The Styles Brothers

Chapter Twenty One: Good and Evil

Elena's POV

"Please."

My softly spoken words were more pleading than ever, as I watched the hooded figure turn sharply for the door with the intent to leave me alone. At the sound of my broken voice, it hesitated. My breath caught as the person turned reluctantly towards me.

Slowly, deliberately, they lifted their hands. After an excruciatingly long moment of hesitation, they pushed their hood back and let it drop to their shoulders.

"Lily," I breathed. Without a doubt, she was the missing Styles sister. Everything added up: the long, curly brown hair that reached her hips. The wide, staring green eyes, the plump rose lips that twisted in apprehension.

"Who are you?" Her voice was unexpected. High and musical, it was the deft opposite of her brothers', but fit her feminine face perfectly.

"Elena Campbell... your brothers' friend." My own scratchy voice seemed rough and masculine in comparison to hers, and I suddenly felt small and insignificant; chained like an animal to the cold wall. "And you're Lily, right?"

She hastily turned her head. "Y-yes.. I am Semangelaf."

"Why did you stay here? Why didn't you leave?" I cried in confusion. I recalled James and Harry telling me how Lily had gone in glitz and glamour to slay their demon mother, then vanished.

"I.." she began. "I did attempt to find our demon mother. But Lucifer and Charles.." she murmured, her curls falling over her shoulder; concealing her face from me.

"My father," I stated coldly. Her green eyes snapped up to meet mine. Lily blinked once, thick ebony lashes brushing her cheeks as she did so.

"Charles is your father?"

"Regrettably."

"He would not allow me to leave," she tilted her head and stared, as if seeing me for the very first time. She did not blink. "You take after him."

I was instantly defensive. The chains around my wrists rattled as I tensed up at the comparison.

"No," Lily sensed my change in demeanor. "I only meant you are like him, Elena Campbell. His willingness. Determination."

I relaxed. "You look like your brothers."

Lily laughed humorlessly. "Well, we are triplets."

There was a moment of silence filled with unspoken words.

"I cannot unchain you, daughter of Charles de Carmelo," she answered my unspoken thoughts quietly, eyes trained on the floor. I was confused at Lily's old-fashioned way of speaking, until I remembered she had been trapped in the Fourth Realm for more than a century. With no connection to the outside world as her brothers had, it was apparent that her vernacular was from well before the 1900s.

"You can read minds too?" I asked.

Lily disappeared, then reappeared at my side. "Sanvi, Sansavi and I all possess the same supernatural abilities," her mouth quirked up in a little half-smile. "But I am cursed with another."

I watched her pull her hood back up, concealing the beautiful, sad face. "I am blind to the world."

With those forlornly final words, Lily swept out of the room and left me alone.

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I was so confused, my mind reeling with the new information. My slender body folded against the wall; unforgiving manacles not quite long enough to allow me a sitting position.