Chapter 3
OPHELIA
“You.”
I watch as the witch’s pale skin turns as red as his fiery hair. Even flustered, the man is handsomer than any other I’ve ever encountered. Even his twin cannot compare. There’s something about Broderick Shelly that puts me at ease. I think it has to do with his genuine nature.
Or that he’s bad at lying.
Maybe those two are the same thing in a way.
All I know is that I don’t feel unsure of any of the words that he speaks to me. Every time Broderick opens his mouth, there is a resounding ring of undeniable truth. And not even a harsh truth.
He seems kind.
I have not experienced much kindness in my life.
And so, hearing him, with his genuine nature, answer my question with the simple you fills me with comfort.
And also guilt.
The man, seeming to have realized how much his one-worded statement might reveal, continues to babble in a way that he does often.
“You … know … you know, I like things that most people like. I like … pens. And paper. And mugs.” As Broderick lists off these objects, I watch his green eyes flit around his desk.
I do my best to fight a smile, but feel the expression curving my lips nonetheless.
“You seem to have many of the things that you like in your office already.” My voice is as matter-of-fact as I can manage.
It feels good to make a joke. A subtle one though it may be.
I want to be able to laugh. I want to be able to see the humor in the world.
I don’t want my days to be long stretches of twisted anxiety anymore.
Broderick clears his throat and fiddles with one of the buttons on his dress shirt.
He is always dressed well. Not necessarily strikingly or sporting high-fashion designs, the way that his twin brother does.
But the witch is usually wearing an ironed shirt and a nice set of pants and only slightly scuffed loafers.
It’s a professor look I see many of the faculty at Ramla University opt for. But the style looks best on him.
“Yes, well, I prefer to surround myself with things I like.” As Broderick finishes making the statement, his eyes land on me, and it suddenly becomes impossible to ignore how close we are in this cramped office of his.
I want to ask if he would consider surrounding himself with me.
You don’t deserve to think of him like that, I remind myself.
Now, I feel heat rising underneath my own skin, but my mortification comes from a harsher place.
Broderick should not feel shame about saying kind things about me.
I deserve his derision after how horribly I reacted when he freed me from that terrible curse.
The man had cut himself open to help me.
Even now, I can see the scar of his sacrifice puckered on his palm.
The witch cast painful magic for a stranger.
And I snarled at him. I fled from him.
And to this day, six months later, I still have not said thank you.
Every time I come to the university for my job, I tell myself that I will walk into his office and I will say it.
It’s so simple. It should be so simple. And yet there is a part of me, deep in a damaged corner of my soul, that is terrified of saying those words aloud.
Even after all these years, with a great distance from my past, I’m scared of what will be demanded of me once I speak them.
The sorcerer might have kept me captive, but someone else broke parts of me before I ever met that evil man.
Emotional scars from my childhood remain.
And so, if I cannot speak my thanks, then I will find another way to show my gratitude to the group of mythics who ended my most recent torment.
Gifts.
I enjoy the idea of handing something special to each person to show them, even if it’s through a small act, that I understand what they did for me.
“Happy hour.”
I blink myself away from haunted memories and refocus on the witch in front of me.
He blurted the two words, and I adore how the redness, having nowhere left on his face to stain, creeps up to his ears.
A daring part of me wants to lean further forward and press my lips to the heated skin to feel if it scorches like my internal fire.
But I keep my mouth to myself and only ask, “Happy hour?”
Broderick picks up a pen from his desk, tapping it in an anxious rhythm. And because I am currently working against a bout of anxiety too—a state I am never far from—I somehow find the repetitive noise soothing.
“This Friday, if you’re free, you could join my family for happy hour.
We have it on the dock behind the library now that the weather is nice.
If you have any gifts that you want to give to people, that might be a good time to find them in an easy mood.
And I’ll be there.” Broderick, seeming to realize his pen tapping has grown a touch frantic, tosses the writing utensil on his desk.
“Not that that’s a selling point. But I thought I might mention it. ”
Happy hour.
Spending time with peers.
Making friends.
All things I have never gotten a chance to do. And I want to so badly.
But will my mind let me relax enough to engage?
After six months of being free, I still feel like life is on the thinnest knife edge, cutting me when I wobble. But I’m used to pain. And pain in pursuit of happiness seems worth it.
“I’ll think about it.”
He smiles, and my heart rate quickens. I stand from my chair abruptly, feeling the shaking in my fingers that lets me know I need time to myself. Time to breathe. Time to remind my soul that I won’t be trapped again.
But before I leave, I want to give the babbling witch something that I believe he might consider to be a gift.
“Just so you know, for me, you are a selling point.”
brODERICK
I wait until Ophelia is gone before I collapse back in my chair and let out a groan of embarrassment. The sound arises from deep in my chest, carrying with it every mortifying thing I said back up to my brain to replay on a loop. A self-torture I don’t know how to escape from.
“Broderick?”
I snap upright, trying to fling my body into a not-embarrassing position as I realize that Ophelia is at my office door. Again. Staring at me.
The firebird definitely heard my self-pity groan.
“Are you okay?” she asks, both of her golden brows raised in concern.
“Ah, yes. Good. Very good.”
Oh gods. Now, she’s going to think it was a good groan instead of an embarrassed one. Her imagination will start filling in all the very good things I could have been doing right after she left to make me feel like that.
So, I panic.
“I mean, bad. Just a moment ago, I was bad. Because I hurt myself.”
She frowns and steps forward. “On purpose?”
“No. Just stubbed my knee. I mean, knocked my toe.” If a portal opened and sucked me into a hell dimension right now, I would welcome it. “Both those things. At once. Which is why I made that noise. But I have a fast recovery time.”
Seriously, gods, if you would like to smite me, I would be eternally grateful.
“Oh. Okay.” Ophelia tilts her head as she studies me, and the gesture appears almost birdlike. But something an adorable, beautiful bird would do. “Sorry to bother you again, but I wondered if you would mind giving me your phone number?”
“Mind? No. Never. I would never mind that.”
If someone overheard the way I spoke when Ophelia was nearby, they would never believe that I worked as a professor who regularly gave class lectures. Especially not lectures about how to use the English language effectively.
“That’s good to know.” She reaches into her back pocket and pulls out her phone, swipes it open, and hands it over to me.
“It’s an owl,” I say, once again showing my superior level of intelligence. But I’m surprised by the image she has set as her background.
Ophelia sidles closer, and I bite back a moan when I realize the firebird smells like cinnamon. She leans over my shoulder, and her ponytail swings forward, brushing my cheek. I think I might die right here, in my chair.
“He’s cute, right?” She pinches her fingers on the screen to zoom in on the round-faced barn owl. “I like to take walks at twilight, and he joins me sometimes. I wish we could fly together.”
“Why can’t you?”
Her lips twist. “Georgiana says my fire is too bright. Even for dark moon nights.”
Georgiana can go fuck herself. Ophelia spent however long being trapped in the wrong body, and now, someone is telling her she isn’t allowed to be her full self in a town of mythical creatures?
Not happening.
“We can find ways around that.” I don’t know how yet, but I’m determined to figure it out. “A cloaking spell maybe. Or we’ll go to a more remote part of Lake Galen, where humans aren’t allowed. You’re not the only fire being in town. The Mythic Council might already have a solution.”
Ophelia straightens while I talk, and her fingers tangle in the ends of her ponytail. “Georgiana is on The Council.”
Much to Mor’s consternation. Last year, there was an election for the Of the Wing seat on the Mythic Council.
My sister thought for sure someone would unseat the siren with her antiquated notions of how Folk Haven should be managed.
But the siren is a charming woman with deep ties to the Of the Wing community. She ran unopposed.
“Which means she should help you find a solution. Not shut you down.”
Ophelia makes a noise in the back of her throat that’s not quite agreement. But I’m not about to back off this issue unless she tells me to. For the moment, I’ll leave it alone, but I have all summer to work on whatever project I want before classes start again in the fall.
Discovering a way to make Ophelia happy seems like a good use of my time.
I navigate to her Contacts list so I can add my name. There, I get another shock.
Finn Hammond
Georgiana Stormwind
Owen MacNamara
Her boss, her landlord and Council representative, and her other boss.
And that’s it. Those three.
Ophelia has three people listed in her phone.
“You just click that thingy, I think.” Ophelia points at the plus symbol, sounding only partially sure.
Is Ophelia new to using cell phones?
As I add my contact information, I do some mental math.
Jack escaped from the sorcerer three years ago and said he was almost certain he was the only captive the man had at the time. Which means even if Ophelia was taken the day after Jack broke free, she should have lived in the world when cell phones existed.
Unless Jack was wrong. Unless Ophelia was a captive for much longer than we assumed.
I want to ask so many questions, about her captivity and age and knowledge of the world. But I want to know even more than that. Like how she’s coping. Does she like her job? Does she want to keep living with Georgiana?
Are those spikes of orange in her aura normal anxiety or a constant wear at her psyche?
Maybe this exchange of numbers means the firebird might open up to me. Eventually. Now is not the time to pry.
But there is one question that’s reasonable to ask.
I send myself a quick text.
“Now, I have your number too.” I hand her back her phone. “I’m sorry. I just realized I’ve only ever called you Ophelia. I don’t know your last name.”
Until that moment, I didn’t realize the firebird had started to relax around me. I know now because her entire body goes stiff and a flood of orange that isn’t mystical fire burns in the air around her.
“No last name. Just Ophelia.”
She disappears from my office, taking every ounce of warmth with her.