It was late in the night by the time her father finally opened the door to her room. Olivia had been waiting for him for quite a while, knowing he wouldn't go to bed without making sure she was all right.

  She pretended to sleep, tucked in from head to toe, with her head barely sticking out from under the blanket.

  She heard his slow, cautious footsteps approaching, and then felt the weight of his body sitting on the edge of the bed. One hand stroked her hair with his fingertips as if caressing the finest of silks and then his lips rested on the side of her forehead.

  He remained still for a few seconds. She could feel his eyes of the same color as hers pointing at her head like arrows. Did he realize she wasn't sleeping?

  Olivia pursed her lips even tighter, trying to keep her breathing from coming in gasps. It seemed to her for a moment that he was able to hear her heartbeat as if it wanted to escape from the prison of her tormented chest.

  Finally he got up and left the room.

  No sooner had she heard the lock turn again than Olivia began to breathe normally. The pressure in her chest, however, did not relent, partly due to the sadness caused by the unthinkable betrayal she was about to commit.

  But hadn't he betrayed her too?

  At least she was doing it for a noble cause while he...

  She shook her head. There was no point in distracting herself with resentments.

  She waited a reasonable amount of time before jumping out of bed and beginning to pull from a chest the men's clothing she used for sword and bow training. Under the bed she had hidden the saddlebag that contained a leather flask, some more clothing, the leftovers from her dinner that she had barely touched and a crumpled map that her father had once given her with an unfulfilled promise to take her on a journey around the kingdom.

  To think he hadn't even taken her to visit the Blue Dragon Lake that was nothing more than a two-day ride away on horseback. Despite being the heiress to the Guardian of the Circle, she knew little about the world beyond the castle. She should be thankful that she was at least allowed to train, even if her skills were worthless as long as she was kept locked up like a pitiful damsel.

  She wanted to put into practice everything she had learned and this was going to be her chance.

  Finally, she took the small dagger that Cormac, the captain of the guard, had given her for her last birthday and brought it to the nape of her neck to cut the heavy braid that immediately fell to the floor.

  She shook out her hair and looked at herself in the mirror. If her maid had witnessed that scene, she would have dropped dead. The future princess had vanished. Her fringed, uneven tresses pointed in all directions, as if it were a desperate beast that had been released from its captivity.

  She hid the braid among the dresses she would never wear again. Then kept the dagger in the sheath hanging from her belt and put on a thick winter cloak. She hadn't had a chance to retrieve her practice weapons from the armory, but she would have to manage. A sword, in any case, would be too heavy for her to carry during the escape.

  She hung up her saddlebag and took a deep breath before resting her fingers on the wall to carefully draw the golden notches on the key that opened the entrance to the passageway.

  Eldrin had instructed her in the intricate design of the secret routes within the castle that had been created a century ago by the first Count of Shadowrock as an escape route in the event of an invasion. Since the Last War they were only used to take shortcuts as the wizard's protective seals were already enough to repel any external attack.

  But those were peaceful times and no one expected to be attacked, so her father had ordered to block most of the passages, fearing that his daughter would get lost inside them. It had proved useless in the end because he had never imagined that Eldrin could betray him to such an extent.

  The keys were the first seals that the wizard had taught her to draw. First with the quill practicing on sheets of parchment to memorize their shapes, then with her fingers on different surfaces. For the moment that was the only seal that she could draw without making mistakes. She would have preferred to master the use of shields or direct the force of the wind. Not to mention the shockwaves or the black energy orbs to be able to at least defend herself, but for the time being that was enough.

  She first drew a vertical central line and then added the rest of the lines that crossed it horizontally. Then she added a couple more, forming small squares within the design. To someone who did not know how to read the Ethereal Codes that drawing seemed to be made at random, but in reality each line, shape and angle followed a specific pattern to unlock, in this case, the invisible shield that kept the door hidden.

  Once the key was fully drawn, the golden lines shone brightly for a few seconds before dissolving and giving way to a large opening.

  Although Olivia had crossed that door many times before, she couldn't stop her heart from soaring again as she entered the long, dark passageway that soon branched off in several directions, all of which were familiar to her, for that had been her favorite playground, especially during her father's long absences as he carried out his journeys through the Circle.

  Her only adventure, she thought with longing.

  But this was no game. The life of a magical creature was at stake, as well as her own freedom, or at least the little freedom she had possesed until then.

  Blindly and in haste, her feet guided her without any stumbling through abrupt curves, steep stairs and narrow gaps, through which she had to crawl until she reached the invisible door of the south tower. This entrance was blocked by a heavy bookcase that had to be carefully moved aside so as not to alert the guards.

  She drew the key, which consisted in a square inside of which a series of lines and circles intersected, and in front of her appeared the wooden surface of the furniture.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  For what seemed like an eternity she tried to push it very gently until she opened a gap wide enough for her to squeeze through.

  She was now in the experiment room illuminated only by one of the glowing stones embedded in the wall. Even in the semi-darkness, the chaos was visible.

  The bookcase she had pushed was almost empty, while codices and scrolls were scattered in disarray on the various tables and some have even been forgotten on the floor. Artifacts, prisms and containers of all shapes, empty or half-filled, were stacked without any criteria on dozens of shelves. Some had even been tipped over and left to stir some corrosive potion that had left a black stain on the floor as if the stone had caught fire. The work tables were covered with a jumble of shards of glass, stones and plants, and the rest of the furniture was worn or broken.

  In spite of that, the servants were forbidden to enter and they were surely grateful for it because it was very common to hear explosions inside the tower at different times of the day, even early in the morning after Leander had stayed up all night calculating the exact measurements for some sort of strange new metal he was trying to create.

  In the middle of that mess, she discovered the iron cage. Very small, but surely protected by several seals.

  She was about to advance towards it when a powerful growl made her heart skip a beat.

  The chimera, she thought. But from her location she could not get a glimpse of the contents of the cage. The growl was heard again and, as she turned her head in its direction, a shiver ran down her spine, as lying on the floor she discovered a jumble of blankets under which none other than Leander's shaved head was peeking out. He was the one emitting snores that could have rivaled the roar of a dragon.

  She should have guessed that they wouldn't leave the chimera alone just like that.

  On her tiptoes she approached the cage attentively, listening to the rhythm of the wizard's breathing. Several times she had to stop in her tracks between the pauses of each snore, fearing that he might wake up at any moment.

  She was only a few steps away from her target when her foot stumbled over a marble sphere that rolled across the stone floor, producing a hoarse murmur whose echo seemed to amplify as it moved forward. After what seemed an eternity, the sphere slammed into the wall producing a final thud.

  Leander's snoring was cut off, replaced by an uncomfortable snort. Olivia held her breath, frozen in place, as the wizard snorted once more before sinking back into a new snoring concert.

  Finally, she reached the cage, and tried to move it, but it had been pinned to the table. She raised her trembling hands, and, after a few attempts, managed to make visible the golden seals that covered it. There were so many that their glow illuminated half the room.

  She looked in Leander's direction, but, fortunately, his face was turned away from the cage.

  When she returned her gaze, she found herself face to face with the mouse, whose small eyes glittered like two black drops.

  “Ah... Hello?,” she whispered.

  The mouse stared at her.

  “My name is Olivia. We met... a few hours ago...”

  The mouse didn't move or make a sound. Olivia was almost certain that she had read somewhere that chimeras could communicate with humans, but she didn't think it was time to insist.

  “Listen," she turned her head for a moment to make sure that Leander was still asleep. "I am to blame for you being caught, and that is why I have come to set you free. I don't have time to explain everything because I must hurry to crack the seals. Just give me a few minutes.”

  The mouse stood stiffly while she studied the seals carefully.

  She began reading each diamond one by one and the further she went the more disheartened she felt. The wizards had spared no mechanism to keep the chimera captive, no matter how weak his power was. Added to this, Leander's snoring was taking away her concentration.

  She twisted her eyes toward the mouse that had now risen on two legs and was lifting its snout toward her as if curious as to what she was doing. She had no idea what he must be thinking, whether he trusted her or not.

  Perhaps inwardly he was mocking her. How was an apprentice wizard who had never left the castle going to attempt to decipher the subtle and intricate patterns created by the Masters of the Order of Shadowrock?

  But now she was there. She had told him she was going to save him, so she had to at least try to unravel the seals even if it took all night. Even if the sun rose and Leander woke up, even if her father himself appeared to punish her, she could not leave until she had exhausted all her options.

  It was her fault that this innocent creature was in that situation. If only she had left the cat alone once she realized he wanted nothing to do with her. But no. As always, she had expected to find mutual affection in another being who wanted nothing to do with her, and rightly so.

  After all, she was nothing more than an incomplete creature, much rarer than the legendary chimera in front of her.

  She didn't know how much time had passed as she tried to make it to the end of the sequence but it must have been a long time because her arms began to ache.

  Upon reaching the last seal she could already feel tears welling up in hier eyes but they immediately subsided as her frustration was supplanted by astonishment.

  “It couldn't be.”

  The mouse nervously moved its muzzle.

  “It can't be", she repeated. “It's illogical, impossible. Who...?”

  There was the seal she knew so well. In fact, it was a very simple mechanism. Not only that, but the seal had been part of a series of exercises that Eldrin himself had given her during her first lessons when she was taking her first steps in reading the Ethereal Codes.

  The most ridiculous thing of all was that this poorly developed seal of just few tiny lines was chained to the rest of the complex sequence that until now she had not been able to figure out.

  Although it seemed incredible, if her theory was correct, it would be enough to disable that last seal for the sequence to be reversed.

  Could it be that Eldrin...?

  She shook her head. That mystery could be solved later.

  With her fingertips she traced the shape of the key and, to her disbelief, one by one the seals dissolved into tiny sparks until the last one went out altogether.

  Immediately, the cage door clicked open, and the little mouse jumped out of it.

  “If you want to live, you must come with me," said Olivia, opening her saddlebag to encourage him to jump into it. “But you must decide right now or....”

  It all happened so fast.

  "Who are you?" asked a male voice.

  Her success had brought her such joy, that she hadn't noticed that the snoring had quieted down, and that a stunned Leander was looking at her from the ground.

  “Show yourself!” demanded the wizard as he was trying to free his hands from the blankets.

  Olivia could already see under the heavy fabric the nascent glow of his fingers about to summon the seal.

  If only she could defend herself with a shield but she was still far from learning how.

  She had no choice but to react on instinct.

  As soon as she saw the mouse jump into the saddlebag, she picked up a stone resting on a table and threw it towards one of the shelves. The projectile smashed into several jars that fell to the floor and caused an explosion that covered the entire room with thick yellow smoke.

  Olivia covered her nose and mouth with one hand to avoid inhaling the unknown and probably toxic mixture.

  More explosions were heard but these did not come from the jars but from Leander's own hands that had begun to throw shockwaves blindly trying to hit the intruder but also trying to dissipate the smoke.

  One of those waves brushed Olivia's ear, and now with her body bent down and one hand she was groping through the yellow fog trying to find the bookcase that was blocking the entrance.

  “Intruder! Intruder!” Leander shouted.

  The girl heard the door of the tower burst open and the footsteps of the guards rushing in. One of them screamed in pain. From Leander's cries she realized that they had stumbled over him but unable to recognize anyone he continued to summon defensive seals unaware that he was attacking the very people who had come to aid him.

  At last her fingers gripped the wood of the furniture and she managed to slip through the door of the passageway, which closed after a few seconds without either of the men noticing what was going on around them.