As the sun sets behind me, the sky turns a soft hue of orange and pink. If I wasn’t on the verge of death, I might’ve stopped to appreciate the captivating beauty of this realm. Then again, they could hang fucking diamonds in the sky and I’d still hate everything about this stupid realm and this stupid coven.
Karma strikes instantly when I trip over a thick branch, wincing as pain shoots up my left leg. With the adrenaline fading, the pain I had buried before is now flooding back with a vengeance.
I’m worried that if I take a break, I might never get back up. But if I keep going, I’ll probably drop dead in this ugly forest.
I spot a sturdy tree up ahead and decide to stop before I do more damage to myself. Slowly sinking to the ground, I rest my back against the trunk.
Monkey begins to stir, so I quickly cover his head with my hand, letting him know I’m still there. He jolted awake twice already and only went back to sleep if I rubbed his back or covered his head with my hand.
I hate seeing this sweet little boy so terrified. I hate that fear is a constant for him. My blood boils as I wipe dried blood from behind his ear, and he trembles in my lap.
If I survive today, I’m going to rip this coven apart.Piece by fucking piece.
An icy breeze follows the moon rising, soothing my cuts, but reminding me that we can’t spend the night in the open. We’d either freeze to death or worse—the guard dogs would find us.
I need to find a way to fix my knee if I want to keep going. With a shaky exhale, I stretch out my left leg, trying to push the bone back in, but even the slightest movement sends blinding pain through my whole body, and I cry out in agony.
Silent tears roll down my cheeks as I fall back against the tree, breathing heavily. I can feel my energy slowly draining away. My movements have become lethargic, and I’m painfully aware I might not make it through the night.
The boy sleepily nuzzles his head into my neck. I look down at the innocent soul in my arms and pray for a miracle. I never thought I’d willingly surrender to a higher power that has abandoned me more than once, but I can’t let this little boy go back to that hellhole.
AfterHarvey—my best friend—escaped from the coven two years ago, I stopped fighting back. I didn’t care if I died. But that changed the night they tossed this tiny toddler into my cold, bloodstained cell.
We bonded instantly through one-sided conversations that I led because the little guy was so scared he couldn’t speak. That first night, it took him less than two minutes to trust me enough to crawl into my lap and fall asleep.
It terrified me to think that if one gentle introduction from a stranger was all it took to unravel him, then what kind of treatment was he used to?
That was the first time I didn’t beg the Fates to make that night my last. Instead, I asked for the strength to survive another night. Not because I was overly fond of living anylonger, but because I knew this three-year-old needed me to survive that hellhole.
‘I’ll get you out of here, Monkey.’
That promise started the shitshow I’ve been hosting all day. A promise heavier than what my battered body can carry, and what changed the course of my life.
I’m the daughter of the Horseman of Death, and yet I fight death standing on my doorstep every night.
I breathe in the addictive aroma of the damp soil beneath me, and snort at the irony.
All the blood, the scars painting my body, the trauma burned into my soul, and for what? All because of a fucking vision.
The Crescent Moon Coven’s Queen Visha is at the top of the list of people I want to kill by gutting them slowly.
She was born with a gift that became a curse for many.Clairvoyance.
Visha could see glimpses of the future in her dreams since she was a young girl. For years, she watched the snippets and did nothing. But everything changed the night she saw a vision of her death, and her coven’s destruction…by my hands.
By morning, Visha had killed her husband, the king, and seized complete control of the coven.The woman is a complete headcase.
According to her vision, my Divine reaching full potential meant the end of her reign. Visha was enraged by my audacity to try to dethrone the most powerful witch across all realms, so she hunted me down. But she hadn’t expected to come face-to-face with a nine-year-old girl.
A mentally stable person would’ve realized they were decades away from that vision coming true, and there was still time to fix their mistakes. But no one has ever accused Visha of being stable.
So what did she do? The deranged witchkidnappedme.
Now, give me one good reason why I shouldn’t bash her face in and burn her precious coven to the ground?
Snatching the Princess of Death right from under her father’s nose was daring; I’ll give her that. Visha somehow managed to slip into Papa’s kingdom and take me… and my best friend, an innocent fourteen-year-old bystander.
Visha was thrilled when she found out that my best friend was none other than thePrince of War,Horseman Adler’s only child, and the heir to his legacy.
