Alle Kapitel von bride of vengeance : Kapitel 21 – Kapitel 30

Valeria's POVThe word hit me like a blade sliding between my ribs.Hybrid.I froze completely, every muscle locking in place, my mind racing through a dozen questions at once. How does she know that word? Who told her? Does she know what I am, or is this some trap meant to draw the truth out of me?Camila watched my reaction with obvious satisfaction, the way someone watches a fire finally catch after struggling with damp wood. Her smile widened just slightly, like she was enjoying every second of my panic."What did you say?" I asked, keeping my voice as steady as I could manage."Nothing," she said, tilting her head, feigning innocence so smoothly it almost worked."You mentioned a hybrid," I pressed."Did I?" Her eyes glittered with something cold and amused. "How strange. I don't recall saying any such thing."Before I could push further, she turned and walked away, her long violet skirts trailing behind her, leaving me standing alone in the hallway with my heart hammering agains

*Valeria's POV*I couldn't sleep. Not after everything that had happened. Not after Alejandro's fever, the whispers in the hallway, Camila's smile, that word she'd let slip like a knife.*Hybrid.*So I did what I always did when my mind wouldn't quiet down. I moved.I'd taken the map from the archives two nights before, folded small and tucked into my boot, right after I found the torn scroll. I hadn't looked at it properly until now. When I finally spread it out on my bed, my candle flickering low, I saw it wasn't a map of the palace at all. It was a map of what sat beneath it.Tunnels. Dozens of them, branching out under the palace like roots under a tree, most marked with faded ink so old I could barely read the labels. One line stood out from the rest, drawn in darker ink, leading from a spot near the old chapel down into the deepest part of the map.No label. Just a small symbol at the end of the line.I didn't recognize it right away. But something about it pulled at me, the sam

Valeria's POV The ground kept shaking, harder now, dust pouring from the ceiling in a steady curtain that coated everything in pale gray. I grabbed Catalina's arm, my grip tight enough to bruise, desperate for an answer she clearly didn't want to give. "What did I awaken?" I demanded again. For the first time since I'd met her, real fear flashed across the witch's face. Not the careful, controlled concern she usually wore. Fear. Raw and old, the kind that comes from nightmares you've carried since childhood, the kind that doesn't fade no matter how many years pass. "We have to leave," she said, already pulling toward the tunnel entrance. "Not until you answer me," I said, planting my feet despite the trembling floor beneath us. The chamber shook harder in response, as if the earth itself had heard my defiance and decided to punish it. A crack split open beneath the statue, wide and sudden, followed quickly by another, then a third, spreading outward in jagged lines that rac

*Valeria's POV*The tunnel finally stopped shaking somewhere behind us, though the memory of it still buzzed in my legs, in my chest, in every nerve that hadn't quite settled from the run. We came out into an abandoned corridor, dust-covered and unused, far from the wing where anyone would think to look for us. Cobwebs hung thick between old wall sconces that hadn't held a candle in years, and the air smelled of neglect rather than the ancient stillness of the shrine below.I pulled my arm free from Catalina's grip the moment we stopped moving."No more running," I said. "No more half answers. Tell me what that thing is. Tell me who's hunting me. Tell me everything, right now, or I swear I'll find the answers myself, even if it means going straight back down there."Catalina closed her eyes.For several long moments, she said nothing at all. I watched her jaw tighten, watched something pass behind her closed eyelids that looked almost like she was praying, or maybe bracing herself for

*Valeria's POV*The palace erupted into chaos the moment we stepped through the doors of the royal wing.Servants screamed somewhere down the hall. Guards ran past us in both directions, shouting orders that overlapped into noise instead of meaning. Torches burned too bright, too fast, throwing wild shadows across walls that had felt calm and untouched only hours before.Alejandro didn't slow down. He pushed through the gathering crowd of guards and staff, and I stayed close behind him, my pulse hammering with every step closer to whatever waited ahead.We found the body in a side chamber off the main corridor.A nobleman. I didn't recognize him, though something about his fine clothes told me he'd held some rank at court. He lay sprawled across the floor, blood soaked deep into the carpet beneath him, spreading out in a wide, dark stain that had already begun to dry at the edges. His eyes were still open. Frozen wide, locked on something that wasn't there anymore. Whatever he'd seen