“I don’t know.” My vulnerability was speaking now. “I will never know. The look in her eyes when I ended her… it wasn’t gratitude. It was shock. Maybe that’s why she haunts me. I know that thing isn’t her, but it’s her to me. And this all feels like my comeuppance.”
“That’s not possible.” He gave me a long stare and shook his head.
I held his gaze. “Why?”
“Because you’ve done enough good in this world, and there’s more for you to do,” He spoke with a fervency I hadn’t seen in him before. “The kingdom still needs you—its king. We all still need you, Wolfe. I need you. Your mate needs you. This cannot be the end for you.”
Of all the things he’s ever said to me, that carried the most sentiment. And I deeply appreciated it.
“Thank you. It means a lot.” I leaned onto the table and paused for a beat. “This Deathwalker thing…it’s out of my hands, Alaric. I don’t think I have a choice in the matter. Whatever will be will be. But I’m not going to give up just like that.”
“At least that’s something to hold on to.” He dipped his head and offered a soft smile.
“Promise you’ll do what needs to be done if everything falls apart.”
“Wolfe—”
“I mean it.” I intensified my stare. “You end me. With father’s sword. End me. And take care of Elariya. She’s a Nightblade now. If anything happens to me, you must do those things.”
With reluctance, he nodded.
The silence that followed was thick with grief, and I couldn’t say anything more that would change it.
Anything I could have said was interrupted when a flash of bright luminous blue light shimmered in front of us and swirled around the air.
Kaem stepped from the swirling light, clad in thick leather armor, his broadsword lifted high.
In his other hand, he dragged something behind him.
At first, I thought it was a body.
Then I realized itwas.
It was one of the rebels. Bloodied and broken, his neck bent at an unnatural angle.
Dead.
Dead except?—
Fuck.
The corpse jerked upright and the rebel’s eyes snapped open, but they were empty voids filled with darkness. A sign the soul had long left the body.
Zombified.
He’d been zombified—his body reanimated by corrupted death magic, will and soul stripped away, leaving only a shell of meat and bone. And Kaem commanded what remained of him.
A rope made of bone pierced through the rebel’s spine, emerging from the base of its skull like a grotesque handle. Dark magic coiled around it, thin and smoky.
Alaric and I exchanged shocked stares.
“Kaem, what in the hells is going on?” I asked, moving forward.
“We’re about to find out, young Nightblade. This one is one of their generals. And the snake is bound by an unbreakable oath. Theyallare.” Kaem kicked the rebel in the gut and he howled, the sound unnatural and eerie.
Unbreakable oath. Fuck. That is exactly what I’d been thinking all along, from the way the prisoners had all held their silence. I’d thought the same thing about Thayden too. There was a vibe about all of them. Something that felt similar to me though I didn’t know for certain what it was.
“How are we going to get him to talk if he’s bound by an oath?” Alaric asked. He was at my side again, staring down at the zombified rebel with the same disgust I felt.
