They shoved us through a towering archway. Heat rolled out to meet us, as thick as breath from a furnace.
Severen’s throne room.
Authority did not reign here—it decayed.
Smoke coiled from the braziers, black ribbons rising from the pitch that burned in shallow iron bowls. The heat warped the air, licking low and hungry, and the smell—burned cloth and old blood—crawled down my throat until every breath tasted of ash.
Chains hung from the walls, their links crusted with rust and what might once have been flesh. Dried strips clung to the metal like parchment left too long in the sun. Masks of hammered iron—faces frozen mid-scream—watched from the stone above.
At the end of the hall waited Severen’s throne, carved from bone and obsidian, as jagged as the cliffs beyond the city. He rose when we entered. Shadows curled around his ankles like obedient dogs. The bone charms on his chest clattered together, the sound like small relics shaking in a sacrificial bowl.
His hand came fast. The strike cracked across my face, a flash of pain that split my lip and filled my mouth with copper.
“You fucking idiot!” Severen’s voice struck harder than the blow. “Why did you defy me? Why didn’t you kill Salvatore? You knew the rules—you knew the fucking stakes! Yet you still cling to that bastard. Why spare the one who dragged you into this prison?”
The words hit deeper than the slap. My blood went molten. My fists clenched until the chains cut skin.
“What… did you say?” I managed. My voice shook between disbelief and fury.
Severen smiled, and the torches flared as if the fire itself recoiled.
“Salvatore murdered your mother,” he hissed. “He couldn’t face the Dreadhold alone, so he put her in the ground and framed you for the murder. Every pain, every lash, every hunger you’ve known in this place is because of him. He wanted you to rot beside him—miserable, chained, his equal in damnation.”
The floor pitched beneath me. Heat flooded my chest, making it hard to breathe. For a heartbeat, the world narrowed to the sound of my pulse, hammering like a drum behind my ribs.
“No—Lazarus, let me explain,” Salvatore’s voice cracked, the word shattering halfway out of his mouth.
That sound set something feral loose inside me.
“No?!” The roar ripped through me, bursting from a place beyond reason. It crashed against the walls, louder than the rattle of chains, louder than the hiss of the braziers. “You killed her! You fucking killed my mother!”
Red swallowed the world. My body moved before I thought. I lunged, dragging the chains, iron cutting deep into my wrists as I threw myself at him. Every muscle burned with rage; every breath tasted like smoke and blood.
“YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED IN HER PLACE!”
Severen’s grin widened, teeth flashing in the haze. His voice slid through the air, venomous and cold.
“While you slept beneath the stars on the beach with Amara, he stabbed your mother again and again. She fought him, but he overpowered her. When her blood hit the floor, he left her there—left the dagger beside her body so the blame would fall on you. He made sure the world believed you killed her.”
He lifted his hand. A mirror of polished bronze shimmered into existence between us, its surface rippling like disturbed water.
“See what you’ve been blind to,” he whispered.
Light burst across the mirror’s surface.
The image took shape—moonlight spilling over the black sands of the Ugarit shore, the sea restless and cold. Amara and I lay near the dying embers of a fire, our bodies heavy with sleep. The waves rolled close enough to touch our feet, the night thick with salt and quiet.
Then Salvatore stirred beside us. He rose slowly, the surf clinging to his legs, his hair hanging wet against his face. For a moment, he only stood there—watching us, watching Amara—the moonlight turning his eyes to glass. Then he turned away, his shadow stretching long across the sand as he walked toward the cliffs.
The mirror followed him as he left the shoreline behind, climbing the narrow path that wound toward the upper terraces of Ugarit. The view of the waves faded, leaving the city in absolute stillness—shuttered stalls, clay lamps burning low, no movement rising from the streets below. He moved through it like a ghost passing through a dream and turned down the small street that led to my cottage.
He stopped at the door.
For a heartbeat, he hesitated. Then rage—or something darker—took hold. He drove his shoulder into the wood once, twice. On the third strike, the door split apart, the wood bursting inward in a spray of splinters.
Smoke rippled across the mirror, and the view shifted inside.
The hearth burned low. Clay jars lined the wall, shadows wavering over the plaster. My mother stood near the fire, hands raised, trembling, her voice lost in the silence the mirror held.
