Ronyn’s eyes meet mine, his face serious and unflinching, as if hardened by whatever has happened since I was taken. “We have her! Retreat!” he shouts, and my friends respond with swift nods of acknowledgment.
Kael’s surrounded, Marked soldiers raining down blows he can barely block for sheer volume.
Why isn’t he using his magic?
Even outnumbered, he’s beautiful.
I hate him.
Twin swords of dark metal flash and flare, breathtaking and terrifying in the same way a duskprowler is—they’d just as quickly rip out your throat.
I join the fray, dagger in one hand, magic blazing to life in the other.
I drive my blade into a weak spot between the armor of a soldier, my point finding its way into the soft space between his ribs. He crumbles to the ground with a bone-crunching thud. Small pleasure ignites in my chest—some sick joy from using Maldrak’s blade to cut down his men.
Leave, Duskae. Mavyrn awaits us at the gates.Kael’s voice commands across the tether.
Not until I kill Vessira,I shoot back, unflinching.
I feel his irritation travel down the tether, but I don’t back down. I won’t. And he knows it, because I feel his understanding, too. He knows I need to do this.
My blade is yours to command. Let me cut you a path to her. Make it hurt—no mercy.
Kael’s blades find their mark, slicing through flesh in the same way his betrayal sliced through my heart—precise, final.
And then, he tosses me one of his swords.
“Cut her down and leave her corpse at your feet, my love.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
KAEL
The world stillswhen I see her.
For a heartbeat, I forget how to breathe. She strides into the fray cloaked in war braids and kohl, my blade in her hand, fire in her veins—but it’s her back that robs me of air. Scars carved deep, a brand burned into her flesh.My brand. My family crest.
The crest I once wore with pride now carved into the woman I love.
I’d imagined a thousand ways Maldrak might hurt her, but not this. Not the desecration of her body laid bare for all to see. Not the Thorne family crest she’ll wear on her skin—a reminder of her pain—every fucking day until the Stars claim her.
Fury splits me open, savage and uncontainable, but it collides with something far more dangerous—worship. My knees almost give under the weight of it. Because even mutilated, even scarred, she’s weaponized her wounds.
She looks like ruin incarnate.
Striding through blood and steel like darkness itself kneels to her.
I cleave through Maldrak’s ranks, spurred on by the gut-wrenching pain of him touching—violating—my Starbound.
Stars, she’s beautiful. A woman carved by the gods themselves.
She wields my blade like it’s an extension of her—possessed, fierce, unyielding.
The battle around me blurs.
There is only her.
Her and the soldiers that stand in the way of what she wants. Of what I want to help give her: revenge.
