Page 143 of Mama Si's Paradise

“No, actually,” he said. “I wanted to show you something if you’re not busy. Right now.”

Busy,he said. I’d have laughed if I wasn’t pretending.

“Nope. I’m free right now. Nothing on my agenda.”

“Good,” he said, then his eyes scrolled down my body again. “That dress was made for you, Sunshine, but you might want to take it off before we leave. You’ll need more practical clothing for where you’re going.”

My brows shot up. “Oh?”

He waved at the room. “Go on. Go change. And hurry.”

I did.

Before three minutes were over, I was at the door again, wearing a pair of stretchy black pants and a grey shirt, just like usual.

“Jacket, just in case,” said Valentine when he saw me. He was resting against the wall opposite my door, arms crossed, wearing Shadow’s tail as a necklace as the dragon relaxed on his shoulder.

It struck me that he wasso young.

Grey wasn’t old, either—thirty-five from what the brides said, but Valentine looked like a teenager in comparison.

And fuck if I knewwhyI was making said comparison.

Without a word, I went back in and grabbed my leather jacket, feeling as if I had drunk a cup full of fucking lava.

“Get a shawl to cover your hair, too. The red one,” Valentine called from the hallway while I was still coming out of my closet.

“I don’t—”have a red shawl,I was going to say because I really didn’t think I did, but then I looked at the rack where five different shawls were folded neatly, and I realized I did, in fact, have a dark red shawl at the very end.

“How the hell did you know?” I asked when I came out, the soft cashmere almost melting against my hands. It reallywas a gorgeous thing, the red of it dark, the ends of it tied into knots.

“I know what you have in your closet,” he said matter-of-factly. “Come on. Let’s go.”

He started walking down the hallway and Shadow leaped in the air, stretching his wings wide as he flew soundlessly.

“Are we going outside?” I wondered, rushing to reach them.

“You’ll see,” Valentine said. “Let’s hurry. Romin and Grey aren’t in the castle right now.”

My heart did a flip.Where are they?I wanted to ask but clamped my mouth shut. If he wanted to hurry up because Romin and Grey weren’t here, that meant he was doing something he wasn’t supposed to be doing.

Excitement shot throughout me instantly together with fear, but when we descended the stairs and went down the third hallway, I recognized where he was taking me—the mirror room.

No problem with me. I loved that place, had come back to it with him a couple of times, as well as with the brides. Today, though, Valentine seemed to be extra cautious, looking on all sides, sniffing the air, straining his ears, and even Shadow was constantly flying in circles ahead of us at every corner, as if he wanted to make sure that our way was clear.

“Why so secretive, huh?” I asked when we finally went through the old wooden door that was as thick as me. The mirror room was empty, still as mysterious as that first time, with darkness around the center where the mirrors were placed. But since my eyesight had gotten better, now I could see the walls made out of stone perfectly fine. The room was basically a cave and it didn’t even have any corners.

Valentine pulled me between the mirrors without a word, and the light coming off them felt heavenlyagainst my eyes, like even my eyeballs had missed the sunlight without my realizing it at all.

How long had it been since I was in the mirror room, anyway? Must have been over a week.

He pulled me to the middle and sat me down on the round couch, right in front of Dragons’ Den, the mirror showing the bright blue sky and the side of the mountain, while a few dragons flew in the distance.

“Listen to me, Sunshine. I’m going to tell you something today, and I need you to promise me that you’ll keep it to yourself no matter what happens, okay?”

I blinked. “Okay,now you’re kind of scaring me.” He really was. The way he was looking at me, eyes wide and dark andpanicked.Valentine was never panicked.

“Promise me, Sunshine,” he said, grabbing my hands in his.

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