“Words, Mila.” I dropped my forehead to hers. “I need to hear you say it.”
“I’m okay,” she swore, voice containing more steel than I’d expected. Her fortress solidified. “Shaken, but okay. I could’ve handled him on my own.”
“You don’t have to,” I told her, brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear.
“I’m happy I don’t,” she admitted. And she didn’t seem to feel weak for confessing that she wanted someone to help her. Mila never found weakness in that sort of vulnerability. It made her even stronger.
Made me love her more.
Slipping my hand around the back of her neck, I tilted her head and kissed her hard enough to forget that prick. Sealed the fact that I was the only one kissing or touching her tonight. Ever again.
“Excuse me?” a soft voice asked beside us.
Without turning, I grumbled, “I swear on Damien’s grave if another one of you tries to approach us.”
But Mila kissed me once more and looked around my arm. “Yes?”
A Soulguider with golden skin bedecked in dusty purple scarves and bronze jewelry stood a few feet away. “I only wanted to apologize for the patron and make sure you know we’ve escorted him out. You’re welcome and safe here, and if there’s anything we can do, let us know.”
I exchanged a glance with Mila, trying to shove away the rage still burning through me. “Actually, there is,” I said. The woman’s head tilted. “Do you know where we can find a Storyteller?”
She smiled. “Come with me.” Her scarves whipped around her frame as she turned.
I took a step to follow, but Mila grabbed my wrist and whispered, “I have to say—jealousy looks great on you, Warrior Prince.”
“You ask after the stars?”The Storyteller before us was incredulous, twisting a long braid around her hand. “Surely you know my gift of legends is not about the Fates.”
“Technically,” Mila argued kindly, “Storyteller magic is about relaying history, correct?”
The Storyteller—Parrille, her name was—straightened. “That is correct.”
The worker who had led us here found her walking with two of her comrades, sharing some tale the wind had whispered to her—or whatever the fuck the explanation for their magic was—and pulled her aside in this stretch of hall, abstract tapestries and orbs of shaded mystlight dulling the chill from the stone walls.
We started by asking her about the Angelcurse, but the Storyteller claimed there was no such information in their cult’s history. I was skeptical—Ophelia would certainly be discouraged by that—but once we’d asked a number of different questions that we thought could unravel some tale in her mind, Mila and I had moved on.
“We don’t need to know oftheFates exactly,” I said. “But I was wondering if you are able to speak of fates of those who had passed?”
“Since that is deemed historical fact,” Mila explained.
The Storyteller pursed her lips, locking her arms across her ample chest. The teal scarves wrapped intricately around her body bunched with the movement. “Who is it you ask after?”
Ophelia came into tonight with questions about the Angels and the emblems. But Mila and I had been talking, and we kept coming back to one person—one story he’d written.
The damn gates would not let me in but legend spoke of them and the ones who tell tales of legends whispered of it too so this must be it.
Anything could help. “What about gates?”
“Gates?” Parrille perked up.
“Are there gates that are…I don’t know, special? Where someone would go to worship the Angel maybe?”
“You search for where the legends rest?” I was silent, because I didn’t fucking know what she meant. “I cannot tell you of that.” She spun, her waist-length twin braids nearly hitting us with the movement, and took a step down the hallway.
I groaned. This was useless. But I’d saved one last card to pull, and Spirits, I didn’t want to, but I had to try. “There’s someone else. Another name.”
The Storyteller flicked a judgmental look over her shoulder. “Stop wasting my time, warrior.”
“I promise,” I said with a swallow, “you will know of this one.”
