santorina, or me.

“What would you suggest?” I had my preference.

Cypherion chewed over the question for a moment, a battle playing out behind his eyes. “She should come, too.”

“Really?” Tolek asked, a bit skeptical, searching for a hint of feeling in his friend’s expression, but Cypherion had shut it all down. In return, loss darkened the amber specks in Tol’s eyes, adrift without being able to decipher his friend’s thoughts.

Cyph nodded. “I don’t trust her with anyone else as her guard. When we leave, she comes with us.”

It was a half truth, I supposed. Perhaps he truly did not want Vale guarded by anyone else—he certainly didn’t trust her—but I suspected there was more to his decision. Regardless, it didn’t matter to me. I wanted Vale with us, as well.

“She comes to Brontain, then.” I looked around at the five of them, my family through it all, and a thrill for the journey we were about to embark on tangled with the slightest bit of uncertainty. I didn’t know what lay before me, and too much death and destruction lay behind me, but with them beside me, I had the strength to keep moving forward.

“Will you tell the council where we’re going?” Rina asked.

“I’ll have to. In case they need to reach me and can’t write for whatever reason.” We didn’t share details of the emblems with the newly-appointed Mystique Council members. I didn’t trust many outside of this room and our allies with that information, but they knew there was a task at hand when I took over rule and that it would require us leaving Damenal.

I once would have balked at the idea of entrusting my city to an untried council, but these past two months had sprouted something within me. The new Masters of Trade and Coin, along with Missyneth, would see to the protection and guidance of the Mystiques in my stead. They’d been the strongest candidates for the positions before Larcen and Alvaron had?—

Guilt slammed a rope around that thought. I breathed deeply around the rock lodged in my lungs.

The Masters of Trade and Coin each had an expanding network of apprentice branches beneath them. The new system was established for many to rule, distributing power and pressure. That made leaving slightly more palatable, though we still had not found a Master of Communication.

While I was wary of abandoning Damenal, I wanted to lead by example, not locked up in my golden tower.

“The five of us will head to Brontain with Vale,” I said. “And Malakai, you’ll head straight to the border with Barrett and Dax to meet Lyria. Pack what you can carry?—”

“Plenty of food,” Jezebel instructed.

“Yes,” I agreed, wrapping an arm around her shoulder. “Whatever you deem necessary. We don’t know when we’ll be back.”

“This all feels a bit familiar,” Tolek whispered to Cypherion.

“We’ll never get a chance to rest,” Cyph grumbled in return.

For a moment, I remembered rain pounding rusted gutters and wind shuddering the wooden walls of the Cub’s Tavern. Rina’s worn carpet swam with shadows of the crackling fire. I believed myself alone then, the Curse burrowing into my skin, eating at my blood each day. The need to escape, to get moving and find Malakai before time ran out, choked me.

But now—I had the five people surrounding me. I hadn’t been alone then, though I didn’t realize it. And I certainly wasn’t now.

“Okay.” I cleared my throat. “We’ll leave as soon as Tolek can ride?—”

“Immediately, then,” he interrupted, looking pointedly at Rina.

She sighed. “He dragged me to the stables this morning to see Astania and prove he could remain seated.”

I raised my brows at Tolek, who shrugged. “This is important. We can’t wait.”

We would wait if it meant his safety, but I read the sentiment between his words, I want to go on this adventure with you, and my heart pattered against my ribs.

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