Chapter 78

“What?” Daphne asked, coming up behind her.

“The tub,” Mamie said, “It should be heavy enough to break at least one of them.”

She turned to the other two, “You two lock the door and make as much noise as possible. Scream, argue, whine, whatever. Daphne, sit down.”

Daphne followed Mamie's instructions as the two started yelling at each other about being chosen to come with Daphne. The words were angry and spiteful, but she blocked them out as Mamie maneuvered her hands apart and flat on the floor behind her. Mamie stood beside her. She felt the leg of the tub strike one of the cuffs with a sharp snapping sound. She closed her eyes praying that no one heard anything over the sound of the two screaming. The tub struck her other cuff twice before she could pull her hands apart. She looked up at Mamie who grinned at her.

Daphne stood and went to get one of them to help get Mamie's cuffs off.

"Hey, come in here," Daphne said, looking through the doorway, but they didn't turn or seem to hear her. She frowned and stepped over the threshold to tap one of them on the shoulder.

She looked down at Daphne's hands and jerked her head, hurrying into the bathroom to get her cuffs off. It took a while before they were all free, but Daphne tilted her head looking at the door. She pressed her head to the door, trying to hear through it, but she heard nothing.

Tentatively, she opened the door, but the two guards on either side of the door didn't seem to notice. She closed the door quietly and looked at the women.

"What are you doing?"

"They can't hear us," Daphne said, worrying her lip. She remembered mentions of magic running through the August line, but she didn't know how to tap into it or if she could use it, but she had no other explanation about how the two guards outside hadn't heard a thing.

She shook her head and focused on searching the room for any hidden passageway. They pulled on the sconces in the room, shifted the chairs around and the dressers and furniture until they ended up back in the bathroom pulling at the faucets coming from the walls and the tools around the fireplace.

Mamie pulled on the second chimney brush and the wall swiveled.

"What...?" One of them asked.

She grinned and looked at them, "He isn't the smartest vampire..."

She wasn't even sure that he knew much about the manor. He was the de facto head of his family, but vampires were matriarchal. Maybe the map to all the secret passages was in an office he couldn't access.

Maybe this wasn't even his property. Whatever reason he didn't know wasn't important.

"Let's go," Daphne said grabbing a heavy candelabra nearby and pulling the second brush so the passage opened again.

With any luck, they'd get far enough away from the manor before they realized they were gone.

Osborn walked down the corridor to John's office and found the man pacing. He didn't remember John from the war. He had a feeling that if he did, John would have recognized him and his plan would have failed before it could even begin. In the years since he'd allied himself with John, he'd learned the man had an inflated sense of his importance and a crippling inferiority complex. He hated Nicole with a passion, and it was one of the few things that he and Osborn could agree on.

If he had the chance, he'd gladly kill Nicole without hesitation.

"She's going to find out that Daphne's missing," John said. "I'll be the first person she suspects."

Osborn held back a deep sigh and took a seat. Keeping John from panicking took up more of his time than he liked to admit.

"Then you'd be better off heading back to the castle and appearing as though all is well. Don't draw attention to her being missing or yourself. This property isn't your original home is it?"

"It's a newer acquisition," John said.

Osborn didn't know if that meant he had taken it from another lord or if it had been given to him by one of his allies among the nobles for his purposes.

"I want Arthur dead as soon as possible," John said. "What's the best way to make that happen?"

Osborn smirked, "Luring him into an ambush."

Or killing Daphne, but John wasn't at the point to be receptive to that idea. He loathed the culture of his race because it meant he would never be anything higher than a royal consort, but he did not hate them enough to be ready to kill the queen.

Osborn had long since surpassed being willing to murder anyone who stood in the way of his goal regardless of their relationship with him.

"What can you tell me about Arthur?" John asked.

"I can't," Osborn said with a shrug. "He was a child, barely walking and talking the last time I saw him... You'd be better off asking my son."

John nodded and stood, "Get ready to launch an ambush. Depending on what Owen has to say, there's a chance that we can use Her Highness to lure him into an ambush... Maybe a negotiation for peace that goes wrong?"

He smirked, "At the least, the duchess will be happy about it, and it will make Nicole look bad given all of her talk of peace lately..."

Osborn hummed. He rather liked the duchess. Vicious and bloodthirsty, she hated werewolves almost as he did. He stood and followed John out of the room to start preparing for the attack, whistling an old song from his youth and thinking how wonderful it was to know that all the years of planning were coming together.

How would Dean feel about him now? Sabina? Were they seated at the moon goddess' table seething and weeping? What of his dear Selena? Was she proud of him and everything he'd done for her?

He supposed he'd ask her when the time came. He went to a window that looked out to the training area he'd set up for the vampires. Owen was watching over them as John marched out to speak with him.

He wondered what Owen would say to him and what John wanted to know.

"Your father said you have information about Arthur."

Owen twitched, a little flicker of anger went through him. The sound of his name brought pain to his chest and made his arm throb as if Arthur had just taken his hand.

Owen turned to the vampire noble his father worked with and met his gaze.

"What about him?"

"What is his relationship with Her Highness, Daphne?"

His lips twitched, "They're mates."

He flinched, "What do you mean?"

"They're mates," Owen said. "Arthur would never hurt her, but he'll likely want to kill you for trying to keep them apart."

He lifted his arm, "I kidnapped her, fought him, and lost my arm. You're better off leaving that fight to a larger force."

John scoffed, "I don't plan on fighting him! I'm asking about Daphne. What exactly does being a mate mean for a werewolf?"

Owen wasn't entirely sure himself. He’d never had a mate and never intended to search for one. He was certainly cursed to never have one by the moon goddess and he was okay with that. He didn’t want the limitations that came with it if there were any.

Artur’s bond with Daphne seemed to give him strength, and his father’s strength was bolstered by his fury about losing his mother.

“They’re bonded, destined by the moon goddess, I guess,” He shrugged. “For a Royal, it means that she’s the key to him keeping in control of his power.”

“How would I break that bond?”

He snorted, “Kill him. There’s no other way.”

John huffed, gritting his teeth. Werewolf mates and bonds were more similar to blood bonds than he thought.

“Could she break the bond?”

Owen hummed, “Probably. Either of them could reject the other.”

“Will Arthur reject her?”

“No.”

John grit his teeth. It seemed that his only option was to get her to reject Arthur but how was he going to do that? She made it clear that she loved Arthur. He had hoped that their bond and marriage had a weak point but Owen’s answers weren't giving him any insight into it.

“ I will say this,” Owen said. “ If you are trying to come between them, be prepared to kill Arthur before he kills you.”

“Well I'm having a father work on that,” John said and turned. He was more concerned about facing Nicole than Arthur.

Someone came running towards the pitch, harried and frantic, “They've escaped and taken out a part of the west patrol!”

Owen smirked, “ escaped from a locked room with a tiny window?”

John growled, “ I thought all the secret passages had been closed!”

They had never opened for John. It had been careless to think that they would not open for the queen.