Chapter 55 Valerio dies
…
Meanwhile, while Evyths and Crystal were still locked in the laboratory, a sudden rumble like an earthquake felt like it was drowning everything on the outside.
At some point, Evyths had concluded that death had come knocking but Crystal remained still in Valerio's coffin, her hands flatly crossed over over her chest.
The rumble took at least a minute, threatening to toss the shelves and antidotes to the ground.
Suddenly, it stopped. There was stillness. Perfect stillness. One that you would feel once death comes knocking.
Evyths looked around the laboratory, the places she normally explored, keeping the King's vials and experiments’ items in check.
After that, she sat next to Crystal who was still in the coffin. She had been quiet since they got in, making Evyths wonder if at all Crystal was truly okay or could it be that she's been grieving her mother's death?
A dozen thoughts flipped her mind while she took the latter’s cold hand, giving it a gentle rub.
“Crystal, you have been laying for hours now… Would you like to… stretch?” Evyths asked subtly.
Crystal said nothing except that the smell of toxic chemicals mixed with dust wafted into the air, inhaled and exhaled by Evyths unconsciously.
“Crystal,” Evyths called out softly again. “Strawberry Moon—”
“You can't call me that,” Crystal snapped irritably as Evyths chuckled dryly, her eyes lit calmly.
“At least I got you to talk. You have been quiet for hours now. What worries you that much?” Evyths asked, adjusting her seated position on the floor.
Crystal looked away, sadness crossing her face. “I see it, there's danger ahead. The war will break them, it will disrupt the balance,” said Crystal, her tone thinner and lighter.
“What balance?” Evyths' face squeezed slightly, trying to decipher Crystal's words.
The silence that suddenly engulfed it was louder than words itself, it hinted at something unspoken, something more dangerous than they had expected.
“The balance that links us to them,”
“What ‘them’? Crystal, what are you talking about?” Evyths pressed, this time, her patience ran low.
Like a strike of lightning, Evyths' heart sank heavily as if a rock had been thrown into a lake.
It was palpable. It hinted at something bad.
A bad omen. A curse. Doom. Danger.
Evyths retracted her hand, keeping it to herself as she started to breathe heavily, her heart beating heavily and fastly.
“You finally feel it, don't you?” Crystal asked flatly as Evyths shifted her gaze back to the girl. “Something is happening and we can't turn the hands of fate. No one will save us now,” Crystal added, her words pierced Evyths even more although she tried so hard to keep it together.
Evyths looked around, running to the exit as she sighted a way of weak morning light struck across the floor through a tiny hole.
“It's morning! The war must have ended,” Evyths whispered to herself.
Evyths scurried back to Crystal and sat next to her, her mind heavy with thoughts.
“Tell me, Evyths, do you ever kiss your mother?” Crystal asked, her question was in contrast to the current situation and the heart wrenching alarm that she felt.
Evyths swallowed hard, she's never spoken about her family with anyone but Valerio and now Crystal was asking the same.
“I never got to grieve her death. I wonder if I would ever,”
“Why?”
“The moment was snatched from me—”
“Alpha Ryker Rockwell?” Crystal asked swiftly, her gaze sharp.
Evyths rubbed her neck, a pang in her chest. The memories were clearer than looking through a new mirror, they never faded.
“Does it matter—”
“Stop hiding the truth. My castle knows your backstory. We all know that Ryker was your mate until you rejected him and things got… sour. I have never seen an omega so… determined and stubborn. No wonder the goddess chose you,” Crystal’s gaze shifted. “Ryker’s family killed your father. The same Ryker poisoned your mother because you rejected him. Haven't you thought about revenge?” Crystal craned her neck a little to stare at Evyths.
Evyths whisked her back to the moment, the despair and grief that she silently carried for months, caused by her supposed mate.
A tear dropped as Evyths quickly wiped it off before it reached her cheek.
“Why are you telling me all of this?”
“Because there may be odds, Evyths. You might not last here and… you would need to face your reality as a werewolf. I wonder if you'd be tossed at Ryker again for the umpteenth time. He seems like your nemesis even though you have a pure heart…” Crystal stated.
Evyths was baffled, not just by the words from Crystal but how mature Crystal turned within hours.
“I know. I have tried to tell that to your uncle but he… wants me here instead,” Evyths confessed, swallowing hard. Her fingers interlaced nervously, suddenly wondering if Valerio was returning already. And all who went with him.
“My uncle must be madly in love with you to make decisions that spell danger and war but… what is a vampire without walking into danger or war?!” Crystal paused. “I wish he would be back,” Crystal snapped, her eyes rolling to the back of her head leaving the whites.
Evyths' heart thumped loudly, shaking Crystal's unconscious body.
Was she dead? She didn't have a heartbeat. Was she alive? Her eyes were looking dead.
Evyths grew confused, tears streaming down her cheeks nonstop.
Evyths mustered a bit of courage to hold herself together. She rose, looking from corner to corner, then ran to the shelves where everything sat silently.
Her eyes scampered from the top to the bottom, there was no label on the vials. Nothing related to Crystal's situation. The heap of books on the desk were more or less a torture. She couldn't read fluently. At least Valerio had taught her to identify simple words but the scientific symbols in the book were dreadful.
She shut the book in frustration as a piece of paper flew out of the heavy book, landing on the ground.
Evyths quickly picked it up, scanning the words with her eyes. It was an old, dusty paper with faded writing.
The calligraphy was well accentuated with red ink, if there was anything like that, the words were complicated and the symbols were hard to decode.
“If Valerio were here, he'd have a laugh because I look stupid staring at a paper that seemed to carry information,” she told herself, her voice coming out sharper than she had imagined.
Evyths properly dried her tears and sat in the corner, trying so hard to identify the words in the paper but the only thing that she could break was her name ‘Evyths’, written boldly at the top of the paper.
“Why is my name here? What does this… mean?” she asked herself, sulking in defeat.
Evyths rose and tucked back the paper in the book.
She strutted back to the coffin where Crystal laid peacefully, her heart started to race again. The knots in her stomach tightened harder, she remained helpless. When she heard the exit door creak, Evyths ran towards it, in the hope that the king was there to let them out.
As soon as it opened, a force pulled her out of the laboratory as it shut hastily again. She began to hit the heavy, thick doors, muttering in frustration yet her efforts were rendered useless.
Trying to catch her breath, shoving her hair behind her face, she felt someone approaching in her direction. The hallway had been empty and now someone was lurking in the shadows.
“Well, so you've decided to step out of his… sacred place, haven't you?”
She knew that breathy velvety voice, it was registered in her mind constantly and couldn't be mistaken.
“Qu- queen Raven,” Evyths stopped in her tracks, bending subtly as Raven appeared, a dark haze surrounding her mildly.
“How did you get in there?” Raven asked, her tone sharper than before. Her eyes were pitch black, and her lips were stained with something darkish red.
Evyths tried to calm herself, stabbing palms with her fingers nervously.
“Won't talk?” Raven asked, her smile was radiant and sinister at the same time.
“He locked us there. I don't know how to operate the door—” Evyths admitted.
“Lies!” Raven snapped her fingers, a dark haze forming around Evyths, the same gaze that nearly killed her had Valerio not intervened.
She knew it, it was a family to death, it smelled like it. Nothing pleasant. “With me here, you'd lose your life and Valerio won't be here to save you from my wrath either. If you lie, you die…” Raven threatened, caressing Evyth' s face with her sharp, thorny claws.
“I’m not… lying to you. The king locked us there,”
“Us? Who is the other?”
“It's Lady Crystal,” Evyths snapped, swallowing hard.
Immediately, some soldiers including Queen Raven, as she released Evyths, the haze also scattered until there was nothing left.
“Oh my days, Vance, where’s my dear husband, the king?” Raven began to sob.
Not only was she dramatic, she was pretending to care for Valerio.
Evyths' face slightly squeezed in shock, although she wasn't too surprised about Raven's actions.
Staring at Vance, Evyths saw the pain in his eyes. The hidden pain that sat in his hindbrain.
Vance’s jaw tightened, clad in his official royal cloak, black.
“I bring news but the Duke wants you to tend to Commander Lucian,” said Vance, tone sharp, shoulders even.
“Why?” A flicker of disgust appeared on Raven’s face. “I'm asking after my husband and not… the half-breed outcast. He can burn for all I care.” she said.
Wow, that's an interesting way to refer to the King's brother, the commander of Ravencroft Kingdom as well, Evyths said to herself.
“I suppose you meet the Duke in the throne room, he has something to tell you. I'm afraid, your majesty, I can't tell you…” Vance stated firmly as Raven let out a faint smile shooting him daggers with her gaze.
“You're just like them; rude and full of pride!” Raven snapped and left, her speed doubling a normal walking pace.
When Vance attempted to leave, Evyths caught him by the wrist, risking her life to ask a question even if his gaze split between her hand and her face. The audacity and yet the courage. Her eyes crammed with tears that she fought control. She sensed something odd, she felt it.
The oddity she felt when her heart sank deeply hinted at something and now, what was it? She wondered.
“Please, Sir Vance, where's the- the king?” Her words slightly slurred.
Vance attempted to walk off but rethought for half a second.
“The king is dead,” Vance stated like it meant nothing, like his words didn't carry weight. Like it was normal for a king to die, or like a powerful vampire like Valerio to die casually in a war.
Before she could say a word, Vance vanished.
The truth is, it was hard to tell her. It hurt him deeper than she knew. As the king's guard, he couldn't break in front of her. He had been grieving and so he felt that she needed to know given that the king loved her obviously.
Evyths froze in her spot, falling to her knees, her bones almost crushing and shifting from its normal position.
The shrill silence rang in her eyes, the world suddenly stood still, her breath, her tears, her gaze, her mouth, her heart… everything came to a halt.
Again, Valerio was dead, something reminded her.
A weight landed on her, crushing her finally to the ground, her eyes shutting off. Was it forever? Whatever it was, Evyths wanted to die alongside Valerio.
Wherever he went, she was ready to go.