Chapter 208 Caught
Chapter 208: Caught!!
milo pov
I spun around to find a masked figure emerging from the darkness like a ghost. They wore plain clothes and a simple cloth covering their face. I could not identify them by scent or sight.
"Who are you?" I whispered.
"Someone who wants to help." The figure moved closer, and I caught the faint scent of herbs and something else I could not place. "But we do not have much time. The guard will wake soon, and when he discovers you are gone..."
"Why help me?" I studied the masked figure, trying to place their voice, their build, anything. "What do you gain from this?"
"Nothing and everything." The figure's voice was odd, distorted somehow as if they were deliberately disguising it. "But it is not about what I gain. I have made mistakes in the past. I would not want you to repeat them. Your mate is dying without you, Milo. The curse is killing him slowly. He has maybe a month before his body gives out completely."
The world tilted beneath my feet. "No. That is impossible. The curse was broken."
"Broken, not cured. The residual effects are destroying him from the inside." The figure pulled out a small vial filled with silver liquid that seemed to glow faintly in the moonlight. "This will help you. When the time is right, drink it and await further instructions."
"What? What instructions?" My voice rose with desperation.
But the figure remained silent.
I finally took the vial with shaking hands. "How do I know you are telling the truth? This could be poison."
"It could be," the figure agreed calmly. "But what choice do you have? Stay here and let your sister steal your child? Or take the risk and try to save your mate?"
They were right. I had no real choice.
"Can you get me out?" I asked, hope flaring painfully in my chest. "Help me escape back to Damon?"
"Not yet. Security is too tight after your imprisonment. But give me time. I am working on a plan." The figure pressed something into my hand. A small blade, barely longer than my palm but wickedly sharp. "Hide this. When the time comes, you may need it."
"When will that be?"
"Soon. The Blood Challenge approaches. When the Queen leaves to face your mate, security will be weakest. That is when we strike." The figure began backing away into the shadows. "Until then, survive. Do not give up. Your child needs you. Your mate needs you."
"Wait!" I reached out desperately, the chains clattering loudly in the night air. "Please, tell me who you are!"
But the figure had already vanished into the darkness, leaving me alone with a vial of unknown liquid, a tiny blade, and more questions than answers.
Voices came from inside the estate. Shouting. Running footsteps.
The guard had woken. They knew I had escaped.
Panic seized my throat.
I ran.
My chains rattled deafeningly as I sprinted through the garden, searching desperately for anywhere to hide. But where could I go? The whole estate would be searching for me within minutes. They would tear this place apart.
A hand grabbed my arm from behind, yanking me roughly into a storage shed. I opened my mouth to scream, but another hand clamped over it, cutting off any sound.
"Quiet!" a female voice hissed urgently in my ear.
I recognized that voice immediately. Ella. One of the maids who had worked alongside me during my days in the servant quarters, who had shown me small kindnesses when no one else would.
"They are searching everywhere," she whispered, her breath hot against my cheek. "You need to get back to your cell before they realize you actually escaped."
"I cannot go back there," I protested weakly.
"You have to. If they find you gone, they will punish everyone. Execute servants they suspect of helping you." Her eyes were wide with genuine terror. "Please, Milo. Go back. Whatever you are planning, it is not worth innocent deaths."
Guilt crashed over me like a wave of ice water. She was right. My escape would cost others their lives. Innocent people who had nothing to do with any of this. I looked down at myself, still chained and bleeding. I would barely make it ten yards before being captured.
"Help me get back," I said quietly, defeat tasting bitter on my tongue. "Quickly."
Ella led me through a servants' passage that connected to the dungeon entrance. We moved fast, her intimate knowledge of the estate's hidden routes keeping us ahead of the search parties. I could hear them spreading through the grounds, voices calling out orders.
When we reached my cell, the guard was still unconscious, slumped against the wall. I slipped back between the bars, ignoring the pain as metal scraped already raw skin. I reattached the chains to their wall anchors as best I could with shaking hands. The broken stone would not hold for long under scrutiny, but in the darkness, maybe no one would notice immediately.
Ella nodded at me once, her face pale with fear.
"Thank you," I whispered. "Thank you so much."
She disappeared without another word, melting back into the shadows.
I had just settled back into my previous position when the guard woke with a violent start. He looked around confused, disoriented, then visibly relaxed when he saw me still chained in the cell, apparently unchanged.
I let out a breath I had not realized I was holding.
Close. Too close.
I touched my stomach protectively, feeling my baby's tiny presence like a flutter of butterfly wings. The vial from the mysterious figure was hidden carefully in the folds of my dress. The small blade was tucked securely into my undergarments. And Lior's presence thrummed in my mind, stronger than it had been in weeks.
"Hello, buddy," I called to him tentatively.
But all I received was a disdainful huff, and then silence. Apparently he was still furious with me for the choices I had made.
"Thank you, buddy," I thought anyway, even though he would not reply. I was just glad that I had not totally lost my wolf.
I was not completely helpless anymore. I had allies now, even if I did not know who they were. I had hope, as fragile and dangerous as it was.
And most importantly, I knew Damon was alive. Suffering, dying slowly from curse residue, but alive. Still breathing. Still fighting.
I had to reach him. I had to save him before it was too late.
The cell door suddenly exploded inward, slamming against stone with a deafening crash that made my heart stop.
Aldrich stood in the doorway, his massive frame blocking any hope of escape. His face was twisted with an emotion I could not immediately identify…rage, yes, but something else lurked beneath it. Something almost like... fear?
"Where have you been?" he snarled, crossing the cell in two long strides.
"What? No, I…I have been here," I stammered, my voice breaking. "I have been here the whole time."
His eyes narrowed dangerously as he studied me. I watched in horror as his gaze traveled from my face down to my wrists, where fresh blood stained the shackles. Down to my ankles, where the chains hung slightly wrong. Down to the wall anchors, where cracks spider-webbed through the ancient stone.
He knew.
"The Queen wants to see you," he said slowly, each word dropping like stones into still water. "Now."
He grabbed my chains without waiting for a response, yanking them so hard that I cried out in pain. The wall anchors gave way completely this time, crumbling to dust.
"Wait, please…" I tried to protest, tried to explain, but he was already dragging me out of the cell.
"You have made a terrible mistake tonight, omega," Aldrich said quietly as he hauled me through the corridors. Servants pressed themselves against walls as we passed, their faces reflecting my own terror back at me. "A terrible, fatal mistake."
"I did not…I was in my cell the whole time…"
"Save your lies." He pulled me around a corner so roughly that I stumbled, nearly falling. "The Queen already knows everything."
Ice flooded my veins, colder than any winter storm.
It had been a trap. All of it. The mysterious message. The sleeping guard. The unlocked path to the garden.
A trap, and I had foolishly walked right into it.