Then a woman in a stripped apartment looked at me without fear. Challenged me instead of cowering. Made me feel something I’d forgotten existed.
Hope.
Sitting here now, watching Ivalys hold her brother’s hand while her other hand rests on my chest—I realize the walls I built aren’t protecting me. They’re imprisoning me. Every time I pushed people away, told myself caring was weakness, chose isolation over risk—I was making myself smaller. Safer, maybe. But smaller.
I don’t want to be small anymore.
I want to love her out loud. Want to tell her what she means to me without choking on the words. Want to build something—a life, a home, a future—instead of just surviving day to day. I want to be the kind of man who deserves what she’s offering.
I might not be. Two centuries of blood on my hands don’t wash off with good intentions. The souls I collected—they’ll haunt me until I die. Some debts can’t be paid.
But she knows that. Knows what I am, what I’ve done. And she chose me anyway.
Maybe that’s what love is. Not ignoring the darkness—seeing it clearly and staying anyway. Not pretending the other person is perfect—accepting the cracks and scars and choosing them despite it all.
She turns to look at me. Those amber-flecked depths, seeing too much. Reading me the way she reads contracts—seeing the truth beneath the surface, the intent behind the words.
“What are you thinking?”
I could deflect. Could make some gruff comment about wounds and rest and the chaos still settling around us. That’s what the old Rathok would do. The enforcer. The weapon.
But I’m not that anymore. She helped me kill him. The Ledger Master and the version of myself that served him—both dead in the same moment.
The words stick in my throat. Three syllables. Eight letters. The hardest thing I’ve ever tried to say.
I’ve charged into battle against impossible odds. Faced down debt-golems and wraith packs and enemies that should have killed me a hundred times over. I’ve endured torture, survived wounds that would have ended lesser men, dragged myself through horrors without flinching.
None of it was as hard as this.
Because saying it makes it real. Saying it means I can’t take it back. Saying it means I’m hers completely—not bound by contract but by choice, which is somehow more terrifying.
“That I love you.”
The words come out thick. Unpolished. I’ve never said them to anyone—not in all my years of living. They feel strange in my mouth, clumsy and inadequate for what I’m trying to express.
Her eyes go soft and bright at the same time, that gold-flecked brown I could drown in.
“That I don’t know how to do this,” I continue, because now that I’ve started, I can’t stop. “Don’t know how to be... someone who loves instead of collects. Who protects instead of destroys. Who builds instead of breaks.” I swallow hard. “I’m still a killer, Ivalys. Still have the shadow-curse singing in my blood every time I pick up a weapon. Still enjoy the violence more than I should. That doesn’t go away just because I’ve fallen in love.”
Her hand cups my face. The same gesture I gave her, reflected back. “I know.”
“I might never be good. Might never be the kind of man who deserves?—”
“I don’t need you to be good.” Her thumb traces my jaw. “I need you to be honest. I need you to choose me, every day, even when it’s hard. I need you to stay.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” The words are a vow. “You couldn’t make me leave if you tried.”
“Then that’s enough.” She pulls my face down to hers and kisses me—not gentle this time, not careful. Deep and fierce and claiming in a way that says everything words can’t.
When she finally pulls back, we’re both breathing hard. Her forehead presses against mine.
“That word I mentioned earlier,” she whispers. “The one for holding onto someone when everything tries to tear you apart.”
“What is it?”
She smiles. It transforms her face—the exhaustion and the fear falling away, leaving something luminous beneath. “You just said it.”
Love.
I pull her closer. Feel her heartbeat against my side. Feel the future stretching out ahead of us—uncertain, dangerous, full of challenges we can’t yet imagine.
But not alone. I spent a lifetime alone, and I’m done with it. Whatever comes next—the chaos of a city without its master, the enemies who’ll try to fill the vacuum, the ghosts of my past catching up—I’ll face it with her hand in mine.
Vulnerability and all.
It’s the hardest choice I’ve ever made. And I’d make it again in a heartbeat.
