CHAPTER 460: WINNING PAWN-II

Seeing how Arabella had left, the cloaked woman lingered in silence, her gaze drifting toward the corridor where the echo of her footsteps faded like a vanishing spell. The night around them seemed to shudder, trembling with the remains of the storm that had been Morpheus’s fury. The smell of blood and cold stone hung thick in the air, the torches along the wall flickering weakly as though even the fire dared not move too loudly in his presence.

She turned her eyes toward him. Morpheus stood utterly still, his jaw tight, his breath cutting through the air in short bursts of heat. His hands, which had just moments ago dared to touch Arabella’s skin, now hung frozen midair, trembling faintly as if the remnants of his own magic burned against his palms. The sharp light of his eyes glowed faintly silver under the moonbeam, but it was a glow hollowed by disbelief — and beneath it, humiliation.

The cloaked woman studied him carefully. The rage that had contorted his face was not simply anger; it was the wildness of a man watching control slip from between his fingers. She had seen this expression before — that mixture of desperation and denial that came only from losing something he had convinced himself belonged entirely to him. Morpheus hated nothing more than to lose control over someone, especially her — the woman he had built his delusion around, the one he swore would teach him what it meant to own the world.

And now, she was slipping away.

The cloaked woman stepped forward, her voice soft as silk yet sharp enough to pierce through the suffocating air.

"If she hadn’t entered the hidden passage then it must have been someone else. Didn’t you say, milord, that the ones following the Vampire King is also a witch? They could have the power to do what Lady Arabella could have done."

"No, it was her," Morpheus gritted his teeth and eyed his hands in disbelief, "Yet something is preventing me from uncovering the truth."

His voice cracked with restrained fury, and she could almost hear the echoes of his pride splintering.

"Someone else’s power perhaps?" She raised her eyebrow, her tone light, teasing almost — like a cat circling a wounded animal.

But Morpheus shook his head, silver hair falling across his brow, his eyes shadowed by frustration.

"If it was, I would have noticed but there was no magic."

"Or perhaps a magic that you are unfamiliar with," she deduced before looking at the path Arabella had taken. The long hall was still open, bathed in a wan light that revealed the faint trail of her passing — the sway of her shawl, the scent of jasmine she left behind, like defiance lingering in the air. "Should we look to the memories of the gardeners? Anyone who had crossed her path must have seen her. If we confirm with them then perhaps we could prove whether she had really lied."

"Do so," ordered Morpheus before flicking his robe and crossing his arm behind his back, readily walking towards his own room which was the opposite path of Arabella’s. His steps echoed in the corridor, heavy and slow — the measured pace of someone forcing composure over a trembling rage.

The woman watched him go. Her smile was faint but deliberate, her head tilting ever so slightly as she whispered to herself, "How foolish."

She had served him long enough to know every inch of his weaknesses. He had poured all his power into crafting the illusion inside Arabella’s mind — to reshape her love, to turn what once belonged to Cassius into something that adored him. And yet, the fool did not know how to nurture the illusion he had built. His arrogance, his fear, his hunger to test her, to break her just to see if she would still come back — it was that very obsession that would undo him.

He could have drawn her closer. He could have whispered sweetness, built the kind of warmth that chains a heart more effectively than any spell. He could have made her trust him out of choice, not enchantment. But instead, Morpheus’s cowardice made him prod, question, and test her endlessly until even the illusion of love began to shatter.

The woman’s gaze trailed back to the hall where Arabella had stood. In her mind, she could almost still hear that trembling but defiant voice — the tone of a woman whose heart refused to surrender to another’s design.

"Someone unloved would never know how to be loved," she muttered, the words escaping like a sigh of both pity and disdain.

Behind her, one of the robed guards shifted uneasily, his voice low."Miss, what should we do?"

"What else?" she turned her head slightly and smiled, the movement slow, her eyes gleaming from beneath her hood. "If my Lord wish to make sure that Lady Arabella falls into our hands, all I could do is work to fulfill his wish. After all, I exist for him."

The torches flickered again, a soft gust sweeping through the hall, and in that wavering light, the woman’s smile looked less like devotion and more like quiet amusement — the smile of someone who already knew how this story would end, and confident that she would serve her upmost best for her beloved master, Morpheus.

"Milady!" Isaac closed the door behind them, rushing to help Arabella who had once entered her room immediately stagger toward the wall, barely holding herself to stand up straight if not for the support he quickly rushed to offer.

"I’m alright," she brushed off his worries and moved her hand, causing for an obsidian bracelet to fall from her fingers.

Flustered and fearing the idea that the bracelet would fall from impact, she rushed to take the bracelet mid air and thankfully before it hit the ground, Isaac quickly picked it from the ground, raising it high toward her direction while admiring the gleaming black beads with his eyes.

"These bracelet, I have never seen them before," he muttered and when he stared into the beads, he could almost see his own reflection that sucked him into it.

"Don’t stare too deeply into it," Arabella covered her palms over the bracelet. "I took it earlier."

"Took?" Repeated Isaac with a frown, "From Lord Morpheus? Is this why he couldn’t force the truth from you earlier?"

"Shh," she demanded and walked backward. Looking around them, she then moved to the floor, kicking the carpet and hurriedly Isaac helped her...