Chapter 151 Whispers in the wood

Chapter 151 Whispers in the wood


OPHELIA’S POV

We had to leave the horses less than a mile in.

Seraphina’s horse was still fighting whatever black thing was in its eyes. It kept screaming and thrashing until Kai stepped up and put it down with one clean hit. The rest of the horses were too scared to go any further.

So we walked.

The fog was so thick I could barely see a few feet in front of me. It stuck to my skin and my clothes like cold hands. Every breath tasted like wet dirt and rotting leaves and metal.

The trees were too close together. Their trunks were dark and wet. Roots stuck out of the ground like they were trying to grab our ankles. The deeper we went, the quieter it got. Just the sound of our boots on the wet leaves and this low whispering from birds that seemed to come from the trees themselves.

At first I told myself it was just the wind.

Then I heard my name.

Not out loud. Inside my head. It sounded like Cassie calling me the morning we left. Then it sounded like Kai from some bad night, angry and rough. Then a woman’s voice I didn’t know soft and cold...saying Little queen.

My feet stopped.

Kai looked at me right away. “Ophelia?”

“I’m fine,” I said. My voice sounded wrong even to me.

I wasn’t fine.

The whispers got louder the further we walked. Pictures started flashing behind my eyes that weren’t mine. Green glass labs. A little girl with my face but tired, old eyes. A boy who looked like a young Kai screaming while something dark was pushed into his veins.

My stomach turned. I dug my nails into my palms just to feel something real.

She’s in your head, I told myself. Push her out.

But the pictures wouldn’t stop.

I saw Morwen standing over a silver pool. I felt how lonely she was. How hungry she was for Luna and for me. Our blood wasn’t just a connection. It was a door. And it was opening wider every second.

My own thoughts started mixing with hers.

I tried to focus on what was real. Luna warm against my chest. Eve walking ahead. Kai right behind me, solid and hot. For a few minutes it helped.

Then another memory that wasn’t mine hit me hard.

I saw a young Kai looking up at someone with complete trust in his eyes. The feeling that came with it was cold and amused.

My knees gave out. I fell against a tree.

Kai grabbed my arm before I hit the ground. “Talk to me. Look at me.”

Ophelia!

“She’s in my head,” I said. My voice sounded thin and strange. “Morwen. I keep seeing things through her eyes. I think our minds are starting to mix.”

Kai’s hand tightened on my arm. His eyes were bright and scared. “Fight it. Don’t let her in.”

“I’m trying.”

We kept walking because stopping felt worse. The fog got so thick I could barely see Eve’s back. The whispers turned into a constant pressure behind my eyes. My own thoughts felt thin, like someone was slowly erasing them and writing over them.

I didn’t even notice I had stopped walking until Kai stepped in front of me and took my face in his hands.

“Ophelia, stay with me.”

I opened my mouth to tell him I was trying.

But the voice that came out wasn’t fully mine. It was colder. Older. Cruel in a way I had never sounded before.

“You look just like your father did,” I said softly, a small dark smile pulling at my mouth, “right before I broke him.”